Chapter 5

Loving Neighbour

“As I have loved you, so you must love one another. By this everyone will know that you are my disciples, if you love one another.”

John 13:34b–35

Introduction

One aspect of loving God is loving his creation. One part of his creation is the human race. Therefore, it is not surprising that Jesus, and indeed the expert in the Law, place the command to love one’s neighbour next to the command to love God. The Law, as stated in the book of Leviticus, is, “Do not seek revenge or bear a grudge against one of your people but love your neighbour as yourself.”[1] As we saw in Chapter 1, the Pharisee, keen to justify his questioning of Jesus, asks, “Who is my neighbour?” Jesus responded to this question with a parable.

As we explore the parable, it is helpful to keep in mind the original Old Testament context of this law to love one’s neighbour. The laws given by God, as recorded in Leviticus Chapter 19, are designed to assist the people (including their religious leaders) to become Holy in their daily lives, just as God himself is Holy. Leviticus 19:1–2, “the Lord spoke to Moses, saying, “Speak to all the congregation of the people of Israel and say to them, ‘you shall be holy, for I the Lord your God am holy.’” The Hebrew word we translate as “holy” comes from a term meaning “separate.” What is ‘holy’ is separated from common use or held sacred, especially by virtue of its being clean and pure. In this context, the law was concerned with people living a perfect or pure life, untainted by sin. It was about living a life that was worthy of God, who made creation and each human being within creation, both Jew and Gentile.

Some of the laws listed in Leviticus 19 make it clear that God expects holiness in every sphere of a person’s life. Many of these commands, including the one in verse 18, are focused on the Israelites’ functioning as a loving community, serving one another’s well-being. Significantly, Leviticus 19:33 commands that the foreigner living in the land must not be abused but treated as a native-born, a teaching which is central to understanding the term ‘neighbour’ and to which we will return.

So, let us explore the story Jesus told to answer the Pharisee’s question about the definition of ‘neighbour’, and which we read at the beginning of Chapter 1. It may help just to read it again.

Points for reflection

1. Who are the people that you find it most difficult to love? Are they your next-door neighbour, someone living in your road or in your village, asylum seekers, people homeless or hungry, members of a particular political party, a particular religious group - who?

2. Do you see these people as part of God’s creation: made in his image?

3. Galatians 5:14 [NRSV], “The whole law is summed up in a single commandment, ‘You shall love your neighbour as yourself.”

Luke 6:32 [ESV], “If you love those who love you, what benefit is that to you? For even sinners love those who love them.”

1 Thessalonians 5:15 [ESV], “See that no one repays anyone evil for evil, but always seek to do good to one another and to everyone.”

The Road

In Jesus’ parable, a man is walking from Jerusalem to Jericho. That wasn’t the old city of Jericho, the walls of which Joshua demolished during the Israelite invasion of Canaan, but one located about a mile further south.

This new city of Jericho had been built around a huge palace complex first established by the Hasmoneans in the second-century BC and subsequently extended by Herod the Great.

Jericho was a flourishing oasis located at a strategic crossroads in the road network of southern Israel.

The road from Jerusalem to Jericho has been important throughout history, being used by traders, the military, pilgrims, and priests. The road descends some 3,200 feet (975 m) along its 18 mile (29 km) route, twisting through long stretches of isolated, barren and rocky terrain. It would have taken six or seven hours to walk between the two cities. Its mountainous topography provided an ideal environment for bandits and highwaymen to ambush unsuspecting travellers, which they did. Indeed, the road was notorious for its danger and difficulty.

In his commentary on the parable of the Good Samaritan, William Barclay comments that;

“People seldom attempted the Jerusalem to Jericho road alone if they were carrying goods or valuables. Seeking safety in numbers, they travelled in convoys or caravans.”[2]

Tom Wright adds that first-century pilgrims would prefer to travel the longer but safer, easterly route along the Jordon valley. “Few Israelis today will travel from Galilee to Jerusalem by the direct route, because it will take them through the West Bank and risk violence. Similarly, most first-century pilgrims making the same journey would prefer, as Jesus himself did, to travel down the Jordan valley to Jericho and the turn west up the hill to Jerusalem. It was much safer.”[3]

So, we may regard the man who was beaten up to be rather foolish, culpable for his own downfall. If only he had taken the safer route.

