A young cheeky Jewish lawyer wanted to test Jesus. He began by asking him what he needed to do; to gain eternal life and further wanting to justify himself, he asked Jesus who his neighbour was. If you spent any time in Sunday School, you know the story: a man is robbed, beaten, and left for dead on the side of the notorious Jericho Road. The religious elite, first a priest, then a Levite, see him and pass by. But a Samaritan, the one nobody expects to be the hero, stops, binds his wounds, and carries him to safety. We know it as the Parable of the Good Samaritan. But, what if x2, the real shock isn’t that the Samaritan is good, but that Jesus is asking us to redraw the lines of who counts as our neighbour? Let’s set the stage shall we. The lawyer’s question: who is my neighbour is not about geography or social proximity; nope! It’s about boundaries. Who do I have to love, and who can I safely ignore? It’s a question we’re still asking, in subtler ways, every day. But Jesus doesn’t answer with a list or a definition. He answers with a story. In that story, the expected boundaries of, religion, ethnicity, even morality, are all blurred. The priest and the Levite, men whose lives are defined by the Law, pass by. Maybe they’re afraid. Maybe they’re concerned about ritual purity. Maybe, as is often the case with us, they just couldn’t be bothered! I don’t know!
The Samaritan, though, is different. He’s an outsider, despised by the Jewish audience listening to Jesus. The animosity between Jews and Samaritans was deep, historical, and theological. Yet it’s the Samaritan who acts with compassion, who risks his own safety, who spends his own money, who refuses to let convenience or prejudice dictate his response.
What’s deeply beautiful, about this parable is that Jesus doesn’t just tell us to be nice. Nah! He tells us to see. To see the suffering in front of us, and to allow ourselves to be moved; to be compassionate. The Greek word used here for compassion is σπλαγχνίζομαι-pronounced as (splang-khnee-zoh-my)-it’s a beautiful word-its more than compassion. It’s a gut reaction, a visceral kind of mercy. The Samaritan doesn’t just notice the man; he is moved to the core of his being. That’s what the author is trying to convey by using the word- σπλαγχνίζομαι.
Now, this is where the theology gets real. In the Incarnation, God doesn’t pass by on the other side. In Christ, God comes into our brokenness. He sees us, bruised and battered by sin and circumstance, and he crosses every boundary to bind up our wounds. The Good Samaritan is both a mirror and a window. We see ourselves in the ditch, helpless, and we see the face of Christ in the one who comes near. But Jesus isn’t content to leave us as mere recipients of grace, no. Go and do likewise, he commands. The call is not just to admire the Samaritan or to ponder the boundaries of love, but to cross them. To let our theology shape the way we move in the world. To let mercy be inconvenient. To risk being misunderstood, or even rejected, for the sake of love.
The early church saw in this parable an image of the gospel: humanity wounded by sin, religion unable to save, and Christ the outsider who brings healing. But the story doesn’t end there. The innkeeper is asked to care for the wounded man until the Samaritan returns. That’s you and me. We are not just rescued, we are commissioned. We are called to be caretakers of the broken until Christ returns.
So, who is your neighbour? The one you’re tempted to avoid. The one who doesn’t look like you, vote like you, or pray like you. The one whose suffering is easy to ignore, or whose pain makes you uncomfortable. The cheeky lawyer knew the answer before he asked the question. A neighbour is not a definition: a neighbour is a human being.
Here is the point of the story: Neighbours are not defined by race, religion, economics or by a geographical position. No, no, a good neighbour is the person who shows mercy to those in need. When the Samaritan saw the wounded man, the scripture tells us; he was moved with compassion. Compassion, ladies and gentlemen begin with eyes that see. The priest, the Levite, and the Samaritan all travelled the same road, but only the Samaritan saw the injured man. He saw not a Jew, Samaritan, gentile, black, Asian, Latina, or white but a human being in need. Compassion does not require heroic acts of self-denial: oh no; just ordinary sensitivity in everyday living.
The primary lesson of this parable is to make us understand that the wounded traveller along the side of the road hurts as much as you or I would, should the circumstances be reversed. And Jesus ultimate hope and prayer is that we will respond and entertain the half dead travellers of our world because we are all neighbours. May our church, be a place where the wounded are welcomed, fed, clothed and made whole again in Jesus Mighty name-and the Church says? - Amen.