The Parable of the Good Samaritan
I would ask you to turn in your Bibles to Luke chapter 10, Luke chapter 10, and the parable of the Good Samaritan. It's difficult to prepare a sermon on a parable as well known as this because most of us approach this parable thinking, "I already know what it says." Or perhaps we approach it and say, "I wonder what interesting thing he might say that I've not heard before," or "I wonder if there's a new angle, some new challenge."
And I would just encourage us, let's look at this parable with fresh eyes this morning to see what God wants us to receive from His word and to try to understand it in its context. Some of you first heard this parable when you were elementary age children, perhaps even preschool age, and you heard it with a Sunday school teacher who taught it, perhaps even using flannel graphs or coloring books for Sunday school, and some image is impressed in your mind about the Good Samaritan and his good deed to the man by the wayside.
Others of you came across this first as an adult, and perhaps you've heard it preached in terms of love for neighbor. This morning, I want us to consider this parable in a different light. Not that we should not love neighbor. We certainly should. But I want us to see that in this parable, Jesus wants us to know that He sees our hearts and He offers us mercy.
Jesus Offers Us Mercy
Jesus sees that we are sinners in desperate need of a savior, and he offers us the forgiveness of the gospel. Let's read the parable and then continue. Beginning in verse number 25, it says this:
On one occasion, an expert in the law stood up to test Jesus. "Teacher," he asked, "what must I do to inherit eternal life?"
"What is written in the law?" he replied, "how do you read it?"
He answered, "Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul, with all your strength and with all your mind, and love your neighbor as yourself."
"You have answered correctly," Jesus replied. "Do this and you will live."
But he wanted to justify himself. So he asked Jesus, "And who is my neighbor?"
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 when he saw the man, and 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 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 it to the innkeeper. Look after him," he said, "and when I return I will reimburse you for extra expenses you may have."
"Which of these three do you think was a neighbor to the man who fell into the hands of robbers?"
The expert in the law replied, "The one who had mercy on him."
Jesus told him, "Go and do likewise."
In 1988, Nike shifted their brand identity from athletic products to athletic performance. They launched a new slogan called "Just Do It." And if you're of a certain age, that's probably the one thing you associate with Nike in all of their marketing materials. This "Just Do It" slogan became a metaphor for sports and for life. Nike wanted to be more than simply an apparel company, but they wanted to be a lifestyle brand. "Just Do It" would connect their customers' strong personal ambition, their individual achievements, and their self-improvement with Nike. And the campaign proved to resonate both with elite athletes and everyday people. "Just Do It" gave Nike a memorable, actionable slogan. Now all kinds of people could buy Nike shoes or apparel and just do it, whatever it was. The catchphrase was also emotional in its appeal because it inspired athletes and it inspired third graders and even elderly adults to push harder, to practice more, and to perform better. In many ways, the "Just Do It" campaign simply captured everyone's innate desire to do better.
Dan Doriani, who is a pastor and seminary professor, has observed that "Just Do It" also resonates among many Christians as well. He calls this "Nike Christianity" with a "Just Do It" approach to the Christian life. Nike Christianity reduces following Christ to a set of do's and a set of don'ts. Nike Christians usually avoid obvious external sins, but they inevitably miss the less obvious internal sins of the heart. The Nike Christian thinks that Christian living is simply obedience to God's law. It's doing this, not doing that.
But Nike Christians miss the point of the gospel because, ultimately, we cannot just do it. We are instead stuck. We can't do it. We are unable to perform on our own in a way that meets the righteous standards of Christ. For a Nike Christian, if you're sinning, they would simply say, "Well, stop it. God wants you to keep doing good things instead of bad things. So just make up your mind and do what's right." Or a Nike Christian, if you're not currently sinning, would say, "Keep doing good things. Go get it. You're doing a great job." And then they would add some simple steps. They would say, "Read your Bible. Pray every day. Commit to obey God. Avoid temptation. Guard your heart. Get accountable with someone." And then you won't do bad things.
But Nike Christians miss the point. They put a strong emphasis on what we should do rather than what Christ has done. And Nike Christians fail to even do what they aspire to because we're not able to do it on our own. Instead, we need God's mercy, his grace, and his love, not his law, his commands, or judgment. We already feel the weight of those. But we need to see and experience the love of God demonstrated through his kindness to us in Jesus Christ. We need to see that Christ came to do what we cannot possibly do on our own.
