Who is my Neighbor?

Introduction:

You know when Katy and I first looked at our house in Oklahoma, we walked around the house. It was nearly exactly what we were looking for. It had granite counter tops. The styling was consistent with our decor. The shower had tile walls. We walked through and the kids started picking out which room was going to be theirs. Then we walked around to the back yard. The yard was small but nice. We had an apple and a pear tree. While we were walking around, a lady pops her head over the fence and starts telling us that this fence would be ours and we have to fix it. We hadn’t even bought the house yet. That interaction has set me off of that neighbor since the day we moved in and there haven’t been any positive interactions to repair my esteem of her. Sometimes it is difficult to love those who live right next door to us.

Jesus dealt with this one day in the parable of the Good Samaritan. From

Luke 10:25–37 KJV 1900

And, behold, a certain lawyer stood up, and tempted him, saying, Master, what shall I do to inherit eternal life? He said unto him, What is written in the law? how readest thou? And he answering said, Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy strength, and with all thy mind; and thy neighbour as thyself. And he said unto him, Thou hast answered right: this do, and thou shalt live. But he, willing to justify himself, said unto Jesus, And who is my neighbour? And Jesus answering said, A certain man went down from Jerusalem to Jericho, and fell among thieves, which stripped him of his raiment, and wounded him, and departed, leaving him half dead. And by chance there came down a certain priest that way: and when he saw him, he passed by on the other side. And likewise a Levite, when he was at the place, came and looked on him, and passed by on the other side. But a certain Samaritan, as he journeyed, came where he was: and when he saw him, he had compassion on him, And went to him, and bound up his wounds, pouring in oil and wine, and set him on his own beast, and brought him to an inn, and took care of him. And on the morrow when he departed, he took out two pence, and gave them to the host, and said unto him, Take care of him; and whatsoever thou spendest more, when I come again, I will repay thee. Which now of these three, thinkest thou, was neighbour unto him that fell among the thieves? And he said, He that shewed mercy on him. Then said Jesus unto him, Go, and do thou likewise.

I. The Context

In order to understand the purpose of this well known parable it is important to understand why Jesus was talking about it in the first place. The story begins with vs 25 when a lawyer in Jesus private gather stands up to ask Him a question. Now when we talk about lawyers in this passage don’t be thinking OJ Simpson’s lawyer who got him off scott free. When the NT speaks of a lawyer it is referring to someone who specializes in the law of Moses. This was a scribe who knew the ins and the outs of the law. Now the question he asks is a very common question for the religious rabbis of the day to be asked and he wants to get Jesus’ take on the question. How does one get eternal life? Now the man did not ask this question because he honestly wanted to know. The verses says that he said this to temp him. Now tempt here doesn’t necessarily mean that he had malicious motives, but he was looking to find a weakness in the teaching of Jesus, but Jesus turns it around on him since he was a master of the law. Jesus asks him what the law says. He quotes two passages that sum up the entire law:

Deuteronomy 6:5 KJV 1900

And thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thine heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy might.

Leviticus 19:18 KJV 1900

Thou shalt not avenge, nor bear any grudge against the children of thy people, but thou shalt love thy neighbour as thyself: I am the Lord.

Sometimes we overstate what the bible teaches about the law because we know that no one is saved by keeping the law.

Acts 13:39 KJV 1900

And by him all that believe are justified from all things, from which ye could not be justified by the law of Moses.

But Jesus affirms this man’s answer. He tells him he has answered correctly. So how can this be true? Honestly, if man were able to keep the law completely, he would have no need of a savior. So Yes, you can live by keeping the law, but no man ever can or ever has kept the entire law. That is actually the real purpose of this parable that we will be dealing with today. To show that no man can ever keep the law completely.

You can almost hear the sarcasm in Jesus voice because He knows, the trap he has put this man in and the man knows it too. The very next verse, we find the lawyer trying to justify himself by deflecting. He asks “Who is my neighbor? That is the question we will be answering today.

Now some when they approach this passage, will say that the story of the good samaritan is not a pattern for living that we are to emulate. They will point out that the whole purpose of the story is to show that no matter how good we are we will never be good enough to keep the law perfectly, and they are correct; however, Jesus ends the entire interaction with a command: “Go and do thou likewise.” This isn’t just a story about how imperfect we are, this is a lesson on what it means to love our neighbor as ourselves.

Think about it. We like to say that we love other people, but do we really love people as we love ourselves? We love ourselves an awful lot. We bathe ourselves, we make sure we have food every day, we provide housing for ourselves, we make sure we are entertained all the time. Do we really take that kind of care in the way that we love other people? Honestly, apart from Christ I don’t even think it is possible to love like that. It would be really exhausting to love everyone on the face of the earth that way; so the lawyer’s question though from the motive is on to something. He asks, Who is my neighbor? As we delve into the parable let’s answer that question and look at how we are to love our neighbors.

II. Who is my neighbor?

Who really is my neighbor? Do I have an obligation to every child around the earth that is hungry and if I do, how could I even truely love that person that I don’t even know? I think there are a couple hints in this passage that show us the answer to that question.

A. The meaning of the word- the word for neighbor is πλησιον (plesion) It i actually an adverb meaning near. Literally, the word neighbor could be translated the near one. Often when we think of neighbors we make it generally refer to all mankind, but the focus of this word is all mankind who is near me. Right now at this moment (so and so) is neighbor to (so and so) because they are near by each other. By making neighbor so vague, we really never love any one specifically. We have this general kind of love that we call liking people, but our love never manifests itself in action.

