The Bible speaks about the poor & oppressed way more than you think

In preparation for the Feb. 21-22 Justice Conference venue in Lansing (which you should register for here!), I have been really struck by the vast quantity of the Bible that teaches about caring for the poor and oppressed.  It’s amazing to me how silent many churches are on this issue, but then at the same time claim to affirm the Bible as God’s Word.  Here is a collection of what I’ve gathered so far, let me know in the comments if there are more you can think of.  I encourage you to read this list and allow God’s holy and inspired Word to shatter your (and my) selfish, bias, human paradigm of what following Jesus is supposed to look like:

Matt. 25:31  ¶          “When the Son of Man comes in his glory, and all the angels with him, he will sit on his throne in heavenly glory.

Matt. 25:32 All the nations will be gathered before him, and he will separate the people one from another as a shepherd separates the sheep from the goats.

Matt. 25:33 He will put the sheep on his right and the goats on his left.

Matt. 25:34  ¶          “Then the King will say to those on his right, ‘Come, you who are blessed by my Father; take your inheritance, the kingdom prepared for you since the creation of the world.

Matt. 25:35 For I was hungry and you gave me something to eat, I was thirsty and you gave me something to drink, I was a stranger and you invited me in,

Matt. 25:36 I needed clothes and you clothed me, I was sick and you looked after me, I was in prison and you came to visit me.’

Matt. 25:37  ¶          “Then the righteous will answer him, ‘Lord, when did we see you hungry and feed you, or thirsty and give you something to drink?

Matt. 25:38 When did we see you a stranger and invite you in, or needing clothes and clothe you?

Matt. 25:39 When did we see you sick or in prison and go to visit you?’

Matt. 25:40  ¶          “The King will reply, ‘I tell you the truth, whatever you did for one of the least of these brothers of mine, you did for me.’

Matt. 25:41  ¶          “Then he will say to those on his left, ‘Depart from me, you who are cursed, into the eternal fire prepared for the devil and his angels.

Matt. 25:42 For I was hungry and you gave me nothing to eat, I was thirsty and you gave me nothing to drink,

Matt. 25:43 I was a stranger and you did not invite me in, I needed clothes and you did not clothe me, I was sick and in prison and you did not look after me.’

Matt. 25:44  ¶          “They also will answer, ‘Lord, when did we see you hungry or thirsty or a stranger or needing clothes or sick or in prison, and did not help you?’

Matt. 25:45  ¶          “He will reply, ‘I tell you the truth, whatever you did not do for one of the least of these, you did not do for me.’

Matt. 25:46  ¶          “Then they will go away to eternal punishment, but the righteous to eternal life.”

Mic. 6:1 ¶          Listen to what the LORD says:

“Stand up, plead your case before the mountains;

let the hills hear what you have to say.

Mic. 6:2  ¶          Hear, O mountains, the LORD’S accusation;

listen, you everlasting foundations of the earth. ¶          For the LORD has a case against his people;

he is lodging a charge against Israel.

Mic. 6:3  ¶          “My people, what have I done to you?

How have I burdened you? Answer me.

Mic. 6:4  ¶          I brought you up out of Egypt

and redeemed you from the land of slavery.  ¶          I sent Moses to lead you,

also Aaron and Miriam.

Mic. 6:5  ¶          My people, remember

what Balak king of Moab counseled

and what Balaam son of Beor answered.

Remember [ your journey] from Shittim to Gilgal,

that you may know the righteous acts of the LORD.”

Mic. 6:6  ¶          With what shall I come before the LORD

and bow down before the exalted God? ¶          Shall I come before him with burnt offerings,

with calves a year old?

Mic. 6:7  ¶          Will the LORD be pleased with thousands of rams,

with ten thousand rivers of oil?  ¶          Shall I offer my firstborn for my transgression,

the fruit of my body for the sin of my soul?

Mic. 6:8  ¶          He has showed you, O man, what is good.

And what does the LORD require of you? ¶          To act justly and to love mercy

and to walk humbly with your God.

Mic. 6:9          Listen! The LORD is calling to the city—

and to fear your name is wisdom—

“Heed the rod and the One who appointed it.

Mic. 6:10  ¶          Am I still to forget, O wicked house,

your ill-gotten treasures

and the short ephah, which is accursed?

Mic. 6:11  ¶          Shall I acquit a man with dishonest scales,

with a bag of false weights?

Mic. 6:12  ¶          Her rich men are violent;

her people are liars

and their tongues speak deceitfully.

Mic. 6:13  ¶          Therefore, I have begun to destroy you,

to ruin you because of your sins.

Mic. 6:14  ¶          You will eat but not be satisfied;

your stomach will still be empty.  ¶          You will store up but save nothing,

because what you save I will give to the sword.

