Sunday, July 13, 2025 – Luke 10:25-37
Have you ever been watching a movie and know just what’s going to happen next – even before it happens?
I’ve experienced that when watching a whodunit mystery on television. Sometimes we’re extra observant and notice subtle cues before other people do. That happened to me when I saw the movie “The Sixth Sense.” I remember gasping in air when – just a few minutes before the big reveal of the core plot twist – I saw something that showed me just what was going to happen.
Even more frequent is when we know what’s going to happen next because the script uses a common trope or theme. For example, in PBS Masterpiece mysteries, I know who isn’t going to be the killer just because they’ve tipped their hand on trying to show how nasty that character is too early in the story. I know for sure that it’s never going to be that person because that person is the “red herring” that’s meant to lead us in an unfruitful direction.
Then there’s the trope about the woman running from the killer or the zombie monster. I know she’s going to fall down, because that’s the trope. That’s always what happens. It’s inevitable. Wouldn’t it be funny if just once, the killer was the one who falls? That would be a real twist on the story!
In a sense, that’s exactly what Jesus does in this beloved story that is known as the parable of the good Samaritan. He takes the trope that his hearers would have been expecting and completely turns it on its head.
But first, let me give you a little bit of background on first century Judaism and the context of this parable.
In this period, the main thing we must remember is that Samaritans were enemies of the Jews. Not outcasts. Not an irritation. But sworn enemies. As New Testament scholar, Amy-Jyll Levine points out, the previous chapter of Luke to our reading today depicts Samaritans as refusing to welcome Jesus’ messengers, and in response, James and John want to “command fire to come down from heaven [to] consume” them. Of course, Jesus rebukes his disciples for this suggestion.
She also notes that the Jewish historian Josephus reported that while Cumanus was governor, the Samaritans killed “a great many” Galilean pilgrims traveling to Jerusalem.
In other words, first century Jews might well have thought: “there is no such thing as a ‘good Samaritan.’” There might even have been some who thought that the only ‘good Samaritan’ is a dead Samaritan. Isn’t this how we humans sometimes feel about our worst enemies?
Frankly, I’ve been shocked at the horrible way I see people on the left and the right in this country sometimes speak about their neighbors on the other side of the fence or issue. I’m heartbroken at how impossible it is to have nuanced conversations anymore about what’s happening in our country and our world.
For example, the left wants to make the immigration issue all about compassion and mistreatment of marginalized people. And I get that. They’re right that we should have compassion for people who are struggling and that we should always follow due process. I think it’s horrific that people are being shipped to countries other than their country of origin and thrown into terrible prison conditions without even a court appearance.
But at the same time, where is the compassion for people who live in our cities where all the resources that used to go to poor citizens are now only going to immigrants and asylum seekers? There are people of color there too who are angry and frustrated that they’ve been ignored for decades, only to now see other people who just showed up be welcomed into the fold with open arms and plane tickets anywhere they want to go, housing, medical coverage and more.
Yet it seems impossible to even have those conversations these days.
We’ve got to find a better way. And the good news is there is a better way shown to us in the life of Jesus.
But let me first tell you a bit more about the context of this parable and what Jesus’ hearers would have been expecting. As Dr. Levine points out, there’s another trope used in stories where two characters fail to do what’s good, and the third person that comes along is the hero who saves the day (or the person lying in the road nearly dead). Who would Jesus’ hearers have expected the third person to be in his story after the priest and the Levite passed by?
She writes, “Jews in the first century (and today) typically are either priests or Levites or Israelites.” The people listening would have naturally expected that the third person that happened by the dying man – the one who was the hero of the story – would have been an Israelite. Just like the woman who falls running from the monster, that’s what would have seemed inevitable.
But no, the hero of the story is not an Israelite, but a Samaritan! The one who was the enemy!
Imagine how that must have landed on their ears and in their hearts. Did it make them angry? Did it make Jesus some new enemies? Maybe. Maybe it was stories like these that drove the religious authorities to condemn Jesus to a Roman execution.
But Jesus gives us a twist toward love. He shows us a new vision for life that lifts us out of our constant bickering and division. He shows us that our neighbors are everyone, even our enemies. Even those who are here illegally are still our neighbors. We are still commanded to love them as ourselves.
One way we can love them is to help them build new lives. Another way is to change our foreign policy so that what the U.S. does in other countries – like toppling their leaders for our own gains – no longer drives people to have to leave their homes.
Whatever we do, we’ve got to listen and care. We can’t shut our hearts down.
As Dr. Levine writes,
The parable [of the Good Samaritan] offers another vision, a vision of life rather than death. It evokes 2 Chronicles 28, which recounts how the prophet Oded convinced the Samaritans to aid their Judean captives. It insists that enemies can prove to be neighbors, that compassion has no boundaries, and that judging people on the basis of their religion or ethnicity will leave us dying in a ditch.”
Whatever the answer to the problems that bedevil us, it first must be grounded in love. If it’s not grounded in love then we’re all dead.
