The longer we follow Jesus, the more we tend to gravitate toward like-minded Christians.
Instead of intermingling with the lost, we seem to isolate ourselves among other believers. Today on Insight for Living, Chuck Swindoll teaches from Luke Chapter 10. In this passage, Jesus challenges us to step into foreign territory, to rub shoulders with the lost, and engage with people who don't seem to have their act together. Using a simple yet powerful story, Jesus presents a wonderful model for stepping outside our comfort zones to share our faith.
Chuck titled today's message, Needed a Few Good Neighbors. Today we're going to be looking in a few moments at a day in the life of Jesus as it is recorded in Luke Chapter 10. This passage is very familiar to most of us, but we want to take a little different slant on the story that Jesus delivered to a man who had an honest question. So please turn with me to Luke 10, and we'll begin our reading at verse 25. Luke 10.25, And a lawyer stood up and put him to the test, saying, Teacher, what shall I do to inherit eternal life? And he said to him, What is written in the law?
How does it read to you? And he answered and said, You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your strength and with all your mind and your neighbor as yourself. And he said to him, You have answered correctly.
Do this and you will live. But wishing to justify himself, he said to Jesus, And who is my neighbor? And Jesus replied and said, A man was going down from Jerusalem to Jericho and fell among robbers and they stripped him and beat him and went away, leaving him half dead. And by chance a priest was going down on that road, and when he saw him, he passed by on the other side. Likewise, a Levite also, when he came to the place and saw him, passed by on the other side. But a Samaritan who was on a journey came upon him, and when he saw him, he felt compassion and came to him and bandaged up his wounds, pouring oil and wine on them. And he put him on his own beast and brought him to an inn and took care of him. On the next day he took out two denarii and gave them to the innkeeper and said, Take care of him, and whatever more you spend, when I return, I will repay you. Which of these three do you think proved to be a neighbor to the man who fell into the robbers' hands? And he said, The one who showed mercy toward him. Then Jesus said to him, Go and do the same.
You're listening to Insight for Living. To search the scriptures with Chuck Swindoll, be sure to download his Searching the Scriptures studies by going to insightworld.org slash studies. Chuck titled his message, Needed, A Few Good Neighbors. It happened way back in the 1960s when the then head coach of the Green Bay Packers was standing in front of his beloved team who had lost again to the hated Chicago Bears. Lombardi could not stand losing.
He couldn't stand a lot of things, but losing especially. So he decided on his own it's time to get back to the basics. Standing in front of a group of veteran football players, he said, Gentlemen, this is a football.
You can't get much more basic than that, especially with a group of guys that had been playing the game for, what, 20 years or more. There are days that I am standing in some churches preaching, and I find myself tempted to want to say to all of the Christians who have gathered in that church, as I point to someone who has come in off the street who is not familiar with our songs and is clueless regarding Christ, I want to say to that group of Christians, folks, this is a neighbor. This is a neighbor. What the ball is to the game, what the musical note is to the symphony, what the book is to the librarian, what the diaper is to the mother who lives with babies hour after hour.
A neighbor is to the Christian. How easy to forget, huh? I mean, it's so easy for it to begin to revolve around us, isn't it? My parking place. My seat. Some of you have been coming long enough to where your seat has impacted the seat and it's yours. When I was a little kid, I remember holding hands with my mother and my mother has her hand in my dad's arm as we walk into our church we have been coming to for years and they, of course, have their seats. And they get to the door, I mean, it's early, we always came early so that they could get their seats.
And some neighbors, some visitors had come and had the audacity to sit in their seat. And my mother said, I promise you, my mother says to my dad, well, Earl, what do you think we ought to do? And my dad said, well, level, I think we ought to go home. So we got in our car and we drove home.
I remember driving home thinking, there's nothing wrong with this picture here. I mean, there's 300 other seats and we go home because theirs is taken. While we're laughing at them, we're feeling the sting of conviction ourselves. Life becomes increasingly more myopic even as Christians.
Maybe that's the reason I'm drawn to a familiar story that broadens my world and assaults my selfishness. I like it that it took place out in the street. It wasn't in a temple or some synagogue.
It happened on the street. Jesus gave his best words and did his best work among people on the street. The crowd has gathered and they've heard him speak and they watched him do his work and there's a skeptic in the crowd. According to verse 25, he's called simply a certain lawyer, no offense. But this one stood up and maybe raised his hand to get Jesus' attention. What you may not remember is on the wrist of the scribe, the professional interpreter of the law called a scribe, translated lawyer, there was a wristband called a phylactery, leather pouch. In it would be placed verses from the Torah, Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers, Deuteronomy.
Verses would be tucked in that phylactery for the purpose of memory or reminding the wearer of some truth from God's book. A teacher says this lawyer, what must I do to inherit eternal life? What a question.
What must I do? But before you think about the question, please notice the motive. He stood up and put him to the test.
