Matthew 25:35-46  For I was an hungred, and ye gave me meat: I was thirsty, and ye gave me drink: I was a stranger, and ye took me in:Naked, and ye clothed me: I was sick, and ye visited me: I was in prison, and ye came unto me. Then shall the righteous answer him, saying, Lord, when saw we thee an hungred, and fed thee? or thirsty, and gave thee drink? When saw we thee a stranger, and took thee in? or naked, and clothed thee? Or when saw we thee sick, or in prison, and came unto thee? And the King shall answer and say unto them, Verily I say unto you, Inasmuch as ye have done it unto one of the least of these my brethren, ye have done it unto me.Then shall he say also unto them on the left hand, Depart from me, ye cursed, into everlasting fire, prepared for the devil and his angels: For I was an hungred, and ye gave me no meat: I was thirsty, and ye gave me no drink: I was a stranger, and ye took me not in: naked, and ye clothed me not: sick, and in prison, and ye visited me not.Then shall they also answer him, saying, Lord, when saw we thee an hungred, or a thirst, or a stranger, or naked, or sick, or in prison, and did not minister unto thee?Then shall he answer them, saying, Verily I say unto you, Inasmuch as ye did it not to one of the least of these, ye did it not to me.  And these shall go away into everlasting punishment: but the righteous into life eternal.

 

Compassion is the desire to ease other person suffering. Compassion is a sympathetic awareness of another person distress combined with a desire to alleviate it.  Compassion is shown through  kindness and caring and through our service and generosity toward others.
Compassion is actually feeling what another person is feeling. It's like empathy with sharing. It is derived from words literally meaning 'to suffer together'.
    Sympathy is a feeling of 'togetherness'. Compassion can make you sympathize (because you are literally in the same emotional boat) but it's not necessary that you have any awareness of someone e feelings, but only that you can identify with the person on their own emotional level. Compassion, in my view, is neither empathy nor sympathy, but requires both.  
   There is also no right way, no one-way ticket to experiencing compassion. Some feel it for themselves first, then for others after, or the feeling for another opens the floodgates inwards and then pours it back out. It honestly doesn’t matter, so long as over the course of our lives, we soften to compassion, and observe this sweet negotiation between its loving flow in and its loving flow out.
   Jim, over the last year, has experienced compassion on a level that very few will.  He has shared with me how he really had never shown a lot of compassion for those sitting on the side of the road having car troubles or having to stand in food lines in order to feed their families, until he experienced it first hand.  
     A few months ago we starting having problems with our car not wanting to start and even at times it would just quit running altogether.  Having no extra money, we couldn't get the car fixed.  He would step in faith & go  ahead and drive it not knowing whether it would start or not. Jim would always pray before he left that God would make a way to get there and back. We had no one but God  to depend on for help.   One day, after picking up a few things at the grocery store, Jim pulled out of the parking lot onto the main street where the car  went dead.  He tried over and over to get it started but it wouldn't hit a lick. He had no choice but to  push it off the road out of the way of traffic. As he tried to push the car to a church parking lot, people passed by and didn't offer to stop and help him.  No one seemed to want to show compassion toward him. There was  a young man who stopped his vehicle and helped Jim push the car into the church parking lot.  Jim thanked God and then he thanked  the young man  for helping him in his time of need. Thank God, Jim finally made it  home & he was exhausted from his long day.
    There is an old saying, 'Whatever goes around comes around", which in essence means that if you do  a good deed for someone else, in time the same help will come back to you. I guess it was about 3 weeks later, Jim went to Walmart to get gas for the car. As he pulled away from the gas pumps, he saw a young man trying to push his car off the Walmart parking lot.  Not knowing who this person was, Jim stopped to see if the man needed any help.  He glanced over at the young man and to his surprise it was the same person who had helped him 3 weeks earlier.  Jim told me after they had finished pushing the man's vehicle, he and the young man  laughed about how both of them were at the  same time and the same place to help each other  This man showed compassion and in return Jim gave back   compassion to the young man. Only God could have worked this out for the both of them.   We want our walk with God to be one of compassion and love for our fellowman or woman.
   As Christians, we are to follow the example of our Savior, Jesus Christ, and show compassion to others. Sometimes we find it difficult to show compassion for all people. It is easy to show compassion for certain people, but everybody has people in their lives that they struggle to show compassion towards. I encourage you to pray that God will convict your heart to have compassion for all people.  1 Corinthians 12:25-26.That there should be no division in the body, but that the members should have the same care for one another. And if one member suffers, all the members suffer with it; if one member is honored, all the members rejoice with it.
     As I said before, it has been over a year since Jim has had a job. At the first of the month we do O.k but toward the last of the month,  money  seems to tun out and our food supply gets very low.  Because of this Jim had to resort to visiting different churches in order to receive food from their food pantries.  This has given, both Jim and me a new perspective on those people who have to beg for food or go through garbage cans to find a meal for that day.  We never stopped to think, that without the blessings of God in our lives,  we could have been that man or woman digging in the trash can for food. We never want to  make the mistake of degrading the homeless or those who have to beg for food, but instead we want to  have a compassionate heart for those less fortunate than us.  We never thought this could happen to us but it did. Our new motto is "Love is not love until you give it away and we got a lot of love to give."
    When we go through trials and troubles God teaches us how to handle problems so that we then have the knowledge and sympathetic compassion to help others.  As we see their problems we remember how we felt and how we were able to make it through.  This then opens the door to winning souls for the Kingdom of God because He can use our pain to minister healing into the lives of other people.  We become the laborers of God, harvesting souls for His Kingdom.  If we are failing to see people as God does, it is because we haven’t yet learned to develop Godly compassion.  Jesus had compassion for those weak in faith and yet He still reached out to save them.  He fed the five thousand by taking care of their physical needs first and then their spiritual needs.  Find a way to help others first and then you will reach their hearts.