Even today, we hear people being critical of those who fall on hard times, ridiculing them for their own misfortune. If only they had done this or that, worked harder in school, not had so many children, not spent all their money frivolously, worn different clothes, not been out so late. These are all criticisms we hear as people are blamed for their own situations. Similarly, we sometimes hear people justify their refusal to help another by arguing that helping only encourages reckless, feckless, and irresponsible behaviour.

Is it neighbourly to refuse someone help simply because they have made a foolish decision? The parable is clear that regardless of how stupid or culpable a person is, and however easy it might have been for them to avoid their calamity, they are nevertheless to be regarded as a neighbour and therefore to be loved. A person’s misfortune may well be their own fault, but that does not in any way diminish their need for help, nor our responsibilities towards one another. However, loving a neighbour is not to condone, encourage or affirm their behaviour. We must not confuse approving of everything a person does with loving them. For example, indulging an alcoholic’s craving for alcohol is not a way of demonstrating love. Indeed, loving may involve helping someone understand that they need to change their behaviour.

Priests and Levites

In Jesus’ story, apart from the man who was beaten up, there were three others travelling the Jerusalem to Jericho road; two walked by, and one stopped to help. The two who walked on, ignoring the man, were fellow Jews. One was a priest, the other a Levite. So why did Jesus choose these as characters in his story?

Priests occupied an important position in first-century Jewish society. Their ancestry was in the tribe of Levi and descendants of Aaron. We read in Exodus 28 how God chose Aaron and his sons as priests. Interestingly, the whole of the Hebrew nation were to be priests. We read in Exodus 19 God speaking to Moses on Sinai; “if you obey me fully and keep my covenant, then out of all nations you will be my treasured possession. Although the whole earth is mine, you will be for me a kingdom of priests and a holy nation.”[4] The role of priests is to be an intermediary between people and God. The nation of Israel was to be a nation that, by its life, worship and example, would bring others to know God.[5] Nevertheless, the priests, descended from Moses’ brother Aaron, were set aside from others to be taught Jewish law, literature, and tradition, and trained to perform specific duties, including the conduct of sacrifices. Priests were characters of probity. They were given respect and deference.

Barclay[6] suggest there could have been as many as 20,000 priests in Jesus’ day. According to 1 Chronicles 24, priests were divided into twenty-four divisions. Each division served in the Temple for a week, twice a year, although all served during the major festivals of Passover, Pentecost and the Feast of Tabernacles. Which priests performed which duties was decided by lot and so assumed to be divinely chosen. (In Luke 1:8–10, we read how Zechariah, the father of John the Baptist, was chosen by lot to serve in the Temple and burn incense.) So, it is possible that some priests might never serve in the Temple; however, those who were chosen were only permitted to serve once. There was also an age restriction. Only men aged twenty-five to fifty years old were permitted to serve in the Temple, according to Numbers 8:24–26, although those over fifty were able to assist their younger colleagues. Consequently, it was a great honour to be chosen and something the priests valued and looked forward to.

With the exception of the chief priests, most priests would have lived away from Jerusalem, residing in lodgings in the city during their time of service.

In their book “The Message and the Kingdom,” Richard Horsley and Neil Asher Silberman describe what archaeologists have discovered about the living conditions of the priesthood.

“…impressive archaeological remains of their Jerusalem residences show how elegant their lifestyle had become. In spacious structures unhesitatingly dubbed ‘mansions’ by the archaeologists who uncovered them in the 1970s, we can get a glimpse of a lavish life in mosaic floored reception rooms and dining rooms with elaborate painted and carved stucco wall decorations and with a wealth of fine tableware, glassware, carved stone tabletops, and other interior furnishings and elegant peristyles.”^[7]

So, it is not surprising to find a priest making the journey from Jericho to Jerusalem to serve in the Temple.

