Luke 10:25-37
Carried to Christ
Back when I was in high school, I really loved math. I never struggled with passing math class. Not to brag, but I often showed up on test days without studying at all and walked out with a score no lower than a 90%. To be fair, I had been paying close attention in class all semester... but that’s besides the point. Well, one of my favorite teachers in high school was my Algebra II teacher my Junior year of high school. He had my brother just two years prior so he already knew me to some extent. Knowing I was a good student, he gave me a challenge early on in the year. He knew I would do well on tests, but he challenged me to get every question right on a test, even the extra credit. If I did, he would put my name on his math wall of fame. As one who wouldn’t shy away from math challenges, I accepted! I thought it would be easy. I thought I would breeze through with that perfect score on my first test. Test day came and went... I felt confident. I thought I had aced it without any struggles. But then came the day when tests were handed back. I flipped through the pages to find out I got one question wrong. Just one! So, I told myself I would get it the next test... but yet, again, I would miss the mark by one question. This went on all year long. By the end of the year, I started looking over notes prior to test days just to remind myself what all we had studied. I so wanted that perfect score. So, all year long, I chased it. I looked forward to test days just to prove I could get that illusive perfect score. Though even by the end of the year, I still failed to reach that goal.
While it may have been a fun challenge for me in math class... something I could have obtained... we should be careful about chasing perfectionism in other avenues of life. For such is our Gospel reading this week. We have a lawyer who approaches Jesus, trying to justify himself. That is, he wants to show he’s already aced the test when the test is still being taken.
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It’s all too easy to avoid the story behind one of our beloved parables. We want to skip right to the good stuff, yet we lose the entire purpose of the parable if we do. For consider the lawyer who approaches Jesus. “Behold, a lawyer stood up to put [Jesus] to the test, saying, ‘Teacher, what shall I do to inherit eternal life?” Luke 10:25. This is the question that everyone asks. It’s both a test and a serious question. Tell me, Jesus, what do you require of me. Tell me how much I need to do to be favorable before God. What’s enough to pass the test? We hear Jesus’ parable in this light. Again, “[Jesus] said to him, ‘What is written in the Law? How do you read it?’ And he answered, ‘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.’ And he said to him, ‘You have answered correctly; do this, and you will live,” Luke 10:26-28. Love God and love your neighbor. This is the requirement. It’s what God wants from all of us. And of course, that wasn’t enough for the lawyer. He had to raise the follow-up question... who’s my neighbor? For if we’re to love our neighbor, we must be aware who that is.
The parable of the Good Samaritan is the answer to that question. And the clear answer is that everyone is your neighbor. It’s not to be limited by location, circumstances, or opportunity. Every person you pass on the street, every person in your office, every member of your family, and even every person on this globe is considered your neighbor. You must love them all. As Jesus said, “do this and you will live.” That homeless person standing on the street corner, that veteran tucked away in the warming shelter, that single mom scrapping together money for groceries, the addict who just hit rock bottom. Every single one of them deserves our love if we’re to fulfill God’s holy law. So, before we go ridicule the Priest and the Levite, let us make sure that we’re not following in their footsteps first. This is the holy command of God... Love God and love your neighbor. Fulfill the whole law and you shall have eternal life.
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Is this truly what Jesus meant to teach us? Our only hope is to be perfect and fulfill the law? It’s all up to us to be just like the Samaritan. Let’s hope not. For our normal reading of this parable becomes problematic when we put it this way. If we’re supposed to be the “Good Samaritan”, then we have no comfort for our failings, the times when we act like the priest and the Levite. Rather, Jesus is telling us a different story. As we read, “A man was going down from Jerusalem to Jericho, and he fell among robbers, who stripped him and beat him and departed, leaving him half dead,’ Luke 10:30. Who is this man who faces great misfortune? Let me put it another way, a man was going from the garden of God to the desert. He fell upon the temptations of Satan, who stripped him, beat him, and left him for dead. Yes, the man left for dead is us in our sin. We’re the ones in need of help and healing. We’re the ones who would be lost if not for the help of another. And who would be the Priest and the Levite if not the symbol of the Old Covenant and its inability to deliver us from this body of death?
But the God of all grace and mercy sent his Son to us, a foreigner to our world. Jesus became incarnate among us that he may be our neighbor, our Good Samaritan. “But a Samaritan, as he journeyed, came to where he was, and when he saw him, he had compassion,” Luke 10:33. For Jesus found us in our wretched estate and had compassion on us. Thus, Jesus carried us to the holy inn of his church where he both heals and strengthens us. Then Jesus departs, leaving us in the trusted care of the ministry of his Word. Indeed, Jesus goes to the cross to pay for all of our needs, covering our debts, and ensuring his promise of eternal life! Such is the life of the Christian, one who has been brought by Christ into the arms of his church, a hospital of sinners in need of mercy and grace. Here, he leaves us to the trusted care of his ministers whom he has given for our good. And Jesus promises to return, covering every debt, every sin, every transgression that we have done so that by his mercy, he may restore unto us life everlasting!
In this way, let us learn the true meaning of this parable:
LOOK NOT TO THE LAW FOR YOUR SALVATION,
BUT TO THE ONE WHO SHOWS MERCY!
Jesus is the one who has chased perfection, and has accomplished it. He has been our perfect neighbor, who has loved God and loved us, keeping all of God’s holy law. Thus, may we be comforted by Jesus who shows us this great mercy, covering over all our sins by his atoning death, and restoring us through his Word and Sacraments unto eternal life! In Jesus’ name! Amen!