Who is my neighbor?
By Dennis Johnson, Ph.D., Professor of New Testament and Practical Theology, Westminster Seminary in California.
[Dr. Dennis Johnson discussed Jesus' answer to the question "Who is our neighbor?" (Luke 10:25-37) at a recent breakfast highlighting the ministries of Mision Vida Nueva.]
“Who is my neighbor?” That was the lawyer’s question to Jesus. It was a reasonable question. They had been discussing what it would take to enjoy eternal life with God. Jesus had directed the lawyer back to the Law of Moses, which the lawyer knew so well: “What do you read in the Law?”
“Love the Lord your God with all your heart, soul, strength, and mind, and love your neighbor as yourself.”
Right answer! Jesus said, “Do this and you will live forever.”
But there was a problem: the lawyer lived in a community, surrounded by lots of people. Some of them shared his faith, his commitment to God’s Law, his language and his culture. Others did not. His town may not have been as large as Escondido. But the lawyer knew that if he had to love everybody in his town in the way that he naturally “looked out for Number One,” he was in deep trouble in terms of that second command: “You shall love your neighbor as yourself.”
So he asked, “Who is my neighbor?” That is, “What are the boundaries of the group of people whom I need to care for, protect, and help as I so instinctively care for, protect, and help myself?” There were debates among Jewish religious leaders around the time of Jesus about whether the obligation to “love your neighbor as yourself” included only those in your family or clan, or whether it also included those you saw eye-to-eye with—Pharisees loving Pharisees, Sadducees loving Sadducees, Zealots loving Zealots—or whether it went as far as obligating them to love all fellow Jews, whether or not they shared one’s personal convictions and moral commitments? That discussion is the backdrop of the lawyer’s question.
Actually, Jesus could have directed him back to the Law of Moses again. After all, “Love your neighbor as yourself” is found in Leviticus 19:18, and later in that same chapter (19:34) we read:
The foreigner residing among you must be treated as your native-born. Love them
as yourself, for you were foreigners in Egypt. I am the LORD your God.
Instead, Jesus told him a story and asked him a different question. You know the story, but read it again :
Luke 10:30-37
“A man was going down from Jerusalem to Jericho, when he was attacked by robbers. They stripped him of his clothes, beat him and went away, leaving him half dead. 31 A priest happened to be going down the same road, and when he saw the man, he passed by on the other side. 32 So too, a Levite, when he came to the place and saw him, passed by on the other side. 33 But a Samaritan, as he traveled, came where the man was; and when he saw him, he took pity on him. 34 He went to him and bandaged his wounds, pouring on oil and wine. Then he put the man on his own donkey, brought him to an inn and took care of him. 35 The next day he took out two denarii and gave them to the innkeeper. ‘Look after him,’ he said, ‘and when I return, I will reimburse you for any extra expense you may have.’
Then Jesus asked the crucial question:
“Which of these three do you think was a neighbor to the man who fell into the hands of robbers?” The expert in the law replied, “The one who had mercy on him.” Jesus told him, “Go and do likewise.”
Only recently I noticed a striking feature about this well-known parable: Jesus attaches a label to every character in his drama, except one. We see four men traveling on the dangerous, gang infested mountain lane that linked Jerusalem, the site of God’s temple, to Jericho, on the banks of the Jordan River.
We see a priest going “down” that road—heading away from Jerusalem, presumably having completed his annual service in the temple. A man to be honored, since he offered prayer and incense and sacrifices in God’s house.
We see a Levite, who did the menial work to keep the temple functioning—but again, a man to be honored because he served in God’s sanctuary.
Finally, we see a Samaritan, who belonged to a mixed race. His ancestors had been aliens, non-Israelites, compelled by forces beyond their control to immigrate into the region that was occupied by Israel’s northern tribes. Those early Samaritans had blended their own pagan practices with attempts to placate the God of Israel, and intermarried with Israelites.
So the lawyer would have known in exactly into which religious cubbyhole to place each of these characters: Priest and Levite = good guys, men deserving of my love as my neighbor. Samaritan = a compromiser, half a step away from pagan idolatry and other polluting practices—definitely NOT my neighbor!
But then there is the fourth traveler, who is really the first. By the time we meet the others, he is a bleeding, unconscious body on the side of the road—the victim of a mugging by a local gang. Looking at him, none of the others could tell whether he was dead or alive, much less what race or religion he belonged to. So, understandably, the priest and the Levite kept their distance, since contact with a dead body would defile and disqualify them to serve in God’s sanctuary.
I had always assumed that this victim was Jewish, and that Jesus made his rescuer a Samaritan to underscore that the Samaritan was willing to care for a wounded Jew, though the Jews despised him. But that is not what Jesus says. He doesn’t tell us whether the victim of the mugging was Jewish, or Samaritan, or Gentile—because his point is that asking, “Who is my neighbor?” is the wrong question, if it really means, “Who belongs outside my circle of compassion? Who in my town do I NOT have to love as I love myself?”
Instead, Jesus turns the question inside-out: “Who was a neighbor to the victim in need?” And of course the lawyer got the point: “The one who showed him mercy.” Jesus said in reply, “Go and do the same.” And of course the lawyer said, “Thanks for clarifying that. I will go and do likewise from now on.” No, he didn’t! He said, “But that’s impossible!”
No, he didn’t! At least we don’t know what he said next.
“But that’s impossible” is the response that I feel (and maybe you do too) when I get the point of Jesus’ story. “I can’t possibly love so many people, such needy people, such different people in the intense way that I instinctively love myself!”
That is just where Jesus wants us—confronted with the truth that our inability to love our neighbors as ourselves—ALL our neighbors who have needs that we could help meet—our inability to love so widely reveals that we need Jesus to rescue us from our own instinctive self-centeredness.
We need his rescue, just as much as the bloody victim on the Jericho Road needed a Samaritan “neighbor” to stop, and treat his wounds, and transport him to shelter. When I think about the material, social, emotional, and spiritual needs of our neighbors in the Mission Park neighborhood near the heart of our city, I find the challenges overwhelming. But the Lord who loved us and left his home in order to bring us home—the King of glory who was actually called a “Samaritan” by people who scorned Samaritans (John 8:48)—this King Jesus calls us…
not to turn a blind eye or skirt around neighbors in need, but to move toward them with a love bigger and deeper than we can find in ourselves. It may cost us—in time or comfort or cash.
But his love to us can flow through us, setting us free from our little selves to become neighbors to our Mission Park neighbors who need to be touched by his healing mercy.
