Now we come to
the king’s final question, “What is the most important thing to do?”
The hermit
replies:
“The most necessary man is he with whom you are, for no
man knows whether he will ever have dealings with anyone else: and the most important affair is, to do him good, because for
that purpose alone was man sent into this life!”
Since we’ve
already considered the first part of the reply, we’ll now consider the second,
“The most important affair is, to do him good, because for that purpose alone
was man sent into this life!”
Now it should go
without saying that the idea that “for that purpose alone was man sent into
this life” is amiss. It is amiss because it is but one wing of an airplane in
one sense, in another sense it is amiss because while it is important (as I
hope we will see) it must be rooted in another purpose, that of loving and
worshipping and belonging to God.
We ought not to
dismiss what the Hermit says, we ought rather to place it in its proper place.
We cannot love God without also loving our fellow man.
Jesus says that
we are to love God with all that we are, and that we are to love our neighbor
as ourselves. Then He says, “There is no other commandment greater than these.”
(Mark 12:29 – 31).
The apostle John
teaches us that, “The one who does not love his brother whom he has seen,
cannot love God whom he has not seen” (1 John 4:20). We want to deny this
truth, we want to make exceptions to it, we want to justify our unloving attitudes
and behavior, we want to exalt what we profess to believe over our unloving actions
toward others – thereby exempting us (we think) from truly loving – but the
fact remains that “He who does not love abides in death” (1 John 3:14).
“The most
necessary man is he with whom you are… and the most important affair is, to do
him good.”
“But whoever has
the world’s goods, and sees his brother in need and closes his heart against
him, how does the love of God abide in him? Little children, let us not love
with word or with tongue, but in deed and truth” (1 John 3:17 – 18).
“What use is it,
my brethren, if someone says he has faith but he has no works? Can that faith
save him? If a brother or sister is without clothing and in need of daily food,
and one of you says to them, “Go in peace, be warmed and filled,” and yet you do
not give them what is necessary for their body, what use is that?” (James 2:14 –
16).
“Do not withhold
good from those to whom it is due, when it is in your power to do it. Do not
say to your neighbor, “Go, and come back, and tomorrow I will give it,” when
you have it with you” (Proverbs 3:27 – 28).
The time is
always now, and the person before us is always the most important, for as the
hermit says, “No man knows whether he will ever have dealings with anyone else.”
Jesus alleviated
pain and suffering wherever He went and whenever He could. There is no recorded
instance of Jesus refusing to heal or refusing to deliver people from Satan –
think about that – Jesus was always alleviating pain and suffering whenever He
was allowed to do so. Yes, there were times when the unbelief of people limited
what He could do, as we read in Mark 6:5 – 6:
“And He could do
no miracle there except that He laid His hands on a few sick people and healed
them. And He wondered at their unbelief.”
Are we about our
Father’s business? A business which includes not only making disciples of all
peoples, but of accompanying our Message with serving others in tangible ways,
serving the whole person.
“That you may be
sons of your Father who is in heaven; for He causes His sun to rise on the evil
and the good, and sends rain on the righteous and the unrighteous. For if you
love those who love you, what reward do you have? Do not even the tax
collectors do the same? If you greet only your brothers, what more are you doing
than others? Do not even the people of the world do the same? Therefore you
are to be perfect, as your heavenly Father is perfect” (Matthew 5:45 – 48).
In other words,
we are to be a witness to Jesus and the Gospel and be a blessing to others
wherever we are, with whomever we are.
“So then, while
we have opportunity, let us do good to all people, and especially to those who
are of the household of faith” (Gal. 6:10).
We must not
prequalify people in order to determine if they are worthy of our love and
service – for Jesus did not prequalify us, and for sure none of us are worthy
outside of Christ. Furthermore, we learn to be the sons and daughters of our
Father as we learn to love and serve others – whether others understand what we
are doing or not, whether others are thankful for what we are doing or not.
After all, how
many times has our dear Father in heaven blessed us without us seeing His love in
our lives and without us giving thanks to Him? Can we even begin to understand
how ungrateful we have been over the years?
I’ll close this
series of meditations with a quote from The Valley of Vision (Banner of
Truth, pages 212 – 213):
“May I live
by thee, live for thee, never be satisfied with my Christian progress but as I
resemble Christ…
As I pursue
my heavenly journey by thy grace let me be known as a man with no aim but that
of a burning desire for thee, and the good and salvation of my fellow men.”
AMEN
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