I don’t think I’ve ever congratulated Bill Gates publicly (not that he would ever need my endorsement), but I do want to applaud him for urging the UK government to maintain its current level of spending on foreign aid. Despite the undoubted waste, and the misguided use of funds, reducing the current level of aid would inevitably cost lives. And it would disappoint God too.

I am sure of this for two very good reasons. Firstly the God I know is a very generous God. He gives and gives again. It’s His very nature to give, which is why I can point to my second reason: Jesus has told us very clearly that we are to do more than love God with all our hearts; we are to love our neighbour as we love ourselves.

He made this abundantly clear in the Parable of the Good Samaritan, the well-known story that tells of a very caring man who stopped to help a traveller who had been mugged.

If you look at the background to this story you will see that Jesus told it when a rather bumptious young man tried to put Him on the spot. Put simply he was trying to catch him out. But like so many others he failed miserably, and he ended up deeply humbled in the process too.

We often forget just how much hatred existed between Jews and Samaritans in Jesus’ day. Roy Clements summed it up well when he said: “In their culture there was no such thing as a Good Samaritan. As the American cavalry used to say of the Apaches the only Good Samaritan was a dead Samaritan. .. Samaritans were publicly cursed in the synagogues. Petitions daily offered begging God to deny them any participation in eternal life. Many rabbis even said that Jewish beggars should refuse alms from a Samaritan because their very money was contaminated.”

This story must have felt like a slap in the face to those who heard it. It’s certainly carries a sting in the tale because it shows us that as far as Jesus is concerned our ‘neighbour’ can even belong to a group of people we despise or even hate. And it’s not enough to say we haven’t done them any harm. God has given us a very clear signal: we are to do what we can to help anyone in need.

And I have noticed that that the more people try to help others the more God seems to give them - not to wallow in some kind of self indulgent luxury but to offer their needy neighbour the prospect of a better future.

Mrs. May is not ashamed to talk about Christian values and I am sure she knows her Bible well. And it may well be that as she and her party contemplated the whole issue of aid she has remembered that the Bible assures that the God who provides seed for the farmer will also provide us with the resources we need to be generous. In fact. that’s something we would all do well to remember.

Rob James is a Baptist Pastor broadcaster and writer who currently operates as a church and media consultant for the Evangelical Alliance Wales. He is available for preaching and teaching throughout Wales and can be contacted at [email protected]