Focus: Neighborly Love

Text: Lk.10:29

"And who is my neighbour?"

Questions help us arrive at answers. Cheap answers abound everywhere, answers that fall far short of the questions we have in our hearts. Real answers to life's issues only yield themselves to the right questions.

A lawyer comes to Christ with a crucial question. It was actually a question meant to tempt Jesus. And the question was not as simple as it seems or sounds.

Who is my neighbor? The lawyer wants a definition of who a neighbor is. Then Jesus tells him a short story, not necessarily to define, but to radically redefine who a neighbor is.

For a Jew, a neighbor is never sought or found outside of the covenant people. For a Jew, it is forbidden to help sinners or ungodly persons. Anyone outside the covenant boundary of Israel did not qualify as a neighbor. Rabbinic literature has it that "He that eats the bread of the Samaritans is like to one that eats the flesh of swine" (Mishna Shebiith 8:10). So you see that by the story he told, Jesus redefines the word 'neighbor' and broadens the boundaries of neighborhood.

Your neighbor is not necessarily one who belongs to your tribe or ethnic stock, nor one who belongs to your religion, faith or church, nor one who speaks your language, nor a person who has your skin color. No, not at all! A neighbor is another human being who is in need of your help. A neighbor is not to be categorized by class, color, race, sex, or religion. A neighbor is another human being in need of your love and care.

Jesus also makes it clear from the story that the sacred is not different from the social. They belong together. The priest and the Levite separated religious commitment from social responsibility. They preferred keeping their distance from the dying man than risking ceremonial defilement. That's like being too holy to help. It's actually by helping others that we make our holiness relevant. We are called by God to holy worldliness. We can't be too holy to love or show compassion. Holiness or piety is ugly without love. 'Love your neighbor AS yourself' applies even more to the people of the sanctuary. Love makes our purity glow with beauty. Even our faith works by love. So let's show the reality of our faith by our neighborly love. Amen.

by Bishop Moses E. Peter