Mic. 6:15  ¶          You will plant but not harvest;

you will press olives but not use the oil on yourselves,

you will crush grapes but not drink the wine.

Mic. 6:16  ¶          You have observed the statutes of Omri

and all the practices of Ahab’s house,

and you have followed their traditions.  ¶          Therefore I will give you over to ruin

and your people to derision;

you will bear the scorn of the nations.’”

Psa. 10:14          But you, O God, do see trouble and grief;

you consider it to take it in hand. ¶          The victim commits himself to you;

you are the helper of the fatherless.

Psa. 10:15          Break the arm of the wicked and evil man;

call him to account for his wickedness

that would not be found out.

 

Psa. 10:16  ¶          The LORD is King for ever and ever;

the nations will perish from his land.

Psa. 10:17          You hear, O LORD, the desire of the afflicted;

you encourage them, and you listen to their cry,

Psa. 10:18          defending the fatherless and the oppressed,

in order that man, who is of the earth, may terrify no more.

 

Prov. 3:27  ¶          Do not withhold good from those who deserve it,

when it is in your power to act.

Prov. 3:28          Do not say to your neighbor,

“Come back later; I’ll give it tomorrow”—

when you now have it with you.

Amos 5:1 ¶          Hear this word, O house of Israel, this lament I take up concerning you:

Amos 5:2  ¶          “Fallen is Virgin Israel,

never to rise again,

deserted in her own land,

with no one to lift her up.”

Amos 5:3  ¶          This is what the Sovereign LORD says:

“The city that marches out a thousand strong for Israel

will have only a hundred left;

the town that marches out a hundred strong

will have only ten left.”

Amos 5:4  ¶          This is what the LORD says to the house of Israel: ¶          “Seek me and live;

Amos 5:5                   do not seek Bethel,

do not go to Gilgal,

do not journey to Beersheba.  ¶          For Gilgal will surely go into exile,

and Bethel will be reduced to nothing.”

Amos 5:6  ¶          Seek the LORD and live,

or he will sweep through the house of Joseph like a fire;

it will devour,

and Bethel will have no one to quench it.

Amos 5:7  ¶          You who turn justice into bitterness

and cast righteousness to the ground

Amos 5:8  ¶          (he who made the Pleiades and Orion,

who turns blackness into dawn

and darkens day into night,

who calls for the waters of the sea

and pours them out over the face of the land—

the LORD is his name—

Amos 5:9          he flashes destruction on the stronghold

and brings the fortified city to ruin),

Amos 5:10          you hate the one who reproves in court

and despise him who tells the truth.

Amos 5:11  ¶          You trample on the poor

and force him to give you grain.

Therefore, though you have built stone mansions,

you will not live in them;

though you have planted lush vineyards,

you will not drink their wine.

Amos 5:12  ¶          For I know how many are your offenses

and how great your sins.

You oppress the righteous and take bribes

and you deprive the poor of justice in the courts.

Amos 5:13  ¶          Therefore the prudent man keeps quiet in such times,

for the times are evil.

Amos 5:14  ¶          Seek good, not evil,

that you may live.  ¶          Then the LORD God Almighty will be with you,

just as you say he is.

Amos 5:15  ¶          Hate evil, love good;

maintain justice in the courts.  ¶          Perhaps the LORD God Almighty will have mercy

on the remnant of Joseph.

Amos 5:16  ¶          Therefore this is what the Lord, the LORD God Almighty, says: ¶          “There will be wailing in all the streets

and cries of anguish in every public square. ¶          The farmers will be summoned to weep

and the mourners to wail.

Amos 5:17  ¶          There will be wailing in all the vineyards,

for I will pass through your midst,”

says the LORD.

Amos 5:18          Woe to you who long

for the day of the LORD!  ¶          Why do you long for the day of the LORD?

That day will be darkness, not light.

Amos 5:19  ¶          It will be as though a man fled from a lion

only to meet a bear,

as though he entered his house

and rested his hand on the wall

only to have a snake bite him.

Amos 5:20  ¶          Will not the day of the LORD be darkness, not light—

pitch-dark, without a ray of brightness?

Amos 5:21  ¶          “I hate, I despise your religious feasts;

I cannot stand your assemblies.

Amos 5:22  ¶          Even though you bring me burnt offerings and grain offerings,

I will not accept them.         Though you bring choice fellowship offerings,

I will have no regard for them.

Amos 5:23  ¶          Away with the noise of your songs!

I will not listen to the music of your harps.

Amos 5:24  ¶          But let justice roll on like a river,

righteousness like a never-failing stream!

Amos 5:25  ¶          “Did you bring me sacrifices and offerings

forty years in the desert, O house of Israel?

