It’s a Beautiful Day for a Neighbor. Will You Be Mine?
Introduction: Jesus was a master storyteller, and one of His best is the story of the Good Samaritan. It’s an interesting thing about familiar stories, however. Sometimes they become so familiar that we assume we know more about them than we really do. Sometimes we need to take a step back and look at the story from a fresh angle. I hope we will be able to do that this morning.
Please follow along in your Bible as I read Luke 10:25-37:
On one occasion an expert in the law stood up to test Jesus. “Teacher,” he asked, “what must I do to inherit eternal life?”
“What is written in the Law?” he replied. “How do you read it?”
He answered: “‘Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your strength and with all your mind’ ; and, ‘Love your neighbor as yourself.'”
“You have answered correctly,” Jesus replied. “Do this and you will live.”
But he wanted to justify himself, so he asked Jesus, “And who is my neighbor?”
In reply Jesus said: “A man was going down from Jerusalem to Jericho, when he fell into the hands of robbers. They stripped him of his clothes, beat him and went away, leaving him half dead. A priest happened to be going down the same road, and when he saw the man, he passed by on the other side. So too, a Levite, when he came to the place and saw him, passed by on the other side. But a Samaritan, as he traveled, came where the man was; and when he saw him, he took pity on him. He went to him and bandaged his wounds, pouring on oil and wine. Then he put the man on his own donkey, took him to an inn and took care of him. The next day he took out two silver coins and gave them to the innkeeper. ‘Look after him,’ he said, ‘and when I return, I will reimburse you for any extra expense you may have.'”
“Which of these three do you think was a neighbor to the man who fell into the hands of robbers?”
The expert in the law replied, “The one who had mercy on him.”
Jesus told him, “Go and do likewise.”
The outline we are using today comes straight out of the text. An expert in the law engages Jesus in a dialogue. In Round One the scholar asks a question. Jesus responds with another question, the scholar answers, and Jesus offers an exhortation. In Round Two the exact same format unfolds: question, question, answer, exhortation.
Round One of a dialogue between a religious scholar and Jesus
The scholar’s first question: “What must I do to inherit eternal life?” We don’t know when or where this dialogue occurred, but we do know who and why. The NIV refers to this man as “an expert in the Law.” Though he is called a lawyer in some of our Bibles, he is not a lawyer in the modern sense of the term; rather he is what we would call a biblical scholar. He was trained in Hebrew, in hermeneutics (the science of interpretation), history, and most of all in the fine points of the Mosaic Law.
The reason the dialogue occurs is not because the scholar is seeking information, but rather because he wants to test Jesus. The Greek term used here for “test” is the same term used in the account of Jesus’ temptation. Satan, you will recall, laid three great temptations before Jesus, only to have Jesus respond, “You shall not test or tempt the Lord your God.” Well, this lawyer is doing exactly what Jesus rebuked Satan for doing. Why is he doing it? Probably in order to trick Him. Often the religious leaders of Israel, threatened by this upstart from Nazareth, would ask Jesus thorny questions in the hope that He would anger one religious faction or the other with His answer, and then they would be justified in eliminating Him. But He always impaled them on the horns of their own dilemmas.
The scholar’s question has to do with eternal life and how one obtains it. Every human being must at some time ponder this question because we are all created with eternity in our hearts. Every society, every tribe, every race, every religion has had the same basic quest: how can we know for sure that life will continue after death, and that we will enjoy paradise, as opposed to hell. It strikes me as odd that we have here a biblical scholar asking a layman, Jesus, how to inherit eternal life. Odd, but not unusual. Biblical scholars are like economic experts or stock market gurus. They’re a dime a dozen, and too often their advice amounts to the blind leading the blind. This scholar, though an expert in religion, doesn’t possess eternal life himself, and he doesn’t have a clue how to get it.
This scholar reveals his ignorance by asking Jesus for something to do to inherit eternal life. The tense of the verb here indicates he is thinking, “What one great sacrifice must I make? What one heroic act must I perform? What great pilgrimage must I take?” He clearly believed in some kind of salvation by works. And we shouldn’t be surprised at this, for every religion known to man other than biblical Christianity teaches some form of salvation by works. Only biblical Christianity teaches that it is impossible to do anything to inherit salvation. Instead it is a gift from God, generated by divine grace.
Jesus knows, of course, that the man is trying to trip Him up, so He avoids the trap by answering the scholar’s question with a question of His own.
Jesus’ question: “What is written in the Law?” It is highly appropriate that Jesus refer him to the Law because this man is supposed to be an expert in the Law. The Law was supposed to be Israel’s guidebook in all matters of religion and morals. What does it say about the way to inherit eternal life?
