Human Care

“consider one another so as to incite one another to love and good works” Heb. 10:24

“exhort one another each day” Heb. 3:13

Sometimes, in fact, many times, in our zeal for spiritual things we tend to forget that we are human beings with flesh and blood, mortal man living in the world. Too often we pay too much attention to the spiritual well being to the extent of neglecting the physical. This is as good as a coin with one side, bluntly invalid. This often is the case with our care for our brothers and sisters in the Lord. As much as a one sided coin is invalid, a spiritual care without the human care is invalid too. In our shepherding in considering one another and exhorting one another, we must take care of both the aspects equally and be balanced. One without the other is invalid.

Of late, I have been learning lessons the hard way. I tend to focus too much on the spiritual welfare of the ones the Lord grace me to shepherd. Even as a brother in the church, I often neglect or ignore the human care for the saints. And no wonder, when a baby is prayed for and preached to, without proper "baby care" the baby is messed up with soiled and smelly diapers all around. The baby even falls into sickness from malnutrition or imbalanced diet.

Just this week I am alerted of some saints' situation and I am also very much convicted by the Lord of my lack in shepherding. The symptoms of malnutrition are complaints, murmurings and misunderstandings. Since then I deeply considered the matter of shepherding before the Lord and realised that there is a lack in human care. All the complaints are due to carelessness or ignorance in taking care of human feelings even in small matters, as well as the great ones. Since then, my prayer is that I may have a proper humanity to take care of the saints. The more I prayed about how to shepherd the saints, the more the Lord reminded me my own need for having a proper humanity, the humanity of Jesus as the Spirit of reality.

Today, being well aware of the saints' situation I send SMSs for the combined prayer meeting to almost every saints. Surprisingly, many saints whom I never expected, indeed, turned up for the prayer meeting. After the prayer meeting a sister testified that as soon as she received the SMS she hurried up and rushed for the prayer meeting. Likewise, a brother who had long been  isolated turned up. O a simple SMS, as a concern and exhortation means a lot!

The Lord begins to open my eyes to see that many of the backslidings are because of deficiency in proper and normal human care. However, a question arises. How can I take care of so many saints? I too need to be shepherded. Its not just possible for me alone to carry out the human care. Therefore, the "body" comes into picture. Shepherding with a proper human care must be done in the Body in coordination with the brothers whom the Lord has graced to bear the same burden. The condition of the brothers who bear the responsibility of a church is a litmus test for the condition of the saints. If the saints in  a local church is weak, it indirectly implies the shepherding brothers are also weak.

With this as a background, the church prayer meeting tonight was fully focused on human care; to “consider one another so as to incite one another to love and good works” Heb. 10:24; and to “exhort one another each day” Heb. 3:13.

Lord forgive all my shortcomings. Shepherd me with Your humanity that I may shepherd others in Your humanity.