Guilty of Compassion?

I will never forget the event that occurred one night before a football game when I was a freshman in high school. My 3 best friends and I would gather at a home for a healthy pre-game meal which consisted of Jack in the Box cheeseburgers with curly fries and a large Dr. Pepper…just the right about of protein and carbs to boost the energy level.
We were sitting in the kitchen of a house. Three of us looked like freshman…we had about 18 hairs on our sideburns and chins and we let them grow out as if it made us look more manly. The other friend looked as if he had been shaving since kindergarten. The guy was huge. While three of us still had squeaky voices; the other one was basically getting into rated R movies without them checking ID.
This one day, a verbal spat began between one friend and our manly friend. Their disagreement turned into raised voices and sarcastic outbursts and finally the biggest friend stood up and pushed the other friend into the stove with his head hitting the built in microwave. The two of us who were spectators just sat there stunned. Then, in his low voice he said, “If you say something else, you’re going to get a smack-down.” (That’s the G-rated version of what he really said). The other friend, still holding his head from the collision with the microwave opened his mouth after being warned and said, “That’s real cool. You’re a real friend.”
That’s all my big-buddy needed. He stood up and began to swing. Punch after punch after punch. My other friend turned and covered his head with both arms as his body received blow after blow from the fists of an oversized freshman.

And I was so stunned that I just sat there. I was frozen as I watched one friend treat my undersized friend as a punching bag. I did nothing.

Check out these words from Obadiah…yah, you heard me right…Obadiah:

Because of the murderous history compiled against your brother Jacob,
You will be looked down on by everyone.
You’ll lose your place in history.
On that day you stood there and didn’t do anything.
Strangers took your brother’s army into exile.
Godless foreigners invaded and pillaged Jerusalem.
You stood there and watched.
You were as bad as they were.
You shouldn’t have gloated over your brother when he was down-and-out.
You shouldn’t have laughed and joked at Judah’s sons when they were facedown in the mud.
You shouldn’t have talked so big when everything was so bad.
You shouldn’t have taken advantage of my people when their lives had fallen apart.
You of all people should not have been amused by their troubles, their wrecked nation.
You shouldn’t have taken the shirt off their back when there were knocked flat, defenseless. And you shouldn’t have stood waiting at the outskirts and cut off refugees,
And traitorously turned in helpless survivors who had lost everything.

I texted a preacher-friend in Fort Worth last week and I asked, “Have you ever preached Obadiah?” His response was, “No. It sounds like a Star Wars character and I’ve seen all 6 of the movies like 14 times.”

Here’s what you need to know about Obadiah, since most of you have never read the book:
Jacob and Esau were two brothers who were at each other from birth. They became bitter rivals, and though there were attempts at reconciliation, the resentment towards one another was handed to generation after generation.
Jacob was ancestor to the Israelites.
Esau’s ancestor to the Edomites.
This rivalry was like the hatred between Yanks and Red Sox, Cowboys and Eagles, Lakers and Celtics, and Grizzlies and __________.

There was a long history of war and violence.

Here’s why Obadiah was written, when Israel was taken into captivity in 721BC by the Assyrians and again in 586BC by the Babylonians, Edom stood across the fence and watched. They did nothing.

This is why this message today is so real to what is observed every single day in school hallways and cafeterias, in the streets of our cities and in the slums across the world.

People look across the river at the oppression of others and they do nothing. And, it’s not always because we’re bad people.

Jesus tells a similar story that sounds a lot like Obadiah. In fact, I wonder if the story Jesus tells came from his recollection of this lesser-known prophet. The story is told in Luke 10 and it is known as the Good Samaritan.
Sound familiar?
The people who should have stopped to help because their relationship with God involves them in the cares of the world, don’t! They just keep walking. In other words, they look across the river (or road) and do nothing.
The person who stops breaks every barrier that had been set up by society, but the person didn’t care. It was the right thing to do.

I don’t know what this means for me. Should I care about the AIDS epidemic in Africa? How about the genocide in Darfur? There are the brothels in India? Or the broken down public school systems in our inner-cities?
I know I can’t solve world hunger, AIDS, or the healthcare crisis. But in the words of Mother Teresa, “If you can’t feed a million hungry people, feed one,” keep ringing in my ear.

What does this mean for churches?

I know this…if I’m guilty of something in this life I want it to be that I have deliberately chosen to be on the side of compassion.