the Week of Christ the King / Proper 29 / Ordinary 34
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Bible Dictionaries
Begging
Hawker's Poor Man's Concordance And Dictionary
or I could not prevail upon myself to pass over this word, though it be perfectly well understood, and is not frequently found in Scripture: yet, it appears to me, that as the Word of God hath made ample provision, not only in precept, but in the very constitution and frame of the human heart, for beggars, it is our duty to attend to it. (Psalms 37:25; Mark 10:46) It should seem, by the precept delivered by Moses, that the Lord thereby intimated that there should be no poor unrelieved among them, in that the Lord had so greatly blessed Israel, that Israel would prevent the necessity of begging; though, for the exercises of their brotherly love, the poor should never cease out of the land. (Deuteronomy 15:4; Deu 7:11) I recommend the reader to consult this whole chapter, from whence he will form better ideas concerning the mind of the Lord on the character of the beggar, and his own gracious and all-wise appointments of the inequalities of life. And when he hath done this, I would recommend him yet farther to consider the whole subject spiritually, and with an eye to Christ. The brother waxen poor was to be relieved by the nearest of kin; and when he had sold his possession, this brother, born for adversity, was to redeem it. (Leviticus 25:25) Here Jesus, the nearest of kin, was plainly seen. And therefore, the beggar in Israel had always a claim upon every passer-by, who considered duly this relationship. And may I not ask was not this among the gracious designs of the Lord, in his providence, to afford luxuries to the minds of believers, in the true Israel of God, when, from the inequalities of life, the Lord afforded opportunity to follow the steps of Jesus, in relieving a poor brother? How little have those studied the Scriptures of God, and how little do they know of the mind of Jesus, who, to the numberless miseries of life, arising out of that sin which Christ hath put away, can, and do pass by, and behold, unpitied, and unrelieved, the wretchedness of the beggar, whether in soul or body!
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Hawker, Robert D.D. Entry for 'Begging'. Hawker's Poor Man's Concordance and Dictionary. https://www.studylight.org/dictionaries/eng/pmd/b/begging.html. London. 1828.
