"To the poor the Gospel is preached." (Luke 7:22)
These were the words which Jesus sent to John, to convince him that He was indeed the Christ. He was anointed with the Holy Spirit for the express purpose of preaching the Gospel to the poor. "The Spirit of the Lord is upon me, because He has anointed me to preach the gospel to the poor; He has sent me to heal the broken-hearted, to preach deliverance to the captives, and recovering of sight to the blind, to set at liberty them that are bruised, To preach the acceptable year of the Lord." (Luke 4:18-19)
But in these days it is thought that the poor need something else. Professed ministers of the Gospel are devoting much of their time to discussing "the living wage," and to devising legislation whereby the condition of the poor may be bettered. "Well," says one, "do you not sympathize with work for the poor?"
Most certainly; but we are convinced Christ knew and practiced the best way. No man can improve on His method. The object which "labor reformers" have in view is very often all right, but the method which they employ for the accomplishment of that object is more often all wrong.
It does not seem as though the preaching of the Gospel would help the poor; but it will. They have never been permanently helped by any other means. All the propositions for bettering their condition by means of the State, have been tried many times, and have failed. Rome tried it, and instead of diminishing poverty, increased it. The Gospel of Christ, which is the power of God unto salvation to everyone that believes, is the only hope of the poor.
This does not mean that the starving are to be fed with a sermon, nor the naked clothed with religious tracts. The Gospel is not in word only, but in power. "Pure religion and undefiled before God and the Father is this, To visit the fatherless and widows in their affliction, and to keep himself unspotted from the world." (James 1:27)
He who does not sympathize with the poor and needy, and help them to the utmost of his ability, does not know the Gospel of God. "[Christ] went about doing good." (Acts 10:38)
He did the good himself, and they who know Him will do likewise.
But personal help seems too slow a way; one man can do so little, and the dismal results are so small, that men seek to do the work by wholesale. Just as personal labor with sinners seemed so slow a way of saving them, that people seek to accomplish the result in a mass, by means of general law.
But it will not do. That help which does not come from and as a result of the preaching of the word, will be like salt thrown into the ocean.--Present Truth, May 17, 1894--Timeline: IV-31 (The Inquiry by John's Disciples)--Luke 7:22.