Podcast: Behind the Scenes: I Love You But...No Ifs, Ands, or Buts (Luke 10:25-37)

Good day, and welcome to North Raleigh United Methodist Church Behind the Scenes Podcast, where we sit down weekly and discuss this week's scripture and sermon.

My name is Kevin Van Hall.

I serve as your host and moderator.

And joining me today is one of the senior lead pastors here at North Raleigh, Laura Johnson.

Hi, Laura.

Hey, how are you?

Um well, I hope you are.

Thank you so much for joining with us today to discuss this week's uh sermon that you will be preaching in the series I love you, but so this is the last one of six, correct?

That's correct.

So last week, last week Kevin was here and we talked about uh but do you love me?

And we talked about the other parable in Luke that a lot of people know.

We're gonna be talking about another one that is even probably more well known.

So Luke has uh probably got the two most talked about or well-known parables.

We're talking about the parable of the good Samaritan this week.

And it's probably it might even be the most recognized.

I I think it is.

Just because of the way you just say the word good Samaritan.

That's right.

We even have laws, that's right.

Public laws that talk about the Good Samaritan.

And uh last week the prodigal son, uh most people are familiar with the what happens with the sun, it goes off and wastes and comes back.

Little bit different approach here.

We're still doing parable teaching.

Uh Jesus does so much of that.

Last week it was Do You Love Me?

We talked about the not the prodigal son, but the eldest that stays behind.

And this week it's no ifs, ands, or buts.

So, Laura, what do you mean by that?

That's right.

Well, I think it's a summary statement of what we've been talking about all six weeks that love has no boundaries, no conditions in God's kingdom.

Um that doesn't make it easy and it doesn't make it clean.

Um, it's very messy.

And as we see in this story, it's it's um it knows no boundaries.

That that's what we're called to as Christ's followers to love without boundaries.

So it's a great uh parable in the sense there's a lot of symbolism in it.

And we're gonna ask for a little, I'm gonna ask for a little bit of background uh information first before we read it and uh understand, but too much farther along and we'll forget the prayer pray.

So uh Laura, can you lead us in some prayer?

Absolutely.

Let's pray.

Oh Lord, we ask that you would bless us in this conversation, bless all who are listening in on us, help your scriptures come alive for us, help us hear your voice speaking to us.

May we be inspired as your disciples.

Amen.

Amen.

We are Luke chapter 10, the parable of the good Samaritan.

Luke 10 · chapter mention

But Laura, who or what is a Samaritan?

That's a great thing to start with.

So there was a lot of animosity between Samaritan and Jews in those days.

Samaritans originally were part, I mean, they're descendants of the Jewish folks, but thousands of years before this, maybe hundreds of years, I don't remember the exact timeline.

Um there was a break.

The Samaritans decided to worship in the um in the mountain where they had there in their own ways, which the Jewish folks were like, that's not right, you gotta come to Jerusalem.

And then the Samaritans started to intermarry with some of the folks in around them that weren't Jewish, and the Jews were like, You can't do that, that's not right.

And so over the years, just resentment built up, and then eventually those turned into violent skirmishes, which eventually turned into deep hatred for one another.

And so the Samaritan in a Jew's eye would have been someone untrustworthy, someone who's unholy, someone who has backwards religion, someone who doesn't worship the right way, and someone who might be dangerous.

So they had a very terrible reputation among the Jewish folks.

Yes.

So we it does kind of go back a thousand years at most because we're talking about a separation of the southern kingdom and the northern kingdom.

Northern kingdom gets uh uh invaded and attacked by Assyria to the north, and they overtake it.

Eventually, the southern kingdom of Judah gets overtaken by um what would be Iraq, the Babylonians uh in today's world, and brought back and forth out of exile.

So they are all come back out of exile, but in the meantime, the Samaritans, the ones that stayed in the northern kingdom, were assimilated by the Assyrians, like you said, intermarried.

Uh Bael was a very well practiced uh pagan religion in the northern kingdom at the time.

So there's a sense that they're back together in Jewish beliefs in one God, but they're almost have different ways of practicing it.

It's almost a little bit like Catholic Protestant in the sense it's the same God and same beliefs.

They still believe in Abraham, they still believe in Isaac to all those things.

But the same scriptures have just practices are very different.

Right, right.

Like the Catholic religion wants to fall underneath the Pope, which would symbolize Jerusalem in the temple.

That's right.

And they go to the Mount Gersimi, I think it's Gersim.

Gerism.

Um to worship.

