When you serve people walking through deep suffering, words can feel fragile. You want to help, but you don’t want to hurt. You want to offer hope, but you don’t want to sound hollow.
That tension is holy ground. It’s the space where compassion and courage meet—the space where we remember that the gospel is not a sales pitch but an invitation into the love of Christ.
Here are three reminders that can strengthen your heart as you share the gospel boldly and gently through compassion ministry:
- Serve from a posture of shared experience.
Scripture tells us that we will all suffer. Suffering is a human experience that does not catch God by surprise. God comforts us in our suffering and uses our suffering to make us more like Jesus. Even if the specifics are different, we know the pain and doubt that suffering brings, and we know how God has met us in our suffering.
- Be comfortable not knowing all the answers.
We will not always have an answer to make people feel better in their suffering. This is okay. We can leave space for them to seek the Lord in the things we do not know and can together turn to the Word to gain a deeper theology of suffering.
- Remember Christ is the answer.
We have the confidence of knowing that Jesus is the answer to our suffering. He is the one who brings ultimate healing and peace. Remember to always lead your conversations back to the truth of Jesus and the gospel. He knows what it means to suffer, and He offers us comfort and help when we believe in Him.
When we serve and speak with humility, the Holy Spirit fills our gaps. Boldness doesn’t mean having all the right words, it means trusting that God’s presence will do what ours cannot.
For more on how to share the gospel through compassion ministry, check out Send Relief’s course on Evangelism in Compassion Ministry.
Published December 17, 2025