The Incomparable Christ by John Stott

Author:John Stott [Stott, John]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: Religion, Biblical Studies, Jesus; The Gospels & Acts, Christian Life, General, Christian Theology, Christology, Christianity
ISBN: 9780830832224
Google: kPYUUaYZH_UC
Barnesnoble:
Goodreads: 324690
Publisher: IVP Books
Published: 2000-12-31T20:00:00+00:00

3. The ministry of compassion: Father Damien and Wellesley Bailey

Touching untouchables

On a number of occasions in the gospels we read that Jesus was moved with compassion towards the leaderless crowds, the hungry, the bereaved, the blind, and especially the sick.33 In fact it is quite clear that healing was an integral part of his public ministry. He went about ‘teaching in their synagogues, preaching the good news of the kingdom and healing every disease and sickness’ (Matt. 4:23; 9:35). That is to say, he not only announced the coming of the kingdom, but demonstrated its arrival by his works of compassion and power.

In consequence, Christians have been in the vanguard of those who have sought to develop a ministry of compassion to those who suffer sickness or pain. On entering the Mayo Clinic in Rochester, Minnesota, one is confronted by a stained-glass window, whose central panel bears the inscription ‘To cure sometimes, to relieve often, to comfort always.’

This is not to deny that proto-hospitals were developed by Hindus and Buddhists before Christ, and by Jews as well. It is rather to claim that Jesus of Nazareth introduced into the world a new threefold motivation – his parable of the good Samaritan, his golden rule and his personal example, all of which demonstrated his respect for human persons made in the image of God.

Dr Frank Davey has written:

Jesus reversed the social priorities of his day by demonstrating and teaching a special concern for the poor, the disabled, the outcast and the underprivileged. Such people had no claim to attention until Jesus became their champion...One cannot imagine Hippocrates showing much interest in a prostitute in trouble, a blind beggar, the slave of a soldier of the occupying power, a psychotic foreigner clearly with no money, an old woman with a chronic spinal condition. Jesus not only did so, he expected his followers to do the same.34

Jesus’ respect for those the world despised was best exemplified in his encounter with a leprosy sufferer, close to the beginning of his public ministry:

A man with leprosy came to him and begged him on his knees, ‘If you are willing, you can make me clean.’

Filled with compassion, Jesus reached out his hand and touched the man, ‘I am willing,’ he said. ‘Be clean!’ Immediately the leprosy left him and he was cured (Mark 1:40–42).

His compassion motivated him to touch an untouchable, and his action has been a continuing inspiration ever since. It was the famous Cappadocian church father, Basil of Caesarea, who seems to have founded in AD 369 the first large-scale Christian hospital. He erected a cluster of buildings, which, in addition to the hospital of 300 beds, ‘included hospices for travellers, a hospice for the poor, a hospice for the aged, an isolation unit and a house for those suffering from leprosy, who were treated in isolation’.35

During the following centuries hospices for the care of leprosy victims spread throughout Europe. They were known as ‘lazar (= leper) houses’ or lazarettos, the words being derived from Lazarus who came to be regarded as the patron saint of leprosy sufferers.

Download

Copyright Disclaimer:
This site does not store any files on its server. We only index and link to content provided by other sites. Please contact the content providers to delete copyright contents if any and email us, we'll remove relevant links or contents immediately.