So the Samaritans don't like the the Jews any more than, or the Hebrews any more than the Jews like the Samaritans.

That's exactly right.

A lot of animosity there.

And we see Jesus intentionally trying to break that barrier.

He, I mean, the woman at the well was a Samaritan woman.

He stays in her village for a while.

He doesn't skirt around.

Usually when Jews were traveling around, they would skirt around the region of Samaria, so they didn't even have to go through it.

Jesus didn't do that.

He went right on through it.

So he he was trying to break these barriers down.

And this is one example, this parable, where he was trying to do that through narrative.

Right.

So this area is north of Jerusalem, um, be up near the northern part of the kingdom.

Uh Samaria was the capital of the Assyrian uh invasion land at the time.

That's where they get the name Samaria, and Samaritans were the ones that were still living in that area.

So it's it's like uh Gaza would be in part of Israel today.

Yeah.

As a is some type of understanding.

So that's where we are, uh, chapter 10, and we're gonna read from verses uh 25 through 37.

Laura's gonna read for us.

A legal expert stood up to test Jesus.

Teacher, he said, What must I do to gain eternal life?

Jesus replied, What is written in the law?

How do you interpret it?

He responded, You must love the Lord your God with all your heart, with all your being, with all your strength, and with all your mind, and love your neighbor as yourself.

Jesus said to him, You have answered correctly.

Do this and you will live.

But the legal expert wanted to prove that he was right.

So he said to Jesus, And who is my neighbor?

Jesus replied, A man went down from Jerusalem to Jericho.

He encountered thieves, who stripped him naked, beat him up, and left him near death.

Now it was just so happened that a priest was also going down the same road.

When he saw the injured man, he crossed over to the other side of the road and went on his way.

Likewise, a Levite came by that spot, saw the injured man, and crossed over to the other side of the road, and went on his way.

A Samaritan, who was on a journey, came to where the man was.

But when he saw him, he was moved with compassion.

The Samaritan went to him and bandaged his wounds, tending them with oil and wine.

Then he placed the wounded man on his own donkey, took him to an inn, and took care of him.

The next day he took two full days' worth of wages and gave them to the innkeeper.

He said, Take care of him, and when I return, I will pay you back for any additional costs.

What do you think?

Which one of these three was a neighbor to the man who encountered thieves?

Then the legal legal expert said, The one who demonstrated mercy toward him.

Jesus told him, Go and do likewise.

Well, it's an excellent story.

So we'll start off before we mention the characters in the story with uh I love how a teacher of the law trying to show off to Jesus to ask ask Jesus a question just so he can be answered.

So we already have this arrogance coming out, and uh Jesus kindly puts him in this place by incorporating him into the parable.

That's right.

Well, and what's fascinating when the legal expert asks his question, What must I do to gain eternal life?

Jesus doesn't answer it.

He says, What do you think?

Because Jesus knows that they both agree on this.

Because he he cites Deuteronomy and Leviticus, which were the two commandments that, and we talked about those in the first week, that those are dual commandments, love God, love your neighbor.

That was the Jewish practice.

And so Jesus and the teacher of the law, they agreed on those, no question.

And so Jesus is like, all right, done.

We're in agreement.

You can go on your way.

But the legal expert is clearly trying to get something out of Jesus.

He's trying to provoke Jesus or prove that he's smarter than Jesus or something.

And so Jesus, again, he asked the question, the man does, who is my neighbor?

And Jesus doesn't give a direct answer, which is one of the things that I imagine frustrated people with Jesus a lot because he rarely gives direct answers.

And instead he tells a story, which is like what your grandpa does, right?

Like, oh, you have a question.

Let me tell you this 20-minute story, right?

Um But it was very it was really effective.

It was really effective in in putting the man, getting him out of his arrogance, as you said, in order to see things differently.

So let's say the uh stage here.

Let's uh list the characters.

First of all, we have the victim.

So who what does he represent, Laura?

Yeah, I mean I think I think he could be anybody.

He is yeah, he's anybody.

He's just a man.

You can't identify him.

He's unconscious, so he can't say who he is.

He's half naked, so you can't tell by his dress.

So you come upon somebody and you have no idea who this person is.

That's right.

You don't know if he's, you know, a victim of his own crime.

We don't know if he's someone who's well to do.

We don't know anything.

We just know that the and we don't know what nationality, we just know he's a hurt a hurt-injured person.

Aaron Ross Powell, Jr.

Just a person that needs help.

So then comes along the next character, a priest.

So that's we'll we'll we'll lump the uh arrogant person that asked the question into this, right?

