The Cost of Compassion

Pastor David Jeremiah tells a story about Bob Pierce. Pierce had advanced leukemia. But he went to visit a friend in Indonesia before he died. As they were walking through a small village, they came upon a young girl lying on a bamboo mat next to a river. She was dying of cancer. And she only had a short time to live.

Bob was upset. He said, "Why isn’t she in a clinic? Why isn’t someone taking care of her?" But his friend explained that she was from the jungle. And she wished to spend her last days next to the river, where it was cool and familiar. As Bob gazed at her, he felt such compassion that he got down on his knees in the mud, took her hand, and began stroking it. Although she didn’t understand him, he prayed for her.

Afterward she looked up and said something. "What did she say?" Bob asked his friend. His friend replied, "She said, ’If I could only sleep again, if I could only sleep again.’"

Bob began to weep. Then he reached into his pocket and took out his own sleeping pills, the ones his doctor had given him because the pain from his leukemia was too great for him to sleep at night.

He handed the bottle to his friend. "You make sure this young lady gets a good night’s sleep," he said, "as long as these pills last."

Bob was ten days away from where he could get his prescription refilled. That meant ten painful and restless nights

Even though Bob Pierce was from the other side of the world. He was a neighbor to this young lady. He was a Good Samaritan.