Ministry of the Christian believer. Who is my neighbor.
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Intro
Intro
I want to begin this morning by playing a sound for you.
Play state farm sound
Did you hear words to the jingle along with the sound?
Like a good neighbor, State Farm is there.
The insurance company has built itself upon that slogan that being a good neighbor means having fast and fair claim service.
Portraying their company as being one that is like a good neighbor.
There in a time of need.
We think of a good neighbor as someone you could go to for some help.
Maybe you ran out of sugar for your recipe and can go and borrow some.
In times past, neighbors would get together to help each other raise buildings.
It is easy to help a good neighbor.
Jesus though takes another step in his response to the Jewish Lawyer.
Jesus response to causes us to evaluate what it truly looks like to be a good neighbor.
25 And behold, a lawyer stood up to put him to the test, saying, “Teacher, what shall I do to inherit eternal life?” 26 He said to him, “What is written in the Law? How do you read it?” 27 And he answered, “You shall 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 your neighbor as yourself.” 28 And he said to him, “You have answered correctly; do this, and you will live.” 29 But he, desiring to justify himself, said to Jesus, “And who is my neighbor?” 30 Jesus replied, “A man was going down from Jerusalem to Jericho, and he fell among robbers, who stripped him and beat him and departed, leaving him half dead. 31 Now by chance a priest was going down that road, and when he saw him he passed by on the other side. 32 So likewise a Levite, when he came to the place and saw him, passed by on the other side. 33 But a Samaritan, as he journeyed, came to where he was, and when he saw him, he had compassion. 34 He went to him and bound up his wounds, pouring on oil and wine. Then he set him on his own animal and brought him to an inn and took care of him. 35 And the next day he took out two denarii and gave them to the innkeeper, saying, ‘Take care of him, and whatever more you spend, I will repay you when I come back.’ 36 Which of these three, do you think, proved to be a neighbor to the man who fell among the robbers?” 37 He said, “The one who showed him mercy.” And Jesus said to him, “You go, and do likewise.”
Last week we began this story by looking at a man asking Jesus the question “What shall I do to inherit eternal life?”
He was a Jewish lawyer, expert of the law.
Asking a question in a rhetorical sense, desiring to have a theological discussion with Jesus, this relative to Rabbi on the block.
It was a common thing in that day to have these sorts of theological discussions in public places.
The lawyer wanted to put Jesus to the test.
Perhaps in an attempt to show his own superiority of knowledge, or to build a case against Jesus.
Jesus response to this man was essentially the same as when Satan attempted to test him in the wilderness.
He asked the lawyer, what is written in the law, but drove his point to the heart of the matter with the follow up - how do you read it.
The response was appropriately based in scripture and Jesus tells the man, do this, and you will live.
This brings us up to verse 29 where we pick up today.
29 But he, desiring to justify himself, said to Jesus, “And who is my neighbor?”
The word justify is a legal term having to do with the law and the the courtroom,
It represented the legally binding verdict of the judge.
It is not surprising to see a "lawyer" use this term.
He sought in a sense to "pronounce a verdict" (or have it rendered by a judge) that he was in full accordance with requirements of God's law to love God and to love his neighbor as himself.
The lawyer wanted to vindicate himself, to clear himself from guilt, accusation, blame, etc, by evidence or argument.
So he asks who is my neighbor?
From an outside perspective, this man appears to be Godly.
A true godly person though has a healthy vertical relationship with God.
This the lawyer believes he has worked out.
He believes he has done all the work necessary to be saved by God and inherit eternal life.
This is one that can be easily faked.
Put on the mask, show up to church on Sunday.
Have a show of godliness.
Godliness is also represented in our horizontal relationships as well.
And that horizontal relationship - our interaction with others - is not something that can be faked.
How we interact with others, especially in times of trials, especially in times when they have hurt us, shows our character.
The lawyer wants to know how Jesus defines neighbor because it determines who and how he must interact with in order to inherit eternal life.
