A lawyer stands up 25"to put him to the test," and asks what he must do to inherit eternal life. Jesus sends the question back: 26"What is written in the Law? How do you read it?" The lawyer answers well, joining two commands, love of God and love of neighbor (Deuteronomy 6:5; Leviticus 19:18). Jesus tells him, 28"do this, and you will live." That should have ended it. But the lawyer, 29"desiring to justify himself," asks a follow-up: 29"And who is my neighbor?" He wants a boundary so he can know whom he is required to love and whom he may skip.
Jesus answers with a story, and the story does not draw the line the lawyer asked for. A man traveling down from Jerusalem to Jericho is beaten, stripped, and left 30"half dead." A priest sees him and 31"passed by on the other side." A Levite does the same. Both men served in the temple, and both may have had religious reasons for keeping their distance from what might be a corpse. The story does not say why they passed, only that they saw and kept walking.
Then a Samaritan arrives. Samaritans and Jews had a long bitterness (John 4:9), and Jesus makes the hated foreigner the hero. What he does is listed with care. He 33"had compassion." He bandaged the wounds, poured on oil and wine, put the man on his own animal, took him to an inn, and took care of him. In the morning he gave the innkeeper two denarii and said, 35"whatever more you spend, I will repay you when I come back." The help cost him time, money, comfort, and a promise of more.
Now Jesus turns the lawyer's question around. The lawyer asked who counts as a neighbor. Jesus asks 36"Which of these three, do you think, proved to be a neighbor to the man who fell among the robbers?" The question is now who acted like a neighbor. The lawyer cannot bring himself to say the word Samaritan. He says, 37"The one who showed him mercy."
And Jesus answers, 37"You go, and do likewise." The command sends him to go and be the neighbor.
The story exposes how easily we ask the lawyer's question. It sounds like a request for clarity, and it works as a way to keep our love within safe limits. We want to know where our duty ends. Mercy in the parable has no such edge. It sees a need, feels it, and pays what it costs. Nobody in the story is convenient, and the man in the ditch is not in a position to thank anyone. The Samaritan helps a stranger with no promise of return.
Who is in the ditch beside your road right now? The answer is probably not far away. It may be a neighbor whose spouse is ill, a coworker who has quit talking, or a relative nobody calls. Go and do likewise.
Prayer
Father, we confess how often we ask the lawyer's question to find a limit to love. Open our eyes to the person in the ditch and give us compassion that moves our hands and our wallets. Thank you for the mercy you have shown us when we were the ones beaten and left by the road. Send us to do likewise. In Jesus' name, amen.