The scholar’s answer: “Love God and your neighbor.” He actually puts two key Old Testament passages together – Deuteronomy 6:5 and Leviticus 19:18, and comes up with the following summary of the Law: “Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your strength and with all your mind, and, Love your neighbor as yourself.”
Now frankly, this is not a bad answer, and we would commend the scholar if there were any evidence that he really believed it or lived it. Clearly, though, he is citing a creed here, not expressing the real attitude of his heart.
Jesus’ exhortation: “Do this and you will live.” Now one might have expected Jesus to answer the man by correcting his theology. Why doesn’t He say, “There’s nothing you can do to inherit eternal life; it is a matter of believing, not achieving,” for that’s really what the rest of the New Testament teaches? But instead, He chooses to accept the man’s answer at face value, because Jesus knows that the Scripture passages quoted assume an attitude of faith. Can a person possibly love God with all his heart, soul, mind, and strength and love his neighbor as himself if he has not put his faith in God? No, it would be impossible.
But even if one takes the position that Jesus is giving the man something to do in order to earn eternal life, He does not affirm that this is actually possible. The verb Jesus uses here is a present imperative and should really be translated, “Do this continually and you will live.” Yes, he who observes the law perfectly will live. He who always loves God and his fellow man will inherit eternal life. The problem is, no one has, and no one can. It seems that Jesus is trying to drive this man to the point of recognizing his spiritual need, but he is not interested. In fact, what he does is to instigate a second round in the dialogue by asking another question.
Round Two between the religious scholar and Jesus
The scholar’s question: “Who is my neighbor?” Once again this is not a question for information. His first question was to trip Jesus up. This second question is asked, according to verse 29, because he wanted to justify himself. What does that mean? I think it means he is trying to justify a guilty conscience. He knows he has not met the qualifications of the Law. He knows he has not loved the Lord his God with all his heart, soul, strength and mind. He knows instinctively that he does not love his neighbor as himself. But instead of casting himself humbly upon the mercy of God, he looks for an excuse, trying to suppress his own guilt.
This man does what many after him have done – he tries to deflect the searchlight of the truth by raising an intellectual problem: “Who is my neighbor?” The focus of the Law was upon the responsibility to love, but he focuses instead on the definition of neighbor.
Now there was plenty of precedent among the religious leaders of Jesus’ time for debating this issue. You can find in their writings extensive discussions of just who is and who is not a neighbor. Most agreed that a neighbor had to be a fellow Jew. The Pharisees went further and excluded everyone who was not a Pharisee. A rabbinical ruling held that heretics, informers, and renegades did not qualify and “should be pushed into the ditch and not pulled out.”
A very popular saying made it clear that a personal enemy did not have to be treated as a neighbor. Jesus addressed that very view in the Sermon on the Mount: “You have heard that it was said, ‘Love your neighbor and hate your enemy.’ But I tell you: Love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you.” (Matthew 5:43-44)
The scholar undoubtedly knows about this age-old debate over who is a neighbor, and he decides to use it to his advantage. He is asking in effect, “Where are the limits of the duty to love?” It’s almost as though he is asking, “How little must I do in terms of loving and still have eternal life? Where does my responsibility end?” In fact, he may be even more blameworthy. He may be thinking, “As long as it is not clear who my neighbor is (and it never will be altogether clear, he concludes with some relief, perhaps even chuckling to himself), I am not obliged to practice love. After all, how can I love when I don’t know whom I am supposed to love?”
I have known people like this lawyer. They love to debate religious issues and to talk endlessly about theological dilemmas. But it never translates into daily living; it never results in godly action. I have to watch the tendency in my own life. I love to study. I love to wrestle with theological issues. It’s pretty easy to adopt a habit of thinking that correct views are an end in themselves. They are not. Good theology must always result in right living, or it is worthless. Worse than that; it could bring judgment upon us.
Jesus replies to the scholar’s question with a question. But the question is preceded by a story, the parable of the Good Samaritan. It concerns an unknown victim, some unknown robbers, a certain priest, a Levite, and a Samaritan. The victim, undoubtedly a Jew, fell into the hands of robbers on a very lonely and dangerous stretch of road. It is only about 17 miles from Jerusalem to Jericho, but the road goes through very rugged country. The elevation drops about 3,000 feet in those 17 miles, so the terrain is very steep, and there are numerous caves and canyons in which bandits could hide. I have been there, and it’s not unlike the Badlands of South Dakota or the Superstition mountains of Arizona.
The priest and the Levite (in our parlance it’s like saying, “A pastor and an elder”) are two passers-by who ignore the victim. Now we can try to probe the minds of these two religious leaders, but it might be better for one of them, the Levite, to speak for himself.
DRAMA:
Hello, Honey, I’m home!
