What we are to do

Today, after I finally got a chance to sit and pray with the Bible, I reflected on Jonah (Jonah 1:1-11) and the Good Samaritan (Luke 10:25-37); probably two of the greatest stories of compassion ever told.  In Jonah we see the unreserved compassion of God and the Good Samaritan illustrates the potential of human compassion.

I only read the beginning of Jonah’s story today.  He was a very reluctant prophet.  He decided he could just run away from the task the Lord asked of him.  He would prefer to die rather than go to Nineveh and he told the sailors to throw him off the ship into the stormy sea.  We might be able to sympathize with him if we consider that Nineveh was the capital of the Assyrian Empire and a great enemy of Israel.  We could understand Jonah’s fear of going to the city, but later on in the story we’ll find out it’s not out of fear that Jonah fled, rather he didn’t want to warn the Ninevites of their impending doom because he was worried that they would repent and God would spare them.  He was actually wishing, wanting and waiting for their destruction!

I think a lot of people in our own time feel the same way!  Look at our sayings like, “Let them stew in their own juice.” Or “He/she made his/her bed now let him/her lie in it.”  Or “They deserve everything they get.”  Those usually aren’t said with a sense of well-being for the individuals we’re speaking of.  They usually indicate a lack of compassion for the individuals at best and more often an actual desire that they’ll receive their retribution, which borders on revenge.

Jesus’ story of the “Good” Samaritan is an oxymoron to Jesus’ audience who harbored centuries of animosities against Samaritans.  The Samaritan isn’t a gentile, he’s bound by the same Torah as the Priest and the Levite and therefore the same law of love of neighbor (Leviticus 19:18).  Since he is traveling in Judea though, it’s less likely the injured man is his countryman or kinsman, so even the Torah wouldn’t require that he help this man, but he is “moved with compassion”.  In spite of the cost of time, effort, money, and personal danger, he freely demonstrates unconditional love to the one in need, mimicking the kind of love God offers to us.

It’s also important to look at the setting of this parable. Jesus told this dramatic story in response to questions put forward by a “scholar of the law”.  The lawyer first asked, “What must I do to inherit eternal life?”  Jesus had him answer his own question and he gives us the well-known combination of love God (Deuteronomy 6:5) and love your neighbor (Leviticus 19:18).  It’s through a love of God that the believer is to approach people.  This then has profound implications for the how, why, and who of the love for the neighbor.  And so the lawyer asked his second question “Who is my neighbor?” After Jesus completed His story, He once again had the lawyer answer his own question.  Since the lawyer couldn’t bring himself to name the hero as a “Samaritan,” he simply said “the one who treated him with mercy.”  However, it’s obvious from the lawyer’s questions that he didn’t want to live by mercy.  He didn’t even know what it is.  He actually lived by something quite different from mercy, by his own intention and ability to present himself as a “righteous man before God.”

I sometimes wonder how like this lawyer we are in our smugness and our self-righteousness, especially in regards to our treatment of immigrants, or those who disagree with an individual’s choice of whether to vaccinate or not.  How many times do we “test” God’s mercy for us?  How rarely do we extend that same extravagant mercy to others?  And certainly NOT to our enemy!  When asked to be“merciful as God is merciful” (Luke 6:36), we run away from the task as Jonah did.  We bemoan the task as impossible, and indeed it is a high standard, but it’s what we are to do “to inherit eternal life.”