B. another hint about who our neighbor is comes from the story itself. A certain man went down from Jerusalem to Jericho- when it says he went down in this passage it is referring to literally going down like down a mountain. Now one thing we know is that this man was from Jerusalem or at-least was travelling from Jerusalem when he was attacked by thieves. As he lay there bleeding and naked, a priest passes by him. Now we would expect the priest to help take care of the man because they were fellow kinsmen and priests are meant to ministers, but he walks one by. Many people have speculated about why he would do that, but I heard one preacher remind us that the man never actually existed so he really didn’t have any thoughts going through his mind. Next walks by a levite, another servant of the people, a religious man, and a Jew and he does nothing. Those who should have been expected to do something did nothing. Then along comes a Samaritan. Now Samaritans were despised by the Jews and returned the same sentiments. Their hatred of one another even got so heated that the Jews destroyed the temple of the Samaritans on Mt. Gerazim in the second century. So they were basically enemies and yet he stopped by to help this poor Jews dying on the street. So how does this answer the question of who is my neighbor? To the Samaritan, the neighbor was the man right here right now. He didn’t limit himself to only people from his home town or even only other Samaritans. To the Samaritan, the neighbor was even the man that he didn’t like.

Application: Sometimes when we think about loving our neighbor as ourselves, we forget the people who are literally our neighbors. Going back to the definition of neighbor- it is someone nearby and may even be someone we don’t like. In America, we live in our castles with our barred doors, but society hasn’t always been this way. There was a day when people in a neighborhood actually knew each other. I remember growing up on military bases. I used to always hang out with the kids in the neighborhood. My parents would get together with their parents and we generally knew who each other were. We have allowed ourselves as Americans to become more and more isolated and as Christians that problem can get even greater.

I am becoming convinced that if we are ever to have a real impact in evangelism, we must cultivate relationships with the people we are trying to win. Jesus was constantly going to people’s houses to eat with them. Let’s just take one example

Luke 7:36–40 KJV 1900

And one of the Pharisees desired him that he would eat with him. And he went into the Pharisee’s house, and sat down to meat. And, behold, a woman in the city, which was a sinner, when she knew that Jesus sat at meat in the Pharisee’s house, brought an alabaster box of ointment, And stood at his feet behind him weeping, and began to wash his feet with tears, and did wipe them with the hairs of her head, and kissed his feet, and anointed them with the ointment. Now when the Pharisee which had bidden him saw it, he spake within himself, saying, This man, if he were a prophet, would have known who and what manner of woman this is that toucheth him: for she is a sinner. And Jesus answering said unto him, Simon, I have somewhat to say unto thee. And he saith, Master, say on.

III. What did he do for his neighbor?

Going back to the story of the good Samaritan it is important to see what he did for this poor Jew if we are going to understand the depths that our love for our neighbors should go to.

A. He felt sympathy for him vs 33- The world is full of messed up people with messed up situations and sometimes we as Christians slip into thinking that they all deserve what they got. “If they just would stop doing this and that and go to church, maybe their lives would turn around” Might be true but the attitude behind it is revealing about us. Does it truly greive our hearts to see so much pain and suffering because of sin or have we become callous to the hurt around us?

Matthew 9:36 KJV 1900

But when he saw the multitudes, he was moved with compassion on them, because they fainted, and were scattered abroad, as sheep having no shepherd.

B. He got out of his comfort zone and went over to him vs 34- If you are going to reach out to your neighbors and show Christ’s love and maybe see them come to the Lord, you are going to have to take the initiative to get up out of your Lazy boy and walk across the street. Many times we don’t live this way because it is going to cost us time. What you value is what you will spend you time on.

C. He met his physical need vs 34- The Samaritan bound up the wounds of the beaten Jew. Sometimes people can’t focus on their real need because their physical need is more pressing. Have you ever tried to play with your kids when you have a migraine. You want to do something that is needed in your children’s life but the physical pain of the migraine is keeping you from it.

D. He sacrificed for him- vs 35 The cost of what the good Samaritan did is lost on us in Americans because of this word pence here. We think it was two pennies. The word is actually denarii. In Roman times a denarii was equivalent to one days wages. The Samaritan gave two denarri so two days wages. Some have determined from an archeological dig in which the price of a hotel for a day was found on a sign that this amount of money could pay for food and lodging for two months. Can you imagine paying for a homeless person to stay somewhere for two months. In our day and age, this would be a lot of money and a great sacrifice for the Samaritan. Notice here, he didn’t just sacrifice money. He sacrificed time. He spent the time needed to tend and care for this man. He stayed overnight nursing his wounds.

E. He indebted himself vs 35- He didn’t just pay for what the man would need; he promised to pay anything else that the man wracked up. This was risky in that day because if you ended up being in debt and unable to pay, they would send you to a debtors prison.

IV. The Question

Jesus turned instead of asking Who is my neighbor? He asked who was neighbor to him. Jesus put the responsibility squarely on us in the way he asked this question. How can we say that we are seeking to fulfill this command when half the time we don’t even know our neighbors. Many of us have not even talked to them let alone tried to witness to them. I know it may seem harder sometimes to witness to people we live right next to because they are there every day. But maybe we can start fulfilling this seemingly impossible command by starting with the people next door.