Who Is My Neighbor? (7/17/16)

Deuteronomy 30:9-14; Luke 10:25-37

Vincent van Gogh, Good Samaritan

On July 17th we considered the story of the Good Samaritan. Frankly, I think this parable is misnamed. A better title might be, The Merciful Samaritan. We are so familiar with the phrase "good Samaritan" that we think the two words go together naturally, but in Jesus' time nobody would have used those two words in the same phrase.

Who Is My Neighbor? (7/17/16)

Deuteronomy 30:9-14; Luke 10:25-37

Sermon

          Good morning! As you may recall from last Sunday, I talked a lot about a very important Hebrew word, hesed. Hesed is most commonly translated as loving kindness, but there’s no simple way to translate this word. It implies a continuous, loving relationship between God and humanity. Hesed is an enduring kindness, it also suggests mercy, but it is not deserved.

          The notion of hesed is operating in the background of the story of the Good Samaritan. In fact, it may be more appropriate to refer to this as the story of the Merciful Samaritan. In this story, Jesus starts with the familiar, and then moves in an unexpected direction.

          The familiar part of this story occurs in verses 25-27, in which a lawyer asks Jesus what he must do to inherit eternal life. I say this is familiar because versions of this story also appear in the Gospels of Matthew and Mark, all with the same answer: “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.” The first part of this quote comes from Deuteronomy 6:5 and the second from Leviticus 19:18. In the Gospel of Mark, Jesus identifies these as the two most important commandments given by God. Love God and love your neighbor. That’s it! There are no loopholes in this contract.

          Of course the lawyer in this story has to look for loopholes anyhow; this is what lawyers do. So he asks Jesus, “And who is my neighbor?” This is where Jesus goes off in a different direction: he offers a parable to clarify the terms of the contract.

          The story of the Good Samaritan is also very familiar to us—so familiar that it loses much of its power. We are so used to hearing the words “good” and “Samaritan” next to one another that we think they go together naturally. They do not. Not in Jesus’ time.

          In our gospel lesson from a couple weeks ago, we heard the disciples ask Jesus to call down fire upon a Samaritan village, because the people of that village had refused to welcome Jesus. To understand that story, and this week’s lesson, and why the words “Good Samaritan” or “Merciful Samaritan” didn’t really go together in Jesus’ time, we need a little context.

          The Samaritans believed they were descendants from the tribes of Ephraim and Manasseh. They also believed that Mount Gerizim was the original holy place of ancient Israel, dating back to the days when Joshua led the Israelites into the land of Canaan. For the Samaritans, Jerusalem was NOT the center of worship. They rejected all the other Jews, because the Samaritans believed they were the only ones who followed the true religion of ancient Israel. This is why the Samaritan village rejected Jesus—they thought Jesus was not a proper Jew.

          To a faithful Jew who believed that the temple in Jerusalem was the proper place for worship and sacrifices, the center of the Jewish faith—to that person, there was no such thing as a Good Samaritan! It would be foolish for a faithful Jew in first century Palestine to expect mercy from a Samaritan.

          Even among faithful Jews, mercy was in short supply. In Jesus’ time, there were a number of factions within Judaism and they were all vying for control of religious life. The lawyer in this story can be associated with the Pharisees, a faction who insisted on strict adherence to the Law of Moses. Yes, the Pharisees also believed in mercy, but if the practice of mercy violated some portion of the Law, then mercy would have to wait. Jesus constantly ran afoul of the Pharisees. He healed sick people on the Sabbath; he picked grain on the Sabbath. In the story of the Merciful Samaritan, the lawyer is trying to convict Jesus!

          I’m struck by how similar this is to our society today. We’re in the midst of an election season and we’re all busy arguing with one another. We’re arguing over who is or isn’t a real American. We’re busy trying to convict our neighbors so that our candidate wins the election. We display our self-righteousness every chance we get.

