Sabbath: Unto the Least of These
Image © Pacific Press
Sabbath Afternoon
Read for This Week’s Study: Luke 4:16-19; Isaiah 62:1-2; Deuteronomy 15:11; Matthew 19:16-22; Luke 19:1-10; Job 29:12-16.
Memory Text: “Then the King will say to those on His right hand, ‘Come, you blessed of My Father, inherit the kingdom prepared for you from the foundation of the world’ ” (Matthew 25:34, NKJV).
The Bible speaks often of the strangers (sometimes called aliens), the fatherless, and the widows. This group may be the ones whom Jesus referred to as “the least of these My brethren” (Matthew 25:40, NKJV).
How can we identify these people today? The strangers of Bible times were individuals who had to leave their homeland, perhaps because of war or famine. The equivalent in our day could be the millions of refugees who have become destitute because of circumstances that they did not choose to be in.
The fatherless are children who have lost fathers by war, accident, or sickness. This group could also include those whose fathers are in prison or are otherwise absent. What a broad field of service is exposed here.
The widows are those who have lost their spouses for the same reason as the fatherless. Many are the head of a single-parent family and could use the help that the church can provide.
As we will see this week, because we are managers of God’s business, helping the poor is not just an option. It is following the example of Jesus and obeying His commands.
Study this week’s lesson to prepare for Sabbath, February 18.
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We had a whole quarter on "Unto the Least of These" in 2019 and some comments were made that this was "milk stuff" and that we should be getting to the "meat stuff". I have to say I was a bit disappointed because I believe the real "meat stuff" is the application of the Gospel in our interaction with those who are in need. Granted, you can run out of things to say when a topic is dissected for 13 weeks in a row. (I know because I try and write a comment nearly every day. So after 90 days straight, I am scratching my head a bit to say something different.) But that does not deny the importance of this topic.
Interesting that this comes from the judgment scene in the Gospel.
I just listened to a sermon on Youtube yesterday, entitled: "Are you a Sheep or a Goat?" It was a deaconess day sermon, but it applied to all leaders, and everyone. Look it up on YouTube; she added a different perspective on this parable, in Matthew 25.
But in my opinion, not to be sinical, but we would not have to continue to study this topic, if we were actually doing it: caring for the poor, the widow, the fatherless, the sick, those in prison. We don't want to admit it, but we often turn a blind eye to this group, unless it's Christmastime, like they don't need our help the other 364 days. We need to listen to the Word of God on this, or we will have the same end as the children of Israel because they neglected the "Least of These Jesus' brethen".
Last thing: People are always asking in every catastrophe or when something bad happens: "Where is God?" Well, I'm asking, "Where were you?" We can volunteer to help others more. We don't always have to start a new Ministry; we can volunteer to help those that are already doing the Ministry of helping the "Least of These". So, I say we need to study this topic until we get it right.
God's blessings to you all! Have a Great Week!!
Today's lesson suggests that:
I would like to counter-suggest that this is too small a view of what is actually going on. God's 'business' is life itself - not just an 'enterprise' that is part of life (eg Jeremiah 2:13; John 14:6). And the very fabric of that life - the only life that viably can and does exist - is, in essence, living to give. This is why Ellen White correctly notes that the 'law' (ie, principle/constant) of self-renouncing love is the foundational principle of/for life on earth and in heaven. Take a moment to consider what this is actually saying. Living to give is the very core of life itself - not just a part of life.
Therefore, hopefully we will come to see this week that helping the poor - anyone who is in need - is the foundation of Kingdom life. Put another way, it is the 'nuts and bolts' of life and living, so to speak. And in this way it is not surprising then that helping anyone who is in need is therefore following Jesus' example and living in accordance with Jesus' instruction - because Jesus came to 'show and tell' the way to life (John 10:10).
What do you think?
I think that striving to live in Christ that others "may have life and have it abundantly" is sanctification in a nutshell and that faithfully identifying with Christ is our justification before God.
By looking at those two texts, we find that those who are in need will be with us until the second advent; hence it is our duty and responsibility to go on helping the ones who are in need since we are doing and following Jesus' example (Matt. 25:35-46).
Ellen G. White stated this in The Desire of Ages, p. 639.
Let us be careful with the way we treat those who are in need.
May God bless us all as we are going through this lesson.
Why do Christians continue to impose the law on themselves and others?
