| Poor and Needy
by Joni Eareckson Tada |
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| “Hear, O Lord, and answer me, for I am poor and needy. Guard my life, for I am devoted to you. You are my God; save your servant who trusts in you. Have mercy on me, O Lord, for I call to you all day long. Bring joy to your servant, for to you, O Lord, I lift up my soul.”
Psalm 86:1-4 |
| Several years ago I traveled to Ghana, west Africa, to give wheelchairs and Bibles to homeless disabled people who lived in the filthy slums. A disabled boy who lived in a box by a trash heap said, “God has blessed people in your country so much; why are so many unhappy?” Another said, “Welcome to our country, where our God is bigger than your God.” I heard it time and again in Ghana: “We have to trust God. We have no other hope.”
Don’t think I’m glorifying the poor and needy of Africa. This isn’t a snobby one-upmanship over whose Purple Heart medals shine the brightest. They are more like us than we realize. They too want what they do not have, and have what they do not want. The difference is in the way they look at God.
God always seems bigger to those who need him the most. Spiritual and physical poverty is the tool God uses to help us need him more. Hardships press us up against him. It’s a universal truth we all learned in the old Sunday school song: “We are weak and he is strong.”
Who are the poor and needy? People in Africa? The homeless? The disabled? It is you if you see yourself as empty and impoverished. That’s not a bad position in which to be. When you cry, “Have mercy on me, O Lord!” you are in a great position. God seems bigger when we, in our eyes, seem poor.
I lift up my soul to you today, Lord. I am poor and needy, empty and destitute, without you. As I make myself small in my eyes today, please help me to see how big you are. |
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| Taken from More Precious than Silver
By Joni Eareckson Tada
Copyright © 1998
Published in Print by Zondervan, Grand Rapids
All Scripture quotations, unless otherwise indicated, are taken from the Holy Bible: New International Version. |
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