There is some cultural background we need to better understand the question.
One of the books of Jewish wisdom tells its readers to not help a sinner.
The New Revised Standard Version Chapter 12
12 If you do good, know to whom you do it,
and you will be thanked for your good deeds.
2 Do good to the devout, and you will be repaid—
if not by them, certainly by the Most High.
3 No good comes to one who persists in evil
or to one who does not give alms.
4 Give to the devout, but do not help the sinner.
The lawyer’s question is really an attempt to create a distinction, arguing that some people are neighbors and others are not, and that one’s responsibility is only to love God’s people.
It assumes that some people fell into the category of non-neighbor.
One commentator paraphrases his question this way “How can I spot others who belong to God’s people so that I can love them?”
This desire to justify himself in regards to his neighbor stems from a greater desire to justify himself before God.
Luke, Volumes 1 & 2 Whom Do I Have to Love?
Obviously, he could not love everyone. That would be impossible. But if he could find a way to limit the size of his neighborhood, then maybe, just maybe, he really could love his neighbor, and then he would be able to justify himself before God.
Luke, Volumes 1 & 2 Whom Do I Have to Love?
This is what always happens when we try to be saved by our own works. Rather than upholding the law in all its perfection, we undermine the law by reducing it to something we think we might be able to keep.
Which is exactly why Jesus had to come.
Because we can not keep the law.
We can not do enough good to inherit eternal life on our own.
The question of who is my neighbor is truly a difficult one to tackle.
We draw boundary lines and make distinctions between deserving and undeserving.
Some rightly so as we are called as well to be good stewards of the resources God has given us.
Are we helping someone in need, or are we enabling a sinful lifestyle?
Wherever we draw the line, the lawyers logic is compelling.
The idea that we have to make choices in life.
Our love has to have limits.
Since we cannot help everybody, only certain people qualify as our neighbors.
Everyone else will have to go somewhere else to get whatever help they need.
This suggestion that some people are “non-neighbors” is what Jesus responds to in his story.
The story that Jesus tells here is cleverly crafted to make a point.
Its purpose is to redraw the lines of the lawyer’s neighborhood.
Jesus story begins with a dying man in desperate need.
30 Jesus replied, “A man was going down from Jerusalem to Jericho, and he fell among robbers, who stripped him and beat him and departed, leaving him half dead.
This situation was not uncommon as this was treacherous road.
Road video
Road Video
It was a long and winding road with narrow passages and steep overhangs, it was an ideal place for bandits and robbers to ambush travelers.
So much so that history tells of the road having the nickname of the bloody way.
As this man lay beaten and dying, several people have the chance to save his life.
The first two both being religious leaders.
31 Now by chance a priest was going down that road, and when he saw him he passed by on the other side. 32 So likewise a Levite, when he came to the place and saw him, passed by on the other side.
This is the only time Jesus used by chance, which means essentially by coincidence. "
The phrase by chance adds an initial note of hope and fortune to the expectation in the story.
But that hope is quickly dashed.
Commentators have offered many suggestions as to why the priest avoided the injured man.
Going to or coming form serving in the temple.
Luke, Volumes 1 & 2 Not Good Neighbors
The people who heard this story would assume that these religious leaders had been in Jerusalem to serve at the temple, where they had recited the law and offered sacrifices on God’s altar.
Luke, Volumes 1 & 2 Not Good Neighbors
But however fervently they worshiped at God’s house, when these men went out on the road they failed to keep the law of God’s love or to offer themselves as living sacrifices for a neighbor in need.
The point Jesus was making is that because they knew the law’s requirements, they would have been expected to stop and aid the injured man."
What excuse could possibly justify their refusal to save a man’s life?
If they were in a hurry, their families could wait.
If there was a chance they might get ambushed, they should have died trying to save someone’s life.
Even if there was a chance that the man might be dead, their higher duty to try to save a life superseded any claim of the ceremonial law.
