To Honor and Protect: God's Care for Widow's and Orphans
Orphans and widows captivate the heart of God in a unique way. Our God cares for the most vulnerable in society with a devoted degree of love. And, as God’s people, we are to mirror his compassion and affection, reflecting the heart of our Father, by caring for orphans and widows. As James says, "Religion that is pure and undefiled before God the Father is this: to visit orphans and widows in their affliction, and to keep oneself unstained from the world" (1:27).
This purity of religion has not come naturally to man down through the ages, however. Societies have frequently not only ostracized these vulnerable members (who lack the economic provision and physical protection of a husband/father), they have actively despised them. Some plummeted to abominable degradation. I was moved with pity by the story of William Carey (1761–1834), England's first Baptist missionary to India, who described "life" there for widows. When a man died, his widow was made to climb atop his funeral pyre and be burned alive! The British, through colonial rule, later succeeded in outlawing the practice known as "sati." The law restrained the practice, but only the Law of Christ could transform the heart, bringing recognition, revulsion, and repentance from such evil.
A similarly low view of widows was found in the New Hebrides Islands by John G. Paton (1824–1907), the Scottish missionary, who describes a time when "the quiet of the night was broken by a wild wailing cry from the villages around, long-continued and unearthly. We were informed that one of the wounded men, carried home from the battle, had just died; and that they had strangled his widow to death, that her spirit might accompany him to the other world, and be his servant there as she had been here." *
Whether we look at more modern examples like these or examples from ancient civilizations, we see that the weak and dependent have often been the object of scorn and contempt. Across the face of the earth, we can trace deplorable views of women and children that the collective conscience accepted. These sentiments were not the fringe but the normal, even honorable, values of the whole. But this is not the holy heart of God for those without father or husband: "Father of the fatherless and protector of widows is God in his holy habitation" (Ps 68:5). God's care and compassion as well as his provision and protection are certain. In a Psalm resonating with the ministry of Christ himself, we read: "The LORD sets the prisoners free; the LORD opens the eyes of the blind. The LORD lifts up those who are bowed down; the LORD loves the righteous. The LORD watches over the sojourners; he upholds the widow and the fatherless, but the way of the wicked he brings to ruin" (Ps 146:7c–9).
Precisely because the issue matters so much to him, in both testaments, God calls his people to protect and honor widows and orphans. Rather than shaming and shunning, God expressly commanded that widows and orphans be included in Israel's most holy festivals and enjoy full participation in God's community. They were to be invited to dine on tithes of produce at generous feasts held every three years, eating food donated by the community (Dt 14:28). "And the Levite, because he has no portion or inheritance with you, and the sojourner, the fatherless, and the widow, who are within your towns, shall come and eat and be filled, that the LORD your God may bless you in all the work of your hands that you do" (Dt 14:29, see also Dt 16:9–12 and Dt 16:13–15).
The nation of Israel was commanded to treat widows and orphans justly, along with other vulnerable populations such as sojourners (foreigners) or other dependents (such as the priests who did not own land to farm). "You shall not wrong a sojourner or oppress him, for you were sojourners in the land of Egypt. You shall not mistreat any widow or fatherless child" (Ex 22:21–22). To mistreat them was to incur God's wrath. "If you do mistreat them, and they cry out to me, I will surely hear their cry, and my wrath will burn, and I will kill you with the sword, and your wives shall become widows and your children fatherless" (Ex 22:23–24). Psalm 94 calls on God to avenge, among other evils, the murder of widows and orphans. "O LORD, God of vengeance, O God of vengeance, shine forth! . . . They kill the widow and the sojourner, and murder the fatherless; and they say, "The LORD does not see; the God of Jacob does not perceive" (Ps 94:1, 6–7).
These OT commands are almost universally tied to the fact that Israel itself was enslaved in Egypt. "You shall not pervert the justice due to the sojourner or to the fatherless, or take a widow's garment in pledge, but you shall remember that you were a slave in Egypt and the LORD your God redeemed you from there; therefore I command you to do this" (Dt 24:17–18).The memory of their lowly position, their helpless estate as slaves was to provoke empathy for those in their midst who were likewise lowly and vulnerable. As God had rescued Israel from Egypt when they were in that very state of weakness, Israel was to go out of its way to give aid, honor, and protection to the defenseless.
Some of the fiercest rebukes in Scripture are against those who claimed to follow God while neglecting widows and orphans. In a passage that sounds like Carey's India or Paton's New Hebrides, Israel's sins are exposed through Ezekiel: "Behold, the princes of Israel in you, every one according to his power, have been bent on shedding blood. Father and mother are treated with contempt in you; the sojourner suffers extortion in your midst; the fatherless and the widow are wronged in you" (Ez 22:6–7). In the NT, Jesus unearthed the ungodliness of the scribes when he warned, "Beware of the scribes, who like to walk around in long robes, and love greetings in the marketplaces and the best seats in the synagogues and the places of honor at feasts, who devour widows' houses and for a pretense make long prayers" (Lk 20:46–47a). What would be the result? "They will receive the greater condemnation" (Lk 20:47b).
Thankfully we also have positive pictures in both testaments of God's people caring for the lowly. During a period of gross moral decay in Israel, Boaz stands out as a man who honors and protects Naomi and Ruth, both widows. God's care for the Sidonian widow is mediated through Elijah the prophet, who raises her son to life (1 Ki 17). The gripping story of Christ raising the widow of Nain's son portrays the same heart of God in the NT (Lk 7). As for the church, Spirit-filled men were called upon to ensure the proper care of not only Jewish but Gentile widows (Acts 6). In a section that comprises nearly twelve percent of his letter Paul instructs Timothy, as part of his role in the church, to ensure that widows are honored (1 Tm 5:3–16). It was that important to proper church life! Beloved, let’s be alert and seek, heart-felt ways to meet the needs of the most vulnerable around us and to show special honor to widows and orphans in our midst. When we do, we engage in the purity of religion to the pleasure of God our Father.
* Paton, John G., John G. Paton: Missionary to the New Hebrides, 68-69.
