We learned that orphans are easier to ignore before you know their names. They are easier to ignore before you see their faces. It is easier to pretend they’re not real before you hold them in your arms. But once you do, everything changes.
Interpretation
Knowing someone's story makes it harder to overlook their suffering.
This quote by David Platt emphasizes the importance of personal connection and empathy towards orphans. It suggests that acknowledging the humanity of those who suffer, such as orphans, fosters compassion and makes it difficult to ignore their plight, as true understanding stems from personal interactions and genuine care.
In practice
In a speech highlighting the importance of community service, one might use this quote to illustrate the transformative power of empathy.
So what is the difference between someone who willfully indulges in sexual pleasures while ignoring the Bible on moral purity and someone who willfully indulges in the selfish pursuit of more and more material possessions while ignoring the Bible on caring for the poor? The difference is that one involves a social taboo in the church and the other involves the social norm in the church.
The price is certainly high for people who don’t know Christ and who live in a world where Christians shrink back from self-denying faith and settle into self-indulging faith. While Christians choose to spend their lives fulfilling the American dream instead of giving their lives to proclaiming the kingdom of God, literally billions in need of the Gospel remain in the dark
What if the very reason we have breath is because we have been saved for a global mission? And what if anything less than passionate involvement in global mission is actually selling God short by frustrating the very purpose for which he created us?
A high view of God’s sovereignty fuels death-defying devotion to global missions. Maybe another way to put it, people, and more specifically pastors, who believe that God’s sovereign over all things will lead Christians to die for the sake of all peoples.
[...]there is no injustice in God. The injustice lies in Christians who possess the gospel and refuse to give their lives to making it known among those who haven't heard.
God involves us in his missions not because He needs us, but because He loves us. And in His mercy He has invited us to be involved in His sovereign design for the spread of the gospel to the ends of the earth.
Blushing is the most peculiar and most human of all expressions.
If we believe that a person seeking refuge is to be pitied, feared, despised, and looked down upon, we are doing ourselves a disservice.
The world has only one border. It is called humanity. The differences between us are small compared to our shared humanity. Put humans first.
We may be different races and religions but we are all part of the same human family
For me the Holocaust was not only a Jewish tragedy, but also a human tragedy. After the war, when I saw that the Jews were talking only about the tragedy of six million Jews, I sent letters to Jewish organizations asking them to talk also about the millions of others who were persecuted with us together - many of them only because they helped Jews.
The greatest nation in the world should not have much to fear from a family, especially children, fleeing violence. More importantly, children fleeing violence ought to have nothing to fear from the greatest country in the world.
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