Good Samaritan - Neighborhood
May 31, 2026 2026-05-31 Ben Hoyer Luke 10Concluding the three arenas of vocation, this message turns to neighborhood, examining the parable of the Good Samaritan in Luke 10 and the lawyer's question about how to inherit eternal life and who counts as one's neighbor.
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The rest of us, we have been looking at these areas of vocation. We finished that long walk through the whole story of Scripture. And I started thinking about, okay, great, that we know the story of Scripture, but what are we supposed to do? And the church has been kind of struggling with that question, what should we do for a long time? All the way back, I mean, you hear the story of the Good Samaritan, we're going to look out a little bit deeper, but really that's what drives that story coming about, that
parable from Jesus is somebody asking, Jesus, what should I do with my life? And the church over the generations has structured the thinking about what should we do with our life? How will we live up to who God expects us to be? And of course, we know that in being who God calls us to be, we find the greatest joy in life. So God is glorified and we get the most joy. They've structured that into this idea of vocation that God cares for the world immediately. And we've been talking about this, how crazy it is that God would make a world and then
give it over to people to manage for good and for ill, right? Like some things go well. Sometimes we have the capacity to love our kids, right? Sometimes we don't, right? So like the image of childhood as a gauntlet. Sometimes we are good at loving our kids and sometimes we injure them. And God allows that to happen because he's given humanity over. And sometimes nations collaborate and with industry make the world better for everybody
and other times nations clash and kill and destroy. And God allows that to happen. He's engaged and works in the world through people and is committed to doing that. And so that's true on a broad sense and on an individual sense. So like when I start to think about what ought I to do, how might I live in a way that's consistent with who God calls me, I think I want to know where is he working through me? We call those our vocations and we've talked about that we have these vocations in three
arenas, family, church and what we're calling neighborhood. So we talked two weeks ago about the arena of family and what it means that God recklessly trusts humans from conception to maturity like that he would teach people about love and generosity and hope all the things that we need to learn about through other people. That's crazy.
And last week we talked about church and the potential to be church together. And it was Pentecost and we talked about the gift of the Holy Spirit that we might continue to meet together. And God's commitment to have not individuals but a group, a tribe, a family, a church of people who let him be God. And this week I want to talk about neighborhood. And so we're going to look at that story of the Good Samaritan that we just talked to the kids about. It's in Luke chapter 10 if you want to follow along with me there.
Luke chapter 10. Starting at verse 25. And behold a lawyer stood up and put him to the test saying, teacher what shall I do to inherit eternal life. And we've talked about this before but like the main way that they would teach in first century Israel is to ask questions. So Jesus isn't being coy when he is asked a question and responds with another question.
That's just kind of how they would teach. And so the guy is not being genuine in this question, he's being disingenuous, he's trying to set Jesus up. He's a lawyer, maybe even a lawyer for the church. He knows in his mind what the right answer is. He's testing Jesus to see if Jesus gives him what he thinks is the right answer. And Jesus then instead of just answering him makes the guy answer. So the guy says, teacher what shall I do to inherit eternal life. And he said to him, what is written in the law?
How do you read it? And he answered, 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 your neighbor as yourself. And he said to him, you have answered correctly, do this and you will live. I mean I think like, I don't know how that would be a satisfying answer really for anybody
who's honest. You know what I mean? Like if you're trying to figure out, okay I can recognize I didn't conjure myself into existence. There's something going on here that's broader, deeper, longer, older, newer than me. And so I'm trying to figure out my place in the world and I've begun to believe the idea that there is a God and it's not me or that there is a life beyond the one that I can sense. And so I want to figure out what would I do to live well and long.
And the answer is love the Lord your God, love God the God with all your heart, soul, mind and strength and love your neighbor as yourself. And Jesus is like, yeah that's it, just do that and you'll be fine. That's what I'm saying, that's not really a satisfying answer. Even if I knew like how to love God well or as the guy will suggest who my neighbor is and how to love them well, that almost makes it worse actually.
Because then how can I do that actually? And so the guy is the lawyer that's like questioning Jesus is pretty sure that this is a solvable problem. And this is how you kind of crack this nut if you are determined to solve this problem in your own mind and strength you get very specific about it. You want to check off each little thing.
I don't know if you get that way but it's true like if you have to manage people and you're trying to get someone to do a job, whether that's your kids or a co-worker and they don't seem to be getting it, then you make a very clear bullet list, bullet point list. Let me give you very specific tasks. Do these eight things and then come back to me and show me that you did them. And so the lawyer is recognizing I would like to live beyond this one.