These men had a righteous responsibility to stop and help, and when they failed to do so, they became accomplices to the man’s murder.
The poor example of these religious leaders shows us some of the characteristics of bad neighbors.
When am I a bad neighbor?
When I avoid people in obvious need.
When I come up with flimsy excuses for refusing to get involved with someone in my path who has a legitimate claim on my love.
When I have little concern for those who are wounded and dying, whether their injuries are spiritual or physical.
When I see someone who might be in trouble, but refuse to stop and find out what kind of help I might be able to offer.
When I walk away from worship with a heart as hard as the one I came in with.
When I am too selfish to interrupt what I am doing or to be inconvenienced by someone else’s problems.
Whenever I make lame excuses for not doing what I know, deep down, that Jesus wants me to do for someone else.
I am a bad neighbor whenever I refuse to be a good neighbor to someone in need.
At this point, Jesus listeners may have been able to give some grace to these busy men for not stopping.
The natural expectation continuing the story would be for a good, honest Israelite to come along and help.
An average everyday, Godly Israelite.
Instead, Jesus adds a surprising twist to the story.
The hero is not a Jew at all:
33 But a Samaritan, as he journeyed, came to where he was, and when he saw him, he had compassion. 34 He went to him and bound up his wounds, pouring on oil and wine. Then he set him on his own animal and brought him to an inn and took care of him. 35 And the next day he took out two denarii and gave them to the innkeeper, saying, ‘Take care of him, and whatever more you spend, I will repay you when I come back.’
A Samaritan was just about the last person that anyone in Israel would expect to stop and help.
In centuries past the Samaritans had defied God’s law by intermarrying with the Assyrians.
Over time they had developed their own version of the Torah and set up their own center for worship.
As far as the Jews were concerned, the Samaritans were half-breed heretics.
And the Samaritans had little to do with the Jews as well.
This would have initially brought thoughts of the end for the wounded traveler to Jesus listeners minds.
But then that the phrase pops in - he had compassion.
He felt sorry, took pity on the hurt man.
As we read the text that follows we notice some things about this man though.
Beginning with his character, it was other focused.
Even towards someone who would have been considered an enemy.
He went to the injured man, used his own oil, his own wine, and bound up his wounds.
He placed him on his own animal and brought to to an inn and took care of him further.
And he went to leave we see that his credit was good as well!
Clearly the innkeeper was prepared to trust him.
He may have been theologically unsound, but he was an honest man.
He alone was prepared to help.
A heretic he may have been according to the Jews, but the love of God was in his heart.
This would have been so hard to believe because we call the story the parable of the good Samaritan,
but as far as the Jews were concerned, there were no good Samaritans.
It is difficult to come up with a contemporary comparison that conveys the same sense of social surprise,
but we do not really understand this story until we make a racial and religious comparison that seems to go too far.
Maybe it would be something like an Islamic fundamentalist helping an evangelical Christian who was injured in a terrorist attack.
It was the last thing anyone would expect, and in fact if the injured man had not been so desperate,
he may have refused the Samaritan’s help altogether.
These men were not neighbors at all; they were enemies.
Jesus concludes by asking the lawyer
36 Which of these three, do you think, proved to be a neighbor to the man who fell among the robbers?”
Jesus did not ask ‘Who was the neighbour whom these three were expected to love?’,
but ‘Which of these three became neighbour, or, acted as neighbour, to the man who fell among the robbers?’
From the practical point of view that was all the guidance that the lawyer, or anyone else, needed:
whenever we come across somebody in our pathway in great need, we are to have compassion on them and help them as we would like them to help us if we were in need.
A good neighbor notices people in need.
A good neighbor is also willing to stop and help, even when it is inconvenient.
A good neighbor makes sacrifice of time and money to serve others.
In short, a good neighbor is someone who loves others as he loves himself.
A notable example of the application of this principle comes from the life of Ernest Gordon.
