We Need to Experience Misery in Order to Serve Properly

I used to work with some non-profit, charitable organizations. Someone I like very much said, to the best of my memory:

Misery hurts only when it’s experienced. The challenge of charity is to experience misery on a regular basis without becoming desensitized to it – since nobody desires to experience it. Nobody wants to feel pain and despair and grief that they do not need to feel. Since we naturally shy from misery and pain, if we are not careful, we will insulate ourselves from those we say we serve and begin to value the process of giving over the receiver of that giving – and that is a dangerous result.

One of the worst effects of not searching actively for and serving those in pain and misery is the type of insulation it breeds.  I believe "knowing God" often occurs in direct proportion to how well we come to know His children - especially those like the ones Jesus served with such single-minded intensity during his mortal ministry.