來自倫敦的律師亞歷山大．麥克林（Alexander McLean）在接受採訪時談道：「有時我們一旦看到某些事，就再也無法視而不見。」他在18歲時前往烏干達，參與監獄及臨終關懷的工作。他在那裡看到無法視而不見的場景：一個老人無助地躺臥在廁所旁邊。麥克林照顧他五天，直到他去世。

這段經歷激發麥克林的熱忱，當他取得法律學位之後，便回到非洲去幫助被忽視的群體。最終他創立正義捍衛者組織，為囚犯伸張正義、爭取權益。

有許多人的生活景況是我們一旦看見了，就無法視而不見的，只可惜我們都沒有看見。先知耶利米因國家遭難而哀嘆，訴說沒人看見他的痛苦。他哭喊：「所有過路的人啊！你們毫不在意嗎？你們要細察要觀看，有沒有痛苦像我所受的痛苦。」（耶利米哀歌1章12節，新譯本）

耶利米不僅為自己，也為所有受逼迫的人感到心碎。他反問道：「人把地上所有被囚的，都踐踏在腳下，或在至高者面前，屈枉正直，⋯⋯主不都看見嗎？」（3章34-36節，同上）但他仍看到希望並且說：「主必不永遠丟棄人。」又說：「主啊，祢申明了我的冤，祢救贖了我的命。」（31、58節）

我們周遭有許多人常被忽視。那位救贖我們的上帝會賜給我們力量，讓我們看見並服事他們。

“Sometimes in life we see things that we can’t unsee,” Alexander McLean told a 60 Minutes interviewer. The South Londoner was eighteen when he went to Uganda to assist in prison and hospice work. That’s where he saw something he couldn’t unsee—an old man lying helpless next to a toilet. For five days McLean cared for him. Then the man died.

The experience ignited a passion in McLean. He earned his law degree and returned to Africa to help the marginalized. Eventually he founded Justice Defenders, an organization that advocates for prisoners.

Many people live in conditions we couldn’t “unsee” if we were to see them. But we don’t see them. In his lament for his devastated homeland, the prophet Jeremiah poured out his heart over his sense of being unseen. “Is it nothing to you, all you who pass by?” he cried. “Look around and see. Is any suffering like my suffering?” (Lamentations 1:12).

Jeremiah’s heart ached not only for himself but for all the oppressed as well. “To crush underfoot all prisoners in the land, to deny people their rights . . . would not the Lord see such things?” he asked rhetorically (3:34-36). Yet he saw hope. “No one is cast off by the Lord forever,” he said. “You, Lord, took up my case; you redeemed my life” (vv. 31, 58).

The “unseen” are all around us. God, who has redeemed us, calls us to see and serve them as He enables us.