Almost every neighborhood has one: the kid who always gets picked on. But sometimes an advocate - a protector - steps up on the kid's behalf and says, "If you mess with him, you mess with me!" The poor have such an advocate in God. When we treat the less fortunate with compassion, we are, in effect, doing it as unto God Himself. Likewise, Proverbs 19:17 states that, "He who is kind to the poor lends to the Lord, and the Lord will reward him for what he has done." God can identify with the poor because His own Son held that status when he was here on Earth.