Last week I left everybody hanging and will try to. To deal with that, but if you would please turn back to Luke chapter 10. We were looking at that. A part of this. This chapter that's. It's one of those parts of scripture that we're so familiar with it, we pass by it too quickly, and we don't see all that's going on here. But normally called a parable, the Good Samaritan, let me just read this again. It begins in verse 25. It says, and behold, a lawyer stood up to put him to the test saying, teacher, what shall I do to inherit eternal life? Jesus says to him, what's written in the law? How do you read it? And he answered, you shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, with all your soul, with all your strength, with all your mind, and your neighbor as yourself. And Jesus said to him, you've answered correctly. Do this and you will live. But he, desiring to justify himself, said to Jesus, and just who is my neighbor? Jesus replied, With the parable, 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. Now, by chance, a priest was going down that road, and when he saw him, he passed by on the other side. So likewise a Levite, when he came to the place and saw him, passed by on the other side. But a Samaritan, as he journeyed, came to where he was, and when he saw him, he had compassion. He went to him and bound up his wounds, pouring on oil and wine. Then he set him on his own animal and brought him to an inn and took care of him. The next day he took out two denarii and gave them to the innkeeper saying, take care of him and whatever more you spend, I will repay you when I come back. Which of these three do you think proved to be a neighbor to the man who fell among the robbers? The lawyer replied, the one who showed him mercy. Jesus said to him, you go and do likewise. What we saw last time, we had a few notions about parables. We're going to start to get into quite a few of them here and how you should go about looking at them. But even the larger perspective of scripture, I talked about a minimum of two horizons that you need to look at. We're going to blow that one out of the water today. in just a tad, but the notion of first looking at the era and the times and the particular factual content of a passage of scripture is very important. It's difficult to do because we're now 2,000 years after the facts, and this is a completely different culture and a completely different world, so it's important, and that's why we spend a little bit of time going through the realities of what it meant for this event to take place. And there were a lot of things that perhaps you hadn't considered before. One of the main ones being that passage is so easily overlooked, verse 30. When the man's going down to Jericho, he fell among robbers who stripped him, beat him, departed, leaving him half dead. And the two facts that this whole parable revolves around is the guy is stripped, he's naked, he's not wearing anything. And the fact that because he's left for dead, he can't talk. And we mentioned the fact that what an enormous role that plays because the two ways you had of determining who this person is was by seeing how they were dressed and talking to them. And I've been ruminating about that thought for the last week. It's not too dissimilar to the way we function. When we see people, you immediately, if you've never seen them, before, you immediately start forming impressions of them by how they're dressed, how they walk, how they handle themselves, so to speak. And once they start speaking, it becomes very, very obvious. So appropriate for me after a sermon on repentance that I would tell you of my sin. This past week, I was speaking to to someone in a place of authority. And I asked him a simple question, did so-and-so do X, Y, Z? And the reply was, he has did it. And it just, it was so grating, because of my pride, But I'm thinking, okay, this individual A has never read a book in their life. And this is a, you know, this is a 35, 40 year old individual. I will not depend on anything this person tells me. How could they not know better than this? I am just, I have repented, but, and this was over a phone. I wasn't in person with this individual. So my point is that we too listen to the way people speak and the way, what they wear and how they conduct themselves and draw all kinds of conclusions, usually inaccurate ones, usually unbiblical ones. And that is the position that this attorney is in. This attorney is trying to weasel out of his responsibility to be a neighbor to everybody. So the jolting part of the parable, and there's always a time in the parables Jesus tells when there is a shock. The shock comes in verse 33, when these people on a road in the middle of Israel, Palestine, A priest, who you would think would be someone who would help out, didn't, and a Levite, who you would think would help, didn't, but a Samaritan. That's, we don't know, we don't understand, we don't appreciate this as much. It doesn't jolt us as much as it would have the listeners of this parable to Jesus. We mentioned the fact that this thing has a chiastic structure and I put line in here to help you see that, that X there, Greek letter Chi, C-H-I, you see half of Chi, thus the word chiasm. It's simply a literary device