Pleasant Stone Devotional Meditation: August 15

“But when he saw the multitudes, he was moved with compassion on them, because they fainted, and were scattered abroad, as sheep having no shepherd” ~ Matthew 9:36
Are you perhaps suffering this loneliness of what you quite honestly feel is a consequence of your having been misunderstood? Has a wall been raised between someone you love due to a “stand” you feel you just had to take? This is often true. As Christians we cannot compromise what we know to be the Christian position. The estrangement brings acute suffering. Christ knew it. His own family said He was “beside Himself.”

He was shut away by the wall of their misunderstanding what He was about. As Christians we must learn from Him, to be misunderstood and remain true to His Spirit in us. “If we have not the Spirit of Christ, we are none of His.” We long to resemble Him. But if we are not willing to be misunderstood graciously as He was, we do not have a family resemblance to Him.
But, with this “purple stone” verse above, let’s take it farther than merely being willing to be misunderstood. Here we see Christ “was moved with compassion” for the multitude, although they were acting like scattered, unruly sheep without a shepherd. Are we perhaps suffering this current loneliness because our motives were not clear? Did we perhaps become moved with condemnation instead of compassion? Perhaps someone did act unkindly toward us. Does this give us a right to condemn and defend ourselves? No. As followers of the Crucified One, it gives only the right to be “moved with compassion” realizing that our part is to point to the Shepherd and not at the sheep who are acting up.
“… When he saw… he was moved with compassion … For God sent not his Son into the world to condemn the world; but that the world through him might be saved.”