An expert in the rules and in the laws, very pious individual.

And he crosses on the other side of the street.

Now, why would he do that if he knows the rules and laws?

Is he worried about uncleanliness, unholiness, that the person might be dead?

And again, you brought up Leviticus Deuteronomy, the rule, not because if he would touch a dead body, he wouldn't be able to fulfill his duties in the temple.

Right.

Because that was part of their practice.

You know, I read a really interesting article written by Sam Wells, who's an Anglican priest in London.

He was the um the the head pastor at Duke Chapel when we were at Duke in Divinity School.

And he it was this really clever article where it was written as um an inquiry from the Jewish temple, the the governing body in in Jerusalem, to figure out what happened that day and who was in the wrong.

And and so it's like we we did an inquiry and we we think the priest did the right thing because if he had gone out of his way to help that man, who knows?

He could have been taken by robbers.

He could have been hurt himself.

And then if he had touched a dead body and had to have not been able to do his duties, that would not have been fair to the temple.

So we think the priest did the right thing.

In this whole article, he justified he he uses like our rationale to justify, to help us see how we justify our reasoning all the time.

And so one of the reasons the priest didn't stop was likely because it would endanger his ability to be a priest or put him in physical harm.

Well, at least that's his excuse.

Right.

That's his excuse.

That's his out.

It's kind of like in our law market lawmakers today when uh there's another school shooting, it's like, oh, well, there's nothing we could do about it.

We'll just say a prayer.

Um exactly.

Such strong actions of of no action at all.

Exactly.

Yep.

So we have him, and then the next person that comes by is a Levite.

Now, Laura, does he represent who?

He's a he's from a particular tribe in Israel, so he's like a good Hebrew guy.

And uh Samuel's article made a point to say that the Levite is just following the example of his priest.

Like he's just doing what he was taught to do by his priest, that he's just going along like if his priest didn't stop, then he shouldn't have to stop, right?

Because it would put him in danger too, and he needs to have good, proper decorum when he's out in public, and you can't stoop that low.

That's right.

He follows his examples and goes to the opposite side just as well.

Probably even maybe he even says a prayer too as he goes by.

Maybe he does.

It's a prayer might be, um thank God I'm not that person.

That's right.

Versus uh please be with that person.

Sometimes people say a prayer, oh, thank God I'm not him.

That's right.

That's right.

So again, the Levite can represent anyone.

This is why Jesus brings this person by an expert who knows what you're supposed to do, a person that know a Levite, also probably very well versed in the rules and laws and what's been taught.

Absolutely.

Right.

So he can represent anybody.

And then we mean they should know better.

Yes.

They should know better because they're supposed to love the Lord their God and love their neighbor as their self.

Yes.

So they should know better, but they find all the excuses that are out there to not help.

Right.

And then Jesus brings in the next character, a Samaritan.

But before we talk about the Samaritan, let's talk about where Jesus sets this area.

We're on a road outside of Jerusalem.

Jericho.

Oh I think it's Jericho.

I thought it was Jerusalem to Jericho.

Yes, yes, yes, you're right.

Sorry.

So we're on a road outside of Jerusalem to on our way to Jericho, which is in the Southern Kingdom, outside of the Samaritan's homeland.

So he is already in hostile area, hostile country, right?

Versus being in Samaritan.

Right.

Yeah.

So Jesus plays this scene and the stage so well, I wonder if they even get it or if they understand it.

We're 2,000 years later and we're still analyzing it, figuring it all out, right?

Mm-hmm.

So who does the Samaritan represent?

Well, if you look, it's interesting that in a lot of ways the Samaritan represents Jesus himself.

So a lot of Jesus' parables teach us about God's kingdom or about how God acts or about and by extension how we ought to act as people who follow the the um Jesus' example.

But if you think about it, so the couple of words that are used here to describe the Samaritan is he was moved with compassion and he had mercy.

And in the Gospel of Luke, the only folks who are moved with compassion or have mercy are people in the parables who are meant to mirror God or Jesus Himself.

And so it's already kind of setting him up as kind of like a Christ-like figure.

Um he he comes down, he sees this man, um, he comes down and he he lifts him up, he raises a man up, he uses oil and wine to anoint him, which is a lot of what like the prophetic texts point to what God does to um the metaphorically wounded people of God.

Um he rescues this man at personal great cost to himself.

He suffered um by hauling this man all the way to Jericho.

Um, and he paid a debt for the man that the man could not pay for himself at the at the um at the place where he left him at the end, and then promised to return to address any any other problems.

Like all of those are Christ-like things that he did.