          Sadly, the church is no different. Over the last ten or twenty years, we’ve spent a lot of time and energy debating who is and isn’t a real Christian. As church attendance declines across the board, we spend our time arguing with one another. We shun our neighbors because they don’t have the right politics or the right faith. Sometimes we think that everybody else is doing it wrong! We think we’re the only ones who are faithful! We’re the only ones who are doing it right! We have a very narrow definition of who our neighbors are.

          And for those of us who still come to worship, it feels like we’re stuck. We tread so lightly around sensitive subjects and we’re afraid to be honest with one another. We don’t want to lose any more neighbors, so we’re afraid to speak uncomfortable truths and we’re afraid to listen to things that might take us out of our narrow comfort zone.

          As always, Jesus shows us the way forward. Jesus doesn’t return evil for evil or rejection for rejection! In the story from a couple weeks ago, Jesus refused to call down fire upon the Samaritan village, even though the Samaritans had rejected him. Similarly, he doesn’t attack the lawyer or use this parable as an opportunity to beat up on priests or Levites. Instead, Jesus uses the parable of the Merciful Samaritan to redefine the concept of neighbor.

          Jesus shows that the Samaritan, the rejected outsider can be righteous. Jesus reminds us that love of God and love of neighbor are our highest obligations. Jesus does not attach conditions to these commandments. These are blanket statements. Show mercy to all people and at all times—even if that person is an outsider. That’s not easy. And you know what? I don’t always get it right, either.

          I want to tell you about a time when I didn’t want to show mercy—I didn’t want to practice hesed. It was three years ago. I was taking Hebrew that summer, and I had just received my textbooks—the seminary doesn’t have a bookstore. Students order their textbooks from Amazon.com. And on that fateful day, three years ago, I returned home from work to find a box from Amazon on my back porch. Normally that was a good thing, but that day it had rained while I was at work. The box of textbooks was wet! Didn’t the delivery person even look at the forecast?

          I was so angry! Most of the books were fine, but my Hebrew workbook was ruined. That meant that I had to call Amazon’s customer service. I don’t know about you guys, but I hate dealing with customer service over the phone. You have to go through a bunch of menus only to be put on hold for half an hour or more. It was eight o’clock at night. I was tired and irritable. I didn’t want to deal with the aggravation of dealing with customer service, but I had no choice.

          So after a while on hold, I finally got to speak to a live person—in the Philippines! Don’t get me wrong, I don’t have any problems with foreigners, I don’t mind listening to foreign accents, but on that night, I wanted to know that I was being heard. I wanted to that guy to feel all of my righteous anger! Over some wet books. I really wanted to blow this whole thing way out of proportion, darn it!

          You know what customer service rep from the Philippines did? He apologized! The nerve! Instead of making me even angrier, he was really nice. And he spoke excellent English. He had an accent, but I understood every word he said. What was I supposed to do with all that rage?

          After he offered to refund my money and replace the damaged book, he said, “May I ask you a personal question?” I thought that was odd, but he’d been really nice, so I said sure, ask away. He asked if I was a Christian and why I was studying Hebrew. I explained that I was a Presbyterian seminary student, studying to be a pastor. It turned out that he was a church musician, he’d attended a Protestant seminary, and he was a lay leader in his congregation, but not a pastor. Needless to say, it was a very interesting conversation, and it was very different than the conversation I had expected.

          That customer service rep from the Philippines reminded me of who I really was. He taught me more about practicing hesed, practicing mercy, practicing grace than any seminary class could ever teach me. He reminded me that as a Christian, I am commanded to show mercy to all people. He reminded me that everyone is my neighbor. He reminded me that everyone is a beloved child of God. May we all remember this, today and every day. Thanks be to God. Amen!

BENEDICTION

          Now, Beloved, as you depart from this place, remember that we are all beloved children of God. Remember to treat everyone as your neighbor. Go forth and be instruments of God’s peace and reconciliation. Do not return evil for evil to any person, but know that we are all loved by God, and that we are called to reflect that love to everyone we meet. This is the truth and the love in which we were created. Go forth and live fully and abundantly into that love. In the name of Jesus Christ, our Lord, let all God’s children say, Amen!