One of the more well-known stories that Jesus told from the Bible is that of the Good Samaritan (Luke 10:30-37). It's a story that has been preached upon many times, usually with some kind of an emphasis on our care for our neighbor. We often have found ourselves compared to either the priest or the Levite, people who had an opportunity to help a poor, beaten man on the side of the road, and yet, who refused to help. We're then encouraged to be more like the man who actually stops and helps the man, who sees to his needs, and brings him to a place of healing.
In future posts, I intend to get into the meaning of this story (parable) a little more. There's a great deal of depth to this that often goes unseen or unnoticed, and I'd like to highlight some of it for you. But before we get into that, I actually want to take a bit to introduce the whole reason Jesus told this story. He didn't just come up with this story on a whim, but told it to convey a very particular point.
Throughout His ministry, Jesus often had people come to Him with hard questions, looking for Him to have an answer for them. Some people came with honest intentions, wanting to know what God really did think. Others came looking for a way to trap Jesus in His words, to find something to use against Him when an appropriate time arose. As we look at the context surrounding the different stories or parables that Jesus told, we get a bit of a better picture on why He would tell that particular story.
This is also the case with the Good Samaritan. A few verses prior to the beginning of this parable, we have a lawyer approaching Jesus. Remember, this isn't a lawyer like the ones you and I are familiar with. A lawyer in that day was more along the lines of an expert in God's law. This man would have known the Torah (the first 5 books of the Bible) extremely well. He would have been highly educated in everything God had spoken to Moses, and so would have been someone that others looked to when they had questions.
This lawyer asked the very pertinent question about what it took to obtain eternal life. After all, this was the promise that God had made. So how does one go about getting hold of it? And Jesus responded by asking him what he knew from the law of God. The lawyer fell back on the summary of the commandments. Love the LORD with all your heart, soul, mind, and strength, and love your neighbor as yourself. Jesus very bluntly told him that if he did this, he would live.
It seems that this wasn't the answer the lawyer was looking for. He knew that already. Maybe he thought that Jesus had some further insight into it, or maybe Jesus would take a different approach than what had been taken before. He just couldn't take that easy of an answer. There had to be more. And so, almost in desperation, he asked the question that led to Jesus telling the parable. "And who is my neighbor?"
That got to the heart of the issue for the lawyer. Who do we consider to be our neighbor? If part of the fulfilling of God's command is to love our neighbor as ourselves, then it helps to know who our neighbors are. So as we continue our journey through this story, we'll look at how Jesus answers this question, and what the parable says about our neighbors.
In future posts, I intend to get into the meaning of this story (parable) a little more. There's a great deal of depth to this that often goes unseen or unnoticed, and I'd like to highlight some of it for you. But before we get into that, I actually want to take a bit to introduce the whole reason Jesus told this story. He didn't just come up with this story on a whim, but told it to convey a very particular point.
Throughout His ministry, Jesus often had people come to Him with hard questions, looking for Him to have an answer for them. Some people came with honest intentions, wanting to know what God really did think. Others came looking for a way to trap Jesus in His words, to find something to use against Him when an appropriate time arose. As we look at the context surrounding the different stories or parables that Jesus told, we get a bit of a better picture on why He would tell that particular story.
This is also the case with the Good Samaritan. A few verses prior to the beginning of this parable, we have a lawyer approaching Jesus. Remember, this isn't a lawyer like the ones you and I are familiar with. A lawyer in that day was more along the lines of an expert in God's law. This man would have known the Torah (the first 5 books of the Bible) extremely well. He would have been highly educated in everything God had spoken to Moses, and so would have been someone that others looked to when they had questions.
This lawyer asked the very pertinent question about what it took to obtain eternal life. After all, this was the promise that God had made. So how does one go about getting hold of it? And Jesus responded by asking him what he knew from the law of God. The lawyer fell back on the summary of the commandments. Love the LORD with all your heart, soul, mind, and strength, and love your neighbor as yourself. Jesus very bluntly told him that if he did this, he would live.
It seems that this wasn't the answer the lawyer was looking for. He knew that already. Maybe he thought that Jesus had some further insight into it, or maybe Jesus would take a different approach than what had been taken before. He just couldn't take that easy of an answer. There had to be more. And so, almost in desperation, he asked the question that led to Jesus telling the parable. "And who is my neighbor?"
That got to the heart of the issue for the lawyer. Who do we consider to be our neighbor? If part of the fulfilling of God's command is to love our neighbor as ourselves, then it helps to know who our neighbors are. So as we continue our journey through this story, we'll look at how Jesus answers this question, and what the parable says about our neighbors.
No comments:
Post a Comment