April 10, 2014 | Moved With Compassion

Here’s a wonderful note from my pulpit team partner, Randall Satchell:

Wayne, reading the 1 John text for this Sunday and preparing for a lesson on leadership, I came across Mark 1:41. Moved with compassion, Jesus stretched out His hand and touched him, and said to him, “I am willing; be cleansed.”^NASB

While preaching in different synagogues and casting out demons throughout Galilee, Jesus heals a leper. Mark records an interesting phrase that is the impetus for Jesus’s healing of the leper, He was “moved with compassion.” In the Greek text, “moved with compassion” is one word that means “to be inwardly disturbed.” Jesus was so inwardly grieved for this man that he could not help but stop and care for him. His concern for others made Him aware of the opportunity. The depth of His compassion led Him to take action.

Amidst the hustle and bustle of my everyday life and ministry, what opportunities lay before me? And what is my response? Do I take the time to be moved by compassion and take action? Or am I being ruled by the tyranny of the urgent and overlooking an opportunity to be a blessing?

We must not be so consumed with life and ministry that we fail to miss opportunities to be moved by compassion.- Randall