Tattoos on the Heart

“Tattoos on the Heart:
A Case for Apocalyptic Compassion”—3

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□ Luke 15:1 ,2

• “‘This man welcomes immoral people and enjoys their company over a meal!’” (v 2 The Voice)

□ Luke 19:1-10

• “‘For the Son of Man came to seek and to liberate the lost.” (v 10 The Voice)

□  Luke 5:17-26

• Desire of Ages: “ . . . this paralytic had lost all hope of recovery. His disease was the result of a life of sin, and his sufferings were embittered by remorse. . . . The Pharisees regarded [his] affliction as an evidence of divine displeasure, and they held themselves aloof from the sick and the needy. Yet often these very ones who exalted themselves as holy were more guilty than the sufferers they condemned.” (267)
• Gregory Boyle: “Compassion isn’t just about feeling the pain of others; it’s about bringing them in toward yourself. If we love what God loves, then, in compassion, margins get . ‘Be compassionate as God is compassionate,’ means the dismantling of barriers that exclude. . . . The focus of the story [Luke 5:17-26] is, understandably, the healing of the paralytic. But there is something more significant than that happening here. They’re ripping the roof off the place, and those are being let in.” (Tattoos on the Heart: The Power of Boundless Compassion 75)
• That was the mission of Jesus—and that is the mission of those who : margins get erased, and those outside get let in.

□  Three prayers you can pray to love the lost back to Jesus (Luke 15:20)

• Prayer #1—Ask God to open your to see the one in need.
  •   Luke 15:20—“The father looked off in the distance and the young man returning.”

  Matthew 9:36 The Message: “When [Jesus] out over the crowds his heart broke. So confused and aimless they were, like sheep with no shepherd.” ​

• Prayer #2—Ask God to open your to love the one in need.

  Luke 15:20—“He felt for his son.”

  Luke 6:36 The Voice: “‘So imitate God and be truly , the way your Father is.’”

  Gregory Boyle: “God is compassionate, loving kindness. All we’re asked to do is to be in the world who God is. Certainly compassion was the wallpaper of Jesus’ soul, the contour of his heart, it was who he was. I heard someone say once, ‘Just assume the answer to every question is .’” (Tattoos on the Heart 62)

•   Prayer #3—Ask God to open your to hold the one in need.
  •   Luke 15:20—“He enfolded him in an , and kissed him.”
  •   When Jesus lepers, the news sent shock waves through the community of the untouchables as well as the circles of the respectables—because conveys a solidarity that words can never prove.

  Ellen White: “The strongest argument in favor of Christianity is a loving and lovable Christian.” (Last Day Events 191)
 

Just like Jesus