One Moved, Two Moved Over
Luke 10:25-37
By Dave Redick
Compassion is when you feel the pain of another person. You identify with his or her plight. You imagine what it would be like to be lying there beside the road wondering if you are going to die and realizing that you are totally dependent upon the good-heartedness of whomever might happen to pass by.
Introduction
What does it take to move us?
I guess that depends on what we mean by "move," right?
With 50,000 fans in a modern football stadium, a quarterback sneak touchdown by our favorite team in the first two minutes of overtime might do it.If someone came into the building here shouting "Fire! Fire!" that would probably move us.
If you parents were summoned to the phone and told that one of your children had been in a serious accident and was on the way to the hospital you would move. You'd be up and out of here in a flash.
If you woke tomorrow to the news that the stock market was in free-fall panic, you might be moved to call your broker and move some money. I know. What broker? What money? :-)
If a sister here in the church was burned out of her home at a time when she was unemployed and her homeowner's insurance had lapsed, you would be moved to help. I know that because I have seen you do it.If a missionary comes and describes his work in some far off country where people speak a different language and have a different culture and skin color, some of us would be moved to help.
This morning I want look at a story that Jesus told about four men. Two of them were Jewish - a priest and a Levite. One was a foreigner. The nationality of the other was not stated. The man whose nationality isn't stated (he was probably Jewish) was beaten up by robbers and left along the road for dead. All three of the other men were moved. Two of them simply moved over. The other, the foreigner, was moved to render aid. Jesus used the story to teach a lesson about neighbors.
By now you probably know where I'm going. Luke chapter 10 and the familiar story we call "The Good Samaritan."
We'll get our lesson from Luke 10:25-37. Jesus answered an inquiry from a certain lawyer in this passage who was doing what lawyers usually do - asking him questions and putting him on the spot. Let's read it.
25And behold, a certain lawyer stood up and put Him to the test, saying, "Teacher, what shall I do to inherit eternal life?" 26And He said to him, "What is written in the Law? How does it read to you?" 27And he answered and said, "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." 28And He said to him, "You have answered correctly; do this, and you will live." 29But wishing to justify himself, he said to Jesus, "And who is my neighbor?" 30Jesus replied and said, "A certain man was going down from Jerusalem to Jericho; and he fell among robbers, and they stripped him and beat him, and went off leaving him half dead. 31"And by chance a certain priest was going down on that road, and when he saw him, he passed by on the other side. 32"And likewise a Levite also, when he came to the place and saw him, passed by on the other side. 33"But a certain Samaritan, who was on a journey, came upon him; and when he saw him, he felt compassion, 34and came to him, and bandaged up his wounds, pouring oil and wine on them; and he put him on his own beast, and brought him to an inn, and took care of him. 35"And on the next day he took out two denarii and gave them to the innkeeper and said, 'Take care of him; and whatever more you spend, when I return, I will repay you.' 36"Which of these three do you think proved to be a neighbor to the man who fell into the robbers' hands?" 37And he said, "The one who showed mercy toward him." And Jesus said to him, "Go and do the same."
I think all of us can identify with what Jesus is teaching here. All of us have neighbors. If you live in subdivision like me, you have neighbors on either side of you, neighbors behind you, and neighbors across the street. If you live out in the country, your neighbors might live a little farther away, but you still have them. We meet neighbors at the grocery store, at the mall, at meetings of the city council and the PTA, and many other places.
The word Jesus used for "neighbor" in this passage means "one who is close by." I suppose there is a case to be made in our modern, shrinking world of instant communication that all mankind is "close by" and that we should be generally concerned for all mankind everywhere. Indeed, we should be concerned with all the people in our world. I think though, that we can quickly get overwhelmed when we start contemplating everyone in the world, all six billion of them, as our neighbors. Any deed we might do on that kind of scale ends up seeming hopelessly insignificant and we usually end up doing nothing because we can't possibly do it all. In this message, at least for the sake of our discussion, let's keep it closer to home. Let's think of those people we live around, do business with, go to school with, and shop among. Your neighbors and mine.
Jesus told the lawyer in this story what a good neighbor is and His words, "Go and do the same" in verse 37 reach all the way down to us living today. The Lord would have us do what the man did. This helpful Samaritan man was a good neighbor because the plight of the wounded man moved him to help rather than just moving him over to the other side of the road. Further, the Lord seems intent to point out that the Samaritan wasn't a good neighbor just because he was religious. The priest and Levite were religious, but they weren't moved to help. They just moved over.
As I thought about how this applies to us, I thought back over the last several years. I don't remember coming upon any bruised and bleeding victims of robbery. Do you? I don't even think I've come upon a car accident in that duration - at least not one where the police and ambulance hadn't already arrived and there was nothing I could have done. I guess I did help dig a guy out of an area of deep snow where his four-wheel-drive was stuck a few weeks ago, but certainly no one's life was in danger. Before it was over we were all laughing at the driver's admission of his foolishness attempting to drive through such a spot.
