“Only they asked us to remember the poor, the very thing I was eager to do.”
-Galatians 2:10
So in this chapter that contains just some awesome verses, one of my favorite verses in all the Bible in Galatians 2:20 that’s summarizes what it means to be a follower of Christ and just rich doctrinal truth about what it means to be united with Jesus and saved by Jesus and justified by his grace, not by our works, through faith in him.
Galatians 2:10 Leads Us to Remember the Poor
So there’s so many different verses we could pray according to, but the reason I want us to pray according to Galatians chapter two, verse 10 is because it’s a keen reminder in the middle of this treasure trove of biblical theological truth that these truths are intended to transform the way we live and the way we love in a world of urgent need all around us.
Galatians 2:10 says, in the middle of all these other verses, they asked us to remember the poor, the very thing I was eager to do. This is obviously not an isolated verse. This is all over the Bible, Old Testament, New Testament alike. God’s people are commanded to remember the poor, to be eager to remember the poor. You can’t help but to think at this point about the book of James, which sometimes people kind of pit Galatians and James against each other because of the way they talk about grace and faith and works.
This Verse Reminds Us to Examine
But we don’t have time to dive into that. They’re both proclaiming the same gospel. According to Paul and Galatians and James in the book that bears his name, true faith in Jesus always leads to care for the poor. So when we come to a verse like this and we pray according to it, let’s examine our hearts and our lives and our use of money and ask, are we remembering with eagerness the poor? Not just remembering them in our minds, but caring for those who are in need around us, in need around the world.
God help us to be faithful to remember the poor, to see the poor, to see those in need around us, right where we live. God help us to be active in meeting needs in a James 2 kind of way. Not just to say, “Oh, I wish you well, keep warm and well fed,” but to do nothing about people’s physical needs in a way that shows our faith is vain and worthless. God, we pray for faith that leads to compassionate care and provision for those who are in need right around us and around the world as we pray continually for unreached people in the world, many of whom are in physical poverty.
Prayer
We pray today for the Shanenawa people of Brazil, another one of these Amazon tribes. God, we pray for the spread of the gospel in the Shanenawa tribe. Today we pray for their physical provision. God, as we think about looking at website like stratus.earth, and just seeing so many different places in the world where physical and spiritual need collide.
We pray, help us to be faithful in our lives, in our families, in our churches, to remember those in need, to care for those in need, to give of the resources we have for the sake of those in need, that they might know your love, that we might be a reflection of your grace and your compassion, of your remembrance, that they would know that they’re not alone because of the way your grace is at work in our lives as we care for them, reach out to them.
Make Us Faithful
God to help us to be faithful with… God, help us to be eager and faithful to remember, reach out to, care and provide for those who are in need around us. We pray this according to your word in Galatians chapter two, verse 10 in Jesus’ name. Show us God, we pray, maybe in a fresh way today what that needs to look like in our lives, any first steps or additional steps that you’re leading us to take to care for the poor, to care for those in need around us and around the world, specifically among people who’ve never even heard your grace in the gospel. We pray this in Jesus’ name, according to Galatians 2:10. Amen.
David Platt serves as a pastor in metro Washington, D.C. He is the founder of Radical.
David received his Ph.D. from New Orleans Baptist Theological Seminary and is the author of Don’t Hold Back, Radical, Follow Me, Counter Culture, Something Needs to Change, Before You Vote, as well as the multiple volumes of the Christ-Centered Exposition Commentary series.
Along with his wife and children, he lives in the Washington, D.C. metro area.
