Once upon a time, when I was in Seminary, I took a class called “Principles of Christian Ethics.” It was a very interesting class, and I enjoyed it immensely. One of our assignments was to keep what is called a “Commonplace Book,” that is, a notebook used to collect and organize knowledge; it can contain quotes from things you’ve read, thoughts/observations about a subject, class notes, or anything else, really. Quite by accident, I stumbled across my Commonplace Book recently; it’s been fascinating reading through it, and I’ve gotten quite a bit of material for this blog from it. For today, though, I thought it would be a fun exercise to revisit something that I wrote in my Commonplace Book and expand upon it.
The entry I want to revisit is actually very short. I opened with Galatians 6:10, which reads “So then, as we have opportunity, let us do good to everyone, and especially to those who are of the household of faith” (ESV). I then wrote the following: “There’s a discussion here, somewhere, about Christian ethics, and living a Christian life, and how we treat the people around us, especially our fellow Christians. Hopefully we’ll get to have it someday.” And that was the end of the entry.
Let’s begin that discussion.
Christian ethics are moral principles based on Scripture and the life of Jesus Christ that guide how Christians live. So the question we have to answer is, how does this verse guide how Christians should live their lives?
I can think of three ways that Galatians 6:10 relates to how Christians should live their lives. First, the phrase “let us do good to everyone.” This establishes the idea that we are to do good to all people, not just those who are like us in some way, or who “deserve” it. Just as God “makes his sun rise on the evil and on the good, and sends rain on the just and on the unjust” (Matthew 5:45), so are we to be a blessing to all people, even those we do not like, or who do not like us. Second, the phrase “especially to those who are of the household of faith.” While we are to do good to all people, our resources (time, money, etc.) are finite; we can’t help everyone. “Why should we prioritize our fellow Christians?” you might ask. I would argue that if we cannot love and take care of our own community, those outside the community have no reason to believe we will love and take care of them.
Third, the phrase “as we have opportunity.” The Greek word that is translated as “opportunity” is transliterated as kairos; it refers to a fixed and definite time, an opportune or seasonable time, the right time. So, at a fixed time that is favorable for doing good, we are to do it. It isn’t necessarily of our choosing; there’s nothing in the definition that stipulates it must be favorable for us. If we recognize an opportunity to do good, and it is within our means and ability to do it, then we should do it. The fact that the time is fixed implies that there is a window of time where we are meant to act; once that time has passed, the opportunity is lost.
I want to take a moment to expand upon my qualifier that “it is within our means and ability to do it.” I believe that, while we are to do good to others, we are not obligated to do harm to ourselves, or to neglect our own welfare for the benefit of others. It’s often referred to as the “oxygen mask” rule. When in an airplane, if the cabin loses pressure, oxygen masks will fall from above; we are instructed to put our own mask on before helping others. If you don’t put your mask on first, not only are you impeding your ability to help others, but you are also putting yourself in the position of needing care from others. You will be best able to do good to others if you first do good to yourself.
For me, the most challenging thing about this verse is the idea that we should prioritize fellow Christians. I do believe what I said, that if we cannot love and take care of each other, non-Christians have no reason to believe that we will love and take care of them. But don’t non-Christians need to see and feel God’s love as much, if not more? Isn’t doing good an effective means of evangelism? Aren’t non-Christians just as deserving of love and help as Christians? Plus, I don’t like the idea that some people might point to that part of the passage and use it as justification for only helping other Christians.
But then I think of the non-Christians I know. Of the ones who were Christians at one point in their lives, every single one of them left their church and stopped being Christians because of the lack of love and care they encountered within the Christian community. There are other reasons people leave Christianity, of course, but there is definitely a need for more love and care within our community.
There is also the idea of the “oxygen mask” rule I mentioned earlier. Before we can help others, we must first take care of ourselves. Besides, wouldn’t you rather join a loving, caring family where everyone helps and takes care of each other? Before we can persuade others to join our family, we must first become a family people would want to join.
Of course, nothing says it has to be one or the other. Nothing stops us from allocating a certain percentage of our resources to helping our fellow Christians and another percentage to helping non-Christians.
There’s also the matter of the “as we have opportunity” part of the passage. Some opportunities will be of our own creation; for example, donating money to a Christian organization is a deliberate choice we make. Other opportunities will not, and we may never know anything about the people involved; you can bring a sandwich and a bottle of water to a homeless man on the street corner and never learn whether or not he is a Christian. I suppose you could stop and talk with him, and only bring him a sandwich and a water bottle if he’s a Christian…but that’s not honoring the “do good to everyone” part of the passage, is it? Doing good to others is not contingent on anything, including the religious beliefs of the party being helped.
What opportunities to do good are there in your life? Some are more obvious than others; some seem important, and others inconsequential. When you look around you with the mindset of actively seeking opportunities to do good to others, you’ll suddenly notice a lot more of them than you would have expected to find.
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