Ex-pyrozo means to entrap someone into giving information that will jeopardize the person. He wanted to entrap Jesus. I mean, what do I have to do to get this life you keep talking about, emphasis on doing? Jesus in good pedagogical fashion doesn't jump in and answer the question. He answers it with another question. Remember getting teachers like that?
Some of our best teachers knew the best questions. And Jesus turns the question around and asks another, maybe as he saw the phylactery on his wrist, you tell me what is written in the law. How does it read to you?
You're the professional teacher. What does it say to you? This attorney, I'm sure without needing to pull anything from the pouch, simply spouted out a verse out of Deuteronomy 6 and a piece out of Leviticus 19. Familiar to us, you shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, with all your soul, with all your strength, with all your mind, and your neighbor as yourself. That's what one must do as I read the law. Now, Jesus said to him, you're right.
Now keep on doing this and you will live. Pretty succinct, isn't it? If he were a Texan, he'd say, you got it? Get at it.
Just get at it. All of a sudden the ball is back in the lawyer's court. Lawyers don't like balls in their court. They like serving them.
They don't like getting them. And so he, now this text, Luke is so careful in his writing, wishing to justify himself. Never miss little comments like that when you're reading your Bible. Verse 29 kicks off with, again, the motive, wishing to justify himself, trying to make himself look better than he really was. He picked at a word.
Lawyers are known to do that, aren't they? Neighbor. Who is my neighbor? Is it the person who lives right next door to me?
Okay, how about two doors down or into the block? Or is he a neighbor if we've never met? What if he's in another part of the town where I live? Is that a neighbor? I mean, I don't know who a neighbor is. There is an eloquent pause that we can't read about, but at that moment the wheels begin to turn in Jesus' omniscient mind and he puts together a story, nothing like a story to communicate a point. Remember the question, who is my neighbor?
Who is my neighbor? Jesus leaves the scene where they're standing and mentally takes the lawyer and those listening to another road at another time. A certain man was going down from Jerusalem to Jericho. Now, if you ever travel to the Holy Land, be sure and take that 17 miles of bad road.
When he says going down, he means it. Jerusalem sits like a gym with a beautiful backdrop on the hill at 2300 feet above sea level. Jericho sits in a slew down below of 1300 feet below. 3600 feet between the two is enough to make your ears pop if you travel it quickly. But in those days, no one traveled quickly.
They walked or they rode a mule or a donkey, horse. And it was a favorite place for thugs and thieves to hang out. The road is winding and there are lots of rocks and boulders and many places to hide. And if you're alone, there's no one who will hear if you call for help. It's like all big cities with their back alleys. You learn soon after you've moved to a city where to stay away from. You don't go there unless there's a police force parade and you're marching in the parade yourself, well-armed.
It's not a spot where you spend some casual time. It was that kind of road. This lawyer knew that. So Jesus picks a place familiar to the attorney and he says, not surprisingly, he fell among robbers and they stripped him and beat him and went off leaving him half dead. It's pretty obvious what happened. This man's a victim of a mugging. I'm sure by now the attorney is wondering, what's this got to do with who is my neighbor?
Everything. But it has a twist to it. By chance, a certain priest was going down on that road. Now to take the pressure off you, let's say this is a pastor and we pastors are preoccupied. We've got sermons to prepare and people to talk to and events to attend. And so this pastor seeing him goes to the other side of the road.
I mean, my time is far more important than this individual. For all I know, he had it coming. You know how pastors think. But he sees him.
Don't miss that. He just doesn't want to get involved. And then verse 32, there's a Levite. All of this is coming out of Jesus' mind. It's never been told before. He's imagining the scene and it's enough to make the lawyer's mouth drop open.
Where's he going with this? I just want to know who's my neighbor. Well, now there's a Levite. Let's call him an assistant pastor, music minister. How would that be? And they're busy.
They've got a lot of stuff to do, songs to work on, choir to present and prepare. And he sees him and he doesn't want to get involved. But a certain Samaritan.
Hear the breaks? That's exactly what happened in the mind of the lawyer who has been raised a good Jew, orthodox if you will, and he's learned before he could talk or walk to hate them, those Samaritans, half-breeds. So hated were the Samaritans that a good Jew didn't even want the dust of Samaria on their sandals. But you don't know is that Samaria is right in the center of the heart of what the Romans called Palestine. In ancient Israel, if you traveled from southern Judea up to northern Galilee, you'd have to go through Samaria, but not the Jews.
They went around to get up to Galilee. Now this Samaritan is on a journey. He too has plans. And like the other two, he also sees the same thing they saw, but there's something different. See the last three words?
Always make me pause. He felt compassion. Something happened inside him and all of a sudden the man was faceless and raceless and colorless and he hurt as he put himself in his place. Jess Boody wrote on one occasion, Compassion is not a snob gone slumming.
