Jonathan Edwards, the great theologian and revivalist preacher, once said, “God is the fountain of love, as the sun is the fountain of light”. He wrote these words in a work called, “Charity and its Fruits”.
Have you ever really stopped to think about the church’s role in poverty alleviation? As those united with Christ we’ve been immersed in the source of love. How does that love tangibly show up when others around us lack?
Material poverty is complicated, as is life in a broken world. In our materialistic Western world we tend to define poverty in simple terms. The poor are those with a lack of resources. But is that all poverty is? Doesn’t poverty often include isolation, marginalization, and powerlessness?
In the gospel the Source of Love finds us in our spiritual and relational poverty. The waters of Christ’s affection have met us in the barren desert of sin’s dehydration. But, through Christ we have gained access to rivers of love-giving life water. And we get to splash around in them together.
Edwards says it this way, “And there this glorious fountain forever flows forth in streams, yea, in rivers of love and delight, and these rivers swell, as it were, to an ocean of love, in which the souls of the ransomed may bathe with the sweetest enjoyment, and their hearts, as it were, be deluged with love.”
The grace we have given motivates us to use trench-digging tools that bring the flow of God’s love to those around us. In the local church we have a pool of resources that can be distributed in personal ways. We, as the church, have the opportunity to provide something the state can’t provide: love-driven poverty engagement that flows from our connection to a personal God.
The materially poor often long for hope that roots into a sustaining drink. They long to be connected, to be treated with dignity, and to be empowered.
Tangible love addresses the felt needs of the materially poor while remembering the remedy for our universal spiritual poverty.
“By this we know love, that he laid down his life for us, and we ought to lay down our lives for the brothers. But if anyone has the world's goods and sees his brother in need, yet closes his heart against him, how does God's love abide in him? Little children, let us not love in word or talk but in deed and in truth.” (1 John 3:16-18)
As we engage the complex issues surrounding poverty we must do so with a personal love. This love should prioritize our brother and extend toward our neighbor. We’ve been given a sacrificial pattern to follow, and an ocean of resources that flow from the heart of Love Himself.
Church, let’s dig trenches together while we drink from the fountain that sustains us. Knowing that one day we will see the bright crystal waters flowing from the throne of God with our very own eyes (Rev. 22).