Compassion, The War Within, & How to Be an Overcomer

By Pamela Gudgeon

“The treacherous dealer deals treacherously.”  Isaiah 21:2 records that he had a vision of the destruction that was to come upon Babylon from the Medes and the Persians.  During the Babylonian festivities they were about to be surprised by their enemies. (Adam Clarke’s Commentary, pp. 579, 580)  That particular Babylon fell to the Medes and Persians.  That was a season that has already been fulfilled, however, we, even now, still have a type of Babylon in operation that is bringing a great destruction to God’s people.  The treacherous dealer will always deal treacherously, if we allow it and do nothing.  

We are in a season of war; a war for the mind, soul, and actions of God’s people.  Who we are and what we do have become more important to our enemy than we would like to admit. How do we battle this horrific theft of our rights?  We use our God given gifts  (1 Corinthians 12) and we use the gifts of knowledge that we have gleaned through our lives.  Everyone has something to offer in this war and we need to find our place in the battle.  My hope is that within this thoughtful article you find a pure-hearted meaning that can cause a positive change in thought, so as to act for the sake of righteousness in our challenging season as a body of believers in Christ Jesus.

Teachers guide themselves and others into a process of mental or physical improvement.  We are all students, for one cannot even teach without first having the love of learning.  There are three words that we need to separate and define before we go forward.  “Sympathy involves understanding from your own perspective.  Empathy involves putting yourself in the other person’s shoes and understanding WHY they may have these particular feelings.” (www.psychmc.com, articles) Compassion is even different from sympathy and empathy in that there is the willingness to relieve the suffering of another: action rules compassion.

Empathy or Sympathy, as a stand alone emotion, can be associated with extremes: some have more, some have less. If we place this on a horizontal continuum, we can see the extremes. For instance, on the left side of the extreme, we have a person that has zero amount of empathy/sympathy for their fellow man, while on the other side of the extreme is a person that is overloaded with empathy/sympathy for their fellow man. Neither one is defined as compassion until or unless “mercy” compels that person to “faith in action”.

A truly apathetic person is extremely rare and tends toward being evil, while an overloaded emotional person tends toward a catatonic state of inaction, but is not committing evil. Neither one is truly compassionate. The first example is a sin of commission, the latter, a sin of omission.  How can we understand this further?

The Hebrew thought of true teaching or instruction, is the word “torah” (H. 3384, yarah)  It paints a picture of water flowing, raining, and like a shooting arrow hitting the bullseye.  “Sin” by definition means missing the bullseye, the center red area of a shooting target. In order to be guilty of sin, one must truly understand what sin is. If by odd chance, a person is incapable of understanding what sin is, then they are judged under the law accordingly (mercifully). If they truly understand, but are consumed by self (carnally minded), they are judged accordingly (punishment). 

A Christian is called by the Master to judge oneself, not by condemnation, but by true Godly self correction. The word translated “repentance” from the Greek, metanoia, simply means “to change one’s thinking”.  This process happens as we justify and continue to justify ourselves to the truth of God and His works.  In other words, we make ourselves “right” with God by our faith in Him and our sometimes painful process of correction.  Salvation is a decision made in the grace of God, yet a continual process of increasing faith as we grow and mature in Him.  Let our daily correction move us into action to combat evil on the earth.  A clear indication that we are in a good place with our Lord is that we live in the light of the truth, not only learning truth from our own inadequacies, but also learning truth from unrighteousness in the earth (both truths will prompt us to action).  

 

We are justified not through our works, but through our faith. Faith is an action verb, as faith without works is dead. This may seem like a contradiction, but it is not. The scriptures tell us that it is impossible to please God apart from faith. The letter kills, but the Spirit gives life.

 

The equipped and emotionally balanced person searches for the middle ground of truth. Jesus teaches us not necessarily what to think, but how to think.  In order to walk in the light of the middle ground, we may need to be able to consciously remove ourselves emotionally from any given situation in order to help; to be ready in season and out (as it were) to give an account of our actions or inactions as the case may be.  

Much like a valued and educated emergency physician that truly cares about people, they often face seemingly impossible situations, but they are often able to keep their emotions in check and use their training to help the patient through their emergency, even though doing so might increase the patient’s pain level.  A valued police officer is trained in the same way.  Oftentimes there are no easy answers, but doing nothing at all yields no good outcome. So it is with us. 

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So, there are remedies and there is always hope.  

1. Emotional Health (admitting problem with self and fixing it so as to walk in the middle ground of truth)  This takes much work and requires a strong individual.

2. Widening the scope of right decision making with cognitive thinking and meditating can keep us from erroneous judgment of other people (great quality in any continuum thinking)

3. The shallow and self-serving people need knowledge of themselves and Christ Jesus so they can truly grasp the movements of the season in which we live.  Action to help others is a good practice of faith.  

4. Lastly, the truly evil people that act to destroy and harm others can also turn to Christ Jesus and move to upward motives as well. (only God knows who can have that kind of revelation in Christ Jesus)

Our war, as Christians today, is a war within ourselves. It is our Christian duty to study, to move in good faith by our good actions, to know ourselves and our limitations, to find our place in battles, AND to not be passers-by when we see a wrong being done.

This war is not a gender issue, a sexual issue, a political issue, or anything else that is manifesting against the truth and the Word of God.  This war is a good vs. evil issue.  We are required to DO something good.