Ryan Cooper, a fire-fighter in Lake Mary, Florida, was saying goodbye to his wife as she prepared to head off to work on Tuesday morning when two of their neighbors homes exploded into flames. A Cessna 310 carrying two passengers had just moments before fallen out of radar contact with air traffic control having made a distress call with smoke in the cockpit. Cooper grabbed his equipment from his car and sprinted to the two homes engulfed in flames. Having saved two critically injured people he tried to move upstairs in search of a four year old girl still inside. “I walked in as far as I could,” Cooper recalled later, “The jet fuel that was dumping down from the second story to the first floor stopped me and prevented me from going up the stairs.” Neighbors frantically called for help as Cooper moved to the next house in search of anyone inside before himself being overcome by smoke inhalation.[1] Today, Cooper is recuperating and being hailed as a national hero, as well he should be. In the media he has been called a hero and a savior. In light of today’s gospel lesson we might call Ryan Cooper a Good Samaritan.
This is our standard for using the term Good Samaritan; someone endangers their life for another person in dire need. Communities like Sanford, Florida where that Cessna crashed into two houses hand out Good Samaritan awards to people like Ryan Cooper. Hospitals, public and private, by the hundreds are named Good Samaritan and they do great things like blood drives and free clinics. Our image of the parable of the Good Samaritan is one of kindness to all, especially those in the most urgent of need. When I read the story in today’s gospel I most often associate myself with the Good Samaritan, not really thinking about cases like Ryan Cooper’s and how I might respond. I don’t really think about how this is one more case when Jesus sets the bar so high that I know I can’t live up to it. Today I’d like to look at the parable of the Good Samaritan and imagine myself as another character using the entire surrounding story as my guide.
We arrive at what appears to be a chance encounter along the long road to Jerusalem between Jesus and a lawyer; a man trained in the law of God, whose job it was to test for hypocrisy and heresy in those who called themselves rabbis – teachers. He needed to know, not for himself so much, but for the faith he was sworn to defend, that Jesus was a true rabbi; teaching the orthodox faith. “What must I do to inherit eternal life?” a question that to us today seems like the question of a seeker. We often assume the lawyer to be man interested in following the Way of Christ, like all those who have come up to him in recent weeks. Instead, this man is trying to trap Jesus, trying to test his faith to make sure of his orthodoxy.
Jesus responds, “What is written in the law? What do you read there?” The lawyer would have, no doubt, had with him the necessary ammunition to catch Jesus in heresy. He probably would have had his phylacteries on. Phylacteries were little leather boxes that carried the sacred scriptures that lie at the heart of the Jewish faith. In these little boxes were often carried Deuteronomy 6.4-6, “Hear, O Israel: the Lord is our God, the Lord alone. You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, and with all your soul and with all your might. Keep these words that I am commanding you today in your heart.” In addition they would carry the summary of Commandments of men from Leviticus 19.18, “You shall not take vengeance or bear a grudge against any of your people, but you shall love your neighbor as yourself…” Jesus asks the man what he reads, and the man literally reads to Jesus what he carries on his person. Unfortunately for the lawyer whose aim is to trap Jesus in heresy, the answer he gives is exactly the same summary of the law we hear from the lips of Jesus in Mark 12 and Matthew 22. Jesus simply agrees with him, thereby avoiding the trap.
Not to be out done, the lawyer wants to justify himself. What we read here as the lawyer wanting to “show that he hadn’t asked a trivial or obvious question” is more along the lines of “winning the point; to come out on top in this public confrontation that he initiated.” The first question, a standard one in these sorts of debates, didn’t reveal Jesus for who the lawyer thought he was, so he goes in for the kill by adding the follow up, “And who is my neighbor.” As a lawyer, a defender of the faith, he was looking for a right answer that is something narrow like “your neighbors are your fellow Israelites.” Trying to trap Jesus, the lawyer wants to hear him say, “forget the law that forbids you to help a gentile even in childbirth, everyone is your neighbor.” Instead, Jesus responds with a story that traps the lawyer in his own question.
There once was a man, any person really, who was on his way from Jerusalem to Jericho. I guess this wasn’t just any person, this was a man who wasn’t very smart. The road from Jerusalem to Jericho is steep, full of switchbacks, blind curves, and places for robbers to hide. So this rather dumb person decides to travel this very dangerous road alone against the advice of just about anyone he would have talked to. Surprise, surprise, robbers are active on the trail today, and they do a doozy on our unwise traveler; stripping him, beating him, and leaving him in a ditch half-dead.
As chance would have it, there were some other people on the road that day who stumble upon our hapless traveler. The first, a priest, is no doubt very busy and very important. Probably on his way to the Temple he can’t be made ritualistically unclean by touching blood (or worse yet a corpse) so he takes the round about way around the naked bloodied traveler to avoid possible contamination. This priest chose the law over an act of charity toward another human being. Our poor traveler gets a second chance as a Levite comes down the road. A Levite had duties similar to that of the priest, so he too is most likely on his way to the Temple, probably in a bit of a hurry, and certainly not too excited about the messiness he encounters on the side of the road. This Levite, like our traveler, isn’t too smart, traveling alone, and probably begins thinking of all those stories he’s heard of one robber faking an injury to lure an unsuspecting helper into a trap. Not wanting to take a risk, the Levite too moves quickly by choosing safety and security over love of neighbor. Things now turn from bad to worse for the poor dummy that fell into the hands of robbers as a Samaritan comes down the road. Assuming our traveler is still conscious, he is probably now faking death to avoid being beaten while he’s down by the worst of the worst. It is sort of like lying naked and beaten in a ditch on the side of the road and having a Taliban soldier strolling in your direction; the assumption is that things aren’t going to get any better in the immediate future.
Instead, things take a dramatic turn for the better, despite our traveler’s bleak expectations as the Samaritan cleans his wounds, places him on his own animal, takes him to an inn, and pays for his recuperation. Our ill fated traveler happened upon a Samaritan who put love of neighbor over and above ethnic and partisan ugliness.
So Jesus asks the obvious question, “Which of these three, do you think, was a neighbor to the man who fell into the hands of the robbers?” The lawyer can’t even say the word Samaritan, “the one who showed him mercy,” he spits through gritted teeth. And then we get the phrase that defines our reading of this text, “go and do likewise.” We read that and instantly place ourselves into the role of the Good Samaritan, looking for ways in which we can reach out to those in need. But to really be like the Good Samaritan is impossible, even for people like Ryan Cooper, who no doubt has passed by the opportunity to help other people in other ways. We can’t live up to the expectation of being the Good Samaritan at every opportunity. We are more like the careless traveler, going against the advice of God in his commandments and doing our own thing. When we fall into the hands of robbers, get stripped naked, and beaten where do we turn? So often we seek help from the church or from the government, but what happens when they fall through? Jesus Christ, who himself was called a Samaritan, meaning a heretic, comes along the path to our aid. He will always clean our wounds, he will always give us a lift, he will always insure our recuperation.
It is good to strive to be like the Good Samaritan. But we must not feel guilty when we fall short. It is good also to be offered a helping hand by Jesus. We will fall into the hands of robbers for our own stupid decisions to walk alone, apart from God. Seek after the Good Samaritan, Jesus Christ, who often appears to help in a form we least expect. Amen.
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