Anybody can set his conscience by an occasional foray into knitting for the spastic home. But did you ever take a real trip down inside the broken heart of another? To feel the sob of the soul, the raw red crucible of emotional agony, to have this almost as much yours as that of your soul crushed neighbor than to sit down with him and silently weep.
This is the beginning of compassion. It happened to my friend Mary. Mary Graham had a meal with Johnny Erickson and don't we all feel it when just the name comes up. Mary said she sat down and Johnny was her cheery self and they were having a great time and the meal was served and Mary began to eat and Johnny said to her, Mary, would you feed me please?
It's compassion you feel right now. Would you feed me? And then Mary said I did a quick review and I thought someone had to help her that morning at the bathroom. Someone had to dress her. Someone had to help her get into the chair. It's only right that I helped feed her. The next time you see someone without legs, don't wonder what he did wrong to get over there on the corner asking for money.
Just let your heart be broken a little. Like the Samaritan, oh man, he's about to die. One life connecting with one life.
The story is about who is my neighbor. Don't forget that. So what did he do? Compassion won't just sit there and be quiet. It accelerates a number of very important steps toward the person to whom your heart goes out. He came upon him, in fact kata is used in the Greek, it suggests down, coming down, so he knelt down to him. He got right down there with him and he bound up his wounds. You would expect a physician to write that. That's important to Dr. Luke. Along with pouring oil and wine on the wounds. You've heard of the Hippocratic Oath that physicians take.
I understand they no longer take that oath but back when I was a boy they did. Named after Hippocrates, the 4th century B.C. physician known as the father of medicine. Long before Jesus ever lived, Hippocrates wrote, for skin ulcers bind with soft wool and sprinkle with wine and oil.
The wine would soothe the fevered laceration and the oil would soothe it and the wine with its alcohol content would serve as an antiseptic to clean the wound. And the Samaritan had both and freely poured that out and he brought him to an inn and he took care of him. Well we're midway through a message from Chuck Swindoll called Needed a Few Good Neighbors and there's much more ahead.
In fact Chuck is in the studio to share a closing comment with you so please keep listening. And to learn more about this ministry please visit us online at insightworld.org. And then I'd like to remind you Insight for Living produces a wide variety of resources perfectly suited for any occasion. As you browse through our online store you'll find a vast array of resources such as the Swindoll Study Bible and you'll also find beautiful coffee table books on topics such as Christmas and Easter. Or choose one of the creative and entertaining series for your kids and grandkids from the Paws and Tails collection.
All of these options and more are found at insight.org slash store. Chuck. Thanks Dave. It was the revered pastor and author A.W. Tozer who made this brilliant observation many years ago. He wrote these words, what comes into our minds when we think about God is the most important thing about us. Now stop and ponder that statement. To paraphrase A.W. Tozer the most important thing about you is what you think about God. So here's the question. When you think of God is he a big god with a capital G or a little god with a small g?
Oh I'm not talking about the dimension. I'm referring to God's competence, his significance. What do you think about God? Well at Insight for Living Ministries we fully submit ourselves to the majesty and the magnitude of a big god with a capital G of course. The God who does the impossible. Remember what the resurrected Lord said to his disciples when he was in Galilee? He said go and make disciples of all nations. Doesn't that sound a bit grandiose? Maybe over the top?
Perhaps even audacious? Well not if you're God. With God you see nothing is impossible. At Insight for Living Ministries this accurate view of God is what shapes our entire mission. We're driven to pursue the impossible and that is to make disciples of all the nations just as Jesus commanded. And gratefully we have big minded and generous friends like you who come alongside us and enable us to make that happen. As we come to the end of another year I'm calling upon you to lock arms with us as we pursue an impossible God-sized goal of reaching all 195 countries in this entire world with the good news of Jesus Christ.
Your special year-end donation will make all the difference believe me. So are you with us in this? Can I count on you to stand alongside us? Let's introduce people to the great God who says behold I am the Lord the God of all flesh.
Is anything too difficult for me? So it's your move. Let's do this together okay?
Let's do this together. Well here's how to respond to Chuck Swindoll. Give us a call right now if you're listening in the U.S. dial 1-800-772-8888. Our phone number again 1-800-772-8888. Or if you prefer go online to insight.org slash donate.
You can also use our convenient mobile app to give a donation. Well Chuck sat down for a personal discussion about the challenges of this year and in particular how our study in the Gospel of Matthew will give you renewed strength and direction in the coming year. Well we had the video cameras rolling and we invite you to take a seat at the table with Chuck for this 30 minute conversation online. To see and hear Chuck's conversation look for the link at insight.org slash conversation. Join us again when Chuck Swindoll describes a time tested model for sharing your faith. That's tomorrow on Insight for Living. The preceding message needed a few good neighbors was copyrighted in 2005 and 2019 and the sound recording was copyrighted in 2019 by Charles R. Swindoll Inc. All rights are reserved worldwide. Duplication of copyrighted material for commercial use is strictly prohibited.
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