Lessons in Luke No. 1
The Parable of the Good Samaritan
Luke 10:25-37
Introduction
Tonight we are starting to look at some important lessons from Luke’s Gospel.
“Lessons in Luke” will be our theme at the Outreach Nights throughout the year ahead.
Back a few years ago, in our old building I started preaching through Luke’s Gospel and got as far as Ch.8 and the Parable of the Sower. But much of the material in Luke is
covered in Matthew’s Gospel that we looked at in its entirety in our Bible Studies a couple of years ago as well. So I have decided rather than preaching right through all of Luke, we are going to look as some key passages that are only found in Luke’s Gospel.
Some parables that Jesus told that only Luke records, and some characters that Jesus met that only Luke mentions. It will be very familiar ground, but some of it I have never preached on before - for example, tonight’s passage. You might find that hard to believe.
I have been the full-time pastor of this church for seven years today, although I preached for you for almost 4 years before that. I have been in the Christian ministry for 13 years next month, and yet I have never preached on the Parable of the Good Samaritan!
Does that mean that we evangelicals tend to shy away from the Good Samaritan because he is so often epitomised by liberal preachers as the essence of Christianity – doing good to others, as if that will get you right with God and get you into Heaven. Maybe so, maybe not. But we shouldn’t be afraid of this story that Jesus told, because if we look at it closely it interprets itself, and leaves us all with a real challenge.
Let’s see what the Good Samaritan has to say to us tonight.
1. The Character who prompted this story from Jesus (v.25)
“An Expert in the Law”
Luke tells us that on one occasion – he doesn’t tell us when, where, or what circumstances. But on one occasion, obviously while Jesus was teaching, an expert in the Law stood up, not just to ask Jesus a question, but to test Jesus. Now nobody likes Lawyers, particularly when they’re asking you the questions. They have a way of tying you up in knots before you even realise they’ve done it. They have very sharp, quick minds. Well Jesus gets a question from this “Expert in the Law.” - He was an expert in the OT Law of Moses.
2. The Question that prompted this story from Jesus (v.25)
“Teacher, what must I do to inherit eternal life?”
This is a question that Luke seems to have a fascination for, because in Luke 18:18, we find the Rich Young Ruler asking the exact same question, using the exact same words.
There the questioner was a leader in the local synagogue, here he is an expert in the Law. But both of them are asking the same question. The difference is that the Rich Young Ruler earnestly wanted to know for his own benefit what the answer was. Here the expert in the Law simply wanted to put Jesus to the test, to see if he could trip him up. Jesus knew the difference, but he answers the question in basically the same way in both cases: “What is written in the Law?” he replied “How do you read it?”
Jesus brings up the Law of God to both of these men. To the Rich Young Ruler he said, “Why do you call me good. No-one is good – except God alone.
You know the Commandments:”
And then he proceeded to list the last 5 of the 10 commandments, those that refer to
loving your neighbour, to which the young man replied, “All these I have kept since I was a boy.” The point was, the Rich Young Ruler thought he was good enough the way he was to inherit eternal life. He just wanted Jesus to confirm that, to pat him on the back and tell him he was alright the way he was. Much like many ministers today might do to people who sit in their pews every Sunday.
With the Expert in the Law, back in Luke 10, Jesus puts it straight to him,
“What is written in the Law? How do you read it?”
Now this expert in the Law, doesn’t quote any of the 10 commandments, but the two Great Commandments from the OT that summarise the Ten.
1. “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,
2. “Love your neighbour as yourself.”
To which Jesus said, like a teacher marking a piece of work.
“You have answered correctly.”
Just to remind this expert in the Law, who was really testing who!
Yes he had answered correctly. His head knowledge about God’s Law was perfect.
But then Jesus added this:
“Do this and you will live.” (v.28)
Which brings us back to the lawyer’s initial question, which was,
“Teacher, what must I do to inherit eternal life?”
The Lawyer was looking for something to do, to get or gain or inherit or deserve eternal life, so Jesus gave him something to do:
“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 if you’re able to do all that, and at the same time always love your neighbour as yourself, then you will live, you will have eternal life.
Now if the Lawyer had stopped at that point, and gone away and had a think about it, it might have done him some good. Because if any of us think about that long enough, even for a short time, we would very quickly realise what a tall order that is.
Can we really love the Lord our God with all of our heart, and all of our soul, and all of our strength and all of our mind, all of the time? For example:
Have you ever questioned God, for what he was doing in your life?
Have you ever been angry with God?
Have you ever shaken your fist at God, for something he allowed to happen?
Have you ever taken God’s name as a swear word on your lips?
Have you ever just let his name trip off your lips lightly, with no meaning?
Have you ever been singing in church about how great God is, and yet your mind’s been miles away thinking about something else, and not on God at all?
Well then you don’t love the Lord your God with all of your being, all of the time.
You don’t, I don’t, none of us do, none of us can. We all fall short of his standards! And that’s only the first of the two commandments. What about the second one?
Do you always love your neighbour as yourself?
We’ve just moved into a new house in Ballyhaise, and our neighbours slowly but surely have moved in beside us. Well at the moment I’m putting up a fence, because I’m a firm
believer in the old proverb, “Good fences make good neighbours.” But I’m putting it up for another reason. It’s because I don’t always love my neighbour as I love myself when his mad dog runs through our garden scaring the life out of our children, doing what he has to do in our garden, and carrying off anything he can get in his mouth and away back to his own garden with it, or worse still a few houses down the row! I can assure you,
I don’t always love my neighbour as I love myself, and neither do you!