The Jews regarded Temple worship as essential for ensuring God’s presence and blessing on the land, so the duties the priests performed were hugely important. Custom and law required they meet rigorous regulations to maintain their purity. Otherwise, it was believed that their worship might not be effective, and God would withdraw his blessing from the nation. Consequently, to ensure their purity, serving priests underwent both a physical examination for skin diseases or broken bones, and a spiritual examination to ensure there was moral, ethical, and legal probity.

Touching a dead body would instantly make a person ritually unclean and so debar a priest from serving.[8] So, when the priest saw the man lying on the road in Jesus’ parable, it is understandable that he became conflicted with his duty to help someone in distress and his need to remain ritually clean so he could undertake his Temple responsibilities. He decided to walk by on the other side of the road.

So, let us empathise and indeed sympathise with him. He faces a moral dilemma; help the man and be prevented from conducting his duties in the Temple or leave the man and remain ritually pure to enable the people to fulfil their religious devotions. However, there may also be in the priest’s mind an element of self-preservation. The thieves might have used a man lying on the ground as bait in a trap. The priest might be weighing in his mind whether the man had actually been beaten up or if this was a scam to catch the unwary traveller.

Another character in the parable is a Levite. Like the priests, they also had special functions within the religious life of Israel.

All firstborn males, animal and human, were regarded as holy to the Lord and therefore belonging to God. However, Numbers 3:12 states God’s instruction to Moses; “I have taken the Levites from among the people of Israel instead of every firstborn who opens the womb among the people of Israel. The Levites shall be mine.” So, along with the priests, Levites also had responsibilities and duties concerned with the Temple and worship. They supported the work of the priests. Their traditional duties are set out in Numbers 3:5–10 and 1 Chronicles 23-25. These included guarding all the furnishings of the tent of meeting against intruders, ensuring it was clean and ready for worship, including transporting it from place to place. Levites also slaughtered some of the sacrificial animals and performed the music during Temple worship. Over time, the precise duties of the Levites changed, but they continued to serve in the Temple during the time of Jesus. Levites were not regarded as highly as priests and were sometimes described as a lower-level priesthood. However, just like the priests, their purity was important, although the requirements were not as rigorous as those for priests.

The Levite would have been equally as challenged as the priest when he saw what looked like a corpse lying in the road. The Levite faced the same moral dilemma as the priest: to check that the man was indeed dead or to walk by on the other side and remain ritually clean to enable him to perform his Temple duties.

Both the priest and the Levite may well have taken the view that their service in the Temple was their foremost priority. They would have likely regarded their Temple service as crucial to the life of the nation. Similarly, they would have regarded serving the spiritual needs of the large number of people they would meet in the Temple outweighing the risk of ritual uncleanliness and the time spent helping just one person, whom they probably regarded as dead and beyond help.

We may face similar moral dilemmas in our own lives. We may regard what we do, the duties, obligations and responsibilities we carry, extremely important, and indeed they may be so. Others may be relying upon us. How should we respond when these conflict with our humanity towards someone in need? Imagine the local vicar or minister travelling to conduct a wedding in a neighbouring village. As he or she travels the country lane, they see a car that has crashed into a tree. If they stop, they will be involved the whole afternoon with paramedics and police. That will mean 100 or more guests will be kept waiting at the church and a bride’s big day ruined. Perhaps in these days of mobile phones, satisfactory arrangements might be made, but what if there is no signal or the minister has forgotten to charge the battery on their phone?

Perhaps the importance, kudos, honour, and uniqueness of serving in the Temple meant that the priest and Levite put their own needs and desires above those of the man in need. How often do we do just that with our own time and our own money? The priest and the Levite would be fully aware that stopping to help would involve making extremely costly sacrifices.

