Proper 10 - G - 2013 - Like a Good Neighbor Jesus Is There

The Eighth Sunday after Pentecost

July 14, 2013 - Pastor Adam Moline
Leviticus 18:1-5, 19:9-18                    Colossians 1:1-14                    Luke 10:25-37

Grace, mercy and peace to you from God our Father through our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ.  Amen.  Our text today is the Gospel lesson just read, especially these words, “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.”

Dear friends in Christ.  As we’ve all learned in Catechism class, the entire law can be summed up into two parts, love for God and love for neighbor.  And it sounds simple doesn’t it?  It seems like it should be easy to love God, like it should be easy to love our neighbors, and yet, there is something else that we love, something else that we cherish.  It’s not God.  It’s not our neighbor, but instead its ourselves that we love. 

That’s the very definition of sin, being turned inwardly upon oneself.  Loving oneself, caring most for oneself.  It’s been that way since sin entered our world.  The very reason we have sin is because Adam loved his own ideas more than he loved God’s. 

And it’s the same thing in our text today.  A lawyer comes to test Jesus.  He wants to see if Jesus is a true Jew, and if he understands what the Scriptures say about how to be saved.  “What must I do, Jesus, how can I inherit eternal life?” the man asks.  Jesus looks him square in the eye, and asks him, “What does the bible say?  Haven’t you read them?”  The man responds, “Of course Jesus, I know how, You are to love, both God and your neighbor.  Love is the way to save yourself.  All you need is love, perfect love, and if you can love in such a way, you will deserve heaven. 

Jesus responds, “You are correct, If you do this, you will live.”  The man looked over his life, and decided he’d loved as best as possible.  He’d loved God, after all he went to church as often as one could honestly be expected to, at least more often than the other people at synagogue.  So he must have the “Love of God” down.  But what about others.  Had he loved his neighbor?  He felt like he’d certainly shown care for those in his town, he’d been kind, he’d been courteous.  But what about those Roman occupiers?  Did he have to ‘love’ them?  What about the people living in Parthia?  Did he have to love them?  What was a neighbor? 

And so he asked Jesus, seeking not an answer, but rather, our text says, to justify himself.  Who is my neighbor, Jesus?  Who do I have to love, because I don’t have time to love everyone. 

Jesus responds with our famous parable.  A man was robbed along the road and left for dead.  A priest walked by, ignoring him in his time of need.  A little while later, a Levite, one of the holy house of Israel also passed by, also ignoring him.  But finally, a Samaritan, one who was despised by Jews, one who was hated because of their different worship, he stops to help the injured man.  He gives up his own money to help the man.  He pays for the best doctors available, he promises to care for all of his needs.  And in the parable we learn who a neighbor is. 

A neighbor is not just the person living in the property immediately abutting yours.  A neighbor is not just someone living in your town.  A neighbor is not just your fellow Hankinsonians.  But a neighbor is something more.  It is anyone who has mercy upon you, or really by extension, anyone you have mercy upon. 

Now, dear friends, when we hear this, there are two options of where we can logically go from this understanding.  We can say, “O yes, I am so holy and perfect, I care for all people, everywhere.  I love and care for those in Africa and China, I love and care for those, even in such places as Lidgerwood or Great Bend.  I love all my neighbors, and thus I fulfill the law. 

Or we can tell the truth, and be honest with ourselves.  We can tell the truth and say, “I love mostly myself.  I love mostly my own desires.  I, like the Levite in our parable, drive by on the other side of the road when someone I don’t know has a flat. I like the Priest turn a blind eye to those in our world who are really truly in need.  We haven’t fulfilled the law.  We haven’t been perfect, in fact, we’ve even ignored those people in our town itself who are in the most need. 

You see, we cannot inherit eternal life on our own merit.  There’s nothing we can do to save ourselves.  We even confess that “I cannot by my own reason or strength believe in Jesus Christ my Lord or come to him.”  I can’t do it, because my love for self is too great.

But there is one who truly loves, even more than the Samaritan in our text today.  The Samaritan gives to the injured man of money and care, but the one who loves us gives even more.  He gives us his life.  He gives us forgiveness, he gives us salvation.  And this one who loves us is none other than Jesus Christ, who spurned not the cross for us. 

You see there’s the whole point of our text today.  It’s not a tome telling us to go and serve others, but rather it shows us how Jesus serves us first.  How he gives for us first.  How he takes away our sin by suffering, bleeding, and dying on your behalf.  And in His care, you are made well.

He pours not oil on your wounds, but instead water, washing away your guilty.  As he pours water on your head, he takes away your guilt forever.  He buys food for you, not mere bread and wine, but instead his own life giving body and blood, so that you might live and have life to the full.  And he promises to take you, not to the local inn, but instead to a heavenly, eternal mansion, where he will care for you as his own brother or sister, wiping away every hurt and pain that you have faced in this world. 

Because Christ has had mercy on us, we too do have mercy on those around us, those in Lidgerwood and Great Bend, and yes even those in Africa.  Not to fulfill the law and earn God’s grace, but instead because Christ has had so much mercy upon us that we can’t but share it with those around us.  WE can’t help but love and care for those for Whom Jesus has also died. 

Dear friends, its in our text today.  What must you do to earn eternal life?  You can either Love perfectly – and impossible feat because of our sin.  Or you can be loved perfectly by Christ, and his grace, and his perfect mercy, shown to you in baptismal waters, and in body and blood eaten for forgiveness.  Who has shown you mercy?  The crucified and risen Jesus.  He is your good neighbor, he is your good Samaritan.  He is the one who has compassion upon you.  In the name of Jesus.  Amen.