The law on its own will never change our hearts. The law is designed to expose our hearts and our sinfulness. God uses the law to show us our need for Christ and his righteousness and our unending dependence on Jesus. The law reveals our disobedience, so we will go to Christ for his mercy.
Then when we confess our sin and we receive his incredible forgiving grace, Jesus transforms our rebellious hearts into obedient hearts. Now we live for Christ and we obey because of what he has done for us. It's not a performance that we're earning his favor, but we are responding to him because he's given us his favor.
This is at the heart and soul of what the parable of the good Samaritan is about. In this parable, Jesus is showing a lawyer, an expert in the law, that he is simply incapable of being good. This man has spent much time in his life studying the Old Testament law and the Torah. He is considered someone extremely knowledgeable, conscientious, and even careful about what it says in the law.
And yet, this man Jesus will reveal as someone who, even in his best "just-do-it" moments, fails to do all that the law demands.
Jesus Reveals Our Greatest Need
You see, Jesus in this parable wants to reveal our greatest need. And that is my first point this morning: that Jesus wants to reveal our greatest need. In his biography of Jesus' life, Luke places this parable immediately after the 72 disciples have returned from preaching the kingdom of God and performing miracles in Jesus' name. They came back to Jesus overjoyed with what they had done in his name, especially casting out demons, when they said, "Even the demons obey."
But Jesus rebuked them and he told them in verse 20, "Rejoice that your names are written in heaven." Last week, when we went through that earlier section, I made the point that the disciples were focusing on the results of their salvation rather than the salvation itself. They cared more about what they were doing than what Christ had done. Christ had declared them to be his sons in the gospel, and that gave them a new identity and a new purpose for living.
So now, as we have the parable of the Good Samaritan, we're not sure that it happened immediately after the 72 disciples' return to Jesus, but Luke in his biography is putting it here to further illustrate the principle that Jesus was trying to make to the disciples. So he simply starts this encounter with the phrase, verse 25, "On one occasion." He doesn't say the next day or a few moments later, he just says "on one occasion," setting the context that this parable would well illustrate the disciples' self-righteousness, that they were trusting in their works rather than in the work that Jesus had come to do.
This Jewish scribe who Jesus has an argument with is introduced as an expert in the law, one who is willing to stand up to test Jesus, it says in verse number 25. Like other scribes and Pharisees of his day, he was trying to catch Jesus in a religious trap. Earlier in Luke's gospel, he even said that they were following him, listening to every word, so that they could catch him as either a blasphemer or as someone who was teaching false doctrine.
So now this lawyer stood up to test Jesus and challenge him with a question. It was a common question of the day, one that was asked in other contexts, even in the New Testament. But he was asking Jesus as a trick, not as a search for the truth. And he said this: "Teacher, what must I do to inherit eternal life?" The man's question implied that he could do certain good works that would be worthy of eternal life. His test is aiming to justify his own self-righteousness. His doing would be in contrast with Jesus' doings among Gentiles and sinners.
They already had this against Jesus, that he was guilty by association of hanging out with some of the most despised people in society. Therefore, there had to be something suspect about Jesus. There had to be something wrong about this teacher because why would he associate with scum rather than scribes? Why would he associate with publicans rather than Pharisees?
So this man, in order to justify his doing and what he wanted to do versus what Jesus was doing, decides to quote the law after Jesus asked him a follow-up question. So Jesus draws this out of him. He knows the lawyer's heart in advance. He's not asking because Jesus doesn't know the answer. He's asking the man to get him to say out loud something that will reveal what is inside his heart. So Jesus asked him, "What is it that is written in the law? And how do you read it?" In other words, "Give me a chapter and verse of what it is you think you ought to do, and then give me your interpretation of that chapter and verse."
Jesus knew that the man would cite the Torah and that he would interpret it in his favor. But he used the man's answer against him to show that no one can earn salvation by keeping the law. Jesus asked this expert in the law to give evidence that would demonstrate he was doing the right things to inherit eternal life. So the lawyer quickly, perhaps even by rote, answered with the Shema. He quotes Deuteronomy and says, "Love the Lord your God with all your heart, with all your soul, and with all your strength and with all your mind." And then he adds to it what is recorded in Leviticus, "Love your neighbor as yourself."
