Sermon Tone Analysis
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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.
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.
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.
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.
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.
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.
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.
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.
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.
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.
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