I get 70, 80 years if I'm lucky. I would like for my life to mean something, not just be a blip on a radar screen and I go through to something else. I think that I stand for something more than that. So I'd like to live for something more than that. And so now I see, okay, love the Lord your God with all your heart, soul, mind, strength, love your neighbor as yourself. Let's make this manageable so I can get this job done and feel good about myself and know that my future is secure. So let me just, he asked kind of the wrong question. Like if I were in his seat, I would say, Jesus, what does it look like to love?
I think that would be like actually more helpful. But the guy is like almost, he's running past that. He assumes he knows that and he just wants to get to who do I have to love, right? Which is why he asked the question, who's my neighbor? But he desiring to justify himself said to Jesus, who is my neighbor and Jesus replied, a man was going down from Jerusalem to Jericho and he fell among the robbers. The one thing we talked about this parable, I don't know, it's been a while, but like,
it's important to remember that at this point when Jesus launches into this story, it is a story, he just made it up, but it's a common enough experience that the people that he tells the story to initially have an image in their head of what it looks like. Because it's a thing that happens. So they know the places. The road between Jerusalem and Jericho is like very well traveled, right? Like actually, if you remember the story of the triumphal entry when they come back and they
heal blind Bartimaeus, they're walking through Jericho up to Jerusalem, right? And so like this is a road that's traveled a lot. So they would imagine it immediately. And supposedly it's a pretty dangerous road because there's a lot of hidden cracks and crevices and because there's a lot of people. So immediately there would be some things that come to their mind when he starts telling them this story. Jesus replied, a man was going down from Jerusalem to Jericho and he fell among robbers, who stripped him and beat him and departed leaving him half dead.
Like I said, this would be a fear that anyone that travels the road would have and it would be a reasonable fear. So it's why when they're going up, we've talked about when they're going up for Passover, they would travel in groups and families to deter the robbers from coming that lay in wait on a highly traveled road with lots of hiding spaces. This guy was on his own and he got beat up. Now by chance a priest was going down that road and when he saw him, he passed by on the other side.
Just real quickly, when they think of a priest, a priest would be coming down from Jerusalem, leaving Jericho to go on duties. A priest would be a bigger deal. He might have been at the temple for something and going to do something important. A priest in their mind would always travel on a donkey. A priest had the capacity to travel on a donkey but a priest needs to keep ceremonially clean and so when he sees the person on the side of the road in their mind, they would envision a dude on a donkey who sees a guy who's left for dead.
What did they say? Beat him and stripped him and leaving him half dead. Supposedly in first century, there were these stages towards death and half dead was a specific stage. Dead is almost dead and nearly dead. There's these different stages of how close to death you are and half dead is a spot where you're not conscious. And so when the priest would see him from a distance, he doesn't have clothes on and they took his
clothes so he's like, he can't tell whether he's Jew or Samaritan and he can't associate with anyone that's not a Jew. And also when he's half dead, he's close enough to dead that he's not sure if he is dead and he can't associate with anybody that's dead because that would make him unclean. So they could imagine very quickly what you and I are having to talk about here. They would know implicitly when Jesus tells the story, there's a priest who's coming down the street and he saw the guy half dead and he crosses over to the other side of the street. It's almost like they wouldn't blame them almost.
They would kind of grimace because yeah, you'd want but they know why the priest crosses over there and nobody would really think they would kind of assume almost. The priest would keep clear of someone who could be dead and may not be Jewish. They just kind of assume that. I don't know what we would think of church leaders today, what we would expect them to do. But I think that's kind of what they would expect. Leaving him half dead now.
And then so likewise, a Levite when he came to the place and saw him, passed by on the other side. So the Levite is a step down from the priest and more than likely if they're leaving from Jerusalem going towards Jericho, they're done with their term of service at the temple. They would rotate through cycles and be called up from where they lived and they would stay in Jerusalem for like a week at a time and serve in the temple and then go back home and have a certain amount of time off. So the Levite is less worried about being ceremonially clean because he's done.
He doesn't have to go back to the temple any time soon. But they would also in their mind when they think of a Levite he's a lower class, he's probably walking. So the thought is like when he comes up and then Jesus says he came to the place. So the priest they would imagine is coming down on the donkey and can see the guy from a distance and skirts over to the side. They're almost not surprised. Then the Levite is walking but Jesus says he came to the place. And so the implication is he comes right up to where the guy is and looks at him.
See he says the Levite when he came to the place and saw him then he passed by on the other side. And again like now this is like he's the cleanliness is less of a worry but if the Levite more than likely is just walking and by himself and he sees a dude half dead robbed and beaten he doesn't know where these jokers are. You know what I mean? If he stops they might come and get him too.