that allows you to come in and focus on the center of it. The center is verse 33, what we just saw, where Samaritan comes in and does everything that you would have thought the priest would have done, the Levite would have done. And in fact, as you go on into verse 34, it's incredible what this man does. And again, we'll see some nuance with it as we go out. So let's look at scene number five of seven. Now we're coming out of the parable of the chiasm. Again, what this means is that scene five will resonate with scene three. Sometimes they reinforce it, sometimes they swim against it. In this case, it's going to be the diametric opposite. This Samaritan is going to treat the wounds that the Levite ignored. When we get to six, This Samaritan is going to give transport that the priest failed to give. The priest, remember, is riding. He's on a donkey, probably. But he does not help the man, the Samaritan does. And then finally, in 7, he's going to pay for this man where the robbers took all that the man had. So you see how this thing works from a literary perspective. Now, scene 5 of 7, verse 34, the giving of first aid. What this Samaritan does is basically to give every resource he has on hand. He gives him oil. He gives him wine. He has some kind of cloth available to wrap his wounds in. He puts him on an animal that he's riding. He gives him his time, his energy, his money. But remember, he's out of place on this road. That's part of the shock. He should never, ever have been on this road to begin with. And therefore he is in great danger. Not only should the robbers come back or other robbers be encountered, but just the fact that a Samaritan is on this road is bad news. Let me give you just a glimmer of an insight of how serious this was between Jews and Samaritans in John chapter eight, verses 47 and 48. Jesus is speaking. You know the structure of John. You have seven discourses, seven miracles or signs is the word John usually uses. The discourse would normally unpack one of the signs. That's how he starts the book. We're in the middle of that sign discourse section here on a discourse. Jesus is talking to a group of Jews and in verse 47, whoever is of God hears the words of God. The reason why you do not hear them is that you are not of God. Now that's, Jesus never hesitated to get in your face. And he is doing that here. Here is the response in verse 48. The Jews answered him, are we not right in saying you're a Samaritan and have a demon? And all I want you to see from that is that if they wanted to hurl the greatest epithet they could come up with toward Jesus, they call him a Samaritan. You're just a Samaritan. And you've got a demon, obviously, they would see those as synonymous. But at any rate, it is extraordinary what this man does. And it gets even more so in scene six of seven, also in verse 34, this transport that he provides. This Samaritan transports this man to a Jewish owned and operated inn in Jewish territory. Again, he's doing what the priest should have done but failed to do. The end is going to be either in Jericho or Jerusalem because there weren't any other ends. I mentioned last time that road was and remains, oddly enough, so dangerous that the Crusaders built a fort, but there weren't any ends built along the road, the 18 mile road between Jerusalem and Jericho. So he's taking him to an end in one of those two places. A Samaritan, think about what it looked like. If you're in the inn, a Samaritan comes riding up with an almost dead Jew draped over his dog. Those would not be well-received, any of that. The audience perhaps expects the Samaritan to leave the body of the Jew on the edge of town and not come into the town. This Samaritan not only goes into the town, but he spends the night there. There were all kinds of risks for this Samaritan in doing what he did. Among them being, you remember way, way back in the Old Testament, there were refuge, cities of refuge established where people who had murdered could flee to. It's kind of like today. when I think of it, it's pretty simple in a lot of ways. You're safe in the cities of refuge. We call them today sanctuary cities for totally different reasons. But that kind of thought process, the reason those were important was you were, it's a lot like dueling. I was recently reading a book on the establishment of the Navy, United States Navy. There's a book called The Six Frigates. which basically from about 1790 to 1815, the United States had no navy, but we were engaged in naval warfare. So we had to build, we built six frigates. And the thing that kept messing up the chain of command was the fact that some general would exit a door that would slam onto some major and the major would say, throwing my sword down, we're going to have a duel at dawn. And they would do it, and one of them would be killed. And when you read about it now, looking back, you think, who could possibly be that foolish? But it was done. Well, the sanctuary cities and the cities of refuge in the Old Testament were there because the family members, if someone were killed, the family members of that person had total right to go kill any of your family members. So the only way you could protect them was to move them into the city of Revi. That still existed when