The Cost of Compassion

Compassion is not just a passing feeling or a fleeting emotion. It is something learned and practiced.

It’s a small thing, really. A drive-through line for the morning coffee. A few extra coins or a tap with your credit card. The stranger behind you.

You’ve heard of people paying for the car behind them at the drive-thru coffee shop window. Sometimes it starts a “pay it forward” chain reaction—ten, twenty cars deep. Other times, it’s just one small gesture, unnoticed except by the one who receives it. Maybe you’ve done it. Maybe you’ve thought about it. Or perhaps, like me, you’ve hesitated.

It’s not that we can’t afford it. It’s only a couple of dollars. It’s not even that we don’t want to be kind. It’s the voice that whispers, “What if he’s ordering more than one coffee? What if she’s not a nice person? What if they’ve got lots of money already and wouldn’t appreciate my kindness?”

We glance in the rearview mirror. Do they drive an old pickup truck or a nice SUV? Are they smoking? Do they look kind? Do they look like us?

And before we know it, compassion becomes a calculation.

I pulled up to a red light at an intersection one afternoon and watched a bedraggled man standing in the center median, slowly walking from car to car, holding a sign that read, “Need Spare Change.” I glanced at the console. No change. I rarely carry cash on me, but I opened my wallet, nonetheless. And you know what I thought? It wasn’t, “I really hope there’s something in here.” It was, “Please don’t let there be a twenty-dollar bill.” Because if there were, I’d have a battle on my hands. For me, $20 is not the difference between making a credit card payment or not. It’s also not the factor between a warm meal and going hungry. The problem was in giving $20 to someone I didn’t know. A stranger.

Was I able to give? Absolutely. Do I want to? No. In fact, I secretly hoped the money wasn’t there, as that would solve the problem for me.

Looking back, what I understand now is that the challenge with generosity is rarely about ability, but about surrender; not whether we can give, but whether we will open our hands when it costs something we value.

Proverbs addressed this hesitation head-on:

It doesn’t ask if the recipient deserves it. It doesn’t ask if the person will be thankful. It doesn’t ask if someone will return the favor. It simply leaves us with the pointed question: when you have the power to act now, will you open your hand immediately?

Ultimately, it serves as a warning against ignoring moments of opportunity. James sharpens it further:

These are heavy words.

Knowing vs Doing

Each act of giving is a two-step process: first the heart, then the hand. God’s commandments address both because He knows how quickly we talk ourselves out of generosity and justify holding it back. In Deuteronomy 15, the Israelites were commanded to lend freely to those in need, even when the sabbatical year was approaching, the year when all debts were to be cancelled:

Each act of giving is a two-step process: first the heart, then the hand. God’s commandments address both because He knows how quickly we talk ourselves out of generosity and justify holding it back.

The warning wasn’t about the duration of the loan; it addressed the likelihood of repayment. Lending early in the cycle carried little risk because repayment could be expected on time. However, lending in the sixth year meant facing the real possibility that the debt would soon be wiped away, and the gift never returned.

It didn’t matter, though. God’s command was the same: Give.

The same principle applies to nearly every law regarding giving. For example, the people weren’t told to offer their leftovers or their blemished animals. They were told to bring their firstfruits. Their finest flour. Their unblemished lamb. The things that were most valuable, most desirable, most difficult to part with. The things you’d be tempted to keep for yourself because they were worth a premium, and after all, hadn’t you worked hard for them? It didn’t matter. The command was still clear: Give.

These laws weren’t really about the physical act, the second step in the process of giving. They were about the first step, an act of surrender, putting trust and reliance in God. This is the idea spoken of in Jeremiah 17:

But blessed is the one who trusts in the LORD, whose confidence is in him. They will be like a tree planted by the water that sends out its roots by the stream. It does not fear when heat comes; its leaves are always green. It has no worries in a year of drought and never fails to bear fruit. (Jeremiah 17:7-8 NIV).

Actions of Avoidance

Sometimes, a lack of compassion doesn’t announce itself in the absence of action. Sometimes it’s revealed in our footsteps, purposeful actions of avoidance.

An unknown man lies beaten on the side of the road. He is nameless, stripped, unconscious. Dehumanized by violence and left half-dead. A priest walks by. Then a Levite. Both are religious men. Both are familiar with the law. Both of them, according to Jesus’ words, “saw him.” But they passed by on the other side. There was no excuse. These weren’t ordinary passersby. These were men set apart for the service of God, the “religious elite,” charged with representing God, upholding His commandments, and guiding others in righteousness. They weren’t unfamiliar with the law. They lived and breathed it. And the law was crystal clear:

If that was the expectation for a fallen animal, how much more for a human being lying broken in the road! In Exodus 23:4–5, the law pushed even further:

If you come across your enemy’s ox or donkey wandering off, be sure to return it… help him with it.