Jesus could have chosen anyone busy and with responsibilities to others, but why did he choose a priest and a Levite to leave the man for dead and walk by on the other side of the road? Throughout the Gospels, Jesus is most critical of Pharisees and the scribes. Matthew 23 records succinctly Jesus’ condemnation of Pharisees. In that chapter alone, he refers to Pharisees as hypocrites no less than seven times. Jesus considers their teaching as misleading the people and keeping them from God. Jesus is rarely critical of the priests or Levites. There must be a purpose in Jesus choosing a priest and a Levite, rather than, say, a Pharisee (all key figures in the religious life of Israel) as the characters who neglected to help the man and pass by on the other side.

Firstly, Pharisees were teachers of the Law. So, given that it was a teacher of the Law who questioned Jesus, to have included a Pharisee as one of those who passed by might have made him antagonistic towards Jesus and the parable he told, rather than willing to contemplate its meaning.

Secondly, Jesus was highlighting the failure of all Jewish religious leadership. This is exactly the same failure about which we read in Ezekiel 34. There, God is speaking to the prophet Ezekiel about the shepherds of the people. These were the religious leaders. God is critical and condemns their failure to care for the people.

“This is what the Sovereign Lord says: Woe to you shepherds of Israel who only take care of yourselves! Should not shepherds take care of the flock? You eat the curds, clothe yourselves with the wool and slaughter the choice animals, but you do not take care of the flock. You have not strengthened the weak or healed the sick or bound up the injured. You have not brought back the strays or searched for the lost. You have ruled them harshly and brutally.”[9]

Later in the same chapter, God tells Ezekiel, “I myself will search for my sheep and look after them. As a shepherd looks after his scattered flock when he is with them, so will I look after my sheep.”[10]

Thirdly, in choosing his characters, Jesus is likely teaching something specific about worship. The Priest and Levite were people who had specific duties in the Temple involving worship and sacrifice. Jesus chose those central to ritual worship to make the point that true worship is not simply what happened in the Temple or happens today in our church buildings. Worship takes place in and through our daily lives. We noted in Chapter 3 how Paul referred to faithful Christians as ‘living sacrifices’^[11] and how God regards the rituals of our worship as worthless if they are not supported by following his commands for daily living. In the parable, the worship leaders are focused on ritual rather than giving God praise and glory by fulfilling God’s commands to love their neighbour as themselves. It is hypocritical to worship in the Temple, or to be in church Sunday after Sunday if what we proclaim with our lips we do not live out in our lives. As James famously and succinctly writes, “Show me your faith without deeds and I will show you mine by what I do.”[12]

By making the priest and Levite key characters in the parable, Jesus is emphasising that genuinely loving God with all one’s heart, soul, mind, and strength requires loving one’s neighbour as oneself.

The Samaritan

Jesus chose a Samaritan as the hero of his parable. Why did he do so? Who were the Samaritans? Is there anything significant in the fact that the man who cared for the traveller beaten up on the Jericho to Jerusalem road was not a Jew but a foreigner?

The Jews hated Samaritans. The relationship between the two peoples was not much different from that between Roman Catholics and Protestants in Northern Ireland during the ‘troubles’ of the 20^th century. To Jesus’ Jewish audience, and particularly to the ‘expert in the law’ whose question to Jesus prompted the telling of the parable, it would have been shocking to hear that a Samaritan came to the aid of a Jew and saved him from dying on the road.

The Samaritans came from the place known as Samaria, a region bounded by Galilee in the north and Judea in the south. Joshua 16 records how this region largely corresponded to the land allotted to the tribe of Ephraim and the western half of Manasseh. Following the death of Solomon, around 975 BC, the Kingdom was divided into the southern Kingdom of Judah and the northern Kingdom of Israel. Samaria became the southern part of the Kingdom of Israel. So, people from Samaria had a shared ancestry and shared the same ancient history as first-century Jews.

However, three major developments occurred that created a huge rift between those who became known as Samaritans and those who became Jews.

