A Law to frighten the secure and to guide the forgiven

Sermon for Trinity 13

Galatians 3:15-22  +  Luke 10:23-37

I saw a post on one of the Las Cruces community groups on Facebook this week. A local man was recounting how he had noticed a young woman, a complete stranger, being followed by a scary-looking man at a gas station, how he kept an eye on the young lady, gave her some advice, followed her to her car and scared the stalker away. It sounds, just a little bit, like the deed of a “good Samaritan,” doesn’t it? Now, did he do the right thing there for that stranger? Absolutely! Should every man offer that kind of assistance to a woman who may be in danger? Absolutely! But the question I’d like you to consider this morning is this: Did that man earn himself a place in heaven because of that good deed? The answer is, absolutely not!

And yet, some people are confused about the parable Jesus told in today’s Gospel. They think that’s exactly what it’s about, that Jesus is commanding people to go around doing good deeds for strangers in order to earn themselves a place in heaven. Nothing could be further from the truth.

You have to read this parable in context, as with all of Scripture. And what is the context of it? Luke tells us. An expert in the Law of Moses was testing Jesus. What must I do to inherit eternal life? It’s a strange question, because you don’t normally “do” anything to “inherit” something. You inherit something based on your relationship to someone, not because you’ve done a good deed. But this expert in the Law was confused, as many people are confused on this point. He was confusing the promises that God had made in the Old Testament to Abraham and his Seed—promises of the free gift of an inheritance—with the laws commanded by God through Moses, laws that had to be kept, that had to be obeyed, where God agreed to do His part if the people of Israel would do theirs.

Jesus asked him, What is written in the Law? How do you read it? Remember, “the Law” refers to the first five books of the Bible, starting with Genesis. Jesus was giving the man the opportunity to cite the promise God made to Abraham and his Seed in the book of Genesis about the inheritance. But instead, the man cited a portion of the law-covenant from Mt. Sinai: 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. That’s a good summary of the whole moral Law. Complete and utter devotion to God, from the heart, and devotion to one’s neighbor has always been God’s will for mankind. And that will of God was codified and written down at Mt. Sinai, where the people of Israel all agreed: (1) This is what is good and right, and (2) we will do it. All the other laws proclaimed by Moses were examples of putting this law of love into practice.

So, since the expert in the Law wanted to focus on God’s moral commands, and since he believed that keeping those commands was the way to inherit eternal life, Jesus went along with him. You have answered correctly. Do this, and you will live. Love God with your whole heart. Love your neighbor as yourself. That’s your end of the bargain. That’s what you have to “do” to inherit eternal life—if you get it by “doing something.”

But if you do—if you gain eternal life by doing—then there’s always a follow-up question: “And how do I know I’ve done enough?” How do I know if I’ve loved the Lord enough, or if I’ve loved my neighbor as myself enough? You see, the expert in the Law was left in doubt. He understood that his own law, the law he loved so much, only made his hope of eternal life more doubtful. And so he tried to “justify himself.” He asked, “And who is my neighbor?” You see what he was getting at. If he can narrow down the list of people he’s commanded to love as himself, maybe he can at least pretend he’s done it. But if “his neighbor” includes too many other people, he knows he has no chance.

So Jesus answers the man’s question with the parable of the Good Samaritan. A man was beaten and robbed and left for dead on the side of the road. A priest (a servant of the Law) came along and offered no help. A Levite (another servant of the Law) came along and offered no help. But then a Samaritan came by. Samaritans lived in Samaria, north of Jerusalem. They had a little Jewish blood left in them and some Jewish practices and beliefs, mixed with pagan practices and beliefs. The Jews hated them. But this Samaritan came along and, when he saw the injured man, went right over to help him and offered every sort of help you could think of, including caring for his wounds, taking him to an inn, caring for him there, and then paying the innkeeper to keep looking after him while he was away on his journey, adding the commitment to return and pay any additional expenses he might incur.

