Aching Hearts

“And the King will answer them, 'I assure you: Whatevery you did for one of the least of these brothers of Mine, you did for Me.'" Matthew 25:40, HCSB.

As I walked along a narrow path to Saturday afternoon Bible Study in the province of Batangas in the Philippines, a cute, small girl was heading toward me.  I stopped and chatted with her.  She is 8 years old, and she was going out to the main road to buy gin for her Dad.  Her dress was tattered, and the flip flops she wore must have belonged to her mother. Her family was very poor but with enough money to supply the father’s vices. My heart ached for her and her family. 

After she passed by, I met a teenage boy that we have known for sometime.  As I chatted with him, he said that he should be graduating this month. Sadly, though, the people who had been sending him to school and for whom he also worked had a pig business that went bankrupt.  As a result, he could no longer work for them, and he returned home after finishing only his first year of high school.  Although many young people in our Bible studies share regularly when they have poor grades, his grades were good. He simply could not afford the schooling. He is the middle of twelve children, and his Dad, too, is an alcoholic. As I left him, my heart ached again. 

I continued to walk along that narrow path, and as I walked, I prayed, "Dear Lord Jesus, may my heart always ache more for their spiritual poverty than it does for their obvious physical poverty. And, God forbid that these situations should ever cease to bother me.”

Thank God for:

Workers in the Pacific Rim whose hearts are broken by spiritual and physical poverty.

Pray that:

Pacific Rim workers will continue to reach out to the poor with the compassion of Christ.

This compassion will lead workers to be diligent and bold as they share the Good News of Jesus Christ.

By: Kathy North, Batangas, Philippines

Pacific Rim is a region of the International Mission Board, SBC.