Luke 10:29-37 But he, willing to justify himself, said to Jesus, And who is my neighbor?… We need to be brought out of our luxurious houses and into personal contact with needy ones. God has linked the poor and rich together. Sir Robert Peel's daughter wore a beautiful ermine coat, that was purchased from a fashionable store in the West End of London, but which had been worked upon in one of the lofty tenement houses of East London. The sewing-woman who made the cloak was ill with fever, the contagion of which was carried in the beautiful cloak that soon enwrapped the peer's daughter, from which she died. So God says, "Neglect no portion of your city, or it will send back its pestilential airs into your homes and your children's hearts." There is no possibility of redemption until we go out and find those that are in need, clasp hands over the chasm that divides us from the unfortunate, look into their faces and tell them that we are akin to them in need. I may not be incorrect in thinking that the priest and Levite went back to Jerusalem, and reported to the secretaries of various societies, saying that they had better send down at once and relieve this wounded man on the highway. If they did, those two men did what a majority of people are doing to-day. They report their cases to somebody else to relieve, instead of, as largely as possible, going and doing it themselves. There is nothing that so relieves and cheers as the presence of the donor with his donation. If it comes through agencies, it never blesses to the extent that the touch of your hand does the poor woman who needs your encouragement and cheer. In conversation with Octavia Hill, last May in London, she said, in regard to the tenements of London: "We have more model tenements than we can take care of. My present work is to train women that will go down and oversee them." If you get families out of poor tenements into the model ones, ten chances to one they will sink to the level in which they are accustomed to live; and the great thing to do in London is to get a corps of workers who will oversee those tenements, and give inmates constant counsel. Remember that the happy man makes the happy world, and not the happy world the happy man. (G. M. G. Dana.) Parallel Verses KJV: But he, willing to justify himself, said unto Jesus, And who is my neighbour?WEB: But he, desiring to justify himself, asked Jesus, "Who is my neighbor?" |
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