Bloghardt's Reflector

Notice, that the Lawyer doesn’t question that he should love God. That’s not an issue. He really loves God. The problem is the people around him. 

 

Some people are easy to love. You know - the nice ones. They do what we want and think is right, and so we get along with them. 

 

But others, they very aren’t lovable at all. The evil people who are around us and hurt us. Or the dumb people that don’t seem to get it. Do they do the stuff that annoys us deliberately? 

 

Love the unlovable? The poor, the sick, those who are constantly demanding of our time and from whom we get nothing in return.  Those who should know better, do better, try harder, or something that would make themselves at least tolerable for us. Those who are of a different culture that we don’t understand or skin color we don’t like, or we just because of our own sinfulness don’t want them around. Those people - so unlovable, so unwanted. Love them as much as I love myself? Well...I’m not so sure about that law, Jesus.

 

What we need is a loophole! Good thing we have the Lawyer! Some way to circumvent the harshness of the law. To get around its demands. 

 

“How about I love those people from a distance? Can I love them from the other side of the road, Jesus?” Or, “I’m all for loving my neighbor.. Just tell me who that guy is! Can I be the one who tells God who I love and who I don’t love?”

 

And my personal favorite from my oldest son, “So I’m supposed to love them and put them first...but shouldn’t they be putting me first, first?”

 

All this justifying ourselves. All this putting ourselves first. All this putting our faith in who we are, where we go to church, and how committed we are to loving God. That’s why Jesus tells this parable - to un-lawyer us! There are no loopholes in this parable, no wiggle room.

 

You see, it wasn’t the priest that helped the man. It wasn’t the Levite. Nope, they passed on the other side of the road.  No, it was the Samaritan, the half-Jew. 

 

Samaritians were not God’s people by birth. They were from the other side of the tracks. It was the unlovable sinner, one of “those” people good Jews would cross the road to avoid passing too closely.- He went and saved the half-dead Guy in the ditch. 

 

And here the lawyer is priceless! He’s so like us! He doesn’t even want to say that it was a half-breed Samaritan who was neighbor to the man. Not that guy. Not that sinner.. The Lawyer simply says, “the one who showed mercy.” It’s as if the thought of it being a Samaritan who was the guy in the ditch’s neighbor, and not someone good and on fire for God like the priest, the Levite, or...him. That was just too much for this Lawyer to even say.

 

And Jesus, He throws this young lawyer in the proverbial ditch of the Law with the simple words, “Go, and do likewise.” You want to earn eternal life?  You want a checklist? You want Law? You wanna appear righteous, well then.. Do the law. Just do it. Do it right. Do it completely. Do it to the lovable people. Do it to the unlovable too. Do it for the guy in the ditch. 

 

And so if the lawyer is the guy walking by people in the ditch in this parable, that makes Jesus the guy who fell amongst the thieves. Stripped down, dragged around, beaten, bruised, numbered with the thieves and transgressors, and crucified. 


Can you get any more unlovable than a beaten and stripped Man hanging on a cross? Can you get a man any more cursed that this? Any more despised? Hanging there surrounded by... Thieves and by robbing clergy.

 

Dear friends, what Jesus said to the Lawyer, He says to you today. “If you wish to be justified at all before God by what you have done, how you have lived, how you have taken care of others, how you...anything, that’s fine.  You can do that. You might find life too... just don’t miss one neighbor. When you miss that one, you’ve missed Jesus in that ditch. You’ve passed Me by on the side of the road.”

 

Then, whether you are a priest, Levite, or even lifelong Lutheran, you will not be saved. For if there was a Law that had been given that could give life, salvation would come from the Law!

 

Now, time for a change in gears. A stop and a restart. The Law has left us beaten and bruised in the ditch, without a means of getting ourselves out. Lying there in our sins, in our false beliefs, in our unloving of others. In the ditch,dead to God and dead to each other.

 

And had the Lawyer realized that he was actually in the ditch with you and me and the poor guy in the parable, that he had no hope of getting out of the ditch of the Law, no hope of saving himself, he might have answered the question differently.

 

“Who was neighbor to the man who fell amongst thieves?” Who is neighbor to mankind who fell into sin? The only answer that holds for sure each and every time is “Jesus.”

 

“You are my neighbor, Jesus. You alone save me. You alone forgive my sins. You alone kept the law - loving God with your whole heart always and loving your neighbor as yourself. You alone rescue me from the ditch of my sins, from death itself.”

 

Yes, dear friends, on this other - this Gospel - perspective of the parable in which the Law had its way with us and left us and the Lawyer beaten and nearly dead in the ditch, your Lord Jesus comes and stops. Jesus, despised, rejected of men, and afflicted. Jesus, the man of sorrows, acquainted with grief. Jesus, rejected by His people, He stops along the road and He rescues you. 

 

He pays for your healing, for your salvation - not with gold or silver but His holy precious blood and His innocent suffering and death. You are His own - bought back from your sins, from your death, and from the power of the devil. Bought - by the One who is neighbor to you on the road. Bought and paid for by Jesus alone.

 

So, wait a minute, pastor. I thought you said Jesus was the guy in the ditch for the Lawyer. Yes, I did. 

 

Now, now you are saying that Jesus is the Good Samaritan who gets us out the ditch? Yes, I am. Yes, that just happened.

 

Law and Gospel, friends. Law and Gospel. To the one seeking to justify himself before God, excusing what he does, thinking himself able to get by on his own, Jesus is the Man in the ditch that is passed-by - missed. The Law that is missed is that the Law that damns. 

 

But to the One who realizes that he has no hope in himself - to you who have no salvation, no way out of your sinful condition, no hope...but in Almighty God rescuing you, Jesus is the Good Samaritan that stops and rescues you from death and hell.

 

Repent of seeking to justify yourself before God and those around you. Repent of the excuses you make to God for how your sin isn’t as bad as it appears to be. Repent of it all. 

 

And be rescued this day by Jesus. He’s come to you again and found you. Right there in your pew. He’s come and rescued you. 

 

He’s washed your wounds in Holy Baptism. He’s spoken tenderly to your fears. He feeds you today His very Body and Blood. You are forgiven. You are at peace with God. 

 

And then - Jesus’ “go and do likewise” isn’t a curse any more. No, there simply isn’t enough time to find all your neighbors in this world and help them. 

 

Your family, the people who live next door to you, you pass them in your car, the goofy people with the signs on the road, the unlovable people at work, your friends, your classmates, your enemies...you have been rescued by Jesus to care and love those neighbors. 

 

To love God with your whole heart and to love those He has created as you love yourself. To be a neighbor, a friend, to those who are in need. Loving them with the love that He has for you - love that went through the Cross and death to save you.

 

So, who is neighbor to the man who fell amongst the thieves? Jesus is. He has had mercy on you again, forgiven you, washed you, and fed you. And He’s enlivened you to go and do the same to others. Forgiven. At peace with God.

 

"Blessed are the eyes that see the things you see; for I tell you that many prophets and kings have desired to see what you see and have not seen it, and to hear what you hear and have not heard them." In the name of Jesus. Amen.