Tag Luke

The Cost of Being a Good Samaritan

Todd R 4 Comments

Years ago, I heard a sermon illustration about a parent looking out the window and seeing their kids playing with a skunk.  Naturally, they yelled out to the kids “get away from there and come inside!”  The kids quickly came inside but brought the skunk with them!  The point of the story is that when we want to help others, sometimes their problems become our problems.  There is a cost to truly loving others.

The same principle comes out of the parable of the Good Samaritan.  In the well-known parable a man is robbed, beaten, and left for dead on the side of a road.  First a priest, and then a Levite, passed him by.  But a Samaritan, a member of a group despised by many Jews, stopped and helped the man.  This help had a significant cost, as described in Luke 10:34-35:

“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.’”

Here’s a list of what the Good Samaritan provided for the man in these two verses:

Photo by Jackson David on Unsplash
  • Likely some kind of cloth to bind the wounds.  He likely tried to use the cleanest cloth he had with him and ripped or cut it as needed.
  • Oil and wine, which he “poured” on the man’s wounds.  He is more concerned about treating the man than about pouring out too much.
  • A ride on his own animal.  The Samaritan walked alongside, giving the man the more comfortable trip to the inn.
  • Money.  Denarii is the plural of denarius, which was about a day’s wages for a laborer.  The Samaritan spent at least two days wages (“two denarii”) and promised to pay more if needed.
  • Ongoing care and concern.  The Samaritan promised to pay “when I come back.”  He was going to make a return trip to the inn to check up on the man.

Contrast this to the priest and Levite, who both “passed by on the other side” to avoid being contaminated by the man, who appeared dead.  The Samaritan was more concerned about providing help than about whether he would become ceremonially unclean.

Loving people often has costs, including significant ones and ones we don’t anticipate, like the skunk that ended up in the house in the opening example.  While we can’t help everyone in need that we come across, and we’re unlikely to come across someone beat up and left for dead, “If a brother or sister is poorly clothed and lacking in daily food, and one of you says to them, ‘Go in peace, be warmed and filled,’ without giving them the things needed for the body, what good is that?” – James 2:15-16

“No one can do everything, but everyone can do something” – Max Lucado

He Humbles and Exalts Nations

Todd R Leave a comment

In a parable about humility, Jesus said in Luke 14:11: “For everyone who exalts himself will be humbled, and he who humbles himself will be exalted.”  While the parable is about individual people, elsewhere God also makes clear that he can humble or exalt entire nations.  While Luke 14:11 may contradict much of what we see in our world today, at the final judgment the truth of the verse will be made manifest, and God promises it will be so.

As an example, the Old Testament prophet Isaiah spoke of God’s power over the nations.  Around 605 B.C., Babylon invaded Judah and carried them into captivity, and about 70 years later, Judah was allowed to return home by Cyrus the Mede, who had defeated Babylon.  Over a century before Babylon’s invasion, Isaiah prophesied their entire rise and fall around 700 B.C., when Babylon was not yet even a world power.  Isaiah described the final destinies of both Babylon and of God’s people in startling images.

As recorded in Isaiah 47:1-3, God’s vengeance on Babylon was described, probably before they even considered capturing Jerusalem:

“Come down and sit in the dust,
            O virgin daughter of Babylon;
sit on the ground without a throne,
            O daughter of the Chaldeans!
For you shall no more be called
            tender and delicate.
Take the millstones and grind flour,
            put off your veil,
strip off your robe, uncover your legs,
            pass through the rivers.
Your nakedness shall be uncovered,
            and your disgrace shall be seen.
I will take vengeance,
            and I will spare no one.
Our Redeemer—the LORD of hosts is his name—
            is the Holy One of Israel.”

This is contrasted to the future of God’s people in Isaiah 52:1-2:

“Awake, awake,
            put on your strength, O Zion;
put on your beautiful garments,
            O Jerusalem, the holy city;
for there shall no more come into you
            the uncircumcised and the unclean.
Shake yourself from the dust and arise;
            be seated, O Jerusalem;
loose the bonds from your neck,
            O captive daughter of Zion.”

Did you notice the parallels?  In Isaiah 47, Babylon is disgraced, cast down from the throne and made to do menial labor.  Babylon is stripped of their beautiful clothes and publicly shamed, sitting in the dust.

Contrast to Isaiah 52, which describes the daughter of Zion as rising up from the dust of disgrace under Babylon, from whom she has been freed.  She dwells in peace, awakening and dressing herself in beautiful clothes.  What a beautiful future!

