Good Samaritan
Notes
Transcript
Handout
This week we are looking at one of the most famous stories in history and one that we don’t always know a lot about.
The good samaritan is a story, or parable, that Jesus tells about what it means to be a neighbor. And what we will see is that being a neighbor assumes a posture of generosity and wisdom.
The Christian faith is built on 2 foundations: love God with everything and love your neighbor as yourself. We are not the church if we are not these things.
Christ is the one that makes that possible and the Good Samaritan is a way of understanding not only our posture of generosity and wisdom but more importantly, God’s posture of generosity and wisdom.
The life overflowing with God sees generosity, both experienced and given, as the norm. And over and over I see that reality in this church. We are about to have our annual meeting and you will see event after event and experience after experience and opportunity after opportuntity for us to be generous and that you have met those opportunities.
But let’s take some time to look at how sometimes life gets in the way of our generosity and how we can easily choose otherwise.
But like everything, we have to explore why our experiences don’t always include much generosity or much wisdom.
Who is my neighbor?
Who is my neighbor?
To understand that let’s look at how we play games. Games are some of the best ways to spend time together, to learn and grow, to spend time.
When we play a game we begin by assuming certain things.
In order to play the game you have to know how to win. Do you win by crossing the finish line on the board? Do you win by collecting the most cards? Do you win by getting the most points?
Knowing the rules makes us capable of playing games and playing games together.
What we understand about playing games is that it is a zero-sum condition. Meaning that someone will win the game. And in order for someone to win the game, someone else has to lose the game.
We have even gamified our own lives. What we eat, how we exercise, where we travel. It’s all become a game. And games assume that someone has to live and someone has to lose.
This is called zero sum. Where in order for me to win, you have to lose.
And in much of life this kind of treatment can be tolerated. In some cases it is probably necessary to at least begin with this kind of zero sum thought. But if we are going to look at the way that God looks at life then zero sum and the gamification of everything is going to create some problems very quickly.
We see this in our passage this morning. The parable of the good samaritan comes out of a question, “who is my neighbor?”
A teacher of the law approaches Jesus and asked him
“Teacher, what shall I do to inherit eternal life?”
Jesus responds to him
“What is written in the Law? How do you read it?”
And the lawyer, knowing the law responds quickly, because he knows the law
“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.”
Jesus affirms his answer and tells him
“You have answered correctly; do this, and you will live.”
But then the story takes a turn. The lawyer, the Scripture states needs to poke and prod further for answers. He is not satisfied with the answer Jesus gives, the man wants to know more, but not because He is curious or looking for direction. Look at what it says
But he, desiring to justify himself, said to Jesus, “And who is my neighbor?”
The lawyer is asking, “how much do I need to do? Who do I need to consider my neighbor?” and implied in that question is “who is not my neighbor?” The lawyer gamifies the commandment to love God and others.
He wants to justify himself. He wants to win.
So Jesus tells him a story. And we are going to look at that story of the good samaritan but remember two things as we look into it: Jesus is answering “who is my neighbor” because the lawyer wanted to justify his actions.
The Priest and Levite
The Priest and Levite
Let’s look at the beginning of this story
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. Now by chance a priest was going down that road, and when he saw him he passed by on the other side. So likewise a Levite, when he came to the place and saw him, passed by on the other side.
Let’s look at what is happening.
A man is beaten and robbed, left for dead. This stretch of road, between Jerusalem to Jericho was dangerous. This scenario would not be uncommon. Because the nature of the topography between the two cities was rocky, hilly and desert like. There were plenty of places to hide and wait.
So the man who is robbed would have been an unfortunate common occurance. This route was popular for travelling and soon enough, someone would be along. And that is what happens in our story
A priest comes along and saw the half dead man.
The Scripture states that he saw the man and passed by him.
And then by chance a levite comes along and sees the and comes near to the robbed man.
And the Scripture states that he passed by him on the other side.
Both of these men were influential in their roles in Jerusalem and because of the religious laws in judaism, they were not able to touch a dead body. The man was not dead but notice that neither got close enough to check.
As they approach the man, they could take a chance that they would be made ceremonially unclean and not be able to perform their jobs at the temple or be able to properly worship. They could help but they would then have to deal with personal consequences that would cost time and money in order to be made right for their roles again.
There is a choice that each of these individuals has to make. And it is economic in scope. They consider what will be gained and what will be lost. They consider for a moment what is the most economically considerate thing that they could do?
There is no value to staying on the side of the road. In fact it represents a loss of value. They would be inconvenienced, would have been late to wherever they were going, the would have been ritually impure. That would have a cost associated with it.
