The Repairers
of the Breach: Champions
of the Poor
Study Guide and Supplemental Links
Jesus' solidarity with the poor in Luke's gospel:
- Intimations of his solidarity—1:53
- Born into solidarity—2:7, 15, 24
- Inaugural solidarity—4:18, 19
- Solidarity in the Beatitudes—6:20, 21, 24, 25
- Lifestyle of solidarity—9:57, 58; 10:4, 7
- Parable of solidarity—10:36, 37
- Parable of anti-solidarity—12:15-21, 33
- Call for solidarity—14:13, 21
- Anti-solidarity among the religious—16:13, 14
- Anti-solidarity among the rich—16:19-31
- Solidarity as a choice—18:22; 19:8
- Commendation of solidarity—21:1-4
- Buried and resurrected in solidarity—23:50-53
Jesus Christ was the ______________ of the Poor!
The poor of the third millennium:
TIME calls the new homeless in America, "the working ________ on a losing ___________ ."
- In the mid 1990s, the working poor were almost equally distributed among cities, suburbs, and rural areas. Most 62% had graduated from high school, most were White, and about half were married.
The Bible, The Church, and The Poor, Boff & Pixley, p. 71
- Studies have shown that most of the working poor would remain poor even if they worked 40 hours a week, 52 weeks a year. Thus, working more hours is not a solution to poverty because the problem is low wages or jobs that do not provide full-time employment (Jan Wren, Many Voices: An Introduction to Social Issues, p.236).
So—what would ____________ do?
"Christ's chief work was in ministering to the __________ poor, the needy, and the ignorant. . . . Christ's life is an ______________ to all His followers." (Welfare Ministry p. 59)
What did Jesus teach?
- Luke 6:20, 24
- The compelling issue here, however, is human ______________ .
- Luke 18:24
- Luke 6:30
- Poor or rich—"Give to ____________ who asks of you." 1 Corinthians 13:3
- According to Jesus, nothing is so powerful an antidote to selfishness as ______________ !
- Luke 6:38
The judgment's defining question: What did you do for those __________ __________ than you? Matthew 25; Desire of Ages p. 637
- Read Isaiah 58:7, 8
- According to God nothing is so powerful an antidote to _____________ as unselfishness!
- Nothing can help us become unselfish more effectively than ___________ to the _________ . 3T 548
- For with the measure you give ____ ____________ in this life, God will give ____ ______ in the judgment!
So, do you want a heart for the poor?
- Then go to where the heart for the poor was broken—to the cross, where the Champion of the poor died—and ask for His heart.
- "Look full in His wonderful face—and the things of earth will grow strangely dim, in the light of His glory and grace."
"Give to everyone who asks of you."
Answers: Champion; poor, streak; Jesus, example; selfishness; everyone; unselfishness; more needy; selfishness; giving, poor; to others, to you.