Also what's he really going to do right? It's not like he's going to carry the guy somewhere. So he's like oh what am I going to like try and bandage him and then sit here with him. Right so in one sense it's another sense I'm trying to help you see like the first years don't quite hear this like we hear when we're kids every time. The priest and the Levite don't do what they're supposed to do but also kind of do what people expect them to do. It's like very reasonable what they do but like from another light it's like so disheartening.
It's like both things very reasonable and also very disheartening. Okay and then so he came to the place where he was and when he saw him he had compact oh wait Levi likewise when he came to the place and saw him he passed on by the other side but the Samaritan as he journeyed came to where he was like the Levite came and looked at him and when he saw him had compassion on him. Now it's interesting that that Jesus mentioned this about the Samaritan and not about the Levite
or the priest how they felt. I can imagine the Levite maybe having compassion on the guy but making a reasonable choice in his head like there's nothing I can do so I'm going to go on but Jesus doesn't give him that much credit and so when Jesus is telling this story he runs past that so you he's implying they just like were curious the the Levite maybe was curious the priest wasn't even curious the Levite was curious the Samaritan was curious and then his heart responded
he had compassion on him and I don't know about you but I have I have found this and I have like in my heart and mind like I am not always moved to compassion at the brokenness that I see I just am not like when I'm honest with you there are people in hard spots where I know that I should care but I just really don't.
And so it's conspicuous that the Samaritan does. He has compassion and he went to him and bound up his wounds putting on oil and wine and then he set him on his own donkey on his own animal and brought him to an inn and took care of him stayed there that night with him then the next day he took out to Daenerai which is just a
good amount of money and gave them to the innkeeper saying take care of him whatever more you spend I will repay when I come back and then Jesus says which of these three do you think proved to be a neighbor to the man who fell among the robbers and he said the one who showed him mercy and Jesus said go and do likewise. You know the last little thing there is like by making the Samaritan the hero Jesus is really
messing with the Jewish lawyer in his mind because in that story when that is happening the Jewish guy is is much more identified with the guy on the side of the road the Jewish guy is not a priest or a Levite and so when he sees there's a dude traveling down the road and then there's a priest in a Levite if he's trying to think identify with someone in the story he's identifying with the guy on the side of the road and so then as Jesus is going down the story and the Samaritan stops
he would not want the Samaritan stop almost like part of him would be like don't make the Samaritan the hero and then he keeps going on the story he's like oh jeez and Jesus backs him into a corner he's like now who was the neighborly one and like the lawyer says he doesn't say the Samaritan did you catch that who was the neighborly one well the one who showed him some help and Jesus says yeah go be like that Samaritan yeah
I mean there's so many things in here to think about if I think about our vocation in the neighborhood but a couple of new things popped out to me like a couple of new things popped out to me this time it would be interesting if Jesus told the story and said the Samaritan pulled up on the side of the road
saw the dirty Jew didn't like him helped him anyway he didn't say that though he said he had compassion on him and went to help him so like the first thing I was thinking about is like that the Samaritan responds to places where he has compassion so when I think about what I'm called to in the neighborhood
I want to pay attention to where my heart is when I first started taking this notion seriously was like back when we were very first starting the church and the credo was kind of just an idea still and I was trying to think about how to take how to be engaged in my city and I realized I've said this before that most of the brokenness in town I didn't really care about when I was honest I just was like trying to think when I first started I just was trying to think how can I convince people to show up at a thing maybe I can like do some help
and bring some other people to help me help some other people and then they'll see what a good person I am and they'll want to come to my thing with me it was kind of gross it was part of the reason why then when we started credo I just didn't tell anybody about the church because I thought I want to serve the city and not use it leverage it to get people to come to my thing if people are going to come to the thing it'll be because the Holy Spirit tipped him off through somebody else but then I still had to worry about how come I didn't care about the brokenness so what I decided is
that the Spirit could awaken compassion in me but the problem was I just wasn't on the road to Jerusalem to Jericho I had built a life where I just didn't see very much brokenness and so what I decided to I decided to hope that it wasn't that I had such a cold hard heart that it could not be moved by compassion it was that in ignorance or blindness or self-centeredness I had insulated
myself from any of the brokenness in my city and so my first step was to expose myself to the brokenness in the city how do I put myself in places where I can see it where I can where I can be on the road and see what happens do I cross over to the other side do I come to place out of curiosity or do I have a place of compassion and the reason I could do this is because I was I had started out being honest and going no the problem is I don't care let me see if I might and so I just started
like finding ways to build friendships among brokenness that was different from my own in the city okay the next thing is this is some of the new stuff here the Samaritan gives from what he has so like when I was reading about first century context of the good Samaritan and they point out that the Levite probably wasn't on a donkey so he was limited in what he could do