I do know a lot of people who are bruised and bleeding spiritually, though. They're my neighbors and yours. Ambushed by the enemy of our souls, they've been robbed of their innocence and virtue and left alongside the road of life to wait for the fall of eternal night when they die. It seems to me that the same things that motivated the Samaritan in Jesus' story about this man in danger of losing his physical life ought to motivate us in the context of our neighbors who are spiritually lost.
That's how we'll apply this teaching this morning. The very same qualities in the Samaritan that moved him to help the wounded man on the road to Jerico are the qualities that you and I need to be reminded of when it comes to the condition of our neighbors' souls.
With that in mind then, the first thing to notice about the Samaritan in this story is that:
1. His Heart was Moved.
Verse 33 Jesus says, "… when he saw him, he felt compassion…"
That statement stands in stark contrast to the mention of the priest and the Levite. There is no allusion of compassion in their case. The only thing they felt was the urge to get away. They just moved over to the other side of the road and passed on by. Why? Why would two very religious people who grew up with the teaching that they were to love God with all their hearts, souls, and minds, and love their neighbor as themselves, pass by and leave a wounded man to die? Apparently they had no compassion.
Compassion is when you feel the pain of another person. You identify with his or her plight. You imagine what it would be like to be lying there beside the road wondering if you are going to die and realizing that you are totally dependent upon the good-heartedness of whomever might happen to pass by.
Do we have compassion for our lost neighbors? Do we identify with their condition?
I came across this haunting poem last week as I was preparing this message. It was something I needed to hear. Perhaps it's something you need to hear, too.
You lived next door to me for years
We shared our dreams, our joys, our tears,
A friend to me you were indeed --
A friend who helped me when in need.My faith in you was strong and sure
We had such trust as should endure,
No spats between us ever rose
Our friends were alike, also our foes.What sadness, then, my friend, to find
That after all, you weren't so kind.
The day my life on earth did end
I found you weren't a faithful friend...For all those years we spent on earth,
You never talked of Second Birth,
You never spoke of my lost soul
And of the Christ Who'd make me whole.I plead today from hell's cruel fire
And tell you now my last desire,
You cannot do a thing for me,
No words today my bonds will free.But do not err, my friend, again,
Do all you can for souls of men,
Plead with them now quite earnestly
Lest they be cast in hell with me.Can we hear a poem like that with the names and faces of our lost neighbors in our minds and not be moved? Maybe the behavior of the priest and Levite was not so strange after all.
The Samaritan's heart was moved at the plight of this dying man.
2. His Being was Moved.
Verse 34 says, he "came to him, and bandaged up his wounds, pouring oil and wine on them; and he put him on his own beast, and brought him to an inn, and took care of him."
All of us are capable of emotions. We go through any number of feelings in a day. Anger. Sorrow. Frustration. Disappointment. Annoyance. We can also feel pity. But we don't act on all of them. We can't. Thus, feeling emotions and doing something about them are different things.
C. Ray Dobbins was on a plane and got into a conversation with a man riding in the seat next to him. The subject of compassion came up in their talk and the man told him of a plane trip he had take a few weeks before out of Miami. On the plane with him were 65 psychiatrists traveling home from a convention. During the flight one of the passengers, a woman, became ill and mentally upset. I guess she caused quite a ruckus. Yet not one of the doctors offered to help. It got so bad that the plane had to put down in Nashville so they could take the woman off and to the hospital. Still no one moved to help. The man's comment was, "Life is like that."
Why is life like that? Surely there must have been some measure of compassion somewhere in the cabin of that airplane among 65 men and women who specialize in helping other people with their problems! Maybe there was, but no one moved to help.
A respectable lawyer is walking the streets of Amsterdam in Albert Camus' novel, The Fall. He hears a scream. A woman has fallen into the canal and she's splashing around, yelling for help. Thoughts come rushing to his mind. Of course, he must help, but how? He's a respected lawyer. Should he get involved? After all, who knows what's been going on? Maybe she's a prostitute and people would assume he's been with her. Maybe she's been attacked and the attackers will assault him as well. But by this time he doesn't have to worry about it anymore. The splashing has stopped. The woman has drowned. As he moves on, he marshals his arguments to defend his actions before his condemning conscience. In his own mind he justifies his failure to act. Camus' closes the scene with these words: "He did not answer the cry for help. That is the man he was."
It's always risky and messy to get involved in someone else's life - especially when they have problems. If we feel a measure of compassion yet refrain from getting involved what will be said of us? "That is the kind of people they were?"
What kind of people are we?
The Samaritan's heart was moved, but he didn't stop with that. His being was also moved to do something to help.
3. His Schedule was Moved.
As I read through Jesus parable again, it appeared to me that the Samaritan man must have had some kind of schedule to keep. His trip, whatever its reason, was interrupted. He brought the injured traveler to the inn and took care of him, but he had to leave the next morning. He must have had some business to take care of. Yet he didn't abandon the man. He promised to return. Verse 35 says, "And on the next day he took out two denarii and gave them to the innkeeper and said, 'Take care of him; and whatever more you spend, when I return, I will repay you.'"