And so, in a lot of ways, the Samaritan is Jesus' lifting him up is like the Christ-like model, which is so fascinating because that would have been shocking to his first hearers and to his disciples.

Yes.

So to bring in the uh Samaritan, even his own disciples were not exactly fans of the Samaritans.

They were like often then going from Galilee down to Jerusalem, like they did several times.

You had to either go the long way around Samaria or you went through it.

And a couple of times Jesus was like, We're going through it.

And they're like, Are you sure?

We're wait a minute, you don't we don't want to do that.

You don't want to do that.

We don't want to go.

And Jesus is like, Yes.

That's right.

Yes, we do.

That's right.

So this is even a the a little not a dot in the eye to them as well, but it's to everyone that's listening.

That's right.

You want to ask who what a good neighbor is?

Let me let me explain and show you what a really a good neighbor is.

That's right.

So you said just before the I liked just before this podcast, you said that Jesus turns neighbor from a noun into a verb.

That's right.

So the um the lawyer's question is, who is my neighbor?

So the neighbor is like the object.

Who am I, who do I have to love, basically?

And Jesus flips the flips that question around and asks him, who was a neighbor?

And so it's instead of like who is my neighbor, it's it of the noun.

Jesus turns the question into a verb.

Um, who acted as a neighbor?

How do we live as a neighbor?

So in Jesus' mind, the neighbor is not so much of like the the noun who I have to love.

It's more of an internal, how am I living as a neighbor?

How am I neighboring with people around me?

And and in Jesus's in Jesus' perspective, neighboring looks Christ-like.

It looks like what this guy did.

So we're not neighboring just to people that look like us and think like us.

That's right.

And in this example, relating it into today's world, he would be considered an alien in a foreign land, in a hostile land.

That's right.

Would he not?

That's right.

That's right.

And yet he takes mercy upon him and lifts him up and helps him, and doesn't ask if he's a Sumerian or a Jew.

Doesn't give any qualifications, doesn't ask if he's deserved it.

He's just like, I'll take care of him.

Right.

And doesn't even ask, well, you'll you can just pay me back later when you feel better.

That's right.

Either.

Nope.

Pure gift.

Pure gift.

Pure gift.

And and and I think that's what's one interesting way to look at this story is to see, to put ourselves, instead of putting ourselves in the perspective of the Samaritan, to put ourselves in the perspective of the man in the ditch.

Because in a lot of ways, this story is showing us what Jesus has done for us.

Because we've all been beaten and bruised by this life, right?

Um, and we've all, whether or not we've deserved it, we've all been kicked into the ditch a few times, you know?

And and Jesus is always the one who looks with mercy and compassion on us and lifts us up and pays our debt and and takes care of us, right?

And promises to come back and check on us.

And and so I think the best way to approach this parable is to start with that of to see ourselves as the man in the ditch, and then say, How can I love my neighbor as I've been loved by Jesus?

So in this week's series, continuation of I love you but, no ifs, ands, or buts.

So the Good Samaritan is this is this the example?

Yeah, that's right.

No ifs, ands, or buts.

No ifs, ands or buts.

That's right.

So love can be shown up in many different ways.

It's not necessarily saying I love you, it's just through kind, gentle actions.

And that's and that's the key, is that love is love without actions is is a cheap kind of love, right?

You can say all the all the nice things you want all day long, but if your actions don't back it up, what do you have, right?

Yeah.

So it's instead of just saying I love you, why don't you show someone you love them?

That's right.

That's right.

So it's like uh, well, James, faith without deeds, right?

You can say you have faith, but why don't you show?

And and I think part of being able to love no we have sands or buts, like is to recognize that the people that we the Samaritans in our life are also worthy of being the hero, right?

Like that's also what Jesus is trying to do here, is trying to upset how we look at our neighbors so that we don't look at them as pure enemies, but that the Samaritan would have been seen as an enemy by a lot of Jesus' listeners, and yet he's making him the hero.

And so Jesus is trying to say, like, when you're learning to love, you have to drop the enemy perspective.

Like we we we're all capable of great good, we're all capable of great bad.

Oh, he even makes the uh person that asked the question who who was the Makes him admit that the Samaritan, he's the one who tells the Samaritan is the hero.

But notice he doesn't say Samaritan.

He refuses to even say the word.

He says it's the one who demonstrated mercy.

So that shows that he Jesus definitely hit a sore spot.

The guy won't even say, Oh, it was the Samaritan.

It's like he can't even bring himself to voice that, which just goes to show what Jesus is trying to do of like, even that person, even that person is your neighbor worthy of love.