The man being a devout, religious Jew instinctively directed Jesus' attention to the Old Testament. He wanted to demonstrate that he believed he was already loving God and already loving his neighbor. That's why he invoked these verses. But Jesus knew the lawyer's heart. He knew that the lawyer was not loving God with his whole being or loving his neighbor selfishly. So Jesus said, "You have answered correctly. You have the right facts, but you don't have the right faith." Jesus replied, "Do this and you will live." Jesus was affirming the man's reference to the Torah, not because the man could be saved by keeping the law, but because the man would be exposed for not being able to keep the law.
Jesus agreed with the lawyer, and he helped him realize that he did not love God and he did not actually love his neighbor. This man was not able to do this and live. Legalism in every generation promises, "If we do this, whatever this is, it will give us life." But none of us can obey the law perfectly, and we constantly redefine what "do this" means.
At first, for new Christians, especially children and believers coming from a rocky background, "do this" initially starts as the Ten Commandments. Then we think, "God has given 10 simple rules. We're just going to memorize those and we're going to try to do them to the best that we can." But the "do this" mentality always ends in frustration because, rather than giving us life, we come quickly to see that we're incapable of obeying the Ten Commandments.
So then we say, "Well, wait a second, we're New Testament Christians. We can't do all that." I mean, there are debates about what does the Sabbath mean? What exactly is covetousness? What does it mean to take the Lord's name in vain? And we get on all these sidetracks. So we say, "We're New Testament Christians. Let's just focus on obeying the Great Commandment or the Great Commission." In fact, there are slogans, you can search the internet, that will say we are Great Commandment Christians and, not to be outdone, there are also Great Commission Christians, as if they are mutually exclusive.
And the idea is that if we can simply do one or both of these things, like the man in the parable or the man that's interacting with Jesus before the parable, we will somehow just do this and we will live. But legalism always produces failure and death. It does not deliver victory and life.
The lawyer gave Jesus the right answer. He knew the chapter and verse to go to. And he even tried to appear like he was doing this and living. But the lawyer wanted to justify himself, it says in verse 28, by redefining the letter of the law. So he asked Jesus a typical lawyer question, a definition question: "So who is my neighbor?"
The man asked Jesus to define the term "neighbor" because he did not want to admit his failure to love God or people. As an expert in the law, he wanted to limit the scope of "neighbor" to be people like him—scribes and Pharisees, or at least devout Jews. But the man willfully ignored the Torah's definition of neighbor as being anyone in need. Instead, this lawyer wanted his neighbor to be someone like him, someone that could love him back, someone that would be able to do him a favor if he did them a favor.
The lawyer knew God's law and he quoted it to Jesus, but he did not want to admit his unwillingness to love God completely and his unwillingness to love neighbors selflessly. Instead of admitting his need for the grace of God, this man tried to rationalize his disobedience and his guilt with a debate about definitions. He wanted his neighbor to be someone that he could choose rather than the neighbor be anyone that needed his help.
John Martin has observed this about this lawyer. He says the lawyer's response should have been to ask, "How can I possibly do this, Jesus? I'm not able. I need your help." Instead, the lawyer tried to justify himself. He tried to defend himself against the implications of Jesus' words. So Martin concludes, he tried to move the focus off of himself by asking, "Who is my neighbor?"
Notice that this lawyer was very clever. He knew the right words. He knew how to use them powerfully. And yet those same words would ultimately condemn him. They didn't justify him. They didn't make him right before God. They actually exposed where he was wrong, where he was not doing what God expected.
So although the context differs today, I believe we often make the same bargain with God as this expert in the law. We create our own interpretations of doing God's word, and we think that what we do for God will give us life. We know that no one inherits eternal life by performing good works. After all, most of us can quote Ephesians chapter 2, verses 8 and 9, where it says, "not of works so that none of us can boast."
But then we live our lives as if we can do it. We live as if we are Nike Christians with "just do it." And we use good works to earn favor from God and people. Think about the times that you have sinned knowingly, that you have violated God's righteous requirements, and your response is not one of confession, but it's one of good works. It's, "Well, I'll be sure to read my Bible tomorrow. I'll be sure to share the gospel with someone this week. I'll be extra nice to my spouse or my siblings. I'll do something extra at work." Whatever good work we sort of mete out in our own mind is all an attempt to justify ourselves.
But very simply put, God in his word reveals how we can honor him, and that is to live in response to all that Christ has done for us. Notice I said live in response. I did not say live to earn favor with God, but live because we have favor with God. It turns everything on its head.
It's just like with children. Children are always wanting to please their parents. When they're really small, they bring mud pies and dandelions to their mothers and say, "Look, mom, this is for you." And moms gladly hug their kids and receive the mud and they receive the weed. But do they really, really love it? No, they love their child. And the child, for their part, is responding to the love that they have been shown by their parent. And they are basking in the acceptance that they have with their mother.
