As a pastor, I often get to participate with our associate pastor, Cory Martin, in deciding how to help people who come with a specific financial or physical need. They often make a compelling case for why they need help with rent or utilities, and I am glad to be able to help them when we have the resources to do that. Our church takes an offering once a month to help in this ministry, and I know that other churches do as well. There is certainly a biblical command to help those with less.(see Proverbs 19:17, Luke 14:12-14 among many others).
But as we help we also have to be careful that our help does not end up with bad results in the lives of people who we intend to be actually helping. Just because your intention is to do good for someone doesn't mean the result is good for them. This holds true in any number of areas of life, where people have desires that they want to be fulfilled, and they think need to be fulfilled, such as drug addiction, eating disorders, sexual desires and all kinds of co-dependencies. We sometimes want to help, but if we're not wise we end up hurting the person instead.
This example of a time when people with the intention of helping ended up hurting someone is what inspired me to write this post.
Often times people get themselves into problems because they're following their desires which have led them astray. If we affirm them by simply giving them more money without helping them understand how to use it properly, or affirm them by telling them that their desires are OK even when we can see those desires are in conflict with reality that will never be changed, we end up hurting them in the long run. In this article, we see how empathy for a person's problems can sometimes be a sin instead of a help.
A wiser and more loving response would be to examine the long-term outcomes of certain behaviors, or studying what has worked historically and the wisdom of the ages. Then when we go to help someone, our intentions are more likely to line up with actual good and loving outcomes.
This response takes more time and effort and frequently it also means we have to get more personally involved with someone, which can be scary because unhealthy people frequently wound those around them. We need to stay close to the Lord in the process and have our primary motive be love for and obedience to Him rather than expecting results from the other person who may or may not show appropriate gratefulness.
God does call us to reach out and help all kinds of hurting people, those poor in physical resources and poor in spirit, such as those who might be emotionally distressed, but He also calls us to be wise. I want to encourage you to be willing to go deep with people that you desire to help, so you are not just meeting their immediate need, but rather are able to be wise and see what their deeper needs might be. This will give you insight into how you can help them in a way that is truly loving by helping without leading to further negative consequences in their lives.
If you are interested in studying this more, I recommend the book, When Helping Hurts: How to Alleviate Poverty Without Hurting the Poor . . . and Yourself by Steve Corbett and Brian Fikkert.
