An Instructive Moment About Love

 

"What must I do to inherit eternal life?" 

An "expert in the law", maybe a lawyer, maybe a scribe or religious leader, it's not clear exactly who the man is and its not truly pertinent. It says here that he is trying to "trap" Jesus in an open ended question. Give the wrong answer and we could debate until the back and forth ends up with the man succeeding in trumping the Son of God. Little does he know his answer would lead to his own embarrassment. Jesus leads the redirection of the question to help this "expert" know what really matters. 

After asking him to answer his own question, the Messiah turns thing around by asking a question of his own. The legal expert wants to know what it takes to earn eternal life. Jesus asks the man to share what he knows. He recites the ancient Shema, a prayer that many Jewish people have learned since a young age. 

For many, an extra line of text is added. "And a second is like it, to love your neighbor as yourself." Jesus makes the most of the opportunity to bring his point home with his parable. In this short lived chess game, the expert can't help but take the chance for a check on the King. He asks what seems like an even more boxed-in question. 

"Who is my neighbor?"

Jesus chooses his words carefully and thoughtfully as he weaves a tale only the truly devoted will understand. He begins with a man, a Jew, on his way from Jerusalem to Jericho.

"The Way of Blood" is the direction our Savior chooses to go as he dives into a parable that will shake the foundation of Jewish thought. The Jericho Road is a major connection route east-west through the Judean mountains that is chiseled out of rocky hill tops and sharp corners. Maybe you see someone coming. Maybe you don't. Seventeen miles it stretches into ravines and across desolate pieces of rugged terrain. There are many spots where it would be perfect for robbers and thieves to drop out of hiding, unsuspected, and take what they want and leave someone hurting or dying. 

 The man in question is caught in just such a situation. He is beaten, strip of his possessions and his clothes, for that matter. He is bleeding, on the ground, and left for dead. As Jesus does so well with his parables, he uses every day people and places and item that his audience would know to help define and interpret what the Kingdom of God is all about. 

The first person to enter the scene is a priest. If the legal expert is in fact a person of the cloth, he certainly has his attention. What must a man like this be doing on a road like that going to Jericho. Maybe he lives in the city he is headed to and this is the way he would naturally take, His week has been one of priestly duties, full of worship services and sacrifices made at the altar and prayers being offered over the poor and needy and even the lame. Now, his week is over and all he would like to do is make his way home and see his family. But, the quiet walk along the road is broken with the weeping and pleas of a man half alive.

The priest can see just how dire the man's situation is without stumbling right up on him. The man seems to be a Jew. He is beaten so badly it's hard to tell. What's also hard for him to tell is whether or not he should assist the man or let him be. A few days from this conversation, Jesus shares a parable in another place about a man's animal that has fallen into a hole on the Sabbath. He encouraged those listening to take action, show mercy and step in and help in a dire situation, not just to save the animal, but to help their neighbor out in a tough situation. Maybe that kind of attitude is what a person like this priest should think of and offer to be of assistance. 

However, that is not what goes through his mind in the moment. The priesthood are given strict orders as to what happens when someone touches a dead person. The rites and rituals of cleansing alone takes seven days. He can't afford to be out of the Temple that long. He has classes to teaches and a lengthy time of duties at the Altar with sacrifices and prayers. This is what he is called to do. Maybe someone else will be along soon and can help this poor soul in need. 

The next person Jesus introduces is a Levite. Think of him as a lay speaker in the church, assisting with various duties in the worship service. He is the first line of volunteers to step up and make themselves helpful in the everyday life of the religious community. Today he has a power walk going as he needs to be in Jericho by lunch time. There is going to be a meeting in city market place. He has been asked to pray and give some opening words to people in the synagogue. Anything he can do to help be the face of the Hebrew faith. The more exposure he has, the more people seem satisfied with their religious leaders. The more satisfied they are, the better giving is to the Temple. Maybe he makes a couple coins for himself in the process.

With a bounce in his step, he thinks of the future and all that could be. Suddenly, his feet stop as he sees the bloody mess just feet in front of him. Thieves have left this man groveling in pain. The Levite looks up at the sky. The sun is getting more towards the afternoon. Moving to the other side of the road, he hopes someone will be along soon to help the poor man out. 

The last to come along the way is a Samaritan. In our western language and lore, we have come to align our way of thinking with a simple loving gesture. "The Good Samaritan" is a loving and kind reference to anyone who might go above and beyond to do something simple, especially with charity, to help another human being out. Like so many words and phrases we have seen change down through the centuries, what means one thing here and now in the West meant something far different in the Middle East. Samaritan people living in the northern part of Israel were despised by the Jews in and around Jerusalem. Imagine not being accepted at places where food and wine were served. The mere idea of eating at the same table was equated with burrowing in a pig's pen. Imagine hating someone so much that you went to church and begged God to exclude that person or peoples from eternal life. That's the feeling and sentiment here between Jews and Samaritans. 