Jesus wants us to do the same thing. He wants us to work in response to him. But our best response is filthy rags, is what Isaiah says. It's as if we bring Jesus mud pies and dandelions. And Jesus hugs us and loves us and says, "Thank you for serving me." But those mud pies and those dandelions will never be anything close to capable of earning our salvation.
So as Jesus is interacting with this lawyer, he wants to expose his heart and show the man that his greatest need is not more good works. It's not memorizing more Bible verses that he can quote in an argument. But what the man needs is to give his heart completely to God. He will need ultimately to confess his sinful self-righteousness. And he will need to forsake self-righteousness and take on the righteousness of Jesus through faith. In order to prove this point, Jesus moves from an argument to an illustration.
Jesus Illustrates Merciful Love
Because he knows our hearts and he wants to offer us mercy, Jesus is revealing the man's greatest need so he can illustrate merciful love. And that's my second point this morning, that Jesus illustrates merciful love. Having exposed the man's heart and his greatest need, Jesus responded to him with a piercing parable.
In reply, Jesus said, verse 30, a man was going down from Jerusalem to Jericho and he was attacked by robbers. They stripped him of his clothes, beat him, and went away, leaving him half dead. Jesus cut to this man's heart with a poignant story. He didn't simply offer a theoretical argument or get into the debate about words. Instead, he showed him a picture of what this looked like in reality.
The neighbor in Jesus' parable, or this man, was making his way along the road from Jerusalem to Jericho. This road twisted and turned through rocks and crags for 17 arduous miles. The elevation changed 3,300 feet as people traveled from Jerusalem down to Jericho. And they did this mostly on foot and hopefully during the day. In addition to the challenging terrain, along this route, there were robbers and thieves who would often attack vulnerable travelers. Most people traveled in groups by daylight in order to avoid such attacks, but some people found themselves in a position where they either got separated from their group or because of the nature of their business, they had to travel alone.
And Jesus describes a man here who was the victim of one of these attacks. Robbers had taken his clothes, perhaps for themselves or to sell to others. They had beat him within an inch of his life, and they left the man for dead along the side of the road with no care or concern. There were perhaps no witnesses, and it did not matter anyway. They got what they wanted. Jesus did not say whether this man was Jewish, Samaritan, Roman, or something else. He simply describes the man as being helpless and vulnerable, a neighbor in dire need of emergency care.
And then Jesus describes some passersby. He says in verse 32, or 31 and 32, A priest happened to be going down the same road when he saw the man. And what did he do? He passed by on the other side. So too a Levite, when he came to the place and saw him. What did he do? He passed by on the other side.
Jesus introduced here a pious priest who ministered in the temple on behalf of Israel, leading in worship, and an upright Levite who cared for the temple and its grounds. Both of these pious men saw the neighbor and they avoided him. What did they do? They did nothing. The answer to the question that Jesus said, "Do this and live," neither of these men were able or interested in doing. They simply avoided the problem as if it did not exist.
With Jesus' description of the priest and the Levite, this expert in the law probably felt self-justified. He probably hadn't caught Jesus' point yet because after all, many people looked down on the priests and the Levites. They kept Israel's religious ceremonies and they talked about obedience to the law, but many of these same men were considered hypocrites. In this case, they both used laws about purification to avoid becoming unclean. They couldn't touch someone who was nearly dead. They could not soil themselves and somehow risk becoming impure before God. And yet they missed what God would have them do.
So at this point in the parable, Jesus' listeners, including the lawyer, probably expected him to introduce an ordinary Jew. After all, with the priests and the Levite being corrupt, as illustrated in this story, it would seem fitting that a regular Israelite would come along and do the right thing by rescuing the dying man.
But Jesus introduced a surprise. He introduced a reviled Samaritan, someone that devout Jews, especially a scribe, absolutely totally despised. Verse 33, as the Samaritan traveled, he came where the man was, and when he saw him, he took pity on him. The man had compassion for this wounded person on the side of the road. Pity here is not that he looked down on him, that's that he showed mercy to this man who was in misery.