Firstly, the Jews had a special relationship with God for it is written in In Deuteronomy 7:6, “For you are a people holy to the Lord your God. The Lord your God has chosen you to be a people for his treasured possession, out of all the peoples who are on the face of the earth.” This special relationship was emphasised by the Law that stated every firstborn male was ’holy to the Lord’ or belonged to God. Exodus 13:1–2 states that all firstborn children were to serve God all their lives. Nevertheless, we noted above that that God commissioned the Levites to serve in the place of every firstborn male. (That required every firstborn son to be redeemed from this service with a payment of five silver shekels.^[13])

In the mid-8th century BC, the Assyrians conquered the northern Kingdom of Israel, taking many of those they conquered back to Syria. We read in 2 Kings 17:6; “In the ninth year of Hoshea, the king of Assyria captured Samaria, and he carried the Israelites away to Assyria and placed them in Halah, and on the Habor, the river of Gozan, and in the cities of the Medes.”

However, not all Israelites went into exile, and many who remained, over time, intermarried with their foreign occupiers. In the eyes of the Jews, this blemished the pure bloodline of the nation God had selected as his ‘chosen people.’ So, the Jews regarded Samaritans not only as foreigners but as a people who had tarnished, corrupted and degraded the holy people of God.

Secondly, Samaritans did not recognise all the Jewish books of scripture. Unlike many of the Jews in the northern Kingdom of Israel, the Samaritans resisted paganism, striving to keep the faith handed down by the patriarchs. Samaritan worship was based on the Samaritan Pentateuch. These texts comprise only the first five books of the Hebrew Bible. The Samaritans regarded it as the true religion which had been preserved by those who had remained in Israel before many from the southern Kingdom of Judah returned from exile in Babylonia.

(After the Battle of Carchemish in 605 BCE, many in Judah were taken into captivity in Babylon but were able to return following the fall of Babylon to King Cyrus the Great of Persia in 539 BCE.)

The Samaritans only recognised Judaism as a related but distorted and amended religion, brought back by those returning from exile. Samaritans would have nothing to do with nor recognise any divine authorship of, or inspiration in, any of the other books of the Jewish scriptures, such as the history books of 1 and 2 Kings, 1 and 2 Chronicles, the books of the prophets or the Psalms.

Thirdly, there was a critical difference of scriptural interpretation between Jews and Samaritans regarding the location of the Temple and particularly the interpretation of Deuteronomy 12:5; “you shall seek the place that the Lord your God will choose out of all your tribes to put his name and make his habitation there. There you shall go.” The difference hinged on whether God was to make this choice in the future, as understood by the Jews, or had chosen in the past, as understood by the Samaritans.

Judaism understood this place ‘God will choose’ for his habitation to refer to Jerusalem. In the early years of the Israelite kingdom, the Ark of the Covenant had no permanent location and was moved between several holy places such as Shechem and Shiloh. However, following King David’s capture of Jerusalem around 1,000 BC, the Ark found a permanent home in the city. David chose Mount Moriah, or the Temple Mount as it became subsequently known, as the place to build a Temple as it was believed that, in accordance with Genesis 22:2, this is where Abraham had built an altar on which to sacrifice his son Isaac.

However, Samaritan belief identified the place for God’s Temple not as Mount Moriah but as Mount Gerizim. The Samaritan text of Deuteronomy 12:5 speaks of the place where God has chosen to establish His name. Consequently, in accordance with Deuteronomy 11: 29, which records God’s instructions prior to the Israelite invasion of Canaan; “And when the Lord your God brings you into the land that you are entering to take possession of it, you shall set the blessing on Mount Gerizim and the curse on Mount Ebal.” It was there the Samaritans built their temple.

The woman whom Jesus met at the well at Sychar, about which we read in John 4, was fully aware of these differences. She refers to her Samaritan ancestors worshipping on the mountain near Sychar, which is on Mount Gerizim, whilst she recognised the Jews claimed that the rightful place of worship was in Jerusalem.

The enmity between Jews and Samaritans was therefore based on, as far as the Jews were concerned, Samaritans having a tainted bloodline; scriptures that were incomplete, and their interpretation erroneous, misleading and unsafe; and Samaritan worship rituals unworthy and ineffective since they were not practised in the place God had commanded.

