Luke 10:29-37 – The Christian’s Message – Bible study

Luke 10:29-37 The Christians Message Luke 10:25 And, behold, a certain lawyer stood up, and tempted him, saying, Master, what shall I do to inherit eternal life? 26 He said unto him, What is written in the law? how readest thou? 27 And he answering said, Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy strength, and with all thy mind; and thy neighbour as thyself. 28 And he said unto him, Thou hast answered right: this do, and thou shalt live. 29 But he, willing to justify himself, said unto Jesus, And who is my neighbour? \#25\ This story starts with a question. \#26\ Jesus answered the question by asking one. He let the lawyer give his opinion of the answer. \#27\ The man actually gave the answer that Jesus gave when asked what is the greatest commandment \#Matt 22:36\. \#28\ Jesus said the man hit the nail on the hit. He fully agreed with the lawyer. Notice, nothing Jesus said should have convicted the man, but he felt then need to ask another question. Luke 10:29 And who is my neighbour? Why did the man ask that question? Luke 10:29 But he, willing to justify himself I dont know how well he had done on the first commandment, but it sounds like he had not done too well on the second. So he sought a way to make himself feel better, to "justify himself." If he could excuse some of the people he had not loved like he should by making them "non-neighbors," he could feel better about how he had treated them and himself. But Jesus, as Jesus often did, did not directly answer the mans question. Instead, Jesus gave him a parable \#30-37\. Lets read it and see if we can figure out the answer to the mans question based on the parable. I. Three Groups of People – Notice that Jesus answered the lawyers question by pointing out three groups of people. A. \#30\ The man who needed help. 1. I am afraid we dont know too much about him. All we know was: a. What road he travelled, the one from Jerusalem to Jericho, and b. What happened to him, he fell among thieves. 2. Those two things make him the anonymous man who needed help. a. We dont know his name. b. We dont know his nationality. c. We dont know his character. d. We dont know his religion. e. We dont know the extent of his injuries. f. All we know is that needed help. 3. That anonymity puts him in the same category as so many of the people we seeoften without looking. a. Examples: (1) The man with the sign who says he is homeless. (2) The fellow walking down the highway with his thumb out. (3) The old lady pushing the shopping cart up the hillside behind the shopping mall. (4) The vagrant sleeping on the park bench. b. While we think we know them: (1) They are the ones too lazy to get a job. (2) They are the ones hooked on drugs. (3) They are the ones getting more money given to them in a week than I make. c. The truth is that we dont know anything more about them than Jesus revealed about the anonymous man in this parable. d. We only know he is the person that needs help. B. There is the religious. 1. Two of the characters in this parable were religious. a. In fact, they are two of the most respected religious offices in Israel, a priest and a Levite. b. Priests were those who handled the sacrifices and the Levites were those who cared for the physical property of God. c. Religious people – When you think of the religious, what comes to your mind? It should be that they (1) They love God and help others. (2) That thought just flows natural from what Jesus told us were the two greatest commandments (3) These two did not have that on their minds. (4) I think that was one of the truths that Jesus wanted to get across in this parable. d. This parable is directed TO the religious. (1) \#25\ This man was himself religious. (2) He was a lawyer. (3) In Bible times, a lawyer would not be an attorney who handles legal matters. He would be one who studied the Old Testament and the laws of God. So this man was a Bible student. (4) Whats more, his guilt, i.e. his need to justify himself, makes it obvious that he knew he had not been doing what he should in regards to others. e. But of course you and I are the religious today, arent we. (1) We can quickly use our religious knowledge to say, "Oh, Im not religious. I am a Christian!" but that doesnt really change anything, does it? (2) We are the religious ones in this parable. (3) And our attempts to deny it are just like this lawyers attempt to justify himself. (4) This parable is the Christians message, straight from Jesus to us. 2. Back to the parable – Why did these men walk by the injured man? Of course, like so many questions I ask, we cant know for certain because the Bible does not tell us. However, we can speculate a little. a. Some say it was because they were on their way to Jerusalem and did not want to defile themselves for their service to God. (1) That sounds noble, but it wont fly. (a) Because to help an injured man would not have defiled them. i. The Old Testament did say touching a dead body would make one unclean, but this man wasnt deadat least not yet. ii. Rendering aid to the manat worst would have made them unclean until the evening, but it would not have kept them from their service. (b) Besides these men were not going TO Jerusalem but FROM it. i.