The law was given because the flesh lives in a world of the knowledge of good and evil. (Genesis 2:17.) When we are born again, (John 3:3) we receive a completely different life. That life has nothing to do with good and evil, but everything to do with love.
But the Holy Spirit produces this kind of fruit in our lives: love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, and self-control. There is no law against these things!
Galatians 5:22-23 NLT
https://bible.com/bible/116/gal.5.22-23.NLT
It is in the flesh that we follow the law. It takes our own effort to do so. However, because of Jesus' gift of the Holy Spirit, we no longer have to be of the world. (Romans 12:2) If we aren't of the world, then we are in Christ. Then we need no laws.
For the law was given through Moses; Grace and truth came through Jesus Christ, (John 1:17).
Those who follow the Spirit have no need to follow a law. The Spirit doesn't bring a law with it. It brings love. Those who follow the Spirit follow the love that is in Jesus. This love needs no law because there is no sin in it.
That doesn't mean we aren't sinners. (Romans 3:23) We are sinners because we were first born in sin through Adam. Such a life needs a law. When we are under Grace doesn't mean we live in a law. The law came because of sin, (Galatians 3:19.) Grace comes from the pure love of God. Grace forgives us of our sinful nature. It is love of God and neighbor that fulfills the law through the Spirit of God. This love completes us and fulfills everything in the written law.
If we follow the law, sin becomes alive. When we follow in God's Grace which is found only in the Spirit, love is alive, and sin is dead. The law reveals sin. God's Love reveals righteousness.
When I look at the beatitudes and the Sermon on the Mount, (Matthew 5) I don't see it as a law we need to follow. That would be impossible. What I do see is what happens when we walk in the Spirit.
As I see it, the law describes what God is like, what is His standard of righteousness. It delineates love in action. It remains a valuable touchstone for testing the spirits and their respective teachings. If we are led by the Holy Spirit, we shall be found in compliance with the spirit of the law. Psalm 119:97 (NKJV) says:
In His earthly life, Jesus showed what it means to live out the principles of God's law perfectly. Who wouldn't love Him, and desire to be like Him?
Dear Celeste – I very much appreciate your clear statements to clarify the difference between responding according to the ‘Law’, versus responding according as the Holy Spirit engages with us.
I agree with everything you stated, especially appreciating:
“When we are born again, we receive a completely different life. That life has nothing to do with good and evil, but everything to do with love.”
“For the law was given through Moses; Grace and truth came through Jesus Christ.”
“Those who follow the Spirit follow the love that is in Jesus. This love needs no law because there is no sin in it.”
I see each participant’s contribution to be a facet of God’s diamond of Truth; adding to its beauty and completeness. Flaws will be absorbed as the diamond takes its shape. Phil, another member of this group, coined the phrase: “living to give/giving to live’, which also resonates very deeply with me.
The believer is truly a new creature which learns to recognize one's 'self' in this born-again form of the symbioses of spirit and flesh. Thank you again for sharing with us and helping us to understand.
I thank God for His encouragement through your words. I usually find spiritual connotations in your posts. Thank you for all your contributions.
It is difficult and confusing because, unfortunately, the word 'law' is variously used in language to refer to very different phenomena. Most commonly, 'law/s' is/are understood as rules and standards. But most broadly, 'law' refers to 'functional principles' that are constant/consistent. This means that a certain set of dynamics, when in existence, will always reliably produce a certain result or outcome. As such, this use of 'law' is referring to the 'functional/operational protocols or mechanisms' that are the very operational 'fabric' of reality whereby order is produced and maintained because cause predictably and reliably results in effect - hence Galatians 6:7-8. The 'laws' or 'operational principles that we refer to as 'laws' of physics, health, mathematics and so on are examples of this broadest meaning of 'law'. And, yes, true moral laws are 'in the same boat'.
Taking this broadest view, (agape*) love is actually the broadest and most foundational/fundamental 'law' (ie, principle/constant) in existence. Ellen White (Desire of Ages 19.2 & 21.2) has therefore rightly characterised this reality under the synonymous terms "law of self-renouncing love" and "circuit of beneficence", helping us to see that 'law' is a functional circuit that actually promotes and maintains the perpetual beneficence that is necessary for true, viable and sustainable life and living. Consequently, (agape) love is so foundational to true life that even God shares in this same dynamic to the extent that it has its source within His very core/heart. Thus God exists to authentically benefit all of His creation - the basis of his covenant to be the God of all His creation and therefore to beneficently provide all that His creation needs to 'be his people'.