And his compassion turned into action. It says he went to him, bandaged his wounds, and poured on oil and wine. Then he put him on his donkey, brought him to an inn, and took care of him. The Samaritan recognized another human being, and he showed this man dignity and respect. He could have easily seen him as discarded rubbish on the side of the road, but instead he saw him as a man who had fallen prey to robbers. He delayed his travel plans, and he approached this man, a complete stranger. He did more than offer the dying man a cup of water or call someone else for help. No, the Samaritan, it says, dressed his wounds with first century first aid. Then he chose to walk on the rocky road so that the injured man could ride on his donkey. The Samaritan took the man to a safe place and he provided for his care.
It says 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."
The Samaritan went above and beyond rescuing the man. He spent two days of his own wages for the man's recovery and offered to spend even more.
Unlike the Samaritans who did not welcome Jesus' disciples when he sent them ahead of him in chapter 9, or the disciples themselves who wanted to destroy the Samaritan village, Jesus illustrates selfless love for one's enemies. And if someone could love their enemy the way this Samaritan was loving this man in the ditch, then it should be even easier for someone to love their neighbor.
The Impossibility of Self-Righteousness
But Jesus' point was not, "Do this and live." His point was, "You can't do this. You're not capable of doing this. You don't want to do this." Therefore, Jesus asked the lawyer a final question: "Which of these three do you think was a neighbor to the man who fell into the hands of robbers?"
Jesus turned the lawyer's question around on him. Instead of limiting who is my neighbor to a like-minded Jewish scribe or a Pharisee or a fellow countryman, Jesus expanded who is my neighbor to include the Jews' perceived enemies. Jesus wanted to show the impossibility of the lawyer's initial assertion. Although this expert in the law quoted Deuteronomy and Leviticus as evidence that he was loving God and loving his neighbor, Jesus revealed the man's sinful heart. He helped the lawyer recognize that he fell far short of God's righteous standard. The man only loved neighbors that he liked.
As if to prove Jesus' point, look at the lawyer's response. In verse 36, it says, "The expert in the law replied, 'The one who had mercy on him.'" He gave the right answer, but notice how he gave it. The lawyer could not even bring himself to say "the Samaritan." Instead, he said, "the one." The lawyer's answer does not even acknowledge the Samaritan's identity or his dignity as a human being. He doesn't even say "the man." He simply says, "the one," generic. He is the one who did what was right. This self-righteous expert in the law looked down on the Samaritan even in his moment of goodness.
So Jesus concluded their conversation with his answer to the lawyer's initial question: "What must I do to inherit eternal life?" he had asked in verse number 25. And Jesus told him, verse 37, "Go and do likewise." Jesus told the lawyer, rather than limiting who was or was not his neighbor based on his own preconceived prejudices, that he should imitate the Samaritan and demonstrate love for God by helping anyone who is in need.
There's no doubt that the Samaritan had defective theology by the scribes' standards. 400 years before Jesus, the Samaritans had wrongly intermarried with the Assyrians. They had established a rival system of worship that was in conflict with the right worship of God through the temple. The Samaritans and the Jews despised each other. They saw each other as enemies, worshiping a different God even, and they despised each other for generations. By this point, 400 years later, these Jews and these Samaritans despised each other just because of their identity. They perhaps didn't have a handle on all the differences. Yet Jesus pointed out that the Samaritan at least understood that his devotion to God included care for other human beings.
So Jesus is not condoning Samaritan theology. He's not saying that they're right, that Jews are wrong. He's simply saying this Samaritan demonstrated that his faith took action, that his faith and what he believed in God compelled him to care for another person.
For centuries in Christian history, starting with Origen, Christians have interpreted this parable as an allegory about Jesus and the Christian life. Jesus is the good Samaritan and Christians are the half-dead people in the ditch. But rather than see this parable as an allegory, I think it's more likely meant to reveal our great need and Christ's merciful love. I think Jesus is recounting this event to show the lawyer that he simply cannot do what he thinks he's doing. And I think Luke puts it in this context to show the disciples that their works, though commendable, are not the source of their joy. The source of their joy ultimately is Christ himself, that their names are written in the book of life. When they understood that, then it gives them the freedom to live out their identity as his followers. They would not have to prove themselves to be disciples by casting out demons, by healing, by even preaching great sermons. They simply were loved by God, therefore they could love others. It's a completely different way of doing it.
We so often want to define our relationship with God by what we do rather than what he has done. But the gospel is all about what Jesus has done so that we can live in response to him. Believers in every generation try to redefine what it means to love God and people. In conservative, Bible-believing Reformed churches like ours, we can make doctrinal purity the definition of loving God. And we can use litmus tests of doctrinal purity to limit who we include and who we exclude. We can agree on the gospel and separate over tertiary doctrines with self-righteous pride. And yet we can miss the point.
