Wow I thought this conversation was done. Well I’m back in.

I think, from my perspective there are two motivations for asking the questions I’ve raised.

First, a confession. Last night, and the night before I gave money (very small amount) to a beggar sat on the streets of Cambridge city centre. I did it because my conscience had been pricked by this discussion. I did not have the time to stop and take him to a cafe and talk to him about the gospel (I was rushing to another appointment)- perhaps I should have done that. I have to say I have been confronted with my own selfishness in the last week or so, particularly as a result of this dscussion. I don’t know if what I did was a) right and b) the best thing to do. But I know his (physical and spiritual) need was greater than mine, and I can afford a few pounds to give to someone who slept on the cold and wet streets of Cambridge for the last few nights.

Second, as the discussion has highlighted there are many diffculties in this discussion. Nick has gone a little way to answering the big question “when are the poor not the poor?”. I would speculate that most of the directions in the OT concerning the poor refer to the poor within the covenant. (Nick BTW, if you are refering to the “good Samaritan” passage, the person who was half dead was not the Samaritan, rather the Samaritan gave aid to that person, who probably was a covenant member. Just a detail).Yet there is still that hankering in us (which some, like me, are too able to supress) to help the poor we see on the streets.

It is clear to me that helping the impoverished, whether in or out of the covenant, if divorced from gospel witness is simply an empty work. There MUST be some kind of gospel angle in this work if it is to be a)accpetable before God and b) to have any soul -changing effect.

I have concerns about stewardship, helping God’s people first – which is a clear mandate – and several other issues. But I don’t want to hide behind those “issues” so that my life is that bit easier. Doing so allows me to be distant and often unloving. The issues quickly become a theological justification for not muddying my hands with the sin of society.

I feel my weakness in both areas. I agree with Nick. My heart is spiritually impoverished and cold to those who are outcasts (by choice or circumstance) of our society. I feel the need for guidance on this issue.

Blessings

Matt

I don’t think there is much disagreement that there is a place, even command, for charity outside the church. The point actually seems to be that the over-arching language of “redeeming the city” seems to transform charity into social gospel.

But, heck, I don’t let the misguided religious fantasies of my transformer church keep me from dropping off bags of hand-me-downs for Family Assistance and setting up cots after the AM service for the homeless program.

Nick, here’s the paradox: if being poor is a virtue, as our Lord talks about it in the Sermon on the Mount, aren’t we hurting the kingdom by alleviating poverty? Of course, I’m being ironic, but the tensions between material and physical poverty seem to be writ large in Scripture, such that an imperative to minister “physically” to the poor needs all sorts of qualifications.

In other words, the call to turn the gospel into a war on poverty can easily appeal to middle-class, borgeois Americans who don’t want to be perceived as lacking compassion.

I think your point about the social Gospel seeking to usher in the kingdom is well made, but I do not think this means there is not a biblical imperative to minister to the poor, both within and outside the church.

Sorry to sound so negative, but this is not a new problem that Christians are facing. The Social Gospel tried to minister to the poor for the sake of ushering in the kingdom. It wasn’t pretty. Now “we” conservatives think we can do it better. But the original social gosperlers were evangelical and that commitment to social Christian turned them liberal. Simply saying it can’t happen here doesn’t make it so.

(BTW, not to be missed is that Christians do care for the poor by not creating poor people. The parents who rear and provide for children are doing a tremendous service to society by not creating people who are dependent on others. Sometimes treating poverty is not just responding to the poor. It is creating conditions that generate stability and independence.)

I think you are right to point out that often the word “poor” in Scripture does refer to spiritually poor rather than to the financially poor. I also have concerns that Old Testament verse are quoted illegitimately to promote mercy ministry in the city, when in fact they were commands given to the church with regard to other members of the church. This is one of the sticky issues surrounding the temporal, typical nature of the church/nation in the Old Covenant. But, I want to be careful not to be like the Pharisees and Scribes (and I am certainly not saying you are like them Matt!) who walked past the Samaritan (not a covenant member incidentally) when they saw him wounded and bleeding on the side of the road because of a theology that is not as compassionate as our Lord’s. That’s all!