The Samaritan man has seen his own people treat the Jewish around them just as bad. Now this lone traveler rounds the bend in the road to see something impossible. A bloody, beaten human being, left to die on the side of the road appears. The afternoon sun is going down. Jericho is still several miles away. Instead of finding an excuse to keep on walking, this humble man stops. Kneeling down he notices the man is a Jew but that doesn't stop him from following through with the help this poor victim needs. The Samaritan doesn't care what race or religion or even his nationality. All he knows is the weary person needs help. With wine from his pouch he cleans up his wounds and with oil from a jar her soothes the cuts and scrapes. From an old garment in his satchel, he tears strips and attempts to clean up what blood he can from the skin of the wounded. Patiently, he helps works the weak fellow up on to his donkey and walks with him as a guide all the way into town. Arriving at the Inn, The Samaritan could simply give the keeper a coin, drop the man off and be on his way. However, he doesn't do that. How many of us would stay the night at the hospital with a total stranger? How many of us would tend to the needs of a person we do not know? Would you be willing to sit there by the bed and wait it out hoping to see some signs of recovery? That's what the Samaritan does until the sun rises the next morning.

As he attends to business with the owner at the front desk, The Samaritan makes another amazing gesture. The wounded victim is not able to just hop on a horse an ride away. He needs time to recover. Taking out his money pouch, he drop two more coins on to the desk. Two more days. Also, two days wages. Not only does he help a total stranger by paying for his room for the night, he also goes into debt by using his own paycheck in order to support this man. He also tells the owner to bill him personally for anything else the man needs in order to get better and on his feet. Just an incredible act of love!

These interesting details should grab us and cause us to step back for a moment. Did the Samaritan man offer any kind of prayer for the man who was attacked? None that we see or hear about, according to the parable. As far as we know the kind man does nothing for this person's soul in any way. He quotes no bible verse. He leaves no scripture by the man's pillow. 

Who is my neighbor? What does it means to love with all of one's heart, soul and strength? The Samaritan is the very definition of all that. Love does all it can. Love doesn't just walk away. Love gets into the dirty, grimy parts of people's messy lives and gets into the mud up to the neck. If all you are worried about is being inconvenienced, then loving other people will be hard for you. 

As Jesus brings the story to a close, the question comes to the legal expert, "Which of these proved to be his neighbor?" Realizing that checkmate is about to be played, this Jewish leader can't believe his own answer. Finding it tough to push the answer from his vocal cords, he doesn't say "The Samaritan." Instead he chooses his words. "The one who showed him mercy."

We should be able to understand racial and even religious hatred based on our own history right here in these United States. What brought Jews and Samaritans into such a distraught relationship with one another? Samaritans were considered "half-breeds." Jews who had mixed into with the culture while living in Assyria during their exile later came back to settle in the former Israel north. The Jews who called Jerusalem home and held to the entire Old Testament for their Holy Scripture thought of the northerners as heretics. The Samaritans made the own Temple at Mount Gerazim. They installed their own priest hood. They only looked to the first five books of the Old Testament, leaving out the prophets and the wisdom literature. They also left behind the traditions of the Hebrew elders. 

If you now understand a bit of the disregard and hatred these two groups feel for one another, maybe you can picture how hard it must have been for this Jewish legal expert to have the greatest commandment in the Hebrew law picture painted for him with a man whose race he has been taught to despise. If we back up to chapter 9 in Luke's gospel, we see an entire Samaritan village asking Jesus to go away. “And he sent messengers on ahead. They went into a Samaritan village to get things ready for him, but the people there did not welcome him, because he was heading for Jerusalem. When the disciples James and John saw this, they asked, ‘Lord, do you want us to call fire down from heaven to destroy them?’ But Jesus turned and rebuked them, and they went to another village.”

Jesus was a Jew. Knowing and reading about his poor reception from the Samaritans it would be very easy for us to conclude that the Messiah would put the Samaritan man in the place of the man who was attacked by robbers. Even more so as one of the religious men who cut other other side of the road and walked away. 

But Jesus didn’t do that. Instead, our Lord and Savior made the Samaritan the hero of his story. 

The hero. 

When his disciples wanted to call fire down from heaven onto the Samaritans for their un-neighborly attitude, Jesus blessed them. The Messiah uses one of them as an example. If love means giving up everything to help someone in need, this what a good neighbor should be. Giving a blessing in place of a curse. That is how Jesus lived his life. "Father forgive them, for they do not know what they are doing." That is how he died. And maybe, in the final analysis, that is the most instructive thing about this parable.