In Luke 10:29, the expert is questioning Jesus on who his neighbor is. But he’s not asking because he genuinely doesn’t know the answer to this question. In fact, he could recite the right answer, but it’s that his heart couldn't comprehend it. This expert was trying to measure and justify his list of actions for others, but Jesus and Scripture were trying to measure and expand his capacity for relationship. So, Jesus responds, as he often does in the Gospels, with a parable.
We read this well-known parable in Luke 10: 30-34: In reply Jesus said: “A man was going down from Jerusalem to Jericho, when he was attacked by robbers. They stripped him of his clothes, beat him and went away, leaving him half dead. A priest happened to be going down the same road, and when he saw the man, he passed by on the other side. So too, a Levite, when he came to the place and saw him, passed by on the other side. But a Samaritan, as he traveled, came where the man was; and when he saw him, he took pity on him. He went to him and bandaged his wounds, pouring on oil and wine. Then he put the man on his own donkey, brought him to an inn and took care of him. The next day he took out two denarii and gave them to the innkeeper. ‘Look after him,’ he said, ‘and when I return, I will reimburse you for any extra expense you may have.’
In Jesus’s parable, the priest and the Levite would have been considered to be “neighbors” to this robbed man, much more than the Samaritan. The Samaritan would have likely been taught animosity and contempt towards a Jewish man, like the one he encountered on the road. And yet, we see the Samaritan respond in a way that the two “neighbors” did not. Jesus is showing this expert and us that we should not have boundaries of any type when it comes to who we love and consider to be a neighbor. Who in your life might you have justified as being outside of your comfort or capacity to share Jesus’s love with?
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