Feb 27, 2011
Who Cares?
2-28-11
“Caring” is a buzzword that has become – as most buzzwords do – overused, oversold… and underappreciated, to the point of emptiness. In our society, Caring is a word that covers a multitude of sins: bureaucratic assembly-lines; government overreach; the tyranny of a minority. All in the name of Caring.
There is nothing wrong, of course, with caring. Quite the opposite. But it is a word that must be coupled with something, or else it is a disembodied emotional phantom. Abstract.
It has entered the realm of “Politalk.” A few years ago, some politicians received memos suggesting they insert the words “Caring” and “Children” every so often in speeches. We listeners were supposed to start wagging our tails like Dr Pavolv’s dogs at the words. Enough of us did. “Do anything to me, but just tell me you care.”
The inherent problems are more than emptiness of meaning. The Caring meme charts a steady course from compassion to compulsion to coercion. Next, the Compassion Police come knocking at the doors of our conscience, serving writs of Guilt.
Lest I sound like Scrooge, think of what the vulgarization of Caring has come to mean in the 21st century. In the name of Caring and Compassion, we have allowed governments to co-opt the role of individuals, and individuals’ consciences. The point of the parable of the Good Samaritan was that an individual was moved, and acted alone – in fact, out of character and social expectations. Jesus Himself healed, and empowered His followers to heal… notice that He never empowered or commissioned the government of His day. In fact it was “render unto Caesar,” not “demand from Caesar…”
Through history, the great agencies of Caring, after individuals and family, were more than governments. The authorities in ancient Greece and Rome did build public baths. But it was the church, in a thousand ways, that delivered charity and succor. Also, it was guilds and businesses. The Fuggers, bankers and merchants of Augsburg in the Middle Ages, established almshouses for the poor. In 1858, individual donors enabled a doctor to open baths and health facilities for the poor in County Cork, Ireland. By 1860, around the engine works of the Great Western Railway in New Swindon, outside London, the directors built worker’s cottages, libraries, and hospitals; they provided health care and free medicine.
The point of this history lesson is that in recent years, governments have co-opted care-giving functions from individuals and associations. To cite “efficiency” is to worship a false god, because in the process, individuals are being robbed of the option to emotionally notice; denied the challenge to intellectually consider; discouraged from the initiative to assist. In fact, when governments collect taxes in order to be the agents of Care, people eventually will feel less obliged to do charitable work themselves.
St Augustine (in his Confessions) speculated that the meaning behind the reminder “the poor you will always have with you” is that God desires to set before us circumstances to which we will be inspired to act charitably. Our broken hearts touch His heart.
Through it all (or despite it all), Americans still contribute more money and more missionaries and social workers than do most other countries to most world needs. But the relentless socialization of charity has brought us to a realization – confirmed as we watch the nightly news these very days – that regimes that ruled in the name of managing peoples’ fates, are having their true natures revealed: corruption, theft, oppression.
We give our lives over to institutions that care… but they crumble. Leaders who care… but they get turned out. Officials who care… but they play the system against us. Politicians who care… but they lie. Programs that care… but they run out of resources. Meanwhile, all the time, Jesus has been standing at the door, knocking. When Jesus cares for us, it is not because He has compassion, but because He is the essence of compassion.
And when He cares about us, and cares for us, something happens. He offers healing, provision, and the peace that passes understanding. Those things are not in the fine-print of anything the world’s “compassion” can deliver.
We should not suspect the motives of the compassionate in our midst; not at all. But we always need to remember that without the godly component, the world might care about, but truly cannot care for, its people.
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Does Jesus Care?
A powerful, simple song was written a hundred years ago around this question – and this answer: Cast all your anxiety on Him because He cares for you (I Peter 5:7). It is sung here a capella by the Isaacs – brother and sisters Ben, Becky, and Sonya. From the excellent beanscot Channel on YouTube. It will stay in your heart all week!
Click: Does Jesus Care?
Wow. I appreciate the insights here. We need to discern if we’re reacting to “compassion guilt” or responding to Christ at the door knocking. Well said.
I want to chime in and say that my husband and I brought home two daughters from Burma in June 2008. They were running for their lives in 2007, one locked in the trunk of a car by a shady border agent and the other traumatized by lying under a pile of other refugees in the bottom of a small speed boat, hiding . Both girls knew Christ before they came, thanks America’s first missionaries, Anne and Adoniram Judson, who reached Burma’s shores around 1813. (Obviously, their compassion outlasted their lifetimes.)
Our girls were teenagers when they came into our home. And the youngest one’s favorite song is still, “Does Jesus Care?” My mother pulled that song from an old hymn book and beautifully framed it for her as a gift for her first Christmas here.
Our daughter ventured off on her own three weeks ago with a plan to train as a translator and go to college in another state. I’m missing her . . . the song was perfectly timed for this mama.
Thanks Rick!
Hope