God, I can’t help but to pray at this point for my son who we’re in the process of adopting, and have been waiting for over a year to go and bring into our home, but have been unable to because of COVID. So, God, we pray that with this standing as your bride, this standing as your children, your sons and daughters, with you as our Father, we pray that you would help us to faithfully care for orphans and widows around us So, God, we pray that you would help us as your people today, brought into your family as your children by the blood of Jesus, wed to you. That you and I have been called by God as his people to take responsibility to care for widows and to care for orphans. Even more so it is for God’s people today. Not only not to mistreat a widow or fatherless child, but to look after orphans and widows in their distress.ĭid you hear that? What the New Testament teaches, what God says to his new covenant people, “Religion that I accept as pure and faultless is this, looking after,” and the word for look after there means to take responsibility to care for, “orphans and widows in their distress.” And so we know this command in the Old Testament dealing with widows and fatherless children in Exodus Chapter 22, Verse 22 was not just for God’s people then. Religion, that God our Father accepts as pure and faultless, is this.

We look in the New Testament, where do we see commands from Jesus? Where do we see commands under the new covenant in different places all throughout the New Testament?Īnd this is why I read Exodus Chapter 22, Verse 22, because the command here is, “You shall not mistreat any widow or fatherless child.” So we should pause and ask, “Well, does the New Testament say anything about widows, or fatherless children, orphans?” And you think about James 1:27 and it actually takes this command to a whole nother level. Many of the laws that are given here in Exodus and Leviticus apply specifically to God’s people, the people of Israel, in the Old Testament, under the old covenant. The general rule is we look for laws from the Old Testament that are reiterated in the New Testament. There’s a lot that we could talk about here when it comes to which of these laws apply to God’s people today. What’s interesting as we read through Exodus 21, 22, 23 and different places here in Exodus as well as Leviticus, we see all kinds of laws that God gives to his people in the Old Testament. “You shall not mistreat any widow or fatherless child.” -Exodus 22:22

Bible take care of widows and orphans