The Samaritan, the Inn, and You (Revised Version)

[This is the version of the sermon I’ll preach tomorrow.]

Luke 10:25-37
The parable of the Good Samaritan that Jesus tells in today's gospel lesson is dangerous. I say that for two reasons. The first is that we're so familiar with it, we may not allow it to speak to us.

That's bad enough. But the second and worse danger is that we may reach the wrong conclusion from it. Jesus isn’t telling us here, "Go and be a good neighbor.” Or, at least, that’s not all He’s telling us. Of course, God wants us to be good neighbors. God cares about all people. That’s why Jesus died and rose for the sins of the whole world. But if we think this parable is Jesus guilt-tripping us into being good neighbors, we’re mistaken.

Jesus told this parable in response to an expert in the Law. That includes the Law of God in the Old Testament and all of the laws that some Jewish tradition piled onto God’s Law. This lawyer came to test Jesus. The word translated as “test” in our lesson is, in the Greek in which it was originally written, peirazo. Peirazo can also mean tempt. The lawyer in our lesson wants to show Jesus up. Jesus taught that we are only saved from sin, death, and condemnation by grace through faith in Him. The lawyer didn’t like that teaching. So he tests Jesus, “What must I do to be saved?”

The problem with the question, of course, is that it’s based on the idea that there is something you and I can do to be saved from the death and condemnation that we as sinners all deserve. Jesus effectively says, "Okay, Mr. Lawyer, how do you read the scriptures? What do you think it takes to be saved?” The Lawyer says: love the Lord, your God, with all your heart, mind, soul, and strength, and love your neighbor as yourself. We know that Jesus Himself, elsewhere, describes this as the greatest commandment. It is God’s Law that we love God and love others. “Do this,” Jesus tells the man, “and you will live.”

Now, the Law of God should have seared the Lawyer’s heart at this moment. He should have been driven to his knees in repentance. Who among us loves God perfectly? I know I don’t. And who among us loves their neighbor as we love ourselves? I don’t. Do you? But, instead of allowing himself to be convicted by God’s Law, this lawyer wants a loophole. He doesn’t love all of his neighbors. So he asks Jesus, “Who is my neighbor?” He’s really asking, “Which one of my neighbors on planet Earth can I get away with hating or being indifferent to and still be saved?” This attempted bit of maneuvering with God’s Law is what brings us to Jesus’ parable, one familiar to all of you.

The Good Samaritan of Jesus’ story was a man whose behaviors and actions contrasted with those of the priest and Levite in the parable. Priests and Levites were religious figures whose work was to serve God at the temple. Presumably, the priest and Levite had just completed a shift in Jerusalem and were headed for Jericho, where priestly families lived, when, along the road, they were confronted with a needy neighbor, beaten, robbed, and left for dead.

What was jarring about Jesus' story for those who first heard it is that He made a Samaritan its hero. It wasn’t the pious priest or Levite, who looked so outwardly obedient to God’s Law who bothered with the man on the road. It was a Samaritan. Samaritans were hated by Jesus’ fellow Jews. In the parable, a Samaritan risks being attacked by robbers himself in order to care for the beaten man. Then, after taking the man to an inn, the Samaritan pledges to pay any price needed for the man’s care. Jesus is saying, "Your neighbor is the person you encounter in life for whom you can provide care. Go and do likewise.”

That, of course, is a command, a Law from God the Son. But this is what we know about God’s Law: Though it reflects the will of God, it cannot save us. It cannot save you. St. Paul, in the New Testament calls the Law “the ministry of death.” (2 Corinthians 3:7) The job of the Law of God is to kill us, convicting us of our guilt, showing us that we do not love God completely and we do not love our neighbor selflessly. The Law shows us that we are lost and damned and have no hope of life with God if that life depends on us being good people. The very best the Law can do for us or in us is, as Martin Luther put it, drive us to the cross so that our old sinful selves can be crucified, which is what happens to us every time God’s commands, summed up in love God and love neighbor, convict us.

Anyone who hears the parable of the Good Samaritan shouldn't derive pride in their behavior. They shouldn’t think, “I measure up pretty well.” God doesn’t grade on a curve. The minimal qualification for admission into the kingdom of God is the kind of perfect righteousness that the Samaritan demonstrates in the parable. Our first reaction to Jesus’ parable, in fact, should be despair. We don't measure up. If perfect obedience to God's law of love for God and love for neighbor is the minimum requirement for entrance into the Kingdom of God, we all are damned and doomed.

And so this parable acts, first of all, as convicting law. But, sisters and brothers in Christ, it also acts as God’s saving gospel for you and for all people. The only One Who has ever lived with perfect righteousness, Who has loved God and loved others completely is Jesus Christ, God in human flesh. Jesus, God the Son, died on the cross and rose from the dead so that all who turn away from sin, including the sin of self-righteousness and trust in Christ and His Gospel for forgiveness, have life with God forever. Jesus did these things, dying this death and rising from the tomb, for you!

Here then is a main point of the parable. If you don’t remember anything else, remember this: Jesus is your good Samaritan. You are the person wounded by sin, death, the devil, and the world lying on the side of the road. You were born into this world burdened by these things. You inherited them at birth. Because of sin, our inborn unrighteousness, our inborn inclination not to love God or others, we’re all ticketed for death and condemnation the moment we’re conceived. And the religion of Law that tells us, “Do this and do that to make yourself righteous” cannot save us. None of us could ever do enough good to make ourselves fit for life with God. With Isaiah, we can say, “all our righteous deeds are like a polluted garment…” (Isaiah 64:6)

But in Jesus Christ, God gives you His righteousness. Jesus finds you. Jesus comes to you, even this morning, in His Word. And as you hear His Gospel Word, He gives you faith in His righteousness, not your own; in His Gospel, not your puny attempts at being a good person. He forgives you your sin. He saves you from death and condemnation. He makes you and keeps you as His own dear child! He covers you in His perfect righteousness and makes you fit for heaven! In Him, you, repentant believer, you are fit for heaven and for an eternity with God and all His people right now.

In today’s parable, the Good Samaritan, representing Jesus, takes the man to an inn and says to the innkeeper, "Care for this man until I return and I will pay whatever debt his care is incurred in full." (Just as Jesus Christ has already paid the debt for sin that you owe to God.) The inn represents the Church. Jesus places those who have heard His Word and received His forgiveness and the gift of eternal life that he gives you through Holy Baptism, the Word, and Holy Communion, and places you (and many of your neighbors too) in the care of His Church. The Church then, is the inn, God’s hospital for human souls, His support group for recovering sinners. That description includes this wonderful church, for which I have always had respect and affection.

In the face of sin and death, we know, unlike the lawyer in today’s gospel lesson, that you and I are helpless to save ourselves. There is nothing you can do to be saved or gain entry into God’s Kingdom. Without Christ, you and I are the wounded, dying man in Jesus’ parable. But Christ, your Good Samaritan, saves you! This Word comes to you now to say: In Jesus Christ, all your sins are forgiven. In Christ, you have everlasting life with God. Amen.