The Samaritan didn't continue until he was sure the man's needs were taken care of. He moved his schedule for the sake of the injured man.
A certain man was struggling with questions about whether he was really saved or not - some of the same questions I've heard some of you express. Yes, he had become a Christian, but for whatever reason, he didn't always feel like it. He wondered whether his commitment had been real since nothing especially spectacular had happened to him. No matter what he did, the doubts persisted. Then one day he was hurrying to catch a train. As he sprinted through the station, he ran headlong into a small boy with a puzzle in his hands. The little boy was not hurt but the pieces of his puzzle were scattered all over the place. Instead of rushing on, as the train pulled away, the man stooped down and began picking up the pieces of the little boy's puzzle. After he had finished, the little guy looked up into his face and asked, "Mister, are you Jesus?" "I realized at that point," said the man, "that Christ truly was in my heart. I would never have allowed such an event to alter my business schedule before."
Concern and compassion cannot often be scheduled. That's the nature of need. It comes at random times. It is seldom convenient. It's almost never neat and tidy. You cannot just pencil "Show compassion between 9 and 10 A.M." into your Daytimer.
If you're going to get involved with your lost neighbors in a way that will make a difference, you must be willing, sometimes at least, to see your schedule disrupted - or at least to do some creative re-scheduling. If you offer to help and the call comes at 3:00 a.m., you get up and go without grumbling.
I know I have mentioned it before, but one of the finest examples I can recall of this willingness to alter one's schedule to help another was the minister of the local church in California where Kathi and I were baptized. The preacher's name was John Bell and he was a "bi-vocational minister" which means he worked another job to support his family while serving the church which was too small to fully support him. When we became Christians, Kathi and I were desperate for answers. I was full of questions about the Bible - so many questions, I suppose, that John and Hazel took Kathi and me on as a special project. After the Sunday evening service they would invite us over to their house where we would gather around their large kitchen table, eat, and talk - often until midnight or even later. I didn't realize until many years after that how much that dear Christian couple altered their schedule for us. John preached two services on Sunday, stayed up with us, then had to be at work at 5:30 Monday morning. Yet in all that time I never heard him complain or suggest that maybe we just go home after the service. John would come up to us and say, "You guys want to come over to the house for some fellowship tonight?" I know that at least a part of my own decision to be a minister came from John's example and I also know that I have not always lived up to it.
If we're really going to make a difference among our lost neighbors, we must be capable of being moved to compassion. We must be willing to move our being - that is, get involved. And we must be willing, if necessary, to move our schedules.
4. His Money was Moved.
Verse 35 says, "…he took out two denarii and gave them to the innkeeper and said, 'Take care of him; and whatever more you spend, when I return, I will repay you."
A denarius was a coin worth about a day's wage of a laborer. Knowing the injured man would not recover instantly, the Samaritan made provision for the two days he thought he would be gone, then signed a promissory note for anything else that might be needed.
Are we be willing to give up two day's pay for the sake of a neighbor with spiritual needs? Perhaps if each of us would answer that question in our heart of hearts, we would better understand our lack of effectiveness in evangelism. Caring can get expensive!
Perhaps that is at least a portion of the reason why the other two men in this parable moved over instead of moving with compassion.
A knock at the door brought the lady of the house face to face with a man with a sad look on his face. He said politely, "I'm sorry to disturb you ma'am, but I am collecting money for an unfortunate family in your neighborhood." He went on with great sympathy. "The husband is out of work, the kids are hungry, the utilities are soon to be cut off, and worst of all, they are going to be kicked out of their home if they can't get the rent money by this afternoon." The woman replied with great concern, "I will be happy to help, but who are you?" He replied, "I am the landlord."
Perhaps a good question for each of us to consider is this: Are we more like the Samaritan, willing to move his money, or the landlord who was only moved by his money?
Conclusion
A little fellow in the ghetto was teased by one who said, "If God loves you, why doesn't he take care of you? Why doesn't God tell someone to bring you shoes and a warm coat and better food?" The little guy thought for a moment then with tears forming in his eyes, said, "I guess He does tell somebody, but somebody forgets."
What sadness, then, my friend, to find
That after all, you weren't so kind.
The day my life on earth did end
I found you weren't a faithful friend...For all those years we spent on earth,
You never talked of Second Birth,
You never spoke of my lost soul
And of the Christ Who'd make me whole."Go into all the world and preach the gospel to all creation. He who has believed and has been baptized shall be saved; but he who has disbelieved shall be condemned."
Dave Redick is Minister of the Hwy 20 Church of Christ in Sweet Home, Oregon and Editor of The Preacher's Study. He may be reached at pstudysupport@comcast.net.
Copyright © 1996-2008 by The Preacher's Study. Permission is granted to subscribers to use this document in total or in sermon preparation in the context of the local congregation only. Publishing it in a book, on the Internet, or anyplace beyond the local congregation is prohibited.
All Scripture quotations and references are from the New American Standard Version unless otherwise stated.