Samaritans were similarly inhospitable to Jews. We read that, once, when Jesus was travelling to Jerusalem;

“When the days drew near for him [Jesus] to be taken up, he set his face to go to Jerusalem. And he sent messengers ahead of him, who went and entered a village of the Samaritans, to make preparations for him. But the people did not receive him, because his face was set toward Jerusalem.”[14]

To the expert in the Law who questioned Jesus, these aspects of Samaritan culture, belief, and religious practice would set Samaritans outside of the covenant community of God, and so any contact with them as causing a person to become ritually unclean. The idea that such a person could be a neighbour, someone to love as you love yourself as the Law commanded, would have been abhorrent. For a person who interpreted the Law as “love your neighbour and hate your enemy,”[15] the Samaritan would have certainly been someone to hate.

So, this parable focuses on the term ‘neighbour’ as someone who is not only different by race, religion and custom, but also someone who is despised and hated.

As we recognised in Chapter 1, nowhere in the scriptures is there a law commanding hatred of people, so what does the parable teach about attitudes and actions towards those who are considered foreigners?

The scriptures are clear that all people are created in the image of the creator.^[16] In Chapter 2, we reflected on what James wrote in his letter about being careful with our language; with how we use our tongue. He essentially argued that it is inconsistent and an offence against God to praise him with the same tongue that has cursed people, “who have been made in God’s likeness.”^[17] The Law, as written in Leviticus 19, has much to say about the care and compassion we should show others, regardless of who they are, for all are made in the image of God by God, part of his creation. The Law required those who reap to leave gleanings for the poor and the foreigner.^[18] People are to live with one another without spreading slander, stealing, defrauding, lying and are to judge one another fairly without favouritism. The Law even provided one of the earliest recorded trading standards to ensure honesty in trade.^[19] The Law required compassion to be shown to people with disabilities and that nothing is done to endanger a neighbour’s life.^[20]

Most relevant to the context of the parable of the Good Samaritan is Leviticus 19:33-34; “When a foreigner resides among you in your land, do not mistreat him. The foreigner residing among you must be treated as your native-born. Love him as yourself, for you were foreigners in Egypt. I am the Lord your God.”

People regarded as foreigners are to be treated as natives. The Law reminds the Jews of the time when the nation was ill-treated and oppressed in Egypt. The relationship the Jews were to have with Samaritans living in Israel was to be as if the Samaritans were themselves Jews. They were to be treated no differently.

This is a teaching that the Jews had neglected, particularly given the occupation of their land by Roman forces.

The neighbourliness that the parable encourages is required to be extended to everyone, regardless of race, religion, or cultural background.

The parable has huge implications for us today about the way we treat those who are migrants and refugees.

In his letters, the Apostle Paul makes it clear that in the Kingdom of God, there is no such thing as a slave or free, male or female, Jew or Gentile.^[21]

Jesus lived out the teaching of his parable. He welcomed a Jew, Zacchaeus,^[22] who was a thief and collaborator with the Roman occupiers and forgave him. Jesus changed the life of a Samaritan woman he met at a well.^[23] He granted the request of a Greek woman from Syrian Phoenicia casting out a demon from her daughter.^[24] He granted the request of a Roman soldier by healing his servant.^[25] Jesus accepted the help of a man from Africa, Simon of Cyrene, who carried his cross. Jesus gave the disciples a command to go into the world and make disciples of everyone.^[26]

The neighbourly act

The expert in the Law asked Jesus, “Who is my neighbour?” Having responded with the parable of the Good Samaritan, Jesus then asked the man which of the characters in the story were neighbourly to the man who fell into the hands of the robbers. The expert in the law correctly responded that it was the man who had mercy; that is, it was the Samaritan. So, what is it that the Samaritan did that was neighbourly, helping the man beaten and robbed on the road?

Firstly, he stopped; he did not simply walk by on the other side of the road. He had sufficient compassion to see if the man was indeed alive and what might be done to help. He took the time and the trouble to assist him. That would have been at some danger to himself. In the same way that we reflected that the priest and Levite may have regarded the man as bait in a trap, the Samaritan may have had similar thoughts. However, in contrast to the priest and the Levite, he sets aside his own safety for the sake of assisting the man.

