Daily Encouragement: Year 2, Day 69
From Handbook to God’s Promises
GOD SEEKS AFTER ME
What Breaks God’s Heart
Read Luke 19:10
The totality of the human condition is never ours to contemplate; we can’t see and know it all at once. And there’s no doubt it is best that we can’t, given the heartache that rises in us from what we read on the front page of the newspaper. Granted, some good things happen to offset the bad, but from mansion to homeless shelter, from gleaming skyscraper to backwoods shack, from the most powerful person to the least, pain and heartache persist. No part of this world is entirely free from the struggles of life on this fallen earth.
On at least one occasion Jesus felt heartache similar to ours. After visiting “all the towns and villages” (Matthew 9:35) during one period of his ministry—a tour that involved intimate interaction with the multitudes—He became burdened about the condition of the people.
Everywhere He went He encountered disease, sickness and spiritual oppression. In fact, “when he saw the crowds, he had compassion on them, because they were harassed and helpless, like sheep without a shepherd” (Matthew 9:36). Matthew’s words bring to mind God’s words spoken through the prophet Ezekiel. God had rebuked the shepherds (leaders) of Israel for allowing the nation to become like a pitiful herd of abused sheep—lost, hungry, wounded, plundered, scattered—while the leaders made themselves prosperous. He promised that he would come and gather His sheep and lead them into rich and quiet pastures (Ezekiel 34:12–14). He promised that He would seek and save what was lost.
The Shepherd-God of Israel indeed came in Jesus Christ to seek and to save lost sheep like us. As he went through the land of Israel, His heart broke over the condition of the people. And as His Spirit goes throughout all the towns and villages of the world today, His heart breaks over what is yet lost.
If our hearts break over the same things that break the heart of God, we too will want to seek and save what is lost—all in the name of Jesus Christ. How? By helping an elderly neighbor, by volunteering our time at a local relief center, by contributing financially to disaster relief agencies. As God has sought us, so also we must consider seeking out ways to help others as God’s representatives in a pain-filled world.
God’s Promise: If you seek to learn what breaks His heart, He will use you to help Him seek and save what is lost.