DEVOTIONAL Header2023

When Helping Hurts

March 25, 2025
03252025WEEKLYDEVOTIONAL
“The Lord said to me, ‘Go, show your love to your wife again, though she is loved by another and is an adulteress. Love her as the Lord loves the Israelites…’” (Hosea 3:1, NIV).

 

We’ve been able to control his aggressive chronic lymphocytic leukemia for four to five years. It’s been difficult to do, as he misses medicines for prolonged periods due to his drug addiction. He falls off the wagon for weeks, but then he finally returns—we start over, and he improves. I speak with him and pray for him and continue to hope he can finally overcome his addiction, but he just keeps failing.

 

There was a book published in 2009 entitled When Helping Hurts that describes how helping the poor might actually harm them if not done correctly.

 

It cautions us against hurting those we serve.

 

What about those we serve hurting us?

 

What about all the times we raise our hopes, again and again, hoping the person we care about might finally succeed or overcome, only to see them fail once more?

 

It hurts.

 

Why am I doing this Lord, if nothing ever changes?

 

I suspect a number of us help patients, friends or family with behavior or sin issues. We are deeply committed to improving their lives. We are lifted up by moments of hopeful change…and then watch them fail again.

 

Sometimes I get tired and ask God if I can let them go.

 

How many times should I let my hope rise and fall before I decide to walk away so I might have peace?

 

Then God thumps me: this question seeking escape forces me into another question. Has God placed me in the lives of those in need for my peace or for their redemption?

 

Hosea never gave up on Gomer.

 

Jesus never gave up on Peter.

 

God never gave up on Israel. The incarnation was a fulfilling, not an ending.

 

God has never given up on me.

 

Based on God’s Word, my default position should be that I never let go of hope and never quit helping one whom God has placed on my heart unless God tells me to cease.

 

The question of managing my hurt is another issue.

 

Dear Father,

Bless and change the ones you send me to serve.

Amen

Weekly Devotions

A Window That Isn’t There

“And if it is evil in your eyes to serve the Lord, choose this day whom you will serve, whether the gods your fathers served in ...
Weekly Devotions

A Child’s Question

“I am the Alpha and the Omega, the First and the Last, the Beginning and the End” (Revelation 22:13, NIV).   One of my colleagues ...
Weekly Devotions

Hospice Mallards

“Because we know that the one who raised the Lord Jesus from the dead will also raise us with Jesus and present us with you ...
Weekly Devotions

Level

“Teacher, we know that you are a man of integrity. You aren’t swayed by others, because you pay no attention to who they are; but ...
Promises
Weekly Devotions

Some About Me

“And let us consider how to stir up one another to love and good works, not neglecting to meet together, as is the habit of ...
Weekly Devotions

Droopy Lids

“Vanity of vanities, says the Preacher, vanity of vanities! All is vanity” (Ecclesiastes 1:2, ESV).   Lately, multiple people have asked me if I was tired. I ...
pexels-cedric-fauntleroy-4270365
Weekly Devotions

Time Enough

“Let your conversation be always full of grace, seasoned with salt, so that you may know how to answer everyone” (Colossians 4:6, NIV).   I was totally ...
pexels-victorfreitas-1381415
Weekly Devotions

Airport Happiness

“For it has been granted to you on behalf of Christ not only to believe in him, but also to suffer for him, since you ...