The "Good" Samaritan

July 10, 2022 + Lectionary 15 C + Luke 10:25-37 + Pr. Michelle Sevig

A transcript from a conversation I had earlier this week. 

Her: What are you up to?

Me: Working on my sermon for this weekend.

H: You’re preaching again?

M: Yep.

H: What’s the text?

M: The Good Samaritan.

H: Ugh! (eyeroll) I’m sorry. 

She understood the angst a preacher feels when a very familiar parable is the assigned gospel reading for the day. Even people who are not too familiar with the Bible have heard the phrase “Good Samaritan” and likely know a bit about the reference. A Good Samaritan is someone who helps those in need, especially those who are strangers or unlikely to be helped by others. 

Interestingly, though, the word “good” is not in the biblical text. Jesus doesn’t call him good, the guy in the ditch doesn’t, neither does the lawyer or the innkeeper. So how did it happen that now this parable is known as the Good Samaritan? It’s a title the interpreters gave. Why? Because he did a good thing? Yes, I’m sure. But in labeling this man as the Good Samaritan it also implies that there are bad Samaritans, which was the assumption of the people who were listening in on Jesus’ parable. Samaritans, to them, were bad, not to be trusted, evil, opposite of them, outsider , suspicious.

Think about the ways we do this sort of labeling today.  I remember a rather painful experience from when I was a young adult.  My mom used the word good as an adjective, but it was obvious it was an exception to whatever rule she had in her head about a group of people. I intended to invite my new boyfriend over for dinner, but when my mom learned he was black she was… surprised. I told her about him, how great he is with the mentally handicapped adults we worked with at the group home, that in his other job he works with kids, etc. 

“Oh” she said, “so, he’s one of the good ones,” meaning a good black man. I was shocked! In that instant she quickly identified how she felt about all people of color, even if she wouldn’t have said it so boldly that “they are bad, the other, not to be trusted, outsider, suspicious.” She felt in her gut, groomed in a system of white supremacy, from her parents, and their parents, and the whole system she grew up in, that this group of people is bad, but occasionally there will be one who stands out as good and is an exception to the rule. If the adjective good is needed, it implies the assumption about that group or those people is bad. 

So let’s bring back the shock value of this parable! Saying the Good Samaritan is the one who was neighbor to the one in the ditch is like saying the good immigrant, the good Muslim, the good you fill in the blank of which group is opposite from you, who you distrust, consider bad or suspicious. 

Though we are inclined to love the Good Samaritan and want to be more like him, Jesus’ choice to make him the hero of the story was nothing less than shocking to the first hearers. The Samaritans were the “other.” The enemy. It's not one of their own who saves the day, but the hated Samaritan. Think about it this way, who is the last person on earth you would ever want to deem the good guy? The one you’d be most surprised, or even offended, if they touched you and supported you in your healing? 

  The great thing about parables is that there's never just one entry point. Never just one way to see yourself in the story. On any given day we could be the lawyer asking the question or the one who shows mercy or the one who passes by on the other side of the road. And sometimes we are the one in the ditch who desperately needs the compassionate presence and help from a stranger, the enemy, or the one you’d least expect.  

Theologian Debbie Thomas writes, “Your neighbor is the one who scandalizes you with compassion. Your neighbor is the one who upends all the entrenched categories and shocks you with a fresh face of God. Your neighbor is the one who mercifully steps over the ancient, bloodied line separating “us” from “them” and teaches you the real meaning of “good.”

  Mother Teresa was once asked, “What is the most difficult thing you’ve ever had to do?” and she responded, “See Jesus in his most disgusting disguises!” 

  And maybe that’s exactly what Jesus was trying to do with this parable--show that God comes in and through the most unexpected people. God’s compassion and love is so extraordinary, so out of the box, so surprising (and even offensive to some) yet God comes to us in our brokenness, and restores us to life. 

  We’ve become used to hearing this Good News that it’s lost its scandal. But for those who are beaten up and left for dead because of racism, homophobia or oppression of any kind, who've been told in one way or another “You don’t belong, you’re not one of us, you’re not worthy,” God calls us to meet them in the ditch, shower them with love in action. God calls us to be a good neighbor to those who might see us as the enemy and bring a compassionate presence and restorative justice that leads to healing. 

  Sometimes we are called to be the one who shows mercy to those in need, and sometimes we are the one in the ditch ourselves, paralyzed by anxiety about the future, heartbroken by all that’s going on in the world right now, broken by abuse and unhealthy relationships, or beaten up by disease and illness. God comes to us in our ditches of despair, stoops to our side to tend to our wounds and washes us with the baptismal waters of grace. Here in this community God feeds us with a meal that brings healing; and God entrusts us to each other’s care. 

“Who is my neighbor?” the lawyer asks. Anyone. Everyone. For all bear the fresh face of God who is Good.