Shalom to you too, Eli. How were things in Jericho?
Oh, fine. My seminar on brotherly love was very well received. But I sure am bushed! That is a long, hard road between Jericho and here. I don’t know where you would go to find 17 miles more rugged than that.
I know, Eli, and that’s what scares me so. That highway is so dangerous, especially at night. I wish you wouldn’t take the trip by yourself.
Well, I’m home, aren’t I? So let’s quit worrying about it.
Did you see any wrecks today along the road?
No, there didn’t seem to be any particular problems. Wait, come to think of it, there was one wreck – he looked to be about 5’4″, kind of dark.
Well, who was he?
I don’t know. Don’t believe I’ve ever seen him before. But then, it was pretty hard to tell. Those robbers had made a bloody pulp out of him.
What did you do for him?
Who me? Oh, I don’t think there was anything I could do for him. I think he was probably already dead.
Didn’t you check to make sure?
Honey, I’m not a doctor and you know the rules. If that guy were dead and I got within twelve feet of him I’d be unclean for seven days and wouldn’t be able to attend temple next Saturday and deliver my seminar there.
You mean the one on brotherly love?
Now come on, you’re giving me a hard time. What did you expect me to do? Why, those bandits that did him in could have been waiting to jump me, too, if I’d stopped. And then where would you be? Or the guy could have been diseased.
Well, you’ve got a point there.
Besides about 30 minutes before I came upon this guy, I passed a Samaritan …
Oh, yuck!
You can say that again! He was resting his donkey on the side of the road and I picked up speed after I passed him. You know how those Samaritans are. Why, if I had stopped to check on that poor guy, and that Samaritan had caught up with me, he’d probably have killed us both.
Yeah, that’s the way they are. Boy, it just scares me to think what could have happened to you. Eli, I think we ought to thank God for His protection.
Yeah, let’s. “O God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob, we thank you for calling out your people of Israel, for giving us the truth, for loving us more than any other people. Thank you for your constant care and protection. Particularly I am thankful that the wicked Samaritan I passed today was not allowed to work his evil intentions upon one of your children. And thank you for saving me from the fate of that poor soul on the road today. God, if he was not a believing Jew, may he somehow be spared so that your grace could reach him. Praise be to your holy name. Amen.”
In this brief sketch we’ve been introduced to the hero of our story, a Samaritan. Now think with me for a moment. If you had been in Jesus’ audience, who would you expect the hero to have been? A pastor had the opportunity to help and didn’t. An elder had the opportunity and didn’t. Who would you expect to come through? A layman! That would have been expected, especially from someone like Jesus, who was suspected of having an anti-clerical bent. After all, He was frequently in conflict with the Scribes, Pharisees and Sadducees. He frequently called them whitewashed tombs, hypocrites, and snakes.
Jesus could have gotten a real rise from this expert in the Law and from His entire audience if He had made the hero a Jewish layman. But Jesus goes further. He makes him a Samaritan layman. That’s tantamount to having a Serbian hero in a story you’re relating to a Bosnian audience, or like having a Jewish hero with a Palestinian audience.
There was incredibly bad blood between the Jews and the Samaritans. Do you remember the incident in John 4 when Jesus meets a Samaritan woman at Jacob’s well just outside of the town of Sychar? When he asked her for a drink, she responded, “How is it that you, being a Jew, ask me for a drink, since I am a Samaritan woman?” (John 4:9, NASB). That just wasn’t done.
Actually the worst thing a Jew could think to call someone was a “Samaritan.” In John 8, after the Jewish leaders call Jesus a liar and a bastard, they ask him in verse 48, “Aren’t we right in saying that you are a Samaritan and demon-possessed?” Now they knew he wasn’t a Samaritan. This is a racial slur they are laying on him. Fortunately, we don’t use racial slurs anymore today to stereotype people and to win arguments, but, believe it or not, they did such things back in ancient times!
Imagine how the audience must have reacted when Jesus made a Samaritan the hero of His story. It was probably all they could do to hold their composure. But Jesus is not just trying to agitate them; He is using the man’s race to make a major point: a neighbor is not just someone who lives next door or someone like us, nor someone who has earned our favor. All people are our neighbors, because all men are created in God’s image and are loved by him. In his Sermon on the Mount, Jesus told his disciples,
“Love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you, that you may be sons of your Father in heaven. He causes his sun to rise on the evil and the good, and sends rain on the righteous and the unrighteous. If you love those who love you, what reward will you get? Are not even the tax collectors doing that? And if you greet only your brothers, what are you doing more than others? Do not even pagans do that?” (Matthew 5:44-45).