Then Jesus turns to the expert in the Law and asks: Now which of these three, do you think, was a neighbor to the man who fell among the thieves?” And he said, “The one who showed mercy to him.” Mercy, which is nothing but a form of love. Mercy and love were at the heart of all God’s commandments. And so, with one parable, Jesus turned this man’s religion upside down, forcing this expert in the Law to look at what his Law really demanded of him: mercy and love toward everyone he encountered on his earthly journey, not once, not once in a while, but at every single opportunity.

And then Jesus spoke those terrifying words: Go and do likewise. What must you “do” to inherit eternal life? This is what the Law of God demands. If you would be saved by that Law-covenant, by doing your part to obey God’s commands, while God does His part to pay you the wages of eternal life, then you must do as the Good Samaritan did, showing genuine over-the-top mercy at every turn, in every way, with every person, at every opportunity, in every setting. Not just for injured (or endangered) strangers you come across, but for your parents, for your children, your brothers and sisters, your husband or wife, your coworkers, your boss, your friends and acquaintances, your fellow citizens whom you encounter day after day after day—and also for your enemies. Mercy. Self-less love, love that’s just like the kind of love you would have others show to you. And that’s just what God’s Law requires that you do toward your neighbor. We haven’t even touched on all the things you owe to God directly, to fear, love, and trust in Him above all things, to honor His name, to worship Him, and to cherish His Word above all things.

Terrifying, isn’t it? It should be, if you’re honest with yourself. And that’s the point. In fact, that was always the point of the Law, to reveal the sin that already lives inside each of us. As Paul wrote in today’s Epistle, “The Law was added for the sake of transgressions,” that is, that the Israelites and that all people might have God’s will spelled out for them so that they could see just how much they transgress it. Because sin is there in your heart and in your being, whether you can see it or not, whether you help the occasional stranger or not. The Law simply reveals it for what it is.

And then, once you’ve been beaten to a pulp by the Law, once it’s left you for dead on the side of the road, unable to lift a finger to save yourself, along comes this Samaritan—the Son of God, true God and true man, though despised by men. He comes along with the very, genuine, heartfelt mercy and compassion that He demands of us, because He made us originally in His image and wanted us to be like Him. But now, having come as a man, the Lord Jesus shows this mercy, not only as our example, but first and foremost as our Substitute. He gave His life on the cross for us out of mercy, as the payment for our sins. He began to heal us through Holy Baptism, where He forgave us our sins and gave us His Holy Spirit and made us heirs of eternal life—heirs who will inherit eternal life, not by doing the right things, but by believing in the Lord Jesus, who did everything we were supposed to for us, because we couldn’t.

And then, before He ascended to heaven, He put us battered, weak, still-sinful believers into the charge of the “innkeepers,” the ministers whom He has called into His Church, to keep tending to the spiritually wounded, to keep us on the narrow path that leads to life, to spur us on to love and good works, because while we received the forgiveness of our sins in Baptism and live now under God’s grace, we are not yet what we should be, what God is healing us to become: truly good Samaritans whose hearts are as full of mercy for our neighbor as the heart of Jesus Himself was and is.

We call that aspect of healing “sanctification,” the Holy Spirit’s ongoing work of turning believers into the image of Jesus in how we think and in how we live. So the same “go and do likewise” that first was intended to strike terror into the heart of secure sinners becomes, for the believer, our marching orders, to go and be like Jesus. It begins in the heart—hearts that have been renewed and recreated by God’s mercy and grace toward us. And then it extends to our hands and to our whole life. “Go and do likewise.” Go and walk in the footsteps of Christ, with mercy toward your neighbor, toward everyone whom God places next to you on your path through life, until He determines that your time here is done, or until He returns from His “journey,” and He brings you at last into the eternal life that all who persevere in the faith will inherit, not by doing good works under the Old Testament, but by believing in Christ Jesus, who has made us coheirs with Him in the New Testament in His blood. Amen.