Sermon for July 13, 2025: Luke 10: 25-37

 Sermon: July 13, 2025                        Luke 10: 25-37

Rev. Peter Hofstra                   “What Does It Mean To Be A Neighbor?”

            Seems like in some parts of the gospel, people are just lining up to take on Jesus.  Challenge him on this point or that point.  Today, we have a legal expert, coming to challenge Jesus for all the marbles, nothing less than Jesus’ eternal promise.

            “Teacher, what must I do to inherit eternal life?”

            Now remember, Jesus does not have the Bible of the Church, our gathered Old and New Testaments.  The bible of Jesus is the Old Testament.  But Jesus flips the question, “What does the bible say?”  Or more precisely, “What does the law say?  What do you read there?”

            And the lawyer replies, “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.” 

            These words occur in Matthew, Mark, and Luke.  There are a couple of points of interest here.  First, in Matthew and Mark, it is Jesus who utters them.  Here, it is a legal expert, indicating this summary is a bigger legal precept of the time.  Secondly, it seems sufficient to answer the legal challenge.

            Jesus said, “You have given the right answer; do this, and you will live.” 

This introductory bit often gets lost in the power of the Parable of the Good Samaritan, but look at its fundamental implications.  So, in the bible Jesus knew, eternal life is achieved in loving God and loving neighbor, while in the bible Jesus has given, loving God is accepting Jesus, the Lamb of God who died to take away the sins of the world, is accepting the Jesus who rose to new life with the free gift of salvation and forgiveness that opens the way to the gift of life eternal.   

            You think Jesus looked at the lawyer with expectation as he considered, “What will he think of next?”  And the lawyer does not disappoint. 

            Can you imagine the lawyer, desperate to pick a hole in Jesus’ response.  Except Jesus essentially said nothing, He got the lawyer to say it all.  Okay, okay, okay, okay…love God…how do I pick that apart?  Heart, soul, strength, and mind…  Can I poke at the question of someone being in their right mind?  That has possibilities?

Can you imagine the lawyer putting Jesus Christ on the Stand, “Mr. Christ, do you believe you were in your right mind when you expressed the totality of the mind is required to love God?”

            And Jesus would reply, “I did not say that, YOU did.”

            What is the weak point of any legal argument?  Religious or civil?  People!  We are the weak link, always have been.  So, to vindicate himself (which the Oxford Languages portion of the Google defines as “clearing someone of blame”), to clear himself of the blame of proving Jesus was right!!, “And who is my neighbor?” 

Put Jesus Christ back on the stand, “So, Mr. Christ, how would you define someone to qualify as my “neighbor”?”  And Jesus, as Son of God, would be well credentialled to answer that question.

            “Well councilor,” Jesus might answer from the witness box, “Let me tell you a story.” 

            A man is beaten, stripped of all his possessions, and left for dead.  If we are going to talk about who “my neighbor” is, first thing to define is me.  I’m the one lying there, bleeding out on the Jerusalem-Jericho turnpike.  With the one eye that isn’t puffed shut, I see someone coming.  I know those clothes, that outfit.  He’s a priest, leader of the people, servant of God in the temple, God’s own…maybe I can croak out a plea…till I watch him cross the road, barely glance in my direction, and walk on.

            A while later, there are more footsteps.  Not a priest, but his outfit is also familiar.  He’s a Levite, of the tribe of Levi, dressed to serve in the temple.  Not sacrifice-makers, but the ones who do all the day to day stuff to keep the temple functioning.  Not holier than thou, but a servant of God nonetheless…and I can’t get any words out, but I wave a hand, the one not broken…and I watch him cross the road, practically run past me.

            Then there’s the third guy, this one riding a donkey.  His clothes are unfamiliar…sort of…he looks different.  Maybe he stops and says something, but his accent is strange.  He’s a Samaritan!  The unloved.  Those hypocrites who claim to love God but refuse to worship where God said to worship, in Jerusalem…then, as Jesus tells it;

But a Samaritan while traveling came upon him, and when he saw him he was moved with compassion. ³⁴ He went to him and bandaged his wounds, treating them with oil and wine. Then he put him on his own animal, brought him to an inn, and took care of him. ³⁵ The next day he took out two denarii, gave them to the innkeeper, and said, ‘Take care of him, and when I come back I will repay you whatever more you spend.’ 

            Now Jesus has the lawyer on the stand, “Which of these three, do you think, was a neighbor to the man who fell into the hands of the robbers?” 

            It’s obvious, “The one who showed him mercy.”

            Jesus says, “Go and do likewise.”  Which means “be that neighbor.”  Jesus deliberately chose the Samaritan, the outsider, not a non-believer, but worse, a corrupt believer, a hypocrite, one who mocks God, a person and a race who are taboo, who are ‘those people’, who are the enemy, the unloved, who stand for all that is not “proper”, “approved”, “preferred” believers. 

Doesn’t matter.  Be that neighbor, show mercy.

            I wonder if that law expert continued to follow Jesus, maybe in the news, after this confrontation.  Maybe he was in Jerusalem for the arrest, on the edges of the crowds calling for Jesus’ crucifixion, maybe there on Calvary to see what was done to Jesus.  I wonder if he was there in the aftermath, when the rumors and then the reality of Jesus’ resurrection took hold in the land?  I wonder, I hope, that he came to a day in his own life where he accepted Jesus as Lord and Savior, and, in that moment, realized that the Samaritan Jesus described in His parable, it was foreshadowing the mercy that Christ, at the expense of his own life, showed to the world?

            So here’s the thing.  In a few minutes, we are going to welcome Parker into this family of faith, this congregation for whom the gift of eternal life is assured in Jesus Christ and is promised to those who love the Lord our God with all our heart and with all our soul and with all our strength and with all our mind and our neighbor as ourselves. 

            What this church has done, in the preparation for calling their new pastor-long winded fellow that he might be-and in preparation to live into God’s law as given, is to prepare a Sending Statement.  For those of you not familiar with that, you might recognize it as a “Mission Statement”.  But Jesus said in the gospel of John, “As the Father has sent me so I am sending you.”  What can I say, Bible geek here, I like Bible language.

That sending statement is on the back cover of our bulletins.  We’ve been walking through it, laying it alongside Scripture these last few weeks.

            Today, our focus is on “we make the love of God real to our neighbors as we seek to live out Scripture and grow in faith.”  And if we take nothing else away from this Scripture today, take away this.  How do we make the love of God real to our neighbors?”  When we are the ones who show mercy.

            And if we fall back to the objection of our legal expert, “So who’s our neighbor?”  Jesus’ response flips it, “Who is NOT our neighbor?”  So, to everyone shall this congregation take the call to live out Scripture, take the call to grow in faith, take the call to make the love of God real. 

            They are our neighbors.  We are their neighbors. 

            The world today is a lot like in the time of Jesus.  People were lining up to take on Jesus.  They were there to challenge him on this point and on that point.  Feels like the world is lining up to take on the church.  Challenge us on this point or that point, knock us down, trample us under, prove that we are somehow not what we claim to be?

            But they are our neighbors.  It is not for us to pick and choose where to apply mercy.  Stand firm, love God and neighbor, show mercy to all.  Do not live into the games of sin and division that the world wants to play against us.  God’s Word, our Scripture, is sufficient.  Our faith in God shall overcome.  The love of God shall always be our shield.  The grace of Jesus Christ is always more than enough.  

Amen.