but the good Samaritan wasn't also we don't get the sense when the good Samaritan then puts him on the donkey and takes him to the inn and he leaves the two denari we don't get the sense that this is like a widow's might situation it's not like he's taking his last two denari and giving him to the innkeeper we don't get the sense that he's constrained by by money at all and so he's he goes he responds to the need where he has compassion and then look at what God has
given him and leverage it to repair what is broken meaning we don't get the sense Jesus does not paint the Samaritan as a martyr there is expense to him he's lost time and money but also it comes from a place of giftedness and blessing it comes from what he has so he gives out of what he has for the brokenness where his heart has been moved going even further on that I don't know why this
had never occurred to me before but like he doesn't even stop doing his work he drops the guy at the inn and is like okay I've got to keep going on the road like I can't just stay with this guy forever here take this money I'll come back run up whatever tab you want and I'll come back and take care of it when I get back but I got to keep going and so it's not like Jesus is suggesting to the lawyer that you've got to work against your heart
to do something you cannot and abandon whatever you wanted Jesus is saying to the lawyer those who would have eternal life when they are moving through their life they have compassion awake inside of them and they don't push it down out of selfish ambition or greed they respond to the place of compassion and move with what they have to affect the place of brokenness that's a pretty good story
I'm not saying that it's easy but it feels much more doable and there's like a track to it if you think about brokenness compassion respond with what you have it's a doable thing for those of us with the Spirit of God how's it going
some of us have found areas of brokenness where we can lean in others others of us have been have been the past had areas of brokenness where we are moved by compassion and operate out of generosity but life gets busy and hard I was thinking about that that's a little bit the case for me I used to be I used to have there are seasons in my life where I was way more actively involved in addressing
brokenness in Orlando than I am right now and that's what got me then to this thing about how reckless it is to trust the world to people Jesus tells this story about the way things operate what wait a minute why do we have to put up with robbers on the road if this guy is a Israelite why is there the problem to begin with
he's half dead where is the God in that I was thinking about that and you can of course extrapolate that out as large as you want or as small as you want each of us if not in our life currently know someone who's enduring some
injustice of evil in the world maybe they're not left for half dead on the side of the road but they have got problems that are not of their own making that they're trying to square not to mention the like large bombs flying and ridiculous choices be made in the world so now we just go back to this little story well why are we putting up with robbers
well of course I don't know but also I know that like I am not innocent of evil myself I'm just not so the straightest line to an answer why are there robbers in the world is because I am a mess
the straightest answer to why is there evil in the world is because there's people like me walking around in it the straightest answer to why are there people lying half dead on the side of the road is because there are people like me who just keep walking and pretend they didn't see it this is the we are the problem this is kind of a bummer
so now we've got a workable but we've got a workable course of action and a frail fragile fragmented spirit willing to do it what's next Terry first John first John chapter four
I mean we could just read the whole letter but first John chapter four started at verse seven John says beloved he's that means people listening to his letter who are loved by the Lord beloved let us love one another for love is from God and whoever loves has been born of God and knows God and anyone who does not love does not know God
because God is love in this the love of God was made manifest among us that God sent his son into the world so that we might live through him verse 10 in this is love not that we have loved God but that he loved us and sent his son to be the propitiation for our sins beloved if God so loves us we also ought to love one another no one has ever seen God but if we love one another God abides
in us and his love is perfected in us John is trying to say the trick to evolving yourself or to being the Samaritan in the story more than the priest or the Levite is to drop trying to please God first trying to work your way through and check off all the lists perfectly the priests and the Levite feel like they know who their neighbor is this one might not be it so I'm off the hook and
evil is perpetuated in the world John has learned that we are fully loved by God freely given the life that we cannot earn but endure and live forever and in response to his love move with compassion and generosity in the way that he's given us you see there is enough for the guy half dead on the road it's been given to those around him and if the people can decide
not to beat and take not to harm and rob and not to move with apathy and self-centeredness and avoidance but to move with compassion and share there's enough for all the people so the problem of turning the earth over to humanity isn't the isn't broken the the solution of turning the world over to humanity isn't flawed if they would live as people loved by God this is what I'm
trying to say you and I have the capacity to in small little ways begin to make the world work as it's supposed to work begin to make our cities work as they're supposed to work begin to make our neighborhoods work as they're supposed to work why why can we do that because we have been loved by God beyond reason or measure beyond failure for hope eternal you have
you have been loved by God to the end of eternal life so you can love your neighbor it's fine you don't have to martyr yourself you've got enough you don't have to go against your heart compassion will emerge you don't have to quit what you're doing he needs you to keep doing that too just love the brokenness around you and we will walk our
way into life we were made for let's pray that we could do that like this Samaritan today a lord thank you for the gift of this parable and the story of the good Samaritan make us good Samaritans also aware of your love for us and quick to share it to those around us in Jesus name we pray amen