I hope the above helps us see that it is not possible to live without law - in terms of the broadest meaning of 'law' as the functional principles/protocols that make up the actual realities of live and living. This is why 'God's law' - when that term is used to refer to these functional principles/protocols is "immutable" or unable to change or be changed. It can't change or be changed because it is the reality that is necessary for life - the reality that apart from which, life is not actually possible.
Unfortunately, because most commonly our notion and usage of 'law' is more narrow referring to rules and standards, there is confusion and misunderstanding that grace and truth somehow distinct from 'law' - or that any reference to 'law' is somehow promoting 'legalism' or 'works-based'.
I would invite anyone to ask if further clarification or enlargement of what I have attempted too briefly to outline is needed.
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* I use the qualifying term agape when referring to love because what is most commonly referred to as 'love' in popular society and media is actually self-seeking lust - a completely contrary phenomena.
Phil, a point of clarification on your understanding of John 1:17. “For the law was given through Moses; Grace and truth came through Jesus Christ”. This verse appears to be contrasting the law which came through Moses with the grace and truth which came through Jesus Christ. And yet it is my understanding that the law that came through Moses that God wrote with His own finger (unless it is speaking of the ceremonial law) came from Jesus Christ as when He spoke of Himself as “I Am”.
Hi Michael
Your point of clarification reflects the complexity of the overall phenomena that we unfortunately refer to using the same word. For example, 'the law' is often used to refer to the 10 commandments as though they were the broadest manifestation of God's law. However, God gave the 10 commandments as a simplified, 'codified' expression of the wider principles that comprise the broadest existence of 'law' - with this broadest existence being the actual 'protocols'/principles that promote and maintain life - with . self-renouncing love (or beneficence) being the single broadest protocol/principle that all other protocols/principles are derived from.
God needed to do this because of the 'immaturity' of the newly emerging nation of Israel who were unfortunately not sufficiently understanding of the broad principles comprising those 'protocols' as a consequence of multiple factors. This is similar to the way we need to derive more specific rules for young children to follow - with these rules being simplified and specified examples of application/s of broader principles. We do this in response to developmental immaturity until children gain more experience and maturity such that they are able to understand and apply the actual broader principles themselves. When this happens, the need for the more specified rules becomes obsolete because the children are instead applying the principles for themselves. The 'schoolmaster' has fulfilled its role (as per Galatians 3:24-25 principles). Hence, you will note that Jesus sermon on the mount starts with reference to rules but then extends to application of the broader principles that those rules were synthesised from (see Matthew 5:27-28; 38-42; etc). Similarly, when Jesus was asked which was the greatest commandment, He did not reply as to which of the 10 commandments was the greatest but instead referred to the 1 overarching (submission of self to beneficence) and 2 sub-related principles that the 10 commandments were based upon (Matthew 22:36-40).
So, the broadest level of 'law' - the inherent cause and effect protocols/principles that produce and maintain life - is always in existence and operation. And the principles of grace and truth are operational at this level. By contrast, the 10 commandments are a more 'interpreted' subset application of these - they are not the broadest expression of 'God's law'. John 1:17 is reflecting this distinction.
Does this make sense?
Thank you Phil for your response.
I like Phil's idea that God's law is not merely a set of rules, but a principle that will surely work its outcome, one way or another. I suppose that even implies a mechanism of sorts. But I don't see this as any sort of impersonal mechanism, like the Buddhist "karma." Rather, our universe is blessed with a wonderful Sovereign who looks out for the happiness and well-being of the creatures whom He has made in His image. Thus, of His own volition, He will not allow the walking dead -- those who have finally chosen a course contrary to the law of love and life, and thus permanently separated themselves from the Source of spiritual life and joy -- to physically live on indefinitely, causing needless suffering to themselves and harm to others. Nor will He even allow them to fail of receiving their just retribution, something that God evidently sees as essential to the long-term blessing and security of all.
Yet, although God has set up this law with its inevitable outworking -- wonder of wonders! -- it's clear that He has largely suspended those consequences for the time being, under the right circumstances. Otherwise, there could be no hope for the sinner! He has caused the consequences of our violation of His law to fall on His divine Son (essentially on Himself), so that we may find that abundant and eternal life through faith in Him, regardless of what we may have done, how we may have lived, and how helpless and hopeless our condition may appear.
