Saturday, October 17, 2020

but who is my neighbor?

 If you've been part of a church for more than a year, you've heard the story of the Good Samaritan.

It's a parable in response to a question. A story to explain a complicated response. A proclamation against religious appearances. A social reckoning. Insight into the despised sector of society.

Each night we pray as a family over dinner. First, we thank Jesus for providing His body in our place to pay for our sins. We take the command literally to remember Him every time we eat and drink, moving communion from a sacred Sunday ritual to an incarnational habit. Little Love squeezes his hands together and scrunches up his eyes to keep them closed, standing on his chair and leaning over the food.

Next, we pray that God would help us love. We ask for more grace to love God more. We ask for strength to love each other well. We ask for God's help to love our neighbors, the people we like and the people we don't like.

The parable of the Good Samaritan can be simplified to that last stanza:

We are to love the people we don't like.

The Samaritan wouldn't have liked the beaten up Jewish man in Jesus' hypothetical story. The priest should have. The Levite should have. But they didn't. The Samaritan is called Good for valuing the humanity (God's image) in the battered man on the road side.

I journalize and editorialize the adventures in our literal neighborhood regularly. I've written a lot recently about loving our neighbors. To that point, this story challenges my inclusive definition of neighbor.

You see, the month before a polarizing election and two months into the fiasco of remote learning...I have a few people that I don't like. I find myself interacting with more and more Samaritans. I find myself exhausted, running late, and much like the priest in Jesus' story. Or worse, many days it feels like I'm the Jewish sojourner, shoved off the donkey and left for dead.

And now, thousands of years removed from the first telling of this story, there is advice for my unfriendly encounters. Maybe the Samaritan tears off their face mask and tells me I'm a baby-killer if I won't vote for Trump and Culp. Maybe the Samaritan lights my car on fire for saying there are "good police". Maybe the Samaritan calls those same police because there's a gathering of more than 5 people in my garage. Maybe it doesn't matter why I don't like them. They're still my neighbor.

Jesus extends the teaching of the Torah that loving your neighbor is larger than your comfortable family-safe circle. Jesus invites us to love the "other". Jesus calls us out of our monoculture into human community. For Jesus came to unite all humanity to the Father. And for that, I am grateful.

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Ephesians 5

Therefore, be imitators of God as dearly loved children and live in love, just as Christ also loved us and gave himself for us, a sacrificial and fragrant offering to God. But among you there must not be either sexual immorality, impurity of any kind, or greed, as these are not fitting for the saints. Neither should there be vulgar speech, foolish talk, or coarse jesting – all of which are out of character – but rather thanksgiving. For you can be confident of this one thing: that no person who is immoral, impure, or greedy (such a person is an idolater) has any inheritance in the kingdom of Christ and God.

Let nobody deceive you with empty words, for because of these things God’s wrath comes on the sons of disobedience. Therefore do not be partakers with them, for you were at one time darkness, but now you are light in the Lord. Walk as children of the light – for the fruit of the light consists in all goodness, righteousness, and truth – and find out what pleases the Lord. Do not participate in the unfruitful deeds of darkness, but rather expose them. For the things they do in secret are shameful even to mention. But all things being exposed by the light are made evident. For everything made evident is light, and for this reason it says:

“Awake, O sleeper!

Rise from the dead,

and Christ will shine on you!”

Therefore be very careful how you live – not as unwise but as wise, taking advantage of every opportunity, because the days are evil. For this reason do not be foolish, but be wise by understanding what the Lord’s will is. And do not get drunk with wine, which is debauchery, but be filled by the Spirit, speaking to one another in psalms, hymns, and spiritual songs, singing and making music in your hearts to the Lord, always giving thanks to God the Father for each other in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ, and submitting to one another out of reverence for Christ.

Wives, submit to your husbands as to the Lord, because the husband is the head of the wife as also Christ is the head of the church – he himself being the savior of the body. But as the church submits to Christ, so also wives should submit to their husbands in everything. Husbands, love your wives just as Christ loved the church and gave himself for her to sanctify her by cleansing her with the washing of the water by the word, so that he may present the church to himself as glorious – not having a stain or wrinkle, or any such blemish, but holy and blameless. In the same way husbands ought to love their wives as their own bodies. He who loves his wife loves himself. For no one has ever hated his own body but he feeds it and takes care of it, just as Christ also does the church, for we are members of his body. For this reason a man will leave his father and mother and will be joined to his wife, and the two will become one flesh. This mystery is great – but I am actually speaking with reference to Christ and the church. Nevertheless, each one of you must also love his own wife as he loves himself, and the wife must respect her husband.

hey guys