Amos 5:26  ¶          You have lifted up the shrine of your king,

the pedestal of your idols,

the star of your god—

which you made for yourselves.

Amos 5:27  ¶          Therefore I will send you into exile beyond Damascus,”

says the LORD, whose name is God Almighty.

 

Prov. 14:31  ¶          He who oppresses the poor shows contempt for their Maker,

but whoever is kind to the needy honors God.

 

Prov. 19:17  ¶          He who is kind to the poor lends to the LORD,

and he will reward him for what he has done.

 

Prov. 29:7  ¶          The righteous care about justice for the poor,

but the wicked have no such concern.

1John 3:16  ¶          This is how we know what love is: Jesus Christ laid down his life for us. And we ought to lay down our lives for our brothers.

1John 3:17 If anyone has material possessions and sees his brother in need but has no pity on him, how can the love of God be in him?

1John 3:18 Dear children, let us not love with words or tongue but with actions and in truth.

Is. 58:6  ¶          “Is not this the kind of fasting I have chosen:

to loose the chains of injustice

and untie the cords of the yoke,

to set the oppressed free

and break every yoke?

Is. 59:15  ¶          Truth is nowhere to be found,

and whoever shuns evil becomes a prey.

The LORD looked and was displeased

that there was no justice.

Is. 59:16  ¶          He saw that there was no one,

he was appalled that there was no one to intervene;

so his own arm worked salvation for him,

and his own righteousness sustained him.

Matt. 6:10  ¶          your kingdom come,

your will be done

on earth as it is in heaven.

Is. 1:11  ¶          “The multitude of your sacrifices—

what are they to me?” says the LORD.

“I have more than enough of burnt offerings,

of rams and the fat of fattened animals;  ¶          I have no pleasure

in the blood of bulls and lambs and goats.

Is. 1:12  ¶          When you come to appear before me,

who has asked this of you,

this trampling of my courts?

Is. 1:13  ¶          Stop bringing meaningless offerings!

Your incense is detestable to me. ¶          New Moons, Sabbaths and convocations—

I cannot bear your evil assemblies.

Is. 1:14  ¶          Your New Moon festivals and your appointed feasts

my soul hates.  ¶          They have become a burden to me;

I am weary of bearing them.

Is. 1:15  ¶          When you spread out your hands in prayer,

I will hide my eyes from you;

even if you offer many prayers,

I will not listen.  ¶          Your hands are full of blood;

Is. 1:16                   wash and make yourselves clean.

Take your evil deeds

out of my sight!  ¶          Stop doing wrong,

Is. 1:17                   learn to do right!  ¶          Seek justice,

encourage the oppressed.  ¶          Defend the cause of the fatherless,

plead the case of the widow.

James 1:27 Religion that God our Father accepts as pure and faultless is this: to look after orphans and widows in their distress and to keep oneself from being polluted by the world.

Jer. 22:1 ¶          This is what the LORD says: “Go down to the palace of the king of Judah and proclaim this message there:

Jer. 22:2 ‘Hear the word of the LORD, O king of Judah, you who sit on David’s throne—you, your officials and your people who come through these gates.

Jer. 22:3 This is what the LORD says: Do what is just and right. Rescue from the hand of his oppressor the one who has been robbed. Do no wrong or violence to the alien, the fatherless or the widow, and do not shed innocent blood in this place.

Jer. 22:4 For if you are careful to carry out these commands, then kings who sit on David’s throne will come through the gates of this palace, riding in chariots and on horses, accompanied by their officials and their people.

Jer. 22:5 But if you do not obey these commands, declares the LORD, I swear by myself that this palace will become a ruin.’”

Jer. 22:11 For this is what the LORD says about Shallum son of Josiah, who succeeded his father as king of Judah but has gone from this place: “He will never return.

Jer. 22:12 He will die in the place where they have led him captive; he will not see this land again.”

Jer. 22:13  ¶          “Woe to him who builds his palace by unrighteousness,

his upper rooms by injustice,

making his countrymen work for nothing,

not paying them for their labor.

Jer. 22:14  ¶          He says, ‘I will build myself a great palace

with spacious upper rooms.’ ¶          So he makes large windows in it,

panels it with cedar

and decorates it in red.

Jer. 22:15  ¶          “Does it make you a king

to have more and more cedar? ¶          Did not your father have food and drink?

He did what was right and just,

so all went well with him.

Jer. 22:16  ¶          He defended the cause of the poor and needy,

and so all went well. ¶          Is that not what it means to know me?”

declares the LORD.

Jer. 22:17  ¶          “But your eyes and your heart

are set only on dishonest gain,

on shedding innocent blood

and on oppression and extortion.”