Keep in mind the priest and levite are in the same dangerous road that the robbed man is. They could be beaten as well. It was not safe. The priest and the Levi have to consider their options. They have to consider who will win and who will lose ultimately they have to ask the question what will this cost me?
The most economically reasonable thing to do would be to cross the street. It makes the most sense. In fact it would not have been shocking that the priest and levite do just that. It was well within the law and they were, after considering their options, acting within what was reasonable.
They consider because they cannot have both. They are not able to help and not be affected. They are limited in what they choose.
Someone listening to this story in the first century would have nodded their head: of course that is what a priest and levite should do. It is worthwhile seeing that Jesus is going to challenge our notions of consideration, convenience, identity, and mercy.
The reality is that we are not unlike this at all. We may not cross the street but we definitely do consider how our actions will affect further actions. We want to play the game. We consider all the conveniences as well. We quickly do a cost analysis on the situation and define how to approach it.
## We may be late for work
## We may get dirty
## We may get hurt
## It may cost us
These options may be wise but it they are not generous. It considers the self but not the neighbor.
This is the problem of our own considerations. We have come to see ourselves in this life of win and lose. That if we choose we have to choose the self because to choose the other is to not choose the self. And the self must win at all costs.
We choose one way over the other, because just like the priest and levite, conditions are never ideal. Resources are scarce. Situations are scary. Things are not as we would necessarily want them.
The Good Samaritan
The Good Samaritan
This is where we see the good Samaritan come in. Where the priest gets near, and the Levi takes a look, the Samaritan comes close. Generosity always moves beyond consideration into some kind of action.
But a Samaritan, as he journeyed, came to where he was, and when he saw him, he had compassion. 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. 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.’
When we see the Samaritan enter into this story he represents what mercy looks like. He represents what love for neighbor looks like.
In introducing the Samaritan it is helpful to review what Jesus’ original audience would have heard.
The Samaritans were the most unlike them kind of person that this group could have thought of. Their enemy, the expression of their hatred and anger. (Through Peasant Eyes 47).
The hero of the story would have been the most despised character in the Jewish mindset. When the audience would have heard, “samaritan”, their hackles would have immediately risen, as would thier desire to boo and jeer.
But Jesus takes their assumptions and turns it over on them.
Be very careful who you call your enemy, who you spit your hatred on. They are the group that God holds dear and cares for. They become the lesson for us to understand what it is like to look like Christ.
Generosity is not a consideration of the abundance of resources, but the consideration of needs being met. The gospel is all about understanding that our needs have been met. That we have complete sufficiency.
The gospel tends to the idea that it responds to a debt that can’t be repaid, it is something infinite that responds to something finite. It is light and darkness, it is bread in scarcity.
The Samaritan undoes what everyone else did
The Samaritan undoes what everyone else did
The Samaritan comes close and undoes what everyone else does. The robbers leave him for dead with nothing. The Samaritan binds his wounds. The priest ignores him, the Samaritan places him on his own donkey. The levite can’t be bothered by him; the Samaritan takes him to an inn and spends his own money to care for him.
This is generosity. It deals with how close we get to the man. The act of generosity is restorative and reconciliatory.
And it all happens in the middle of blood in danger and unsavory circumstances.
The bandaging of the wounds that taking to an inn happens in difficult circumstances. The inn itself, was not something that people looked rightly on. Inns were not good places. They were devious places with devious characters.
But this is where we see the greatest act of generosity, where the Samaritan gives to denarii, which should be enough for about three months of food for a family. He gives more because the situation is dire.
The call to be generous comes from the desire to be treated generously. This is met in Christ who came to the unfamiliar and unkept parts of our lives to restore
God is shown through the “actions of a hated foreigner of despised social occupation and is revealed literally in the wilds of bandits and inns.”
Gods activity is in the wilds of “bandits and inns.” We can’t control that God acts but trust that He does and that He pays what He owes. And more. To disreputable characters. This means that God works generously and abundantly in situations that are less than or show no abundance. ( Oakman, Douglas E. 2008. *Jesus and the Peasants*. Cascade Books. 179)
In fact, we have to understand that this is the generous act of the reign of God in dire circumstances, that God, in the person of Christ comes to bandage our wounds, comes to deal with the less than savory circumstances, becomes the commoner for us to become royalty, this is shown in the way that the Samaritan places, though beaten man on the donkey
At the end of this story Jesus asks:
Which of these three, do you think, proved to be a neighbor to the man who fell among the robbers?” He said, “The one who showed him mercy.” And Jesus said to him, “You go, and do likewise.”
We are asked who is the one that acted as a neighbor, and the lawyer answers the one who shows mercy. Samaritan was the least likely want to show mercy the least likely want to act, but he becomes the most representative of the heart of Christ.
We are left with a call toward mercy, toward generosity.