\#31\ "there came DOWN a certain priest" ii. \#32\ "likewise a Levite" iii. Jerusalem is on a hill, a high hill so everything around Jerusalem is lower requiring the people who were leaving the city to always go "down." than Jerusalem so if they were iv. In other words, these not getting ready to do Gods service. If anything, they had just finished doing Gods service. (2) I think it was because these religious men could not tell where this man was from. (a) That may sound strange but these religious leaders were often extremely prejudice against those who did not believe like they didin other words, non-Jews. (b) In that day, it was very easy to tell who was Jewish and who was notjust look at the clothes. (c) Jews always had a couple of tells i. They would have tassels on the hem of their garments. Numbers 15:38 Speak unto the children of Israel, and bid them that they make them fringes in the borders of their garments throughout their generations, and that they put upon the fringe of the borders a ribband of blue: 39 And it shall be unto you for a fringe, that ye may look upon it, and remember all the commandments of the LORD, and do them; and that ye seek not after your own heart and your own eyes, after which ye use to go a whoring: 40 That ye may remember, and do all my commandments, and be holy unto your God. ii. In fact, they would have tassel on all four corners or sides of the garments. Deut 22:12 Thou shalt make thee fringes upon the four quarters of thy vesture, wherewith thou coverest thyself. iii. And their garments would all be made of the same type of material. They never mixed materials. Deut 22:11 Thou shalt not wear a garment of divers sorts, as of woollen and linen together. (d) Why couldnt these religious men tell anything about this man? i. \#30\ The thieves had "stripped him of his garments." ii. Clothes are a basic necessity and there have been times when people could not even afford clothes. (d) These religious people were willing to let what could have been a Jewish man die just to make sure that they did not help a non- Jew! b. What can you say about these two religious men? (a) They did not make very good representatives of God, did they? (b) I wonder what kind of representative I am. (c) We all tend to think we are pretty good at it. (d) These men did too. (e) I wonder what God really thinks about us? C. There was everyone else. 1. We have the religious represented by the priest and the Levite with everyone else represented by the Samaritan. a. Everyone else would be the unsaved doctors, nurses, first responders, Masons, Catholics, Shriners, and all the other people in this world who care for strangers, orphans the elderly, the abused, the abandoned, and the neglected. b. All of those that we fundamental Christians are quick to preach AGAINST for their false religions. c. All of them are rolled into this one man, the Samaritan. 2. The Jews hated the Samaritans. a. In 722 BC, when the ten northern tribes of Israel had sinned so against God that He decided to remove them from the land, those that were left begin to intermarry with other nations and created an international breed of inhabitants in that region of land, he Samaritans. b. The Jews would not even travel through their land. D. So in this parable to the Jews, you would have the two most extremes that Jesus could mentioned, the Jewish religious and the Samaritans. 1. Interestingly, this parable has changed the way people think about the Samaritans. a. When someone mentions Samaritans today, if they know anything about them at all, they are likely to think of the phrase "good Samaritan." b. Why? Because this Samaritan stopped and helped this man. (1) The Samaritan did not care if the man was Jew or Gentile. (2) He did not care if it cost him time or money. He was willing to spend both for the stranger. (3) He did not even care if he was the victim or the bandit. (a) It doesnt sound like the man was conscious. (b) The Samaritan just helped him! c. The Samaritan tended his wounds, put him on his own beast (meaning he had to walk), paid for a place for the man to stay, and pledged to pay whatever else the man needed when he returned again. 2. Without doubt, Jesus intended us to get something important from this parable. II. The Answer A. Who is my neighbor? 1. That is the question the parable was supposed to answer. but the parable itself did not answer it. a. Parables seldom directly answer a question. b. There is usually a hidden or mysterious meaning to the parable that the hearer must fathom for himself. 2. But in this case. Jesus let the man answer the question in \#36-37\. Before we get to that, lets see if we can answer it. B. What is the answer? 1. Is my neighbor the person who worships like I worship? Obviously not. That could only be what the parable meant if the two religious men came out looking good. I dont think they did! In fact, they look pretty bad! 2. Is my neighbor the person who lives near me? Perhaps. Perhaps it is someone you know or maybe recognize, but that is not what this parable is teaching. The good Samaritan knew nothing of the man he helped, and he was certainly not a resident of that area. 3. Is my neighbor the person who looks like me? My nationality, my ethnic group? No. While these two men may have had some of the same DNA, they were removed from each other by hundreds of years of time. 4. Is my neighbor the person who thinks like I think? The one who I would be the most comfortable with? Again, no. The Samaritan knew nothing of the injured mans likes and dislikes, his political views, or his moral values. C. Who then is my neighbor? 