Luke 10 25 to 37

Luke 10 25 to 37

Today’s gospel reading is the Parable of the Good Samaritan which most of us know very well. This morning I’d like to pick out some things that struck me about this story and then see how we can seek to apply it to our lives.

So firstly, we are introduced to this lawyer who isn’t a lawyer as we’d understand today – but a Teacher of the Jewish Law. He was an expert in Old Testament Law and he wants to know what he must do to inherit eternal life.

In other words, he wants to know what he must do to be saved – to be put right with God.

And it’s interesting that he uses the word inherit here - because of course no one works to inherit things.

Inheritance comes through being a member of the family.

And thus it is with the Christian faith. We inherit eternal life by repenting and then believing in the Lord Jesus Christ - and becoming God’s child, a member of his family; not by striving to do good works or to impress God.

So, in a sense this expert in the law is already slightly off track with his question. A bit like the rich young man in Matthew’s gospel – who says ‘what good deed must I do to get eternal life’ - he wants to be given something he can do to earn his right standing with God.

He hasn’t understood that people are put right with God through their faith in him. As Paul points out in his letter to the Romans; ‘Abraham believed God and it was credited it to him as righteousness.’

God regarded Abraham as righteous simply because he had a living faith in him.

Jesus then asks this lawyer for his opinion on what the Jewish Law has to say in answer to his question and he gives the correct answer.

And his answer is the summary of the Law that we use in our services as an introduction to our time of confession.

'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 neighbour as yourself.'

But of course, the reason we use this is - because as we say most Sundays - we each know that we haven’t been able to keep these commandments.

No one apart from Jesus - however holy or good they are - has ever loved God with all their heart and mind and soul or loved their neighbour as themselves.

To be justified by the Old Testament Law required a person to be perfect – to follow the Law perfectly without any deviation - and of course none of us is perfect.

So, as Paul points out in his letter to the Romans; “Therefore no one will be declared righteous in God’s sight by the works of the law; rather, through the law we become conscious of our sin.”

The Law helps us to recognise that we fall short of God’s commands.

And this is why we can never be justified or put right with God by striving to love him or to be good or to impress him – because however good we are we will still always fall short.

No, we are put right with God by grace through faith.

And the great thing about God’s grace is that when we put our faith in Jesus – God credits righteousness to us – just as he did to Abraham.

He no longer sees us in the light of our sin and failure – but rather he sees us in the light of the perfect life that Jesus lead.

Martin Luther described this as a “A wonderful exchange - whereby our sins are no longer ours but Christ’s; and the righteousness of Christ - not Christ’s but ours. He has emptied Himself of His righteousness that He might clothe us with it, and fill us with it.”

And our response to this should then be to do our best to love God wholeheartedly and to love our neighbour as ourselves - but not to earn God’s approval – but rather because we already have it and we are thankful for it.

Perhaps the lawyer recognises that he is unable to love God and his neighbour as the law commands – and he doesn’t want to lose face – so he seeks to justify himself by asking a further question – so “who is my neighbour?”

And then Jesus tells this famous story about the Good Samaritan.

The road from Jerusalem to Jericho was a very dangerous road known as the ‘blood road’ or ‘the way of blood.’ It was steep and treacherous with lots of places for robbers to hide and attack unsuspecting victims.

And the man in the story falls victim to these robbers. And then we get these 3 passers-by – a Priest, a Levite and finally a Samaritan.

And as he so often does, Jesus turns his listeners perceptions on their head.

The Priest and the Levite would have been regarded by his listeners as extremely worthy and holy people – first in the queue for heaven. They were the religious professionals – the ones who organised and officiated at temple worship.

Whereas Samaritans were despised and hated by the Jews – and regarded as heathens.

The Jewish Law taught that whoever touched the body of a dead person would be unclean for seven days, so it may be that the Priest and the Levite – fearing that the man might be dead - didn’t want to risk getting their hands dirty.

Of course, had they bothered to check, they’d have found that this man wasn’t dead.

But whatever their reason – although they may have been concerned about following the letter of the law – they completely missed the spirit of the law.

Again, Jesus is highlighting that God isn’t pleased by outward religion – an appearance of being religious.

God looks at people’s hearts. And this Samaritan has a good heart.

He is moved with pity when he sees this poor man, lying beaten and robbed by the side of the road and his compassion leads him to act.

He isn’t concerned about the man’s colour or creed or social class. He recognises that this man is his neighbour and is in need of his help.

We can be religious and go to church and seem very upright and holy – like the priest and the Levite – but if our hearts remain untouched by God – our religion is nothing but an outward show.

True religion as James says in his letter involves looking after orphans and widows in their distress and keeping oneself from being polluted by the world.

It involves action, actively seeking to make the lives of those around us better.

When I was reflecting on this I realised that the Samaritan in this story pleases God because he does exactly as God would want him to do.

He treats this man as God would have treated him.

You see God loves all people. He cares deeply for every person he has created.

And because he wants the best for all people, he cares when people are suffering and in need.

And this includes people we see today lying on the streets or sitting huddled in doorways. They may be drunks or drug addicts – but God still cares for them – and looks at them with love in his heart.

And of course, as Christians we are Gods hands and arms and voices in the world. He longs to reach out and work through us.

So, when we recognise that anyone can be our neighbour – and we try and show them God’s love – especially those who are struggling with life - he is pleased, because we are expressing to them what is in his heart.

The Good Samaritan by his actions demonstrates God’s heart to this man. And ideally – if we profess to be Christians - this is what God wants us to do in our daily lives.

This isn’t easy – I certainly don’t find it easy - and we won’t always get it right. And realistically we can’t help every person we see on the street.

Jesus didn’t heal every leper or blind person he came across.

But what we can do is seek to be led by God’s spirit to show something of his love to those people who come across our paths that he wants us to help.

We do need to try and be discerning because as I’ve found not everyone in apparent need is genuine or honest.

And loving our neighbour isn’t just about helping strangers or doing charity work.

Its doing small every day things for those we live and work with that help to make their lives better and brighter.

Offering to help people with tasks, giving people lifts, offering to pay for things, offering to baby sit, helping people to move house, carrying shopping bags, volunteering to work in the creche.

Small day to day actions that make other people’s lives that little bit easier and show them something of God’s love.

It’s important to try and share the gospel with people but they will be much more open to what we say if it is backed up by what we do.

The other thing that strikes me about the help that the Samaritan gives this man is that it is very practical help. He doesn’t kneel down by the man and pray a long prayer for God to help him and pat him on the head and walk off.

He rolls up his sleeves cleans his wounds, and finds him accommodation and food. And then he picks up the bill for it.

It costs him time and money. He interrupts his own journey and makes this man’s needs his priority.

When I first got this passage to preach on – I thought oh goodness what more can I possibly say because everyone knows it so well – but studying it has challenged me.

I realised that I need to try and open my eyes much more to the needs of people around me.

Of course, to love our neighbour we need God’s help. We need the help of the Holy Spirit. We need to ask God to fill us with love, and to open our eyes to recognise the people he has brought across our path – that he wants us to help.

And to help us demonstrate something of God’s heart to them – so that they can see something of God’s love in us – and be drawn to him through us.

Let’s close with a short time of prayer and reflection where we can each think about how we can better love our neighbour as ourselves.

Let’s pray. Lord Jesus you told this story to show who our neighbour is – and what practical love in action looks like. Be with us now in this time of quiet as we each reflect on how we can go and do likewise.