Sermon Tone Analysis

Mention two books that I’ve been leaning on and learning from in this first half of our sermon series “Growing in Friendship and Hospitality”

One Blood: Parting Words to the Church on Race, John Perkins

Learning from the Stranger: Christian Faith and Cultural Diversity, David I. Smith

[BLANK]

This morning I want to acknowledge that I will be sharing some of what I learned from David Smith’s book Learning from the Stranger, where he has a chapter in which he deals with our text for this morning from Luke 10.

[BLANK]

The last time I preached on this text—which was around 2 years ago--we were in a sermon series called, “The Parables of Jesus” and in that sermon I mostly focused on the first question that the scribe or expert in the law asks Jesus.

And that was “what must I do to inherit eternal life?”

A brief summary of that sermon would be this: .... What must I do to inherit eternal life?

There is nothing I can do.

I am like the one in the ditch who is completely dependent on the Outsider, our Lord Jesus, who like the Samaritan was despised and rejected.

And I must graciously receive the compassion of God and respond with the same compassion towards others.

That was the thrust of the sermon two years ago....you all remember it right?…

when I focussed primarily on the first question.

Today I want to focus primarily on the second question that the expert in the law asks, “Who is my neighbour?”

Remember how Jesus affirms the response of the scribe to Jesus’ initial question, “What is written in the Law, how do you read it?

The scribe 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.’”

The first part of that answer comes from Deuteronomy 6:5

And the second part of the answer comes from Lev. 19:18

[BLANK]

And Jesus replies, “You have answered correctly, do this and you will live”

that’s a high bar.... how do we know if we attain it.... many in our society, if they believe in a heaven may think that if you’re basically a good person, you’ll go to heaven when you die… but how does one know?

Scribe wanted to “justify himself”.... wanted to know if he was good enough, or wanted to show he was good enough.

So he asks Jesus the question, “who is my neighbour?”

And that of course leads into the parable.

Jesus tells this significant story to answer the questions: what must I do to inherit eternal life? and who is my neighbour?

So, it’s that second question that we are going to think about more deeply this morning.... and we’re going to think about it particularly as it relates to how God is inviting us to grow in our cross-cultural friendships.

At the end of the parable Jesus asks the scribe a question that really focuses our attention on the matter of neighborliness.

[BLANK]

Scene One

A man was going down from Jerusalem to Jericho (map).

The old Jerusalem-Jericho road (trail) is still passable today everyone knew the journey, about 6-7 hours on foot, a total of 17 miles.

Jerusalem sits at 2,500 ft. about sea level and Jericho at 850 ft.

below sea level.

Hence going down.

[BLANK]

The next thing we find in the story is that the man fell among robbers.

One can tell from the slides that the curves in the road could easily conceal a band of robbers and thieves.

In fact, the descending road through the desert has been dangerous all through history.

Numerous writers throughout history have testified to this fact.

Though not mentioned, we have every reason to believe that the traveler is a Jew.

The robbers strip him, beat him and leave him half dead.

Bailey notes that the rabbis had identified stages for death and half dead meant at the point of death.. .completely

unconscious.

In Middle Eastern world there are two ways in which one identifies a stranger: Clothing and dialect.

Clothing and dialect could give away people's identity even to the point of knowing which village they came from.

Without being able to identify the man.. .no

clothes.. .and

no voice to give away a dialect, the simple fact is that here we have a mere human being in need.. .as

Bailey notes: "he belonged to no man's ethnic or religious community!"

He's just a human being in need.

The first people that the traveler meets Came, stripped him of everything to the point of death, and then left him.

Scene Two

Another man enters the scene and meets the traveler.

This time a priest.

And most certainly he was riding, for priests belonged to the upper classes of their society.

And in this society, no one in the "upper class" takes a 17 mile hike through the desert.

This is a safe assumption to make.

if the priest had been walking, all he could have done is given the traveler first aid, BUT if he was riding, at least he could have really helped him and taken him to a place when he could be cared for.

BUT HE DIDN'T.

Good reason why he didn't:

religious world of priest guided by texts like this one:

Sirach 12: 1-7

If you do good, know to whom you do it, and you will be thanked for your good deeds.

Do good to the devout, and you will be repaid—if not by them, certainly by the Most High… Give to the devout, but do not help the sinner.

Do good to the humble, but do not give to the ungodly; hold back their bread, and do not give it to them, for by means of it they might subdue you; then you will receive twice as much evil for all the good you have done to them.

For the Most High also hates sinners and will inflict punishment on the ungodly.

Give to the one who is good, but do not help the sinner.

(Sirach 12:1-7)

[BLANK]

How did the priest know if this man was ungodly?

The man could not speak, he was stripped; there was no way to tell.

Sure the wounded man might have been a neighbor, but how was the priest to tell?

The system of religious rules and regulations that evolved had drawn boundaries around God's mercy.

The priest faced a dilemma in another sense too: The command to love neighbor (assuming the neighbor was a Jew) was in tension with the command to leave the sinner to die.

Not only did the priest face this problem.

He also faced the problem of becoming ceremonially and ritually unclean if he touched a dead body.

It would have been assumed that in all likelihood he just came from 2 weeks of temple service in Jerusalem, and now was heading to his own town and would be expected to perform religious duties there.

And if he was ritually impure, he could do nothing...in fact he would have to find, buy, and burn a red heifer for sacrifice to purify himself, and that cost money and it took an entire week.

If he came within 6 feet of the man and he proved to be dead, the priest would have to tear his now impure garments and this would conflict with an obligation not to destroy valuable things.

Yes the priest was in a dilemma.

Bailey recalls the history for us well.

So the priest did what would be expected of him.. .what

else could he do.. .he

left the man for dead and passed by on the other side.

maybe there's a way in which we sense the dilemma when it comes to showing unconditional love to an individual in our congregation who struggles with sin.....tension between loving the sinner and hating the sin....Tension between loving and shuning… [story of my experience with a particular alcoholic....or someone looking for handout]..

So hard for our humanly manufactured customs and traditions to completely love God and neighbor.. .

so in a practical way, we pass by on the other side.

Scene Three

Levite: slightly lower in the pecking order.. .most

likely not riding

Probably knows the Priest is ahead of him.

[Remember slides]

Bound to same system of regulations and interpretations as priest

Levite couldn't have given the traveler a ride, but he could have given him minimal first aid to try and prolong the travelers' life.

If priest didn't risk helping the traveler, how much less should the Levite.

Scene Four

another certain man comes.. .

.all ears would likely expect it to be a noble Jewish lay person who might help the one in need.

BUT IT'S A SAMARITAN.