1. My answer is, "Whoever I can help." 2. If I can help a person, even if I may never get to talk to him, to learn anything about him, to agree or disagree with him, that person is my neighbor. 3. This understanding busts through some barriers that we who are religious need to have busted. a. It busts through the religious barrier. (1) God knows all about religion. He invented it. (2) He knows about holiness, standards, separation, and all the rest. (3) He still set this parable up in such a way we would have to know that He wants us to help those who are un-religious, ir-religious, and even counter-our-religion. b. It busts through the racial barrier. (1) I dont know that any prejudice smells so bad as the church-grown prejudice. (2) Racial prejudice is something that I can still remember. I remember the black and white water fountain in Murphys and Woolworths. I didnt understand it, but I remember it. (3) I remember some family members, as I grew up, being opening prejudice. Some of them came to see things differently in time, but they were raised with prejudices, and they espoused them when I was young. (4) I remember churchs having prejudices. As a young minister, I heard a few preachers make remarks about other races which let you know that they had a biased against them. I have heard of white churches refusing to allow blacks worship with them. (5) Yet this parable has been in the written Word of God since day one. I dont understand how anyone could miss its message. (6) Race, nationality, ethnic differences mean nothing. (7) We are all neighbors. c. It busts through the political barrier. (1) I dont suppose there has been as wide a gap in political views in this country since the Civil War. (2) America is openly divided, and I have no problems calling some of the liberals Americas enemies. (3) However, Jesus teaching makes it clear that even an enemy is a neighbor when he or she needs help. Matt 5:44 But I say unto you, Love your enemies, bless them that curse you, do good to them that hate you, and pray for them which despitefully use you, and persecute you; d. It busts through the moral barrier. (1) The Samaritan made no inquiries about the injured mans morals. (2) In fact, he did not know whether the man was beaten because he was a victim in a robbery or the robber in a robbery. e. It busts through the status barrier. The Samaritan did not care whether the injured man was wealthy or poor, whether he lived in a fine brick home or a shanty. f. It busts through the "Im too busy barrier." (1) I think the biggest reason we all do not do more today is because we are always in such a rush to get something else done. (2) May the Lord help us from anymore "time saving" devices! III. The Command Luke 10:36 Which now of these three, thinkest thou, was neighbour unto him that fell among the thieves? 37 And he said, He that shewed mercy on him. Then said Jesus unto him, Go, and do thou likewise. A. This parable is not like some of the parables Jesus taught. 1. In many of Jesus parables, there is some hidden spiritual meaning. a. In the parable of the sower, Jesus wanted to move us to tell others about Him. b. In the parables of the lost sheep, lost coin, and lost son, Jesus was demonstrating His love for us. c. In the parable of the unprofitable servant, Jesus was teaching us to stay faithful. 2. Here, Jesus let the man give the secret and then followed it with a command. a. Rather, there is a direct command, "Go and do thou likewise." b. Go, find someone that needs help, and help them. B. The words GO, DO, LIKEWISE take all of the mystery out of this parable. 1. GO means GO. a. It means we are not to sit inside the church and wait for them to come to us, but we are to go to where the hurting, helpless, and hopeless are. b. It implies that we are to look for the people who need help. 2. DO means DO. a. It means we are to give assistance and help to those who need it. b. This isnt a command to teach them or even to preach to them. c. It is a call to aid them. 3. LIKEWISE means LIKE IN THE PARABLE. C. Now, even though this parable does not contain a hidden spiritual meaning, this command does give it a strong, spiritual emphasis. 1. This is the Lord God Almighty speaking. 2. Anything that He says has a strong, spiritual emphasis. 3. AND HE SAID for us to go and do what the Samaritan did. 4. There is no way we can be SPIRITUAL if we do not do what Jesus said! a. Most certainly we have an obligation to preach the gospel to every creature. b. But most people are not willing to grant us the right to talk to them about spiritual matters until they see something in us that tells them we are truly of God. c. To them, we look like the priest and the Levite in this story. d. The only way for us to get the respect necessary to share spiritual truths with them is to show them that we love them like God loves them. e. Words alone are not likely to do that.