At first glance, the lesson in today’s passage should simply go without saying: “Don’t hurt the weak.” This might be news to terrorists who hide out in hospitals or who make a practice of mass murder in schools, but most of us believe that it’s just wrong to kick someone when he’s down, no matter how much he might otherwise deserve it.

And make no mistake – verses 21 and 22 describe the most helpless, most vulnerable people in the ancient world. Strangers, those who were just moving into a new territory, had no land to work, and probably had no extended family on which to rely. And while some wanderers might have brought flocks or herds with them, they relied on others’ kindness for access to wells or pastures they needed to nourish their animals.

Widows were in even worse shape. In those days, women had very few career opportunities beyond homemaking, so not having a husband meant being sentenced to poverty. And orphans were the most helpless of all, having neither father nor mother to protect them or provide for them.

So of course it’s wrong to afflict or oppress people who are weak and helpless. So we need to ask ourselves: is there a way in which we modern people might be causing harm to the poor, however unintentionally? And there may not be obvious answers: some might believe it is wrong to restrict homeless people or ex-convicts from voting. Others question whether it is right to welcome unskilled workers to our shores when there are so few jobs available to them.

Some might say police oppress the poor, while others insist we need law enforcement the most in the neighborhoods where poor people can afford to live. Some may point to the need for greater funding in poor school districts while others might insist that it is the poorest parents who need real options where it comes to educating their children. And given what we learned yesterday, it should be obvious to everyone that our culture’s abandonment of the Biblical idea of marriage has doomed generations of Americans to all sorts of social problems.

So, if we know we shouldn’t harm the weak and vulnerable, how can we take steps to help them out? May God open our eyes and give us opportunities to lend a hand today, in a way that will really help.

Exodus 22:21-24 (NASB)

21 “And you shall not wrong a stranger or oppress him, for you were strangers in the land of Egypt.
22 “You shall not afflict any widow or orphan.
23 “If you afflict him at all, and if he does cry out to Me, I will surely hear his cry;
24 and My anger will be kindled, and I will kill you with the sword; and your wives shall become widows and your children fatherless.