by Pastor Afolabi Oladele

Setting the context, it is good that we have a good grip on what compassion means.

• Compassion is defined by the New Oxford American Dictionary as sympathetic pity and concern for the sufferings or misfortunes of others;
• Merriam-Webster mentions a “desire to alleviate” the distress of others, whereas the New Oxford American dictionary simply refers to the broad sympathetic feelings associated with compassion. It does not connect those feelings of sympathy and pity to any action or thoughts of action making it an incomplete definition. 

It does not make a difference whether the sufferings or misfortune is accidental or self-inflicted. In John 9:2,3 the Lord truncated their questioning, as though pointing to them that when you begin to question the cause of the situation, the capacity to be compassionate is hindered! Originating from the Latin ‘compati’, it literally means to suffer with. The connection of suffering with another person brings compassion beyond sympathy into the realm of empathy; yet compassion is much more than empathy. Empathy is an ability to relate to another person’s pain as if it’s your own. Empathy, like sympathy, is grounded in emotion and feeling, but empathy doesn’t have an active component to it. This much we see clearly demonstrated in our theme verses where their choice of following and remaining with the Lord brought them into definite hardship! Matthew 15:32 (TPT)—Jesus called his disciples to himself and said, “I care deeply about all these people, for they’ve already been with me for three days without food. I don’t want to send them away fasting or else they may be overcome by weakness on their journey home.”

Did you ever notice that these people had been on a 3-day fast, listening to the word of the Lord, and if we consider no sleep and no food as suffering, the LORD was right in the middle of the hardship with them! He had the capacity to relieve them, which was not obvious to His disciples as seen in vs.33—The disciples said to him, “Where in the world are we going to find enough food in this desolate place to feed this crowd?”

Consider the comments in the image at the top of this admonition and the infallible truth of our God’s capacity and don’t let your questioning hinder the compassion needed in these times! Shalom.

Pastor Afolabi Oladele