Jesus was writing this about the Good Samaritan. This Samaritan is going to be a wanted man and any Jew who wants to, this guy is gonna be fair game. So I just want to convey the risk that he is taking, not only to enter the town, but to go to the inn, have conversation with the innkeeper and stay overnight. One commentator had an interesting story. He said, it would be like a Plains Indian in 1878 coming into Dodge City with a scout cowboy over his horse. And you can imagine what Miss Kitty and Mr. Maybe the doc, but certainly, oh, Brother Matt. They might be able to protect them in the Long Branch, but you can bet there would be the townspeople out there throwing some kind of noose over a, it would not have gone well for the Plains Indian. They would not have assumed that the scalped cowboy was not from the hand of the Indian himself. That is what's going on with the Samaritan. Now, when you get to scene seven of seven, final scene, the final panel, having covered the failures of both the Levite and the priest, this Samaritan then covers the failures of the robbers. If you put a comparison between here, verse 35, and what we saw from the robbers, the robbers, of course, robbed the man. This guy pays for the man. The robbers leave him dying. This guy tries to resuscitate him and leave him living. The robbers abandoned the man. The Samaritan promises to return. He tells the innkeeper, don't worry. I'll leave you enough money that should cover his stay here, but if it doesn't, I'll come back. and make sure that nobody loses any money from the deal. So the closing dialogue, the lawyer gets back. Remember, Jesus is telling this story for the benefit of this lawyer who's trying to, Jesus knows what he's doing. He's trying to weasel out and narrow the focus of who his neighbor has to be. That will greatly help him if he can rule out Samaritans and rule out some of these other people. So you pick up the dialogue with the attorney in verses 36 and 37. 36, Jesus returns to the lawyer and he says, okay, which one of these three, the priest and Levi to the Samaritan, which one of them do you think was a neighbor to this beaten man? And of course, it's almost a rhetorical question. You don't have to think much, but in verse 37, There is another interesting issue to deal with, and that is that the attorney cannot even get himself to say the word Samaritan. He just says, I like that guy that helped him, I guess. You almost sense the reluctance of the lawyer who's saying, yeah, I guess it's that guy. And Jesus says, okay, you're correct. The word youth in that 37th verse is very, very emphatic. Greek has a way of doing that. You can sort of do it in English, but you almost have to draw attention to it in English. But in Greek, the positioning of each word in the sentence is indicative of the impact and the influence of those words. So if you really wanted to make a statement, something that word would be the very first word in the sentence and that is what takes place in verse 37 Jesus says you now it's on your head lawyer you go you go and you do likewise Continuous action again, we saw that last week with the word do, D-O. The attorney wants it to be a finite, the attorney wants a very neat little package that he can go perform one, two, three, and I'm done, my ticket is punched. Jesus says, no, no. Acting toward your neighbor is an ongoing, never-ending process. And here it's the same tense here that Jesus, you go and you do likewise forever into perpetuity. So the lawyer, can he justify himself? Of course not. And you can almost hear Jesus's audience responding. Luke chapter 18, this is an interesting passage. Luke chapter 18, verse 26 and 27. Those who heard it said, then who can be saved? But he said, what is impossible with man is possible with God. You may recall last week I mentioned that some scholars think the entirety of the travel narrative of Luke, that would be basically from chapter nine through 19, is itself a giant chiasm. Look at what, here we are in Luke 18. Look at verse 18 in Luke 18. A ruler asks him, good teacher, what must I do to inherit eternal life? That's exactly the question the lawyer leads with here in chapter 10. So that would be, again, an opposing piece of this chiasm. I'm not, I don't know. Some people get chiasm crazy. When they see one chiasm, everything turns into a chiasm. There's one commentator, he's actually a very, very good commentator, who puts the entirety of the book of Genesis as a chiasm. And I think that's going a little overboard. But the travel narrative lends itself to that because it has somewhat disparate episodes. You don't see it connect. This one that we're in now, it comes out of the blue. The sending out of the 72, that was unique to Luke. That appeared to kind of come out of the blue. Where'd those guys come from? He's been dealing with the 12 disciples. All of a sudden, he sends out 72 that you don't, you haven't, heard of them and you don't hear from them again. So the aspect of this portion of Luke that we're entering now could certainly be this direction, but we'll see. See what that... The issue is the ethical mandate remains. It's not going away. It cannot be answered easily, quickly, and regardless of whatever answer you come across, it doesn't solve all