What Jesus Says About Panhandling

                                                                                                                                                              
                                                                                                                                                              
                                                                                                                                                              

I occasionally listen to a radio talk-show on a local NPR station: a real talk-show, where normal, intelligent people honestly discuss local events and issues without rancor, and welcome call-in comments and questions.

The subject today was a proposed anti-panhandling ordinance.  And of course the host and all of his guests referred to their personal experience with panhandlers.  We've all had personal experience with panhandlers.

Not that any of the panelists were anti-panhandler.  No one said they'd ever felt threatened or harassed by panhandlers; and all agreed that the proposed ordinance was primarily intended to ensure the free flow of traffic, on both streets and sidewalks.

What most caught my interest was the panelists' discussion of how they reacted to panhandlers.  They all agreed that many were people who needed some help through a difficult time.  And no one doubted that some panhandlers chose to beg rather than work.

All the panelists (whatever "liberal" or "conservative" attitudes they'd evinced in discussing the ordinance) said they sometimes gave money to panhandlers.  And for all of them, their decision to give or not give was based on their perception of how "deserving" the panhandler was: their best guess whether s/he was genuinely a person who needed a little help in tough circumstances...or a "mooch," taking advantage of other people's good intentions.

I was thinking that Jesus' saved us making that difficult call.  His command to "give to everyone who asks of you" (Luke 6:30; also Matthew 5:42) pretty well covers it.  But in spite of Jesus' command, I've heard many Christians agonizing over whether they did the right thing or not by giving money to a panhandler.

When I hear Christians dealing with that question, there's always some of the same concern that the radio-panelists had, whether the panhandler is "deserving" or not.  But it's not a concern Christians should have.  Jesus sets His command in the context of God's grace, "... so that you may be sons of your Father who is in heaven; for He causes His sun to rise on the evil and the good, and sends rain on the righteous and the unrighteous" (Matthew 5:45).

Jesus says God gives His gifts to deserving and undeserving people, and his sons do likewise.  His Son Jesus said His Own purpose was to do what He saw the Father doing.  Giving to all who ask is an opportunity for us to be a son of God, like Jesus was.

It's always impressed me that God is Creator and Ruler of time, as well as of the space of Creation.  My experience is that He rules very directly and very personally in our lives daily by His rule of space and time, in the opportunities he creates for us that way.  (And don't we actually rather trivialize God if we only credit Him with spectacular works like the Grand Canyon, and not the everyday circumstances of our own lives ?)

We all can think of incidents in our lives when, if we had not been at the exact place at the exact time we were...if we had started from home two minutes sooner than we did, or not impulsively dashed into the hardware store on our way to the library...our lives would have been different, perhaps dramatically so.  God's rule of time and space in our lives creates opportunities for us, often opportunities to meet people we might otherwise never run into.  We've all heard stories...or perhaps lived them...in which such an unlikely "chance" meeting results in a marriage, or business-partnership, or lifelong friendship.

I don't have anecdotal evidence any of those things have resulted from an encounter with a panhandler (though they may have).  But every person we ever meet, however briefly, is a unique spiritual being of God's creation, in whose heart He has set eternity (Ecclesiastes 3:11).  Meeting one...even one who is panhandling...is a one-time opportunity God has commanded time and space to create for us.  And Jesus says the greatest opportunity we ever have is to show ourselves sons of our Father.

Christians have no reason to agonize over whether someone is "deserving" or not.  Nobody is.  And the religious-sounding argument I often hear, that "God wants us to be good stewards of what He's given us," often betrays the idea that what He gives us, He gives into our command.  He doesn't.

Our faith is that Jesus is in command.  And Jesus commands us to give to everyone who asks.