Life has two sides to a coin. The rich and the successful and the poor and downtrodden. In our excited jubilation, we do not care nor think of the teeming millions who are not so fortunate. The widows, the orphans, the poor, and the physically and mentally challenged are the unfortunate who are continuously crying to God to come to their rescue. Did it ever cross our mind that they also want to enjoy life and require someone to help them and lift them up? That to the God we pray they also cry to Him.
The attitude of the Lord towards the widows and the fatherless is amazing. James 1:27 “Religion that is pure and undefiled before God, the Father, is this: to visit orphans and widows in their affliction, and to keep oneself unstained from the world.” Yahweh, the Great is the father of the fatherless and the protector of all those left at the mercy of man's rapacious greed and ruthlessness.
In the scriptures, we learn that God steps in to fill the role of protecting and caring for orphans and widows. “A father to the fatherless, a defender of widows, is God in his holy dwelling” Psalm 68:5. If we tend to prey on the helpless, let it be a warning to all that, nothing escapes God’s notice, and He will avenge the orphans and widows. “You, LORD, hear the desire of the afflicted; you encourage them, and you listen to their cry, defending the fatherless and the oppressed so that mere earthly mortals will never again strike terror” (Psalm 10:17–18).
The Word of the Lord instructs us not to take advantage of the widow and the fatherless. In fact, we are told that we will give account for lording our power over others.
• Woe to those who make unjust laws, to those who issue oppressive decrees, to deprive the poor of their rights and withhold justice from the oppressed of my people, making widows their prey and robbing the fatherless. What will you do on the day of reckoning, when disaster comes from afar? To whom will you run for help? Where will you leave your riches? — Isaiah 10:1–3
• Do not take advantage of the widow or the fatherless. If you do and they cry out to me, I will certainly hear their cry. — Exodus 22:22–23
• He defends the cause of the fatherless and the widow and loves the foreigner residing among you, giving them food and clothing. — Deuteronomy 10:18
• Do not move an ancient boundary stone or encroach on the fields of the fatherless. — Proverbs 23:10
In the Bible, God places special concern on vulnerable or marginalized people.
• Learn to do right; seek justice. Defend the oppressed. Take up the cause of the fatherless; plead the case of the widow. — Isaiah 1:17
• Defend the weak and the fatherless; uphold the cause of the poor and the oppressed. — Psalm 82:3
• 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. — James 1:27
Dr Ashwin Drummond