of the issues that are going to come up. Now, the theological cluster, remember parables, Many parts of scripture actually have multiple applications to them. there was an overreaction to parable reading and interpretation that when people correctly saw that turning them all into allegories was a terrible idea, which it was, but then they pushed the pendulum all the way over and they said, there's only one thing, every parable is teaching one thing and one thing only, find the one thing and that's it. That's equally preposterous. So, what is the cluster of meaning that comes from the parable of the Good Samaritan? I'm going to give you seven or so. Now, the reason that I find this big circle helpful, there will be some that are dead center. It is true that parables will have a primary concern. It may have two or three applications to it, but there will be a primary concern. Obviously, the parable of the Good Samaritan is trying to get us to think about what we call social justice. Now, we hate those two words because we are overreacting to the abuse of those two words, but nonetheless, they are valid concerns about who is your neighbor and what should you do about it. That's going to cluster. Before I get into the cluster, I mentioned last week two horizons. Get it, understand as much as you can about what happened 2,000 years ago. And we've seen that it has a very peculiar and strong aspect relative to Samaritans versus Jews. Once you know that, then you bring it in to your own horizon. So you bring it up to the 21st century. Here's why those two things alone are not sufficient. A couple of weeks ago, Rick mentioned in one of his sermons, redemptive reading of scripture, redemptive historical interpretation. That is the centerpiece of all of this. If you don't have that, it doesn't matter how much of an expert you are about Israel in 100 AD, or how good you are at assessing America in 21st century. I'll tell you how you'll see this. If you get a liberal commentator, he will go to, he or she will go to the Good Samaritan and the central theme, it's uncanny how this is so similar. The central theme, let's see, let's take, Let's take David and Nathan, what we just looked at with repentance. The liberal commentator's gonna come out of that with the following lesson. Even kings are not above the law. David is king of Israel, but he still has to pay the price for murder and adultery and all these other kinds of things. Now, that would be, okay, If I were to put that on the cluster, I meant to bring a pen, I would've drawn it, but I put a little guy holding on with one hand, barely. That's mostly out of the cluster entirely, but okay, if you really wanna go that far, that would be like number 913 on the theological cluster of that. The reason that they blow it is because they don't know Christ. They're not believers. They're not coming to scripture, seeing it as the inerrant infallible word of a living God. That redemptive historical approach is the umbrella over which every other hermeneutical device falls. You've got to come to scripture knowing that this is the word of God. And that propels you to look for godly theological purpose rather than man-made trivia. So having said all that, what about the theological cluster here of the Good Samaritan? Well, I liked the seven that I saw for one particular man. He says this, number one, he says, self-justification is doomed to failure, for eternal life is a gracious gift. It is not and cannot be earned. I'm a little bit, I think I know what he's talking about. The lawyer, obviously, is trying to justify his own behavior. And this person says, self-justification is doomed to failure. Eternal life is a gracious gift. I agree with that in response to the lawyer. The lawyer's question and what he is trying to accomplish is to justify himself. before God, he doesn't know he's talking to God, but he is trying to justify himself and therefore that would be a valid issue going on. Some even would argue the reason this particular commentator puts it one is because all of this, the parable itself is sandwiched in between a question and response by the attorney and Jesus. So real, the import is what's going on between Jesus and the attorney, not what's going on in the social justice issues of the parable. So that's, I'm sure why this individual puts that as the number one. The lawyer is wrong. You can't find your own justification. Here's his second idea. Jesus still demands an ethical standard of perfection, even though we will never achieve it. Similar to the words in Matthew chapter five, verse 48, that's a sermon on the mount where Jesus says the standard is to be perfect like my father is perfect. Well, none of us are perfect. None of us are going to be perfect no matter how long we live, but nonetheless, it remains a standard. So that second theological response there is saying that what Jesus is teaching here is that there is an ethical standard and it should be perfection. We should reach out to every neighbor in need. His third is a strictly legal approach to ethics is inadequate. The law is a means to an end, not an end in itself. The law condemns all sin and every sin. If you live by the law, you'll die by the law. I don't know, these are still a little bit outside the