So if the Lawyer had stopped at that point and gone away and had a think about it, he might have realised he couldn’t get right with God that way. He couldn’t do it by his own efforts or law-keeping. But no, what does he do? (v.29) He does what most of us try to do, he tries to justify himself!
“But he wanted to justify himself, so he asked Jesus,
“And who is my neighbour?”
I think Luke here chooses his words very carefully. I think it was no mistake that Luke used the word justify here. If we are to have eternal life then we need to be justified – by God, through trusting in the death of Jesus Christ on the cross at Calvary, as the only sacrifice that can deal with our sin once and for all, take away all our guilt, and make us right with God, justified before God. But instead of trusting in Jesus to justify us, we try to justify ourselves. Have you ever tried to justify yourself? Of course you have:
I keep the commandments.
I’ve never committed adultery, and I’ve never murdered anyone.
I never do anything I shouldn’t do on a Sunday.
Sure I’m just as good as anybody else.
“See those born again Christians, if they’re getting into heaven, then so am I,
Sure I live as good a life as they do!”
“I don’t do anybody any harm. I go to my church. I read my Bible, I say my prayers. I try to help whoever I can, and if I can’t do anybody a good turn, I certainly don’t do them a bad one!”
You’ve heard all that before. You’ve said a lot of those things yourself. But you know what all that is? It’s just a vain attempt to justify yourself, and it doesn’t work. At least it doesn’t with God! So this Lawyer tried to justify himself, by asking another question:
3. “And who is my neighbour” (v.29)
To which Jesus told this now famous story to this self-righteous Lawyer.
A man, obviously a Jew, since he was travelling the 17 mile journey down hill, in fact down 4000 ft from Jerusalem, high in the hills, to Jericho, low in the Jordan valley. It was a steep journey with many twists and turns, through deserted areas – ideal country for bandits and robbers. Which is exactly what happened. Travelling alone, he was mugged and robbed, and stripped naked, and left to die. He was semi-conscious at least.
After some time had passed, one by one three people passed along the same road:
1. The first was a Priest. (Help is on its way – The Lawyer thinks to himself).
But as Jesus continues with his story he says that the priest, for whatever reason, just passed by on the other side of the road. He might have been religious but he didn’t stop
to help the poor man lying half dead in the middle of the road! - Who would be next?
2. The second wasn’t far behind – he was a Levite. (a priest’s helper – he’ll do it!)
But again as the Lawyer listened to Jesus’ story he found out that this Levite, who was also a religious professional, just took a glance and then passed by on the other side!
Now this Lawyer was an expert in the Law, so he would have known from Leviticus 21:1-4 that if either of these men had touched the body and found him to be dead then they would have been ceremonially unclean for days and unable to serve God in his Temple. So maybe that’s why they didn’t stop to help. Surely they had their reasons. Or maybe the lawyer thought that Jesus was just giving the priests a bashing (a bit like the Irish) and he was probably now expecting Jesus to say that the next man was just an ordinary 5’8” Jew, and he would stop and help were the priests didn’t – but Jesus said the third man was not a Jew,
3. A Samaritan! (But the Jews have no dealings with Samaritans, They were sworn
enemies. They’re not even of the same religion. There was no way he could do right, when the Jews had done wrong! Jesus’ story was showing up the hypocrisy of Jews!)
But as he listened to Jesus’ story, yes the Samaritan did stop. He gave him first aid. He poured in oil and wine to clean and soothe his wounds. Then he got him up onto his own donkey and walked him to a nearby Inn. He stayed the night there to make sure he was
alright. And then if that wasn’t enough he paid the Inn-keeper 2 silver coins, a
considerable sum of money, for him to continue to look after the man until he was well,
and next time he was back he would pay any outstanding bills on the poor man’s behalf!
I’m sure by this stage the Lawyer couldn’t believe his ears. How could a despised
Samaritan do all that for a Jew, whenever our own priests didn’t even stop to help?
Well while he was mulling all that over in his mind Jesus put another question to him:
A Final Question from Jesus: (v.36)
“Which of these three do you think was a neighbour to the man
who fell into the hands of the robbers?” Which only brought ...
A Grudging answer from the Lawyer: (v.37)
He couldn’t even bring himself to take that name upon his lips, to say the word Samaritan. Instead he just said, “The one who had mercy on him.”
So Jesus told him: “Go and do likewise.” Just as he would tell the Rich Young Ruler in Lk.18, “Go sell all you have and give to the poor, then come and follow me.”
He wasn’t saying that if we all show mercy to people we find lying at the side of the road, and help them out that we’ll all get eternal life. And he wasn’t saying that if we all sell all the possessions that we have, and use the proceeds to feed the poor that we’ll all get into heaven and have eternal life. What he was saying, was that these were the particular things in these two men’s lives that showed that all their law-keeping and self-righteousness had not got them right with God. And it never will. And it won’t for you or me either.
(See Romans 3:20): “Therefore no one will be declared righteous (justified) in [God’s] sight by observing the law;
RATHER, through the law we become conscious of sin.”
That’s exactly what Jesus was trying to do with these two men, when he turned their
attention to the Law. It was to make them see through their smug self-righteousness and to make them conscious of their own sin. I wonder is that what you need a dose of tonight?
*****
You will never get right with God by your own efforts at doing good, or keeping The Law. If you want to get right with God, then Trust the One who never sinned, the One who died for your sins: There’s only one person who fits the bill – and that’s Jesus (Rom.3:21-26).