The point comes through loud and clear that our focus should not be on “who is my neighbor?”,especially in an attempt to limit my responsibility, but rather it should be on the question, “To whom can I be a neighbor?” Mr. Rogers really does ask the right question when he says, “It’s a beautiful day for a neighbor. Will you be mine?”
Let’s take a closer look at the Samaritan’s actions so we can see what made him different from the two clergymen who passed by.
First, he saw the man and took pity on him. The priest and the Levite saw the man also, but they did not see with the eye of compassion as he did.
Second, he refused to categorize the man out of his life. I think we often justify our lack of love and hospitality to people by categorizing them as alcoholic, hopelessly lazy, backslidden, divorced, or some other category that lessens our obligation to reach out to them. He refused to do that.
Third, the Samaritan got very personal in his neighborliness. He didn’t call up an agency. He didn’t call up his pastor and say, “Hey, there’s a guy out on the road who could use some counseling” (or perhaps last rites). He didn’t flag down the next passerby, he didn’t appoint a committee, he didn’t take the man’s name and address to add to his mailing list for holiday fruitcakes. No, the Samaritan got down on his knees, in the dirt, beside the man’s bleeding form, and he dressed the wounds with his own hands. He poured oil and wine on the wounds, then put the man on his own beast, and he walked him to an inn.
Fourth, the Samaritan was flexible. He didn’t determine ahead of time when he would do his good deeds. Oh, he may have done regular visitation to shut-ins on Saturdays; he may have taken part in the jail service on the second Thursday of each month. But he also had the capacity to take advantage of an opportunity to show love when it turned up unexpectedly.
Fifth, the Samaritan was willing to sacrifice in order to be a neighbor. The oil and wine were probably of insignificant cost, but the innkeeper’s charge could have been significant. And when he gave the innkeeper his Master Card to pay for extra expenses, that had the potential of adding up.
There are many who are willing to make a monetary sacrifice for the needy. It’s called “checkbook charity.” What is far more costly is when we offer our time and personal involvement. The Samaritan was willing to give both time and money.
Finally, the Samaritan was willing to take risks in order to be a neighbor. There was danger on this road – obviously the victim had been beaten; the same robbers could be waiting for him. What if the man was diseased? What if he came to, and became violent? What about the danger to the Samaritan’s reputation? When he got back to Samaria he could be in big trouble if any of his friends discovered that he had stopped to help a Jew.
Now following this simple but profound story Jesus asks a second question:
Jesus’ second question: “Which of these three (the priest, the Levite, or the Samaritan) do you think was a neighbor to the man who fell into the hands of robbers?”
The scholar’s answer: “The one who had mercy on him.” Do you notice something here? The man is unwilling to even say the word, “Samaritan.” His answer is very grudging.
Jesus’ second exhortation: “Go and do likewise.” I am convinced that the purpose of this story is not to tell us how to find eternal life. I know that was the scholar’s original question. But I think the purpose of Jesus is to reveal to the man the depth of his spiritual depravity. The man’s motive in initiating the dialogue in the first place was to trip Jesus up, and his motive in continuing the dialogue is to justify himself. Even though he can quote Scripture, his goal is to minimize its impact on his life. Even though he can answer Jesus’ question correctly, he reveals in his answer the prejudice and sin that are in his heart. Jesus wants to reveal all that.
But Jesus has a purpose for us too. He wants us to recognize that orthodoxy is not sufficient; we need orthopraxy too. That may not be a word, but it should be. If orthodoxy is right doctrine, orthopraxy is right practice. Faith without works is dead, according to the Apostle James. We don’t inherit eternal life by good works, but the absence of good works is clear evidence that we do not have saving faith.
Jesus wants us to take stock of our lives today and to examine the degree to which our faith is impacting our lives. The question, “Who is my neighbor?” may have been difficult to answer 2,000 years ago; it is even more difficult today. Modern mobility sometimes brings us across the path of thousands of people a day. We walk by them at a mall, sit next to them in an airplane, or jostle against them at a football game. All have needs. The mass media complicates the issue by making us instantly aware of starving people in Ethiopia or persecuted people in Bosnia. There seem to be endless claims with no boundaries.
Sometimes we justify our failure to be a neighbor by saying, “There are so many needs out there, and I can’t help everybody.” True. We can’t house every homeless person. We can’t support every Christian work we are asked to help. We can’t put every needy student through college. And certainly not every cry we hear becomes our personal or permanent assignment. But we can do something, and we must do something when the needy are right in our path.
That is the one issue we cannot escape in this story. The neighbor I must help is the one who crosses my path, the one whom I must consciously step over or around if I do not step up to help. In the end we will be judged not just by the creed we hold, but also by the lives we have lived.
Tags:
Neighbor
Orthodoxy
Orthopraxy