Even enemies were to be helped in distress. Compassion wasn’t optional. It was part of the covenant.

And finally, in Leviticus 19:18 (ESV), the principle is laid bare:

This wasn’t fine print. These are fundamental, cornerstone commandments, well-known, oft quoted, widely taught. And yet the priest and the Levite chose instead to protect themselves. To preserve their ritual purity and their schedules. Or maybe they were afraid. Perhaps they feared a trap. Whatever their reasons, their eyes didn’t fail them. Their compassion did.

And that’s what strikes hardest because we’ve done it too. I know I have. Maybe not on a bloodstained roadside, but in small ways. Avoiding eye contact with the homeless person asking for food, skipping your morning coffee because the person standing outside the door needs some change, throwing something out because it’s too much effort to donate it.

We see. But sometimes, we move to the other side.

Then comes the Samaritan.

He also sees the wounded man. Was the person lying there pious? Did he know his Bible? Had he been drinking? What color was his skin? But instead of contemplation and delaying calculation, the kind that afflicted the two who had gone before and often us today, there’s immediate action. The kind Samaritan kneels beside the man in need and gives him his oil. His wine. His time. His money. Even his reputation was affected because a Samaritan helping a Jew was socially uncomfortable. Their people didn’t mix. His compassion transcended boundaries that had run deep for generations.

In concluding the parable, Jesus doesn’t comment on the cost. He doesn’t praise the generosity. He simply tells the story and lets it land. The ones who should have helped didn’t. The one no one expected to help actually did. “Go and do likewise,” Jesus says.

When Compassion Feels Wasted

There’s another kind of cost to compassion. It’s the emotional currency that is paid when it feels like what we did didn’t make a difference. You gave. You showed up, stayed, listened, forgave, cooked, cleaned, consoled, provided, and prayed. Yet nothing changed. The person walked away. The thank-you never came. The situation didn’t improve. Or worse, it did for a while, then slipped back again.

There’s something deeply disheartening about pouring yourself out only to feel like it evaporated. And yet, God never says compassion would be met with gratitude or results. That isn’t the metric. He just tells us to give.

Boaz gave to Ruth without any assurance of where it would lead. She was a Moabite. A foreigner, a widow, a gleaner in his fields. He didn’t know her story would lead to a legacy. He only saw a hungry woman who needed help and quietly instructed his men: “And also pull out some from the bundles for her and leave it for her to glean, and do not rebuke her.” (Ruth 2:16 ESV). He gave not because it would matter later, but because it mattered in that moment.

Jesus healed ten lepers in Luke 17:11-19. Only one returned to thank Him. Ten lives restored. Nine never came back. Even in the most miraculous acts of compassion, the return isn’t guaranteed.

But maybe that’s the point.

Compassion that demands recognition isn’t compassion—it’s a transaction. When we withhold kindness because it might go unnoticed, we’ve already shifted the focus from others to ourselves.

The Bible is full of moments where kindness seems to dissolve into silence. But those acts still mattered. They mattered to the person, they mattered to the moment, and they mattered to God. Nothing given in love and kindness is ever truly wasted.

What Kind of Giver Are We?

We began with something small: a cup of coffee, a red light, and a twenty-dollar bill. Ordinary moments that barely register, until suddenly they ask something of us. In those moments, we find ourselves deciding what to do: sometimes we give, sometimes we hesitate, and sometimes, if we are honest, we find reasons to cross the road.

But when we set those moments beside the stories we’ve been given in Scripture, we see the kind of people God is calling us to be. Not those who give to receive recognition, or only when it feels safe, but people who give when it costs them something, or when no one is looking, or when it makes no sense, or, especially, when nothing is received in return.

Compassion is not just a passing feeling or a fleeting emotion. It is something learned and practiced. It is a habit that reshapes our hearts. And its measure is not found in applause, or gratitude, or even results. Its measure is found in the example of Jesus, who gave everything out of love—the ultimate cost.

We’re told to open our hearts, then our hands, to loosen our grip, and to give without certainty of return. Because in doing so, we are formed into people who reflect the boundless love we’ve already received from our Heavenly Father. “Go and do likewise.”

Jason Grant,
Barrie Ecclesia, ON