pale to me. His fourth one, communal and individual racial prejudices are under attack in this parable. community as well as individual I think that is absolutely true that is that's not too far from the center frankly we have again because of the abuse of the word racism in the country we live in now we tend to again just dismiss the whole thing I think well we're not going to talk but the point of the matter is racism is real and it does do great harm it has done it it will continue to do it and that is at the epicenter that's why the the person who came to the man who actually helped was a Samaritan and not a Jew. He's pointing out that as the priest and the Levite and the lawyer wouldn't even mention the guy's name. There is an issue of racism involved here. The fifth suggestion, my neighbor is anyone in need, even an enemy. Now we're really getting close to the parables epicenter. Six, both actions of violence and non-action of neglect can be sinful. That's not bad either, that's in there. The priest and the Levite do nothing because they were imprisoned by their own worldviews of this legalistic perspective and they did nothing which was just as sinful as the violence of the robbers. So the seventh and final cluster member This individual says, parable offers a veiled insight into Jesus, our savior, who binds up our wounds, comes into our personal ditches of pain and suffering and sin and heals us with his blood through his mercy and grace. I think that is an astute observation. The Samaritan is playing the role of Jesus. The Samaritan comes to the man in need and is indeed willing to die in order to help this individual. It's a little bit veiled, but not much so, I think it can be seen. Now, Terry Johnson, one of my favorite, Terry Pastors, the independent Presbyterian church, oxymoron of a name. But if you can get past the name, down in Savannah, if you haven't seen this church, you ought to go to Savannah and worship there for a Sunday. The church is, it's PCA church, but it's Presbyterian, still back in Scotland from the 1600s. What I love about this, the church was built with reformed architecture. There are not many churches in America where you can go and see that. What does reformed architecture mean? Number one, if there's gonna be a choir, they probably would have, Scotsman would have been a little shaky with that, but if you're gonna have a choir and an organ, you put it in the back of the church. You don't want it seen. It's a distraction. The centerpiece is the word and the word alone. So get everything that distracts from that out of the way. So independent, there is a choir, I think, but it's in the back. Here's another interesting feature. The pulpit is higher than this ceiling. And Terry, Terry took me in there one day. It's a little bitty, you feel like you're on some old seafaring movie or something. It's a little bitty thing, spiral staircase. And you start going up in this and there are little bitty lights along it with signs. You better have your act straight, preacher. If this isn't better than Charles Spurgeon, don't even bother wasting it. The higher you get, by the time you get up in the pulpit, not only do you feel like you're up on Mount Everest, but you're thinking, oh my goodness, I'm not worthy to be here. But it's fascinating. But again, the word is center and up, so that everybody, there's no getting away from it. But what is most fascinating Underneath that high, high pulpit were chairs that faced the congregation. And I said, Terry, what in the world, who sits in the chairs? He said, the elders. I said, what are they doing sitting in the chairs? He said, they have little riding crops. And if somebody falls asleep, they get up and go. I don't know if Terry still does that, but. But you should go and, by the way, Terry Johnson is, in my opinion, one of the best pastors in America today. My circumnavigation with all of that was because he's written a book called The Parables of Jesus. It's one of the best books you will ever, ever get on the parables. There are a lot of bad books on the parables. If you want a good one, get Terry Johnson's The Parables of Jesus. Here's what Terry says about this parable. Scripture teaches a covenantal priority. We are to do good to all men and especially to those who are of the household of faith, Galatians 6.10. We're responsible to care for our families and then our church family before all else. That's 1 Timothy 5, 4 to 8. But this is not to the exclusion of others. Love in this case must be understood as concrete sacrificial acts requiring the expenditure of our time, energy, and treasure. Will others take advantage of us? He continues, yes, they will. However, we're not obligated to be naive, but we are required to love. This means that we judge our response by its impact. Does it help or hurt? Sometimes our generosity enables sinful and destructive behavior. Love in those circumstances requires the disciplined withholding of aid. We are not meant to contribute to a person's delinquency in the name of love, but with these qualifications, we are required to love our neighbors, our enemies, strangers, foreigners, immigrants, and idolaters. That is a tall order given what's going on in this culture today, but it is nonetheless a biblical