Photo by Aaron Burden on Unsplash

However, note that God removes Babylon’s temporary throne but does not put His people on a throne.  That honor belongs only to Him, and Babylon’s presumption in taking that place is the reason they need to be humbled.  By humbling themselves before God’s throne, His people follow the example Jesus gave at the wedding feast in verse 10 of the Luke 14 parable: “But when you are invited, go and sit in the lowest place, so that when your host comes he may say to you, ‘Friend, move up higher.’ Then you will be honored in the presence of all who sit at table with you.”  God will honor the humble.

By demonstrating power over entire nations in history, He has proven He has power over nations now and in the future.  And if He has power over nations, He has power over whatever frustrations we have with the state of the world.  He alone is on His throne.

So, if you are frustrated with the powerful and influential who puff themselves up in defiance of God, or if you wonder whether being humble is really a better alternative, remember:

“For everyone who exalts himself will be humbled, and he who humbles himself will be exalted.”

For people as well as nations.

The Love of a Good Samaritan

Todd R 1 Comment

The parable of the Good Samaritan is well-known, even by those who aren’t Christian.  Briefly, it goes like this: a man is robbed, beaten, and left for dead on the side of a road.  First a priest, and then a Levite, passed him by.  But a Samaritan, a member of a group despised by many Jews, stopped and helped the man, getting him to help and paying the necessary expenses.

Jesus told the parable in response to a man who said to inherit eternal life, “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.”[1]  But then “desiring to justify himself,” he asked Jesus, “And who is my neighbor?”  He was looking for loopholes, for people he did not need to love.

Now, there are multiple words in New Testament Greek that translate as “love” in our English Bibles, and the love being discussed in this parable is agape love.  This love is a self-sacrificial love that puts the interests of others above the interests of self, even if those others don’t love you.  Agape motivates acts of benevolence or charity and is epitomized by the cross.

So, why did the priest and the Levite not love the man left on the side of the road?  These men were very religious and should have been interested in doing the right thing according to God.

It could have been that if the man actually looked dead, or would be soon, they didn’t want to risk becoming ceremonially “unclean.”  Numbers 19:11-13 says:

“Whoever touches the dead body of any person shall be unclean seven days.  He shall cleanse himself with the water on the third day and on the seventh day, and so be clean. But if he does not cleanse himself on the third day and on the seventh day, he will not become clean.  Whoever touches a dead person, the body of anyone who has died, and does not cleanse himself, defiles the tabernacle of the LORD, and that person shall be cut off from Israel; because the water for impurity was not thrown on him, he shall be unclean. His uncleanness is still on him.”

The last thing they may have wanted to do was defile the Temple, or to be kept away from worship for seven whole days.  They had to keep up appearances after all.

It might have been that they just didn’t consider the man to be their neighbor, or a member of their “tribe”.  The Reformation Study Bible notes that “First-century Jews had various ideas about who was included in the category of ‘neighbor,’ whether marking its boundaries by community or clan affinities or by religious party affiliation (a Pharisee’s neighbors would be other Pharisees). Yet at its widest extent, the circle of “neighbors” was confined to Israel.”  Tribalism was alive and well in ancient Israel, and neither Samaritans nor near-dead men in need of help belonged.

In either case, they passed by the person because they had rules that told them it was ok to desert him.  These rules may have been faulty applications of Scripture, or just cultural rules, but the rules resulted in situations where it was preferred to not love someone, even in very desperate need.

A lesson Jesus wanted us to take from the parable is that the person who loves whoever needs love, even if they are a Samaritan or from a different “tribe” than ours, is the one who will inherit eternal life.  We don’t get to decide who is our neighbor, and therefore who to love.

American culture is increasingly condemning any rules restricting who we should have erotic love (Greek eros) for, but it is also increasingly welcoming of rules limiting who we should have sacrificial love (agape) for.  American culture is also increasingly permissive of hate toward people in other political parties or those who don’t think the same way about issues.  We are getting better at identifying our enemies, while getting worse at loving them.

However, from the story of the Good Samaritan, Jesus makes clear that any rules that tell us when it ok to ignore agape love are bad rules.  In true righteousness, Jesus would rather die on the cross than leave a man stranded on the side of the road to follow some rule.  Jesus was the only one who could live a perfect life of live, but He also said, “Whoever does not bear his own cross and come after me cannot be my disciple.”[2] Therefore, show agape love to your neighbor, no matter who they are.  Be the good neighbor.  And when (not if) you can’t, trust in God’s mercy and his love for you, which never fails.

[1] Luke 10:27
[2] Luke 14:27