For most of the people listening to Jesus (Luke 10:25-37) there was no such thing as a Good Samaritan. There were plenty of Samaritans, but 'good' was not a suitable adjective to describe any of them.
Jesus has been involved in a discussion about eternal life, loving God, loving your neighbour, and 'just who is my neighbour?' And to help us get it he tells that well known story of the Good Samaritan. The man who helps a fellow human being who is in need, simply because he is in need and he can help - irrespective of what it will cost him, irrespective of the inconvenience, irrespective of the cultural or religious barriers that potentially could get in the way. Jesus is showing us, by painting this picture, that our love for God is demonstrated in the way we love others - even those who we may consider to be our enemies. The two (loving God - loving others) can't be separated from each other.
There are (at least) four levels of response we can make to any parable. 1) Nice story. 2) Nice story - but I wonder what the point is? 3) If that's the point - what does it mean for me? 4) Actually making a life-style change in the light of the point of the parable.
One of the dangers with a parable like this is that we easily answer levels 1-3, but when it comes to level 4 we generalise - so we talk about terrorists, rapists, murderers... But I don't believe that is the point Jesus is making. Jesus is saying that your neighbour is that person in need who you are going to come across tomorrow. They might be your best friend. They might be that person who really winds you up. They might be the atheist who is always having a go at your faith. They may even be a Man. Utd. fan. Who they are is irrelevant. What is important is that you demonstrate your love for God by the way you meet their need. Or do you cross over the road and leave it to someone else?
What difference would it make to the point of the story if the Samaritan got robbed and was helped by an ordinary Jew? The main point, I believe, would be the same. But, with the story as Jesus told it, we are alerted to the danger of painting whole groups of people with the same brush. We live, here in London, in a very multicultural, multi faith environment. And it can be very easy to adopt stereotypes. But that's wrong. Within every community there are individuals who will demonstrate compassion and love toward those who are in need. Young people, for example, generally get a really bad press - whenever they're in the news it's to do with drugs, drink, knives, guns, stealing, threatening behaviour, antisocial behaviour... But that is only a small fraction of the whole picture.
To listen to this message from Keith click here. This message included the Nooma DVD 009 Bullhorn by Rob Bell. For copyright reasons this has been removed from the audio. To see an extract from this short video click here.
