Luke 10:25-37
July 13, 2025
Several years ago there was a story about a police officer who was being called a “Good Samaritan” for helping out a former UNC – Chapel Hill football player, who was struggling with some mental issues. The former player was a star on the team in the late 90s, but had become homeless and was living on the streets in Florida. The police officer bought a meal for the man and was arranging for a place for him to stay when he recognized his name as a former Chapel Hill football player. The police officer contacted the man’s sister, along with the athletic director at UNC to get the man some help. As a result, a plane was arranged to fly the man to the Chapel Hill hospital to see if he was suffering from brain injuries incurred while playing football.
Earlier this year there was a story about a man in Chicago who was being called a “Good Samaritan” for jumping into the cold waters of Lake Michigan in February to save a drowning dog. Apparently a young man was out jogging one morning with his dog when the dog ran out onto the frozen ice of Lake Michigan. But when the ice broke, the jogger struggled to save his dog. Another runner nearby saw what was happening and he immediately jumped into the icy water and saved the dog.
The media often likes to use the term “Good Samaritan” as a way of describing a person who goes out of their way to help someone, especially while the rest of society just seems to walk on by almost without noticing. Is that what a “Good Samaritan” is, according to the Bible? Actually the original question that produced the Biblical story of the Good Samaritan wasn’t “Who is a Good Samaritan?” instead it was, “Who is my neighbor?”
But this question was actually a follow-up question to another question that a lawyer asked of Jesus at the beginning of our Gospel lesson. Our text says that a lawyer decided to test Jesus by asking Him, “What must I do to inherit eternal life?” What is interesting throughout Scripture is
almost every time a person asked Jesus a question with the wrong motives or premise, Jesus would usually answer their question with another question. For example, in verses 25-26 of Luke 10 it says, “And behold, a lawyer stood up to put Jesus to the test, saying, ‘Teacher, what shall I do to inherit eternal life?’ He said to him, ‘What is written in the Law? How do you read it?’” So when Jesus answers the lawyer’s question with a question, this should immediately signal to us that the lawyer has the wrong premise.
This was definitely an odd question for a lawyer to ask, because any lawyer would know that you don’t have to do anything to get an inheritance. All you have to do is wait for someone to die and the inheritance is yours – it’s a gift; it is something that another person has already earned, but you get it without doing anything. It is also possible that the lawyer viewed Christianity in the same way that many people view Christianity today – it is a religion of doing things. You have to do something in order to avoid hell and earn eternal life; but that is a false picture of Christianity. The lawyer has the wrong premise.
But Jesus initially appears to go along with the man’s premise that eternal life is something you earn, by asking, “What is written in the Law? How do you read it?” The lawyer gives a great answer. He quotes directly from Deuteronomy 6 and Leviticus 19 by saying, “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 love your neighbor as yourself.” Now this command, God’s law, has some pretty high standards. It does not say in Deuteronomy 6, “Try to love God and others to the best of your ability. You don’t have to love those who hurt you, just try to be nice to everyone and God will be pleased.” No, God’s law demands total, complete, 100%, 24/7 devotion to God and others.
Consider for a moment, where is the easiest place to love God as He demands? It is probably right here, in the church, in God’s house with other Christians. But how well have you shown
your love to God during the first 30 minutes of this worship service? Did you sincerely confess your sins to God this morning, recognizing your failures and your lack of love towards others? Were you focused on the grace and forgiveness God gives you in our songs today or was your mind wandering a little bit during the singing? Maybe you have a lot of things to do later on today or maybe you are still angry with someone this morning which prevented you from giving your full attention and love to God. If we can’t even love God perfectly right here for one hour, then what hope do we have of loving God perfectly for the rest of our lives?
So when Jesus answered the man by saying, “You have answered correctly; do this, and you will live – you will have eternal life;” I’m sure He knew the lawyer could never measure up to God’s standards, nobody could. And maybe, deep down, the lawyer knew that too as he sought a clarification on the word, “neighbor,” by asking, “Who is my neighbor?” Jesus then replied with the story of the Good Samaritan and ends it with a question, meaning the lawyer again asked a question with the wrong premise. By asking, “Who is my neighbor?” the lawyer was really trying to limit the number of people he needed to love as himself. In other words, the man’s question suggests that loving everyone is rather unrealistic, isn’t it?
But Jesus is not going to let this man limit the number of people he needed to love, so He tells the story of the Good Samaritan and He ends it with a question we all have to ask ourselves. Jesus says that 3 men came upon a man who was robbed, stripped of his clothes, beaten, and left for dead. Of these 3, a priest and a Levite (a person who would assist a priest at the temple) both saw the man, but did not stop to help. Both of these men represented respectable, honorable positions in society – the kind the lawyer would have been eager to include among his neighbors. Now, why didn’t the priest or the Levite stop and help the man? We don’t know, but keep in mind this was not a dying squirrel or a dog struggling in a lake, this was a human being. Whatever reason they had would never be acceptable.
I’m sure the lawyer was very surprised that Jesus would portray these “religious people,” as being so unkind, but he was probably even more surprised when Jesus said that a Samaritan came by and the Samaritan was the one who stopped to help. The Jews and Samaritans hated each other and in the lawyer’s mind, the Samaritan would have had a good reason to pass by, after all, this man in the ditch was a Jew, “Why should I help him?” But instead of making excuses, the Samaritan cleaned and bandaged the man’s wounds, took him to an inn, and paid for his stay. So when Jesus asked at the end of this text, “Which of these 3 proved to be a neighbor to the man who fell among robbers?” the lawyer knows it was the Samaritan as he says, “The one who showed him mercy.”
It is easy to look at this story and conclude that we need to show mercy to all people, but that does not answer the original question in this text, which was, “What shall I do to inherit eternal life?” No one is going to be in heaven because they succeeded in being a Good Samaritan. What Jesus wants this lawyer and all of us to understand and confess is, “I am a sinner. I’ve passed by people who needed my help. I’ve made excuses and have failed to show mercy. I cannot earn eternal life, because of my sin. I need a Savior.” And when Jesus hears that He will say to us, “I forgive you and I want you to live with me forever. So I am going to give you my body and blood in bread and wine as a visible reminder that I love you, forgive you, and will be with you forever.” Christianity is not about trying to prove to everyone how good you are, it is about Jesus saving us when we least deserved it by dying on a cross for our sins. And now that you have been rescued, the question we all need to answer today is, “What kind of neighbor are you going to be?” The media often has it right when they talk about a Good Samaritan, but we are not Good Samaritans because we want to impress God, hoping that He lets us into heaven. We are Good Samaritans, because we know that God has been extremely merciful to us. So let us go and do likewise.
