Remember the Poor

Today's devotional is from Your Life Matters: Daily Reflections from the Psalms

"Defend the weak and the fatherless; uphold the cause of the poor and the oppressed. Rescue the weak and the needy; deliver them from the hand of the wicked" - Psalm 82:3-4.

God requires that His people have a heart for the poor and that their concern translate into action. This action may be the giving of alms and benevolent offerings. It may also be speaking up for those who cannot speak for themselves and protecting the poor from those who would infringe on their rights and take advantage of them.

When Paul was explaining his call to the Jerusalem elders, he wrote this concerning their response: "They agreed that we should go to the Gentiles, and they to the circumcised. All they asked was that we should continue to remember the poor, the very thing I had been eager to do all along" (Galatians 2:9b-10). Are you remembering the poor? Are you eager to do something on their behalf? What more can you do?