"love God’s Style:" The Good Samaritan

Parables to Live By

“Love God’s Style”

Luke 10:25-37

Watch on YouTube channel: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2yfDKJ1jbr0

When looking at the parable we’ll be looking at today, the topic of love is at its heart, and hence the name I am calling this parable, “Love God’s Style.”

Now, when this title came up, I immediately thought about the old TV. Series, “Love American Style,” and then the movie, “The Love Story,” where the phase “Love never has to say you’re sorry,” realizing that it was made when smoking marijuana was the in-thing, so I just chalked up this saying to them being out of their minds.

And today the whole idea of what love is has been turned upside down and inside out, in that what people call love is more like lust in its rawest and most perverted form.

But this is not the purpose of this teaching that Jesus brought out. Rather it is about how God sees love, and the parable Jesus taught about it. And it is the type of love Jesus had for humanity, as it constantly says that when Jesus saw someone in need, He had compassion upon them.

Now, throughout the Bible, we see that as believers in God, believers in Jesus Christ, we are to cultivate godly compassion towards those who are in need, which covers more than merely a person’s physical needs, like food, shelter, and clothing; but also, we need to deal with their emotional and spiritual needs as well.

And the question that must be asked in dealing with this issue of compassion, and what the main point of this parable or teaching is “What is our reaction when confronted with people in need?”

Jesus speaks directly to this question in the parable we’ll be looking at today called, “The Good Samaritan.”

But before we enter this parable and look at its various attributes, it may be good to look at what prompted Jesus to tell this parable, this story if you would. So, let’s pick up our reading in Luke 10:25-29.

“And behold, a certain lawyer stood up and tested Him, saying, ‘Teacher, what shall I do to inherit eternal life? He (Jesus) said to him, ‘What is written in the law? What is your reading of it?’ So he (the lawyer) answered and said, ‘You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, with all your soul, with all your strength, and with all your mind,’ and ‘your neighbor as yourself.’ And He (Jesus) said to him, ‘You have answered rightly; do this and you will live.’ But he (the lawyer), wanting to justify himself, said to Jesus, ‘And who is my neighbor?’” (Luke 10:25-29 NKJV)

Now this is a familiar story to most. In fact, at another time a lawyer of the Pharisees asked Jesus what the Greatest Commandment was, again testing Jesus, and Jesus gave the same two commandments, to love the Lord with the whole of our being, that is, heart, soul, mind, and strength, and to love our neighbor as ourselves.

But the lawyer in our story takes another tack. Instead of asking Jesus about which is the greatest of all the commandments, he asked Jesus how to inherit eternal life, again testing Jesus to see if a fault could be found.

So, we need to take some time and look at this question and how Jesus responded, because this is the same question that people have had from the very beginning of time, and that is, “How can we attain eternal life?” And not just eternal life, but eternal life in the presence of God.

William Hendriksen, a New Testament scholar from the mid 1900’s said this. “It refers to the kind of life that is not only endless in duration, but also priceless in quality.”

Now, in typical Jewish style of debate, Jesus answers the question with a question. He asked the lawyer, what does the Law state, and in doing so he asked for the lawyer’s interpretation of the law, which meant that this was something that God has already revealed. And the lawyer responded with what we know as the Great Commandment.

The lawyer said that which secures eternal life is to love God and our neighbors. In fact, the way that we show God how much we love Him is to love others. And Jesus affirmed the lawyer’s response. Now, the word Jesus used is the word where we get our English word, “orthodox,” which means right, proper, and straight. In other words, the lawyer’s response was the correct one, but then Jesus threw the lawyer, as well as all of us, for a loop. What Jesus went on to says is basically, “Good, now go do exactly that.”

Now, how in heaven’s name are we to love God with all of our being, no less love our neighbor without blowing it somewhere along the way. The answer is that we can’t, which is the reason why Jesus came in the first place, because no one can fulfill the law of God and be without sin.