There is often a deficiency in my own heart with regard to real, Gospel driven, Spirit-wrought care for those who are suffering from the misery of sin and from the situations that arise in a fallen world. I believe that men like John Skilton, in the Reformed church of our day, saw these things as well, and, being moved with compassion, sought to sincerely care for their neighbors in word and deed. I don’t know many pastors/theologians who were as solidly orthodox as Dr. Skilton, but who also had a heart like the Savior. It is not enough to only greet those who greet us, and minister to those who we want to minister to. There are nuanced guidelines in Scripture, as Daryl has pointed out, but we need to be careful not to overreact to what we believe to be an inappropriate emphasis on “mercy ministry.” I wish I were more caring. I have often prayed that the Lord would make me more like John Skilton, and ultimately more like Christ. I think Dr. Keller’s point about Edwards’ argument is well made. “Charity and It’s Fruits” is a work that everyone should read. Essentially, it is an exposition of what the apostle Paul and John teach in their epistles.

There certainly must be guidelines for giving to the poor. As I say about 2/3 of the way through the article–we are not to simply give to anyone who asks, certainly not if the giving helps them continue in irresponsibility and sin. (Matt and dgh may have missed that. I know it goes by fast.)

If you read J.Edwards’ discourse, he is wonderfully theological about how we can be both generous and still draw the poor to make needed changes in their lives. Edwards says that our aid–to start with–should not be conditional, but it should become conditional later. This parallels God’s justifying and sanctifying grace. God’s grace comes to us not because we are ‘deserving’. It comes to anyone who repents. Therefore, Edwards argues, we may give aid to people even who have brought themselves into need through (what Edwards calls) ‘vicious prodigality’. However, he adds, just as God’s justifying, unmerited grace directs us toward holy living, so we should not continue our aid if the poor person continues to act responsibly. Once Edwards says this, he quickly adds that we must not expect or demand that people change overnight habits that they have learned over a lifetime. He shows sensitivity to the diversity of cases as well. We says may need to keep helping a family with some irresponsible members for the sake of other members of the family who are the proper objects of mercy, and so on.

In all this Edwards show tremendous practical balance married to theological wisdom.

So I understand the concerns of Matt Holst and dgh, because in the article I don’t go into detail about how our mercy to the poor parallels the way God’s grace works. Nevertheless, if they look at the full discourse of Edwards on which my article is based, I think they’ll get some good answers to their concerns.

Two things:

First: I wasn’t going to raise this for fear us going down this particular road – it is interesting how Keller moves very quickly from doing good to “all men” to the issue of the “poor”. Paul does not equate the two in a one-to-one manner, as Keller appears to.

Second: I’m also not sure that one is able to equate the work of God in salvation of the ungrateful, with the work of aiding the poor who maybe ungrateful. (My previous questions, re: who are the poor?, are still outstanding in this discussion.) For the work of God in man leads him to repentance and a changed life. If a sinner claimed he was regenerated, and still lived in his sin as before, he would not be allowed into church membership, or if he were a member, he would be disciplined. The work with the “poor” more often (I would suggest) does not lead to such a radical change. How do we continue helping them in light of no change? We then get into issues of stewardship, investing money, time and energy in a non-changing situation.

That is NOT say that we shouldn’t help the poor. It really asks the questions, is there a fair comparison here, and how far does this comparison stretch?

Again I raise this, not with a hidden hand, but simply for illumination.

blessings

Matt

Isn’t the Reformed hermeneutic to let clear passages interpret obscure ones? So when Scripture gives specific instructions about criteria for assistance, should we then turn to passages about the immensity of the generosity of God’s grace?

2. Does a biblically-grounded diaconal ministry allow for instruction and an expectation of maturation, and not just giving out stuff?

3. Keller is not the only one who has written on gospel-driven diaconal ministry for the poor. I would recommend the various writings of George Grant on these issues (e.f. Bringing in the Sheaves) and Marvin Olasky’s The Tragedy of American Compassion. This is not a wholesale endorsement; however, theirs is a view from which we can profit much.

Two questions:

1. In Scripture, how often does “poor” mean spiritually poor or physically impoverished?

2. When the word poor is used, how often is it referring to those whithin the covenant community?

I’m not asking these questions with a hidden hand. I know someone will surely post an entry quoting a verse which points to the physical poor – I’m not really interested in that. What I’m really after is a biblcial perspective on “poverty”.

Matt