2.11.15 3.10.2024 Certain about My Neighbor. Luke 10.25-37
Luke: Certain about Jesus • Sermon • Submitted • Presented
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Entice: Much of Jesus’ teaching was oblique, even open-ended. This is particularly true of parables. Their literary form and creative energy is largely compromised if He closes every loop. In the Parable of the Sower/Seed/Soil, He provided some basic interpretive tools. Otherwise, many of His parables require us to do the heavy thinking. He expects us to assimilate the truth and create the context for application in our own lives.
The Parable of the Good Samaritan
comes to us embedded in a broader
context.
It is colorful
It is character driven,
and more concrete
than some parables. He starts by responding to a somewhat hostile question, tells His story, and ends with a specific answer.
Engage: We are back to Jesus tickling our curiosity with His “parable feather”, requiring us to scratch our itching conscience. He tickles us in this episode very clearly. The law-expert poses a question to Jesus, who replies with His own questions. In turn the man comes right back at Him—Jesus almost refusing to answer the question responds obliquely—with a story that culminates in a final question. A question still lingering that we must ask repeatedly of ourselves as we live our life of faith.
Expand:
“Who is my neighbor?”
“Who is my neighbor?”
And the corollary question,
“How neighborly am I supposed to be?”
“How neighborly am I supposed to be?”
These questions are always before us.
In chapter 9 Luke tells us
Luke 9:53 (ESV)
53 But the people did not receive him, because his face was set toward Jerusalem.
It is interesting that the it was Samaritans rejected Him. And a Samaritan who becomes a hero and model for disciples.
Having set His face to Jerusalem, Jesus provides very few answers that don’t involve some measure of sacrificial, cross-bearing. This is painfully consistent for us. Jesus will not back down.
No one is not your neighbor.
No one is not your neighbor.
There is no social, moral, racial, national, political, sexual, or behavioral boundary that excludes an individual from being my neighbor nor which excuses me from being neighborly—from loving them. As far as Jesus is concerned Christians have no enemies; only neighbors.
Excite: What are we to do with this counterintuitive and painful principle? Perhaps it is parables like this very one which drove the early Church to allegorize and spiritualize so many so many parables. The general tendency is to allegorize and spiritualize the difficult, painful parts out of the story.
But turning the tale into a bunch of vague insinuations about anybody anywhere
tends to mean it’s about nobody nowhere
particularly me.
This was not then, nor is it now responsible exegesis. You may not like what I say, there are times I kind of resent it. We are all obligated to obey Jesus, our Master.
Jesus, who called his executioners friend, requires us to
Explore:
Be the neighbor Jesus commands us to be.
Be the neighbor Jesus commands us to be.
Expand: This story within a story consists of several movements from the first question to the final command. The first movement concerns a
Body of Sermon:
1 Selfish Motive.
1 Selfish Motive.
Luke 10:25–29 (ESV)
25 Once upon a time, 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?”
There is a logic at play here. A logic of deed-doing.
A logic of cold,
dutiful,
precise
performance.
1.1 Doing.
1.1 Doing.
Is this man’s primary spiritual focus. What can be done, what can be earned.
This doing is based on correctly applying the law…
it is based on
1.2 Knowing.
1.2 Knowing.
Jesus reminds him that knowing comes down to two related but separate interpretive issues…
What does it say?
What does it say?
What do you think?
What do you think?
The former should control the latter,
Merely knowing is not enough. Knowing should lead to
1.3 Understanding.
1.3 Understanding.
And understanding is rooted in what God wants and expects not what we want.
The tragic phrase in this whole episode is the narrator’s comment
“wanting to justify himself.”
“wanting to justify himself.”
The first movement fades out and the next movement fades in…with a remarkable and famous
2 Story of Mercy
2 Story of Mercy
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.’
There is the book part of the test and the driving part. This Lawyer seems to know the “book part” pretty well, yet it’s all just theoretical to him. Additionally, he already has a long list of exceptions to rules and strategies to expand the list. Jesus teaches him the “driving part”. You can smell the donkey. You can hear the cries of pain. You can sense the reluctance of the inn keeper. Step by step Jesus subtly shows him that there are no exceptions.
This story teaches us to
2.1 See with Clarity.
2.1 See with Clarity.
This story teaches us to
2.2 Love unconditionally.
2.2 Love unconditionally.
This story teaches us to
2.3 Act extravagantly.
2.3 Act extravagantly.
The final movement, the plot twist comes when Jesus issues a
3 Simple Mandate
3 Simple Mandate
Luke 10:36–37 (ESV)
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.”
To follow His mandate means
3.1 Understanding what Jesus expects.
3.1 Understanding what Jesus expects.
This is the beauty and power in Jesus’ question. The man’s response shows that he understands the story. His emotions, his mind have been immersed in Jesus’s story.
Which means he can grasp, if he wants to, that the only faithful response comes from
3.2 Obeying what Jesus commands.
3.2 Obeying what Jesus commands.
Shut Down
Jesus did not build walls,
Jesus did not build walls,
He tore walls down.
He tore walls down.
Jesus did not draw lines,
Jesus did not draw lines,
He obliterated them.
He obliterated them.
Jesus did not provide a list of exemptions,
Jesus did not provide a list of exemptions,
He includes everyone
He includes everyone
in His offer to redeem our lostness and bind up our traumas. His vision for the wounded of our society is the continuing mandate of the Church. That is Gospel!
That is Good news!
And we don’t know how that man, that day responded. So, the tragedy of this episode is repeated over and over again. Self-justifying know-it-alls spend their time looking for loopholes and exploring exceptions to the consistent Biblical truth that if you don’t love those around you you don’t really love God. Too many so-called believers have become, If I may allegorize a bit, the insurrectionist bandits in this passage waylaying the innocent, inflicting pain and chaos. And like priest and levite the Church sometimes averts its gaze. What Jesus needs is people who get through the maze of conflicting voices to embrace His message of mercy and passionately practice His mandate.
No enemies.
No opponents.
No threats.
Only neighbors.
Desperately traumatized neighbors,
lost neighbors,
hurting neighbors,
addicted neighbors,
suffering neighbors,
angry neighbors,
weeping, wounded, bloodied neighbors
who we are commanded to love.
Luke 10:37b (ESV)
37b And Jesus said to us, “You go, and do likewise.”