Now, my understanding of the Ten Commandments are that they are an adaption, for humanity, of God's changeless law. Thus, it would be impossible for us to willingly violate any of their precepts and yet live in accordance with the law of life and love.
Can the new life offered us in Christ be about love, yet have nothing to do with good and evil? I don't think so, not if love is good and the failure to love is evil. I really think we need to allow God and His word to define love for us.
Love is a principle, not an emotion(feeling).
It is amazing how many so-called Christians go about their daily lives seemingly oblivious to the plight of their fellow men yet on Sabbaths they come to church regally dressed commenting on the goodness of God in their lives.
The pronouncement, "depart from Me, I know you not" will come as a surprise to many. May God help us to open our eyes to the need around us and to help as He would have us help!!!!!!!!
In my opinion, focusing our ‘acts of kindness’ only on those we consider to be ‘the least’, is narrowing the broad and all-inclusive scope of sharing ‘acts of kindness’ by assigning it a ‘need-based’ status. Maurice already stated that ‘giving’ “is the application of the Gospel in our ‘interaction’ … “ with each other. I hold that this interaction based on 'sharing/living to give' is our new life's basic, ‘born-again’ nature expressing itself 24 hours a day in all settings of life.
Phil states that: “God’s ‘business’ is life itself- not just an ‘enterprise’ that is part of life", and Celeste Davio comments about the beauty of one’s new life lived by Grace and faith in the love of God.
I agree with Phil that we cannot separate an act of kindness from the basic tenet of how we live, and with Celeste as she places our ‘giving’ squarely at the feet of Jesus Christ in whom and by whom we live our born-again life.
Could we then understand Jesus’ admonishment to ‘give to the least of these’ as addressing our need to understand that everyone, all humanity, is our neighbor whom we have been instructed to 'love' as we have been shown by the Father?
No matter in what condition we find each other, we are called to love each other – pour or rich, healthy or sick, happy or sad, old or young, influential or down-and-out – we are called to love each other as we are our brother’s and sister’s keeper – Matt.25:31-40.
Many times the focus is on doctrines, tithes, offerings, etc.
The text reminds us that faithfulness in little things, toward those to whom we tend to give little consideration, means a lot to God.
To be a true follower of Jesus is to be so as to give one's self completely to Him in every aspect of our lives above everything else. That means doing His bidding. "If you love Me Keep My commandments". Love and obedience can not be separated, as Jesus summed up the law as "thou shalt love the Lord with all your heart, and all your mind, with all your strength, and your neighbor as yourself".
The law is the transcript of God's own character, so if we have issues with either the law or love, we may need to re-evaluate and reaffirm our commitment to God.
Keeping the law does not buy salvation, because without Christ we can't. Only as the new covenant says "I will write the law in their hearts and in their minds", only then will obedience will be a natural love response. Love toward our neighbor is the result of our love of God, not something imposed on us or anyone.
How much do I want to be perfect? Is that a sin in desiring to be perfect? What am I really living for? Am I ready to gain true life by giving up my own? I'm truly looking for a change in my mindset! How much am I willing to leave in order to live freely? How much am I sharing the possessions I'm given to manage?
Materially detaching myself and sharing means with someone around me who is in need may represent a lever (or a result) for a real change in my mindset.
When we make helping everyone we see in need as a law of the Spirit, then we will fail in keeping it. No one can help everyone! In striving to do so, we can end up overwhelmed with the burden of helping others with many acts of kindness which can effect our health and/or our finances.
Take my yoke upon you, and learn from me; for I am gentle and lowly in heart, and you will find rest for your souls. For my yoke is easy, and my burden is light. Matthew 11:29-30.
I know Jesus is alive and living within me! I see Him guide me through most every day. I have learned all the clues that reveal my fleshly invasion where I find myself focusing on the law rather than on Jesus. With my mind on the law, I end up struggling against my flesh which feels burdensome. However, I only need to call upon the Lord, and He starts to guide me once again.
This requires faith that opens up our minds and hearts to hear Jesus guiding us in the Spirit. Following His guidance is how we walk in the Spirit. Our connection to Him can help us hear what He is saying in the blessed Scriptures. He puts His guidance through the Scriptures into our hearts and minds. It doesn't come as a law, but as a desire which we follow because of our love for Him. I find Jesus guiding me to who He calls me to help. He has even moved me away from helping someone He is testing for His purpose of teaching them.