Secondly, the Samaritan attends to the man’s wounds, bandaging them and pouring on oil and wine. These would have acted as antiseptics, and the bandages would have prevented any dirt from entering the wounds. We might imagine that the Samaritan was not carrying any first aid kit but needed to tear cloth or clothing to make bandages. Clearly, there would have been a real cost to the aid he was providing.

Thirdly, the Samaritan, having bandaged the man’s wounds, did not leave him on the road. The Samaritan lifted the man onto his donkey and took him to a place of safety where he would be able to heal and recuperate.

Remember, the man had been robbed, so the Samaritan would have needed to bear the cost of the man’s stay at the inn. Indeed, he gave the innkeeper two silver coins - two denarii. A denarius was what an agricultural worker was typically paid for one day’s labour. So, the Samaritan incurred another substantial cost.

Fourthly, the Samaritan leaves the man in the care of the innkeeper. Amazingly, the Samaritan writes the innkeeper a blank cheque, offering to pay him more money when he returns if the two denarii are insufficient to meet all of the innkeeper’s expenses. Clearly, neither would have known how long it would take for the man to recover and be fit and well enough to leave the inn.

This is truly an amazing gift. The Samaritan trusts the innkeeper to care for the man, although he risks being swindled by the innkeeper, who could easily claim expenses he did not incur. He also risks being swindled by the man beaten on the road, for he could stay at the inn longer than he needed. The Samaritan does not say when he will return. So, there is some trust placed in him by the innkeeper who might have been concerned that he would incur costs that would never be repaid.

Finally, the man, once recovered from his injuries, would go on his way. The Samaritan would never see him again. He would never be thanked for his compassion and care. He would never receive anything in return. All he did for the man was out of love and grace.

It was the Samaritan who acted in a neighbourly way fulfilling the command to love his neighbour as himself.

However, there was more to the Samaritan’s actions than simple kindness. His love was limitless, as reflected in his willingness to pay the innkeeper “any extra expense”[27] he may have.

We might see in his actions a reflection of Christ’s limitless and sacrificial love; healing the sick, making the blind see and the lame walk, casting out demons, raising the dead, and dying on the cross for the forgiveness of sin.[28]

In his letters, the Apostle Paul urges his readers to be Christ-like, writing,

“Follow my example, as I follow the example of Christ.”[29]

“Clothe yourself with Christ.”[30]

“All you who were baptised into Christ have clothed yourself with Christ.”[31]

“Be imitators of God, therefore, as dearly loved children, and live a life of love, just as Christ loved us and gave himself up for us.”[32]

Similarly, the Apostle John wrote;

“Whoever says, “I know him,” [Christ] but does not do what he commands is a liar, and the truth is not in that person. But if anyone obeys his word, love for God is truly made complete in them. This is how we know we are in him: Whoever claims to live in him must live as Jesus did.”[33]

In his conversation with the expert in the law, Jesus refers to the Old Testament command to love neighbour as oneself. However, Jesus extended this command when speaking to his disciples at his Last Supper. In his account of the Gospel, John refers to Jesus washing the disciples’ feet, sharing bread with them, and Judas leaving. Jesus then went on to say, “As I have loved you so you must love one another.”[34] This takes love to a new level, for Jesus loved sacrificially.

The Samaritan in the parable made a number of sacrifices: of his time, his possessions (pouring oil and wine on the injured man’s wounds), and his money by paying for the man’s care.

Jesus calls us to love as he loves; he calls us to love sacrificially, not half-heartedly. Jesus loves us: people who are unworthy, wavering, often uncaring of others and God himself. Jesus loves us regardless of who we are: our racial or cultural background. He welcomes us with arms wide open upon the cross - not because of anything we have done, but simply by his grace. That’s the kind of love he asks us to have for our neighbour.

We have explored what it means to love God with all our heart, soul, mind, and strength. We have understood from the parable that we can only do that if we love others. However, when we place the parable alongside the command of Jesus to love as he loves us, all these ideas and concepts are brought together into a love which is sacrificial. The love we have for our neighbour is a love that is to give up self for the sake of others. It is a love that does not walk by on the other side but gives something of oneself, expecting nothing in return.