Luke 12:13  ¶          Someone in the crowd said to him, “Teacher, tell my brother to divide the inheritance with me.”

Luke 12:14  ¶          Jesus replied, “Man, who appointed me a judge or an arbiter between you?”

Luke 12:15 Then he said to them, “Watch out! Be on your guard against all kinds of greed; a man’s life does not consist in the abundance of his possessions.”

Luke 12:16  ¶          And he told them this parable: “The ground of a certain rich man produced a good crop.

Luke 12:17 He thought to himself, ‘What shall I do? I have no place to store my crops.’

Luke 12:18  ¶          “Then he said, ‘This is what I’ll do. I will tear down my barns and build bigger ones, and there I will store all my grain and my goods.

Luke 12:19 And I’ll say to myself, “You have plenty of good things laid up for many years. Take life easy; eat, drink and be merry.” ’

Luke 12:20  ¶          “But God said to him, ‘You fool! This very night your life will be demanded from you. Then who will get what you have prepared for yourself?’

Luke 12:21  ¶          “This is how it will be with anyone who stores up things for himself but is not rich toward God.”

Luke 4:16  ¶          He went to Nazareth, where he had been brought up, and on the Sabbath day he went into the synagogue, as was his custom. And he stood up to read.

Luke 4:17 The scroll of the prophet Isaiah was handed to him. Unrolling it, he found the place where it is written:

Luke 4:18  ¶          “The Spirit of the Lord is on me,

because he has anointed me

to preach good news to the poor. ¶          He has sent me to proclaim freedom for the prisoners

and recovery of sight for the blind,

to release the oppressed,

Luke 4:19                   to proclaim the year of the Lord’s favor.”

Luke 4:20  ¶          Then he rolled up the scroll, gave it back to the attendant and sat down. The eyes of everyone in the synagogue were fastened on him,

Luke 4:21 and he began by saying to them, “Today this scripture is fulfilled in your hearing.”

Deut. 10:18 He defends the cause of the fatherless and the widow, and loves the alien, giving him food and clothing.

Deut. 10:19 And you are to love those who are aliens, for you yourselves were aliens in Egypt.

Deut. 24:17  ¶          Do not deprive the alien or the fatherless of justice, or take the cloak of the widow as a pledge.

Deut. 24:18 Remember that you were slaves in Egypt and the LORD your God redeemed you from there. That is why I command you to do this.

Deut. 24:19  ¶          When you are harvesting in your field and you overlook a sheaf, do not go back to get it. Leave it for the alien, the fatherless and the widow, so that the LORD your God may bless you in all the work of your hands.

Deut. 24:20 When you beat the olives from your trees, do not go over the branches a second time. Leave what remains for the alien, the fatherless and the widow.

Deut. 24:21 When you harvest the grapes in your vineyard, do not go over the vines again. Leave what remains for the alien, the fatherless and the widow.

Deut. 24:22 Remember that you were slaves in Egypt. That is why I command you to do this.

Deut. 27:19 ¶                            “Cursed is the man who withholds justice from the alien, the fatherless or the widow.”

Then all the people shall say,

“Amen!”

Psa. 10:14          But you, O God, do see trouble and grief;

you consider it to take it in hand. ¶          The victim commits himself to you;

you are the helper of the fatherless.

Psa. 10:17          You hear, O LORD, the desire of the afflicted;

you encourage them, and you listen to their cry,

Psa. 10:18          defending the fatherless and the oppressed,

in order that man, who is of the earth, may terrify no more.

 

Psa. 82:3          Defend the cause of the weak and fatherless;

maintain the rights of the poor and oppressed.

Psa. 82:4          Rescue the weak and needy;

deliver them from the hand of the wicked.

 

Is. 10:1  ¶          Woe to those who make unjust laws,

to those who issue oppressive decrees,

Is. 10:2          to deprive the poor of their rights

and withhold justice from the oppressed of my people,

making widows their prey

and robbing the fatherless.

Jer. 22:3 This is what the LORD says: Do what is just and right. Rescue from the hand of his oppressor the one who has been robbed. Do no wrong or violence to the alien, the fatherless or the widow, and do not shed innocent blood in this place.

Zech. 7:9 “This is what the LORD Almighty says: ‘Administer true justice; show mercy and compassion to one another.

Zech. 7:10 Do not oppress the widow or the fatherless, the alien or the poor. In your hearts do not think evil of each other.’

Zech. 7:11    “But they refused to pay attention; stubbornly they turned their backs and stopped up their ears.

Zech. 7:12 They made their hearts as hard as flint and would not listen to the law or to the words that the LORD Almighty had sent by his Spirit through the earlier prophets. So the LORD Almighty was very angry.

 

Show your support of Noah's content via Patreon to help create more frequent blog posts and podcast episodes.