Wesley Chapel Episcopal Church, Wesley Chapel, FL
Preacher: The Rev. Adrienne R. Hymes
Proper 8/Year C: July 13, 2025
Gospel: Luke 10:25-37
In the name of the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit. Amen.
In my public relations (or PR) career, I was active in the hiring process for junior staff. Junior staff candidates, as you may imagine, were overwhelmingly recent college graduates who majored in public relations. You might think that a PR firm would seek PR majors who understood the industry and who could hit the ground running shortly after being hired. That was not the case. For those of us who were industry practitioners, rookie hires were well-educated and well-versed about the public relations 101 “laws,” but struggled to apply those laws to the day-to-day practice, on the ground—with real-life people and real-life scenarios.
Such is the case with the lawyer and Jesus leading up to the familiar parable of “The Good Samaritan.” A lawyer, in this context, is one who was well-educated and well-versed in Jewish Law. Attempting to test Jesus, the lawyer asked what he must do to inherit eternal life. Jesus said, “What is written in the law? What do you read there?” The lawyer already had the answer to his own question, and replied, “You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your mind; and your neighbor as yourself.” Jesus affirmed his answer saying, “Do this, and you will live.”
The lawyer continued, “And, exactly, who is my neighbor?” This question might be translated as, “Just tell me who qualifies as my neighbor so that I don’t waste my attention on people who don’t count towards completing my eternal life ‘To Do’ list.” Much like the recent public relations graduates, the lawyer certainly had a good handle on how to execute the law as it was written. However, he had not yet grasped how he ought to live the law on the ground—practicing with real-life people and real-life scenarios.
At least seven players are involved throughout the parable, including two or more robbers; the man who fell into the hands of robbers; the priest; the Levite; the Samaritan man; and the innkeeper. We know nothing about the robbers other than their total disregard for the dignity of the human being traveling along a notoriously dangerous stretch of road where people were known to be assaulted. As for the man, we know that he had been stripped naked, beaten and left half-dead. Was he Jewish? Was he a Samaritan? How long had he been on the side of the road before anyone saw him? The text doesn’t say.
We also know that the priest saw the half-dead man, perhaps presumed that he was dead, and crossed to the other side of the road. According to Jewish law, contact with a dead body would make the priest ceremonially unclean, severely impacting his ability to perform his temple duties. Perhaps he was concerned about job security. Then, there was the Levite, well-versed in the law, who also saw the half-dead man, and crossed to the other side of the road. As a temple assistant, perhaps the Levite, like the priest, did not want to risk coming into contact with a possible corpse. Unfortunately, the text does not fill in these missing details.
We go from what seems to be an absence of details to a rich description of another traveler along the same treacherous road—the Samaritan man. The Samaritans were Israelites who intermarried with foreigners and adopted their idolatrous religion and were universally despised by the Jews as half-breeds.
When the Samaritan saw the half-dead man, he came near to him and was moved to help him. Two things are striking about the Samaritan man’s reaction to the man. First, the Samaritan, not being constrained by Jewish law, was free to act on his pity for the suffering human being. Second, when the Samaritan came near to the body, he discovered that the half-dead man was just that—half-dead; he was still alive! The text’s use of the words, “came near,” to describe the Samaritan’s approach to the man is significant. Peppered throughout Luke’s Gospel are the statements, “The Kingdom of God has come near to you,” or “The Kingdom of God has come near.”
Last week we heard Jesus tell his newly-appointed, 72 disciples to say to all—whether or not they were welcomed or rejected, that “The kingdom of God has come near to you.”[1] Consider that the gospel writer’s intentional use of the words “came near,” to describe the Samaritan’s engagement with the man underscored how the Samaritan’s actions embodied the kingdom of God for the wounded man just as Jesus had commissioned his disciples to do.
The text goes into great detail to humanize the Samaritan man for the listener. The Samaritan man did not just help the man; he cared for him by addressing his immediate human needs. The man poured oil and wine on his wounds and bandaged them. The man helped to restore the assaulted man’s dignity by gathering him up, giving him shelter, and caring for him until the next day. When he had to leave for a period, the Samaritan man paid the innkeeper to ensure the wounded man’s ongoing care in his absence, saying, “Take care of him…”
I imagine that at this point the lawyer’s skin, hearing this parable, would have been crawling with distaste for how the no-good Samaritan was being positioned as the hero in this parable. For the Jewish lawyer, the thought of an undeserving Samaritan inheriting eternal life would be inconceivable. Jesus then asked the lawyer who out of the priest, the Levite and the Samaritan, was a neighbor to the wounded man. The lawyer stated, “The one who showed him mercy.” Jesus responded with the imperative, “Go and do likewise.”
The parable of the Good Samaritan is about you. It’s about me. It’s about our shared human experiences rooted in sin. Who are you in this narrative today? There are at least seven characters from which to choose, and on any given day, any one of us could be the robber who wounds someone else, intentionally or unintentionally. We could be the priest or Levite, constrained by belief systems and prejudices that restrict us from engaging people who don’t look like us and who have been vilified as a threat to our way of life. We could even be the innkeeper who gets swept up into someone else’s good deeds.
The unrelenting reminders of the realities of the violence, horror and the sheer absence of humanity in our neighborhoods, our state, our country, the world—every day—could make anyone feel beaten down and helpless, like the vulnerable, assaulted man. The Good Samaritan is the image of God’s mercy given freely for ALL regardless of race, gender, religion, sexual orientation, socioeconomic status, nationality or anything else that is actively used to separate human beings for the sake of earthly power.
As children of God, we must be clear that God’s vision for humanity denies that any of us within the human family should live in a traumatized state, stripped of human dignity, and left half-dead in the darkness of despair—robbed of hope.
As followers of Jesus Christ, who pattern our lives on his life and read holy scripture, let us resist being like the rookie public relations new hires and the lawyer, who certainly had a good handle on how to execute their respective laws as they were written, but struggled to grasp how those laws ought to be lived out on the ground—in practice with real-life people and in real-life scenarios.
We are called to respect the dignity of every human being. We are called to resist exclusion in order to more fully embrace Christ’s radical inclusion. We are called to boldly reflect the humanity of Christ, coming near to our neighbors who are being left—physically and spiritually—half-dead before our very eyes. We are called, by God, to practice radical love on the ground, with real-life people and in real-life scenarios and to be instruments of God’s mercy. Go and do likewise. Amen.
[1] Lk 10:9, 11, NRSV
