Is the union so intimate betwixt Christ and believers? How great and powerful a motive then is this, to make us open-handed and liberal in relieving the necessities and wants of every gracious person; for in relieving them we relieve Christ himself. He is not personally the object of our pity and charity; He is the fountain head of all the riches in glory, Eph. 4 v. 10, but Christ mystically is exposed to necessities and wants, to hunger and thirst, cold and pains, in his body the church, and He is refreshed, relieved and comforted, in their refreshments and comforts. Christ the Lord of heaven and earth in this view is sometimes in need of a penny. In Matthew 25, 35-40 He tells us his wants and poverty, and how He is relieved; a text believed and understood by very few. “I was hungry, and ye gave me meat; I was thirsty and ye gave me drink; I was a stranger and ye took me in.” Then shall the righteous answer “Lord when saw we thee hungry . . .” And the King shall answer and say unto them “Verily I say unto you, inasmuch as ye have done it unto one of the least of these my brethren ye have done it unto me.”
It was the saying of a great divine that he thought scarcely any man on earth fully understood and believed this truth and he conceived so much was hinted in the very text itself where the righteous themselves reply “Lord, when saw we Thee sick . . .” intimating that they did not thoroughly understand the nearness and oneness of those persons with Christ, for whom they did these things. And indeed it is incredible that a christian can be hard-hearted and close-handed to that necessitous christian, in refreshing and relieving of whom, he verily believes that he ministers refreshment to Christ himself.
Oh think again upon this scripture, consider what forcible and mighty arguments are here laid together to engage relief to the wants of christians. Here you see their near relation to Christ; they are mystically one person: what you did to them you did to Christ. Here you see also how kindly Christ takes it at our hands acknowledging all those kindnesses bestowed on him, even to a bit of bread. He is, you see content to take it as a courtesy, who might demand it by authority, and bereave you of all immediately, upon refusal. Here also, you see one single branch or act of obedience (our charity to the saints) is singled out from among all the duties of obedience and made the test and evidence of our sincerity in that great day, and men are blessed or cursed according to the love they have manifested this way to the saints.
JOHN FLAVEL