If any man among you seem to be religious, and
bridleth not his tongue, but deceiveth his own heart, this man’s religion is
vain. 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, Chapter 1, verses 26-27.
It’s easy to be a “Back-Seat Christian,” becoming
complacent in our relationship with God.
In doing so, we are letting everyone else take care of God’s work while
we focus on ourselves. God says He wants
us to take an active role as Christians.
He wants us to visit the fatherless, those grieving and we are not to
get caught up in worldly values.
With so many single parent families, visiting the
fatherless could be a relatively easy thing to do. If we each took the time to touch the life of
one child, we could make a major difference.
Some might think that they don’t have the time, but you could include
neighbor kids in your game of basketball with your child. Family board games are nice to invite other
kids to play. Even if you don’t have
children of your own, you can take a child you know with you to the library. You can invite them over to bake or BBQ. Even doing routine chores seem special when
you’ve invited a child to help you. It
gives them a sense of accomplishment and helps them feel like they are
contributing. When you take your child
to a scouting, church or school activity; include a child who wouldn’t have
been able to attend otherwise.
Going to a school once a week for 30 minutes, can
positively impact the life of a child.
(When I was a teacher in a low income school, I tried to get volunteers
to come and read for 30 minutes a week with my students who had behavior problems. Within days, I would notice a positive change
in the behavior choices that these children made. Interestingly, I wasn’t having the volunteer
focus on teaching the child to read or anything else academic. The vast majority of these kids are quite
capable of doing academic tasks. They
just have so many other things going on in their lives that it’s often
difficult for them to focus on academics.
The time with the volunteers was really meant to be a positive time for
the adult and the child to spend together.
Isn’t it amazing that 30 minutes of contact with a child each week could
make such a difference?)
I’m not suggesting that everyone should volunteer to
spend time with kids who have behavior problems, although that’s not a bad
idea. I’m using this as an example. If we each took the time to be with a child
for 30 minutes a week, just think of the positive impact we could have on the
children of our country. It has the
added benefit of making us positive role models of our Christian values to our
own children.
Because this is an example of how I’ve applied this Bible passage to my life, it doesn’t necessarily reflect the whole meaning of the passage.
