Topical Studies
What the Bible says about
Visiting in Mercy
(From Forerunner Commentary)
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Genesis 50:24-26
Genesis 50:24-26 contains the story of Joseph's final instructions before his death. Notice Joseph's confidence in these verses. He says twice that God would surely visit the children of Israel. There was no doubt in Joseph's mind that his brethren would be led back to the land God promised to his fathers. His trust in God's future deliverance prompted him to make the children of Israel swear that whoever was alive at that time would carry his bones with them as they left Egypt and returned to their ancestral land. When Joseph says that God would visit them, he is not using that word in the sense of a social call—it is not used that way in reference to God. God "visited" Sarah when she miraculously conceived Isaac (Genesis 21:1). God decreed that He would "visit" the iniquities of the fathers upon the children to the third and fourth generation of those who hate Him (Exodus 20:5). When God "visits" someone, it may be with either benevolent or with punishing intent, but God is always shown acting or performing a work. Thus, Joseph signifies that God would be acting on Israel's behalf when He brought them out of Egypt and back to the land of their fathers. By faith, Joseph made mention of this (see Hebrews 11:22), and the reason is found much earlier, in the story of Abraham: Then He said to Abram: "Know certainly that your descendants will be strangers in a land that is not theirs, and will serve them, and they will afflict them four hundred years. And also the nation whom they serve I will judge; afterward they shall come out with great possessions. Now as for you, you shall go to your fathers in peace; you shall be buried at a good old age. But in the fourth generation they shall return here, for the iniquity of the Amorites is not yet complete." (Genesis 15:13-16) Romans 10:17 instructs us that "faith comes by hearing, and hearing by the word of God" (emphasis ours). There is no record of Joseph personally hearing words from God, nor did he have the written Word of God as we do. Instead, God's words to Abraham were relayed to Joseph either by his father, Jacob, or by his grandfather, Isaac, whose life overlapped Joseph's by a number of years. Joseph believed those words to his fathers and acted on them at the end of his life. God promised Abraham this, and Joseph heard this from his father, if not his grandfather. If we add to this the other promises given to Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, particularly concerning the land, we can understand the "word of God" that Joseph heard and which made up the basis of his faith. Joseph believed the words that God spoke to Abraham concerning what would befall Abraham's children, and he believed that God would judge the strangers whom they would serve. He also believed that God would bring them out of that strange land and into the Promised Land. These words to Abraham, handed down through Isaac and Jacob to Joseph, formed the trust and confidence in his mind that God would "visit" the children of Israel in a positive way, and then they would be led to their ancestral lands.
David C. Grabbe
The Faith of Joseph (Part One)
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Luke 7:16
This miracle produces fear in those who witness it, but this fear turns into a deep feeling of awe for His compassion and power. As a result, Christ's fame among the people grows, while the hatred of the Jewish leaders increases, as they reject His claims to be the Son of God. However, His primary purpose is to glorify God. The people glorify God when they say, "A great prophet has risen up among us" and "God has visited His people." Christ is the Great Prophet of Israel (Deuteronomy 18:15; Luke 3:16; John 6:14). The tragedy in this situation is that, though a number of people look upon Jesus as the promised Prophet, few give Him much devotion. In the original Greek, the word "visited" means "to oversee," as well as "to visit in mercy or in judgment." In this context, the meaning is that of favoring the people by sending this great Prophet, Jesus Christ, who blessed the people by raising one of them from the dead. In their praise, we see gratitude as they glorified God for favoring them with this great blessing.
Martin G. Collins
The Miracles of Jesus Christ: Raising a Widow's Son
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James 1:27
The apostle presents Christian living as a two-pronged endeavor that we can perhaps simplify or summarize even more. The first is doing good works: visiting orphans and widows in their trouble. The second prong is to become holy or build righteous character in ourselves in cooperation with God. We could also divide it into the practical and the spiritual sides of life. Obviously, when a person does good works, it is a practical application of what he has learned and put on as spiritual character. Another way to look at it is to say that James divides it into the outward and the inward. Part of Christian living goes on inside an individual, and something—a work, an action—comes out of him as a result. However we want to name this two-pronged approach, we must realize that neither of these prongs is sufficient alone, which is why James presents them together. It is "pure and undefiled religion" to have an inward and an outward aspect or a practical and a spiritual aspect. The apostle John agrees with James in I John 3:16-19. Pure religion requires both of these elements: By this we know love, because He laid down His life for us. And we also ought to lay down our lives for the brethren. But whoever has this world's goods, and sees his brother in need, and shuts up his heart from him, how does the love of God abide in him? My little children, let us not love in word or in tongue, but in deed and in truth. And by this we know that we are of the truth, and shall assure our hearts before Him. He says that, if we do not manifest God's love by giving, helping, and caring for others, then we have not fulfilled anything. We cannot be sure that the love of God is actually in us if it is not coming out in some sort of physical work that we do, some act of love. In this church's teaching, we tend to stress only one of these prongs. It is not that we do not talk about the other, but we tend to stress the inward, the spiritual, the holy, the righteous character part—the second prong that James shows in James 1:27. There is good, sound, solid, biblical reason for this. Basically, it is that the spiritual aspect is the more important of the two. The inward, the spiritual, the holy, the righteous-character part of Christian living is the foundation—the wellspring, the fertile soil—out of which good works grow. One could go so far as to say that effective and truly good works cannot be done without godly character or a right relationship with God. This means that we must have godly character before we can even begin to do good works properly! Without godliness, good works are simply common and rather empty, humanistic philanthropy.
Richard T. Ritenbaugh
"If I Have Not Charity"
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