J.A. Matteson
Compassion for the lost is a hallmark of God's character, and the LORD will deal firmly with His servants lacking compassion until it is deeply infused in them. "So Jonah arose and went to Nineveh according to the word of the LORD" (Jonah 3:3). Jonah needed an attitude adjustment toward the lost of Nineveh, so the LORD set in motion adverse providences to tutor His servant in compassion in response to his hard hearted disobedience. A saint who lacks compassion for the lost is deficient in his understanding of the enormity of God's compassion toward him. Watch out, be on your guard against attitudes of condescension towards people not like you, sinners whom you feel are not worthy of God's compassion, individuals or groups of people whom you have written off, who have made unwise life choices. At some point the LORD will deal firmly with you through adverse providences until He brings you around to seeing your own depravity as He sees it. As the Lord Jesus Christ noted, he who has been forgiven little loves little, and he who has been forgiven much loves much (Lk. 7:47). It is the LORD's intent that saints perceive the vastness of their own iniquity and the extreme lengths He went to in order to show them compassion. If we lack compassion toward vile lost sinners it is because we have lost sight of our own spiritual poverty. And unless we bring our callous heart before the LORD in confession He will engineer unpleasant providences that will hit hard, circumstances we might otherwise avoid in order to bring us to our knees, so that we become useful to Him in reaching all souls for Jesus Christ.
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