“UNTO ME”
The Religious Quality of Social
Work
When Jesus
looked forward to the great climax of History, the Last Judgment, he saw it as
a process by which the inner significance of their own actions and relations
would be revealed to men. Those men on his right hand whom he welcomed to their
reward had never realized the high quality of their own actions. Here was a man
who had seen a work-mate in the heat of the harvest-time eating a crust, and he
had shared the contents of his dinner-pail with him and gone on half-rations
himself. Here was another who had seen a foot-sore and dusty stranger limping
into the village at dusk, and had taken him home, helped him clean up, and
turned over his bed to him while he slept on the earthen floor. That one yonder
had restored the self-respect of a poor neighbor by setting him up in a new
suit of clothes. This one had visited a poor debtor pining in prison and
brought him food and human comfort in his hopelessness. They all thought they
had done it for folks, for dusty, sweaty, tired, discouraged individuals. But
Jesus says: “Oh, no, ye did it unto me. My life is so identified with my
brethren that when ye fed and clothed them, ye fed and clothed me. God is
living in these worn human bodies. When ye comforted them, ye comforted God.”