Right.

And go and do likewise.

Yep.

So there's a direction that Jesus says, okay, now that you know, there's no excuses.

That's right.

Go and do likewise.

That's right.

So go and do likewise sounds like a direction of something else that might be going on this Sunday.

This Sunday is also Ascension Sunday.

That's right.

And we celebrate that.

The following week would be Pentecost.

That's correct.

Which is uh it's weird.

We think about it as as Christians, it's the holiday that they receive the Holy Spirit, but it is actually a Jewish holiday.

It's the 50th day after Passover, why?

It's called Pentecost.

That's right.

So Ascension Sunday, what does Jesus say or tell us to do before he ascends?

Yeah, so um Ascension Sunday is when Jesus gathers his followers around and he and it depends on the gospel.

Um in Matthew says go and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit.

In Luke, he tells them um to wait for the Holy Spirit.

Let's see.

And he says that um he kind of opens their minds to understand how he he his life and death and resurrection fit into the prophets and the scriptures.

And then he says that uh change of heart and um forgiveness of sins must be preached to all the nations, beginning from Jerusalem.

And then he tells them to wait until the Holy Spirit is given to them before they go out and proclaim that.

And then he ascends into heaven where he sits at the right hand of the Father.

Um and that's where we we waited until he sent the Holy Spirit on Pentecost, which then empowered the church to fulfill Jesus' commissions.

Right.

And just in comparison, uh in Mark in uh chapter uh sixteen, uh verse fifteen, and he said to them, Go into all the world and preach the good news to all creation, and whoever believes and is baptized will be saved, but whoever does not believe will be condemned.

So he talks about um and Matthew didn't only go out and baptize.

That's right.

He commands everyone to go out and baptize where we get.

And the ascension is one of those, like we often kind of overlook it as a Christian holiday because we don't really know what to do with I feel like it's I feel like Pentecost we get really excited about, but ascension, we're like, okay, what do we do with this?

And but I think that's such an important part of the story because we say in our creeds, he died, he rose, and he ascended.

Like Jesus didn't just disappear into thin air, like he returned to the Father where where he's waiting to come again and bring the kingdom, right?

And and he's and he's working from from from on high with the father to bring about his kingdom on earth.

And so we we have like our advocate is right there next to the father, and that's what we learn about on ascension.

Excellent.

Excellent.

Well put.

That's the way I think of it.

I think of his saying goodbye, I'll be back.

That's right.

Determinate, I'll be back.

That's right, exactly.

Exactly.

So that's the way I kind of think of it.

I don't I don't think about his his greatest his commandment to go do this nation.

I think of his ascension just before he leaves.

He's like, I'll be back.

I think of it as kind of like when I leave my kids at home and I go to a meeting at church or I go to the store or whatever, I leave them a list of like, okay, you gotta do this, you gotta do this, you gotta do this.

Like I think of it as like Jesus is giving us our homework while he's gone until he comes back so that we're ready for when he comes back, right?

Like it's um it's definitely a see you later.

Yeah, yeah.

So we should be like the Samaritan that showed mercy until he comes back.

So that will wrap up no ifs, ands, and buts.

So we'll wrap up this podcast with that is uh well.

And then we talked about the following week would be Memorial Day weekend in Pentecost.

Uh we've already been talking about that.

What else is going on upcoming?

Well, first let me say about Pentecost.

We are encouraging everyone to wear red since that's the color of the Holy Spirit.

So you're invited to wear red on Pentecost.

There may or may not be happy birthday church cakes around on Pentecost, so come get some cake.

Um we're working on that plan.

And this Sunday on May 17th at 5 p.m., our kids' choir is putting on their musical.

Um it's called Storms, and about to where God is with us in the storms of our life, and they have been practicing their lines and their songs and their dances and their costumes.

It's gonna be really great.

So come and join us on Sunday.

Right.

So that's what's uh coming up.

But again, that's um that one is coming up this weekend, Ascension Sunday, and then Pentecost is the week after that, which is uh Memorial Day weekend and official kick off of summer right around the corner.

That's correct.

So Laura, thank you so much for uh being here today and uh going and joining us for the podcast.

Interesting to uh see where the uh sermon's going on Sunday.

Yeah, well the Lord knows at this point.

Only the Lord knows.

Not not written, still thinking about it.

I love that response.

Okay, well, great.

Well, please join us again next week.

Uh Kevin will be back next week.

That's right.

So until then, may the love of Christ be with you always.

So goodbye, everyone.