We know that this is what Jesus wants from us, for he encourages us to pray to the Father, “your will be done on earth as it is in heaven.”[35] In the next chapter, we will explore how, by the power of the Holy Spirit working through us, the world might become a little more like the Kingdom.

Points for reflection

1. To what extent should someone be helped if they are culpable for their own misfortune?

2. Have you ever been in a situation of conflicting claims on your time that placed you in a moral or ethical dilemma?

3. Should the number of people we can help be a critical factor in determining our actions? Should the severity of a person’s need be a critical factor in determining our actions? How do we balance those often-competing influences on our decision making? How often do our personal needs and desires outweigh other obligations?

4. “When a foreigner resides among you in your land, do not mistreat him. The foreigner residing among you must be treated as your native-born. Love him as yourself, for you were foreigners in Egypt. I am the Lord your God.” How well do we live up to this command in Leviticus 19:33–34?

5. What does the parable teach us about our relationship with people of a different race or culture? Is this something we live out in our lives?

6. What does it mean to love sacrificially?

7. John wrote, “If anyone has material possessions and sees his brother in need but has no pity on him, how can the love of God be in him?”[34] How can we respond to this? How do we respond to this?

Prayer

Loving God, I thank you for the message of the parable. Through this story, Jesus has shown me a new way to live. He has shown me what human life should be like, teaching me to love my neighbour and my enemies.

I ask you to direct the people of the world towards harmony and peace, mutual respect and appreciation of one another’s cultures and traditions. I pray that I might embody this in my thinking, speaking and through my loving actions.

I pray for all in need. Move your faithful people and equip them to love, that people who are

hungry will be fed

naked - clothed,

homeless - sheltered

ignorant - educated

lonely - befriended,

sick receive medical care

and people exploited and abused, treated with justice and humanity.

Out of my love and concern for people who struggle with daily living, I ask you to ease the burden of those bowed down by depression, pain, guilt, anxiety, or fear. I pray for all who are bereaved. May tears of sadness turn to tears of joy in the knowledge of the certainty of everlasting life for all your faithful people.

In Jesus’ name, I pray, Amen.

[1] Leviticus 19:18

[2]Barclay, William. The Gospel of Luke. St Andrew’s Press. Edinburgh. (1954, revised 1975) p139

[3] Wright, Tom. Luke for Everyone. SPCK. London (2001) p127

[4] Exodus 19:5–6

[5] In 1 Peter 2:5, Peter tells us that all Christians are part of a “holy priesthood, offering spiritual sacrifices to God.” The role of the Christian is to act as that which brings people and God together.

[6] Barclay, William. The Gospel of Luke – Daily Study Bible. St Andrews Press. Edinburgh (1957) revised 1975 p10

^[7] Horsely, Richard A & Silberman, Neil Asher. The Message and the Kingdom. Minneapolis: Fortress Press, (2002)

[8] Leviticus 21:11 and Numbers 19:11

[9] Ezekiel 34: 2–4 (ESV)

[10] Ezekiel 34:11–12

[11] Romans 12:1

[12] James 2:18

[13] Numbers 18:16

[14] Luke 9:51–53

[15] Matthew 5:43

[16] Genesis 1:26 & 27

[17] James 3: 9

[18] Leviticus 19:9–10

[19] Leviticus 19:11, 13, 15, 16, 35–36

[20] Leviticus 19:14, 16

[21] Galatians 3:28

[22] Luke 19:1–10

[23] John 4:1–42

[24] Mark 7:24–30

[25] Luke 7:1–10

[26] Matthew 28:19

[27] Luke 10:29

[28] 1 John 4:10

[29] 1 Corinthians 11:1

[30] Romans 13:14

[31] Galatians 3:27

[32] Ephesians 5:1–2

[33] 1 John 2:4–6

[34] John 13:34

[35] Matthew 6:10

[36] 1 John 3:17