Other?
Our neighbor is anyone “other” than us! This otherness is where the “rubber meets the road,” as they say, or where “the proof is in the pudding.” There is little value in what I know about God if it bears no love for another. Not just love for one that already loves me, but for the stranger driving too slow in front of me or the cashier ignoring me at the quick store. Certainly not those dressed strangely in the fashion of Muslims or Hindus or those whose skin tone shade is different from my own. Am I only interested and kind to the attractive people I meet, as if they had anything to do with their genes!
Before there was such a term as “user-friendly churches,” eleven AM on Sunday morning was the most segregated hour in the week. We gather with our “kind,” whatever that may be, because segregation is the universal tendency of humanity. It is found on every square inch of the planet, in every race, creed, and nation. It may build significant buildings, but not strong communities. It is opposed to the idea of neighbor. The separating of the field in front of us for any reason, characteristic, or thought whatsoever!
To live in the universal neighborhood is not to look up or down. Not to lean left or right, but to lean forward to the one in front of me! That is why MacDonald said, “He did not want us to think as he thought, but meet the One he met.” Relationships as a whole lead to unity; the emphasis on thinking and agreement leads to division. That is why we protestants have over 45,000 different denominations. We can divide over anything. Then, move down the street and call it a “mission?” It seems where I live, every major intersection has four churches and only four because there are no more corners!
Luke 10:25-37 MSG
Just then a religion scholar stood up with a question to test Jesus. “Teacher, what do I need to do to get eternal life?” He answered, “What’s written in God’s Law? How do you interpret it?”
He said, “That you love the Lord your God with all your passion and prayer and muscle and intelligence—and that you love your neighbor as well as you do yourself.” “Good answer!” said Jesus. “Do it and you’ll live.”
Looking for a loophole, he asked, “And just how would you define ‘neighbor’?”
Jesus answered by telling a story. “There was once a man traveling from Jerusalem to Jericho. On the way he was attacked by robbers. They took his clothes, beat him up, and went off leaving him half-dead. Luckily, a priest was on his way down the same road, but when he saw him he angled across to the other side. Then a Levite religious man showed up; he also avoided the injured man.
“A Samaritan traveling the road came on him. When he saw the man’s condition, his heart went out to him. He gave him first aid, disinfecting and bandaging his wounds. Then he lifted him onto his donkey, led him to an inn, and made him comfortable. In the morning he took out two silver coins and gave them to the innkeeper, saying, ‘Take good care of him. If it costs any more, put it on my bill—I’ll pay you on my way back.’
“What do you think? Which of the three became a neighbor to the man attacked by robbers?” “The one who treated him kindly,” the religion scholar responded. Jesus said, “Go and do the same.”
Samaritan
This love is where obedience comes in, the doing of the Good. Jesus was not saying the Samaritan should recognize the Jew who had fallen among thieves as a sermon to preach or a cause to take up, but a neighbor he needed to love. This love is expressed through his hands as he poured in the oil and the wine! This doing is not giving to get, but loving to give. Obedience here is not the absence of the negative, the not hating of him, but the presence of the positive in loving him face-to-face!