SHOW KINDNESS
TEXT: Deuteronomy 21:10-17
KEY VERSE:
“And she shall put the raiment of her captivity from off her, and shall remain in thine house, and bewail her father and her mother a full month: and after that thou shalt go in unto her, and be her husband, and she shall be thy wife.” - (Deuteronomy 21:13)
A prisoner of war is a person who is taken as a captive or a slave during battle. For most of human history, these prisoners had been ill-treated and manhandled by their captors. However, the Geneva Accord published in 1929 and amended in 1949 after World War II, provided certain rights to prisoners of war, to mitigate the inhuman treatment hitherto meted to them.
From the passage under consideration, the Lord commanded that captives of war in general and women in particular be treated humanely. A captured maid, under this rule, was to be clothed and fed. She was required to shave her hair and pare her nails, and be given a full month to mourn her parents before she would be taken in as a wife. She was not to be taken advantage of at any time. And if the man found her unfavourable, he should let her go wherever she wanted without being sold as a slave or compelled to stay against her wish.
We live in a wicked world where thousands of women are taken advantage of in human trafficking from poor countries with promises of a better life. They take them there and soon convert them into prostitutes and domestic slaves, working under extremely harsh and inhuman conditions.
The quest for materialism is the force behind all this evil. But they forget that the same God that created them also created these less privileged persons they are taking advantage of. Sadly, some of them die in those places - unsaved. It is sad what man’s insatiable desire for wealth and fame has brought upon innocent persons. However, none of these people involved in all these nor any other sinner can escape the judgment of God except they repent. Every believer needs to be engaged one way or the other in helping men to know the Saviour.
THOUGHT FOR THE DAY: Human kindness recognises others as God’s creatures.
THE BIBLE IN ONE YEAR: Jeremiah 43-45.