In the 1970s, comedian Ernie Hilley illustrated this idea with one of his most well-known bits. And yes, it's on YouTube for those who are curious. But walking along the Golden Gate Bridge, Hilley describes encountering someone who's ready to jump off the bridge to their sure and sudden death. So he stops to ask the person if he can help him, to perhaps talk him off the ledge from jumping. And in their small talk, Hilley in his bit starts asking the man a series of questions. And here are the questions, roughly.
He says, "Do you believe in God?" And he says, "Well, I used to believe in God." Well, "Were you a Christian or were you a Jew?" The man says he was a Christian. "Were you a Protestant or a Catholic Christian?" Protestant. "Well, among the Protestants, were you a Northern Baptist or a Southern Baptist?" Northern Baptist. "Well, are you Northern Conservative Baptist or Northern Fundamentalist Baptist?" Northern Fundamentalist Baptist, the man says. "Well, are you Northern Fundamentalist Baptist, Great Lakes Region or Eastern Region?" Northern Fundamentalist Baptist, Great Lakes Region. "Well, then are you Northern Baptist?" Northern Fundamentalist Baptist, Great Lakes Region, Council of 1879 or Council of 1912? And the man says, "Northern Fundamentalist Baptist, Great Lakes Region, Council of 1912." And Phillips looks at the man and says, "Die, you heretic!" And he throws him off the bridge.
It's a brilliant parody of how so often we reduce our belief in God to something we can control. This man in this fake dialogue—I don't believe it was real—but in the fake dialogue, they agreed on so much. But that one tertiary thing that they disagreed on made Phillips' character decide that he would kill the man who was attempting to commit suicide anyway.
While sound doctrine defines Christian faith, and we cannot miss having doctrine, we cannot put confidence in our doctrine and miss our relationship with Christ and our neighbors. We must love God wholeheartedly, and this love for God should overflow into love for our neighbors. We cannot do this to earn our salvation; we can do this as a response to our Savior.
To put this in a modern context, we don't understand the divide between Jews and Samaritans, but we do understand the divide between Protestants and Catholics, between Reformed Baptists and, say, United Methodists. And it should be a rebuke to us as well when we see Catholics or United Methodists doing good things that we would not consider doing. We know that they have defective theology, and we love to point out their defective theology. But our right theology should motivate us to do even better. Not because we're trying to improve ourselves, not because we're trying to impress anyone, but our right theology should motivate us to do better because God loves us. 1 John says, because he first loved us, we love him.
The idea is that a vibrant and warm faith is not simply a precise systematic theology, as helpful as those are. But a warm and vibrant faith is theology in practice. It's seeing people in need and meeting their need. This morning, I'm not focusing on the need and the neighbor. I think many times sermons that have done that fall into the trap that the lawyer set. But Jesus didn't fall for the lawyer's trap on definition of
Response to Our Savior
Jesus went for the lawyer's heart, and I want our hearts to be exposed as well. That rather than be "nice" Christians who just do it, we would instead be Christians who understand our identity as sons and daughters, who are loved and who serve out of love, who give our lives to God, who study great doctrine, and who want to know the scriptures.
But we do this not as an intellectual exercise, but we do it as a response to our Savior. And we see it worked out in our care for other people, our love for one another. So my challenge to you this morning as I conclude the sermon is that your heart would be exposed, that God would show you even remnants of self-righteousness in your heart today so that you can confess that and serve him out of his righteousness, not out of what you can do to earn eternal life, but out of what he has done to give you eternal life.
Let's pray. Heavenly Father, as we consider this passage, help us as it's convicting. The truth is, all of us here are like the lawyer. All of us have an internal expert in the law that wants to argue with you about: Should we do this or should we do that? Should we say it this way or should we say it that way? What doctrinal statements should we hold? Which ones should we condemn? Which practices or which people should we castigate, criticize, and even cast out? Versus which ones should we accept and hold close?
God, forgive us for letting that inner lawyer stop us from showing the love of Christ. And help us instead to demonstrate the love of Jesus in our relationships because you've shown so much love to us. And Father, I pray if there are any here today that have not accepted Jesus as Savior, that they would come to follow you today. And for those of us who are following you, help us to follow you with fresh faith. Not because we're earning our salvation, but because you earned it. And because we want to show our love for you because we're loved so much. And we pray all this in Jesus' name. Amen.