Daring to Hope Part 1


Over Christmas, I was given the book ‘Daring to Hope’ by Katie-Davis (author of Kisses from Katie) which I finished reading at the beginning of March. Katie was a young girl when she first moved to Uganda, subsequently starting her own ministry and adopting 13 Ugandan girls. In her first book, she talks about the journey that brought her to live in Uganda whereas throughout the second book, she invites the reader to go on a journey with her as she discovers what it means to have hope in our Father in impossible and heart-breaking situations. Throughout the book, I felt God speaking to me and challenging the way that I think about Him and who He is.

As a Christian, I think that it can at times be easier to sympathize and have empathy rather than to have compassion which translates to mean ‘to suffer with’. As I read this book and looked at the examples that she used in the Bible, I began to ask myself if I truly knew what it means to suffer with the most vulnerable and I pray that God would continually break my heart and allow me the upmost privilege of entering into His people’s brokenness and desperation.

A paragraph of the book (below) helped illustrate what it means to have compassion and it has become my prayer that God will continually break my heart, help me see people through His eyes and ultimately teach me what it means to enter into one another’s brokenness. 

“Maybe the point of all the miracles isn’t just the healing or isn’t about the healing at all but the great compassion with which Jesus turns towards people. He looks at people and He sees them. And the God of all mercy and comfort is moved to compassion for His people. He looks into their eyes and acknowledges their pain and sin and is not repulsed. He sees our sin, mess and pain and doesn’t turn away. I cannot bring healing or ensure that someone will receive salvation but I can be a witness. I can look at another’s broken, bleeding mess and say I see you. I am with you and I will not turn away.

And if compassion truly means to suffer with, then seeing our visitors with new eyes, being compassionate as He is compassionate is not pity, not to extend a hand of charity, but to be truly broken, to feel gut wrenching pain when we see others suffer.”


All of the quotes are taken from Katie Davis Majors book, 'Daring to Hope'.

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