command. One of the primary barbs of the parable is aimed at the religious community. The churchgoers were undone by the pagan Samaritan. The parable teaches that religion without love is worthless. If I don't love, I'm nothing, 1 Corinthians 13, one to three. If I don't do good works, my faith is dead and no faith at all, James 2, 14 to 26. To love like this, I need a new heart, Galatians 5, 22 and 23. Whom would God have me love today? Anyone with whom I come in contact. Why? Not in order to be saved, but because I am saved. There's a... I wrote down a lot of things Let me just read a couple of Bible passages because, you know, this is a touchy subject with a lot of people. Jesus says that an encounter with his grace must necessarily lead to a life of justice, of good neighboring. Luke 4, 14 to 21. Jesus begins his public ministry by announcing that he has come to proclaim good news to the poor, proclaim liberty to the captive. This, by the way, is Isaiah 61. Proclaim recovery of sight of the blind and to free the oppressed. Can this be spiritualized to avoid concrete action? No. There are many, many people who will try to take those and say, well, Jesus just meant, you know, reach out in good faith. He didn't really mean I'm supposed to feel any kind of obligation to assist physically with someone who is in need. That would just run in the face of the parable we just looked at. Here's Matthew 11, two to six, this is when John the Baptist is in jail. You remember, John, like all the Jews, assumed that when the Messiah came down, he would be on this big white horse with armor suitable to Julius Caesar and he would wipe out the Romans and return Israel to Israel. And here's Jesus going around who doesn't have a home He doesn't, he's not on a horse. He's not trying to wield war toward anyone. So John, just like everybody else, wonders, maybe I blew it. Maybe I started announcing this man that he's not really the Jesus, the Messiah. John at that point is in jail. This is from Matthew 11, the beginning of that chapter. So John sends a couple of his friends and said, go see Jesus and ask him, did I blow it? Are you really the guy? And this is Jesus' response. Go and tell John what you hear and see. The blind receive their sight in the lame walk. Leopards are cleansed and the deaf hear, and the dead are raised up, and the poor have good news preached to them. And blessed is the one who is not offended by me. That is a fascinating response. That is how Jesus assumes that if John hears that is his mission, he will know that yes, indeed, I am the Messiah. That comes from, A hundred different passages in the Old Testament. Here's James chapter two. How can we say we have faith if we fail to reach out to the poor? Job 31, Job's final appeal. If I fail to reach out to the poor, then of course God will punish me. Micah chapter six, verse eight, familiar verse to everyone. What does the Lord require of you but to do justice and to love kindness and to walk humbly with your God? We simply can't get around this, but I love Terry Johnson's qualifier, that that does not mean I am obligated. This current notion, this frankly Marxist, socialist, communist, whatever you want to call it, this notion of equity is not a biblical position, nor has it ever been a biblical position. nor is anybody obligated to see that everybody gets on an equal playing field, for better or for worse. I am not obligated to help every person who comes to me, stops me at a traffic light, or does something of that nature, comes to my door and tells me this, that, or the other. In point of fact, if I don't know the backstory of that person, what I perhaps could be expected to do would be invite that person either into my house or I go outside and meet with that individual and find out the backstory. Why are you here? What is your real? Let me see some indicators. Let me talk to somebody who can tell me better who you are and how I can actually help you for your benefit and get you to Jesus. So Jesus, of course, is the great Samaritan. We are the Jews lying in the ditch, dead in trespasses and sins. Jesus came down our road, crossed to where we were, gave us life by his grace and mercy, saved us. Therefore, Christian, go and do likewise. That's what this part of Luke 10 is about. We'll pick up there. By the way, I just, just dawned on me. We have two more Sundays before we go to, so I will miss you. We've only got two more Sundays, Lord willing, and then we're gonna be off all summer going to John Owen, I guess, Holy Spirit. So just, I just wanna say what a privilege you give me to be with you each Sunday. I will miss you and I hope you'll come back September the 1st or whenever it will be. Anyway, let's pray. Father, we do, when we open scripture, this is a dangerous book. This book knows us a lot better than we want anybody else to know us. And it sometimes opens wounds. These wounds will be healing wounds. We need to pay attention to this and really assess how we go about living our lives and how we can be more faithful to your commandments and do what you would have us do. You have given us everything. We have no right to clutch anything. Father, help us to be prudent and wise, beneficial with the gospel you give us to spread. We pray in Jesus' name, amen.