Episode 1172: Who Is Our Neighbor?

[00:00:00] Scott Maderer: Thanks for joining me on episode 1,172 of the inspired stewardship podcast.

[00:00:06] Barby Ingle: Hi, I'm Barbie Engel, and I challenge you to invest in yourself, invest in others, develop your influence and impact the world by using your time, your talents and your treasures to live out your calling, your purpose in life. Having the ability to be your own health advocate is key and is one way to be inspired.

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[00:00:42] Scott Maderer: It's an important one. I think it's one that changes our heart and makes the rest of that easier. I think it's easier to love the Lord, your God, with all your heart, with all your soul, with all your strength than with all your mind win. We love our neighbor as ourselves. But I [00:01:00] think it's that not being able to love the neighbor that we don't want to love.

[00:01:06] Welcome. And thank you for joining us on the inspired stewardship podcast. If you truly desire to become the person who God wants you to be, then you must learn to use your time, your talent and your treasures for your true calling in the inspired stewardship podcast, who will learn to invest in yourself, invest in others.

[00:01:27] And develop your influence so that you can impact the world

[00:01:32] in today's spiritual foundation episode about impacting the world. I talk with you about Luke chapter 10 versus 25 through 37. I talk about who our neighbor really is, and I talk about why this is important, but difficult. Luke chapter 10 verses 25 through 37 goes like this, just that a lawyer stood up to test Jesus teacher.

[00:01:58] He said, what must I do [00:02:00] to inherit eternal life? And he said to him, what is written in the law? What do you read there? He answered, you should 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.

[00:02:16] You have given the right answer, do this, and you will live, but wanting to justify himself, he asked Jesus and then who is my neighbor? And Jesus replied, a man was going down from Jerusalem to Jericho and fell into the hands of robbers who stripped him, beat him and went away, leaving him half dead. Now by chance a priest was going down that road.

[00:02:36] And when he saw him, he passed by on the other side. So likewise, a Levi when he came to the place and saw him passed by on the other. But a Samaritan while traveling came near him. And when he saw him, he was moved with pity. He went to him and bandaged his wounds, having poured oil and wine on them. Then he put him on his own animal, brought him to an Inn and took care of him.

[00:02:58] The next day he took out to [00:03:00] denari, gave them to the Inkeeper and said, take care of him. And when I come back, I will repay you whatever more you spent, which of these three do you think was a neighbor to the man who fell into the hands of the robber? And he said the one who showed him mercy and Jesus said to him now go and do likewise this story is one of those famous stories that we've heard about the Bible.

[00:03:25] And I, I think it's interesting that before that it has the passage of you shall love your 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 then there's the good Samaritan story. And I think a lot of people know that those two different things are in the Bible, but I'm not sure that everyone actually realizes that they're side by side, that this good Samaritan story is an answer to the question of who is your neighbor?

[00:03:54] Who is it that we are supposed to be loving as ourselves? [00:04:00] I think when we hear that word neighbor. It's so easy to think that our neighbor is that person who's close to us, that our neighbor is the person who is around us. Our neighbor is the person who looks like us. Sounds like us lives, where we live, goes to work, where we go to work, goes to school, where we go to school, who agrees with us, who believes the same things that we believe and speaks about the same things that we speak.

[00:04:25] And yet the truth is. In this passage, it's clear that's not what is meant by neighbor. See the Samaritan story is famous. And so telling not by the way, because it's a priest and a Levi who don't do it. A priest, someone who actually serves in the temple and a Levi is part of the family of people that support the temple the tribe that has been set aside to do this.

[00:04:55] And by the way, those folks were not to come into contact [00:05:00] with dead people or death, unless there were certain things that they did to take care. They would be made unclean and then would have to be made clean. And so there is some argument to be made that if they thought this person lying on the side of the road was dead.

[00:05:16] The tradition, the story the thing that they would be called to do is not go over and help them, but to call someone else to help them. And you could interpret the story that way, but then it's the Samaritan that goes out of the way and Samaritans at this time, and Jews didn't have anything to do with each other.

[00:05:34] They weren't. Necessarily actively at war with each other, but they definitely believed different things. They felt different things. They worship different gods in different ways. They weren't connected fully. there was overlap. There was similarity. They lived in the vague area of the middle east close to each other, but they didn't get along.

[00:05:57] They were fighting about property and about [00:06:00] religion and about how you would celebrate God. And what would you do or not do that would make you clean or unclean? There was disagreement, fairly significant disagreement. Between these two groups, the Jews and the Samaritans, and yet it's the Jew that was helped by the Samaritan.

[00:06:21] And what's more, he was helped pretty significantly. He was helped physically, but he was also helped monetarily, the man took care of him and then the man also provided for his care and recovery monetarily as well. And Jesus is saying. The one who showed him mercy was really his neighbor, not the one who believed like he did not the one who acted like he did not the one who was upholding the law and the reasons and doing all of the things that he was called to do.

[00:06:56] But rather the outsider, the [00:07:00] one that at first glance wouldn't have anything in common because our neighbor is meant to be. Oftentimes, not the people that it's easy to get along with, not the people that are easy to love, but the people that are hard, that's why this is a difficult commandment. That's why this direction is hard because it's really easy to like the people that we already agree with.

[00:07:28] It's hard to like the people that we don't agree with politically, socially, whatever it is. It's all too easy to get triggered by the fact that they're different. They're other, they're not like me and that's threatening. That's scary. Maybe they don't believe politically. Like I do. Maybe they don't believe in the same sorts of treatment that I believe in whatever it is that sets them apart.

[00:07:58] Maybe they're a different skin [00:08:00] color or a different gender, or they believe something that I don't believe in. But rather than reacting with anger or fear, Jesus is saying that we are to act with mercy and compassion and love. And I will tell you that commandment is one that I struggle with every single day to follow.

[00:08:27] It's an important one. I think it's one that changes our heart and makes the rest of that easier. I think it's easier to love the Lord, your God, with all your heart, with all your soul and with all your strength than with all your mind when we love our neighbor as ourselves. But I think it's that not being able to love the neighbor that we don't want to love that often gets in our way of actually being in relationship.

[00:08:55] Loving relationship with God. [00:09:00] Thanks for listening.

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