Can you be an encouragement to someone in need?
Is there someone who needs the Lord that you can speak to about Christ?
Then do something about it! Be a neighbor!
Let me say that we must never imagine that we are merciful because we feel compassionate toward someone in distress.
Mercy means active goodwill.
Author Elmer Bendiner wrote a book, The Fall of Fortresses,
In it he describes one bombing run over the German city of Kassel:
Our B-17 (THE TONDELAYO) was barraged by flak from Nazi antiaircraft guns. That was not unusual, but on this particular occasion, our gas tanks were hit. Later, as I reflected on the miracle of a twenty-millimeter shell piercing the fuel tank without touching off an explosion, our pilot, Bohn Fawkes, told me it was not quite that simple.
On the morning following the raid, Bohn had gone down to ask our crew chief for that shell as a souvenir of unbelievable luck. The crew chief told Bohn that not just one shell, but eleven, had been found in the gas tanks. Only one was needed to blast us out of the sky. It was as if the sea had been parted for us. Even after thirty-five years, so awesome an event leaves me shaken, especially after I heard the rest of the story from Bohn.
He was told that the shells had been sent to the armorers to be defused. The armorers told him that Intelligence had picked them up. They could not say why at the time, but Bohn eventually sought out the answer. Apparently when the armorers opened each of those shells, they found no explosive charge. They were clean as a whistle and just as harmless. Empty? Not all of them. One contained a carefully rolled piece of paper. On it was a scrawl in Czech. The Intelligence people scoured our base for a man who could read Czech. Eventually, they found someone to decipher the note. It set us marveling. The translated note read: "This is all we can do for you now." It evidently was written by a Czech slave who did the best that he could to get involved in helping the Allied forces in WW2.
When you get involved in our church, in things our church is doing, in the lives of people.
It is one opportunity to be neigborly with one another here to begin with.
If we aren’t being good neighbors within these walls, we will never be good neighbors outside of them.
When it is hard, when we are the Samaritan looking up the Jew who lays dying on the side of the road.
You have the opportunity to bind up wounds, to encourage the downtrodden beginning right here within these walls.
But it takes gathering together to do so.
And it takes more than one person to do.
One person cannot bear the weight of a church.
That is why each of us are called to be good neighbors.
When we get involved in our church, in the lives of people that need the Lord,
in the lives of people that need our encouragement, it will be a beautiful day in the neighborhood.
Luke, Volumes 1 & 2 Who Is the Good Neighbor?
The main point is that a neighbor is something we are, not something we have, and that for believers in Christ, neighborly love is a whole way of life.
This story shows us directly that the good news of the gospel is that through the death and resurrection of Jesus,
God has loving grace for law-breaking sinners who are not good neighbors.
Jesus traveled a much greater distance, to help people in much greater need, at much greater cost.
He is equally committed to seeing our salvation through to the end,
for he has promised to come back and carry us all the way to glory.
Commentator David Gooding put it this way
“We were not his neighbors nor he ours. But he chose by incarnation to come where we were; and in spite of the fact that human beings hounded him to a cross, he rescued us at his own expense, and has paid in advance the cost of completing our redemption and of perfecting us for unimaginable glory.”
Even through Jesus story though, this lawyer is still defiant.
His simple response to Jesus of The one who showed him mercy begrudgingly states the Samaritan.
But he certainly still does not want to admit that a Samaritan could be his neighbor.
Check your own heart, check your own motives, check your own involvement this morning.
Am I in a place where I can be a neighbor to my fellow Christians in this church?
Do I know what is going on in their lives?
Am I placing myself in a position where I can know what is going on in my fellow brothers and sisters lives?
If we are not being neighborly here, it will certainly not happen outside of these walls.
The lawyer wanted to make the issue somewhat complex and philosophical, but Jesus made it simple and practical. He moved it from duty to love, from debating to doing.
To be a good Christian neighbor, you must begin by being present.