Service not available on Facebook this week (technical issues)…watch on YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zI4sM9S1guU
Scripture: Just then a lawyer stood up to test Jesus. “Teacher,” he said, “what must I do to inherit eternal life?” He said to him, “What is written in the law? What do you read there?” He answered, “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 given the right answer; do this, and you will live.” But wanting to justify himself, he asked Jesus, “And who is my neighbor?” Jesus replied, “A man was going down from Jerusalem to Jericho, and fell into the hands of robbers, who stripped him, beat him, and went away, leaving him half dead. Now by chance a priest was going down that road; and when he saw him, he passed by on the other side. So likewise a Levite, when he came to the place and saw him, passed by on the other side. But a Samaritan while traveling came near him; and when he saw him, he was moved with pity. He went to him and bandaged his wounds, having poured oil and wine on them. Then he put him on his own animal, brought him to an inn, and took care of him. The next day he took out two denarii, gave them to the innkeeper, and said, ‘Take care of him; and when I come back, I will repay you whatever more you spend.’ Which of these three, do you think, was a neighbor to the man who fell into the hands of the robbers?” He said, “The one who showed him mercy.” Jesus said to him, “Go and do likewise.”
Now as they went on their way, he entered a certain village, where a woman named Martha welcomed him into her home. She had a sister named Mary, who sat at the Lord’s feet and listened to what he was saying. But Martha was distracted by her many tasks; so she came to him and asked, “Lord, do you not care that my sister has left me to do all the work by myself? Tell her then to help me.” But the Lord answered her, “Martha, Martha, you are worried and distracted by many things; there is need of only one thing. Mary has chosen the better part, which will not be taken away from her.”
It was a long week trying to get these 2 stories to connect to each other. I spent the whole time looking for the corpus callosum, the part of the brain that connects the 2 hemispheres together, because I couldn’t find how these stories were talking to each other. So, we’ll start with the parable.
I think sometimes it’s hard for us to keep straight all of the different religious communities because we’ve never met a Pharisee or a Sadducee or a Levite. So here is a description of the characters we need to know today: The priests are the rock stars of the ancient Jewish world–the face of everything and doing all the cool things; the Levites are the Roadies who make sure everything is ready for the priests; and the Israelites are the people holding the tickets to get in.
Over the centuries, some have suggested that the priest and the Levite passed on the other side to stay ritually clean. But I think that is because for centuries, Christian theologians didn’t talk to Jewish theologians. There were accommodations for taking care of somebody in need or handling a body, and there were ways to be purified again. Maybe they didn’t know what group of people the man lying on the ground was a part of because he didn’t have clothes that would distinguish him, so they weren’t sure if he was an Israelite so they were required to help him.
Now, the road from Jerusalem to Jericho was notorious for being unsafe. There were rocks and crevices for people to hide behind and it was twisty and curvy so you wouldn’t necessarily see the person coming up behind you or the person hiding in front of you. Maybe they were discerning and evaluating the situation. Clearly, this man had been attacked by robbers, which meant there were robbers, thieves, and bandits nearby who may assume the priest has something they of value they want. or Maybe they didn’t have the resources or the knowledge to care for an individual. They were people who were whose whole job it was to care for the whole community. Maybe they were so busy looking at the forest and the needs of the whole forest that they missed the tree–the man laying on the side of the road in need.
The Samaritan on the other hand seems to have had the means. He had the money and the donkey, enough clothing to make strips of the fabric to care for the wounds and to cover up the man so his naked butt wasn’t shown off as the donkey bounced down the road. The Samaritan also felt pity, in his guts. The word in Greek has in part to do with spleen, he felt it in his spleen. He felt pity, which is kind of a terrible word–people don’t necessarily want others to look at them and pity them. So maybe we say compassion or empathy. The Samaritan was moved with compassion and empathy in his spleen.
I asked my sister where one feels moved if they no longer have a spleen. She didn’t know, but obviously, it means guts and spleen is just a fun word and an organ nobody really thinks about. It’s also like the whole abdomen of it. An argument to be made that when you love the Lord with all of your heart also your guts, your spleen.
I think we love this story of the Samaritan we call good because we want to say everyone is our neighbor, but that isn’t the question Jesus asks at the end Jesus asked who was a neighbor to the man in need. And we want that to be easy.
I was part of a conversation with other clergy who are preaching this text today and one of the men said, “Well, if there’s someone in need on the side of the road I’ll stop but if my family’s in the car I won’t. For safety.” and every women on the call zoom looked at him and said we’ve never stopped. Am I capable of helping someone change a tire? Most of the time. But anyone who’s never walked through a parking structure with their keys between every knuckle of their hand never understands why I triage that situation driving down the road like the priest and the Levite. I am aware of a level of safety whether it’s someone stalled on the side of the road or someone asking for money at night. Or maybe the person in need is incredibly far away and needs tangible help. Or maybe you don’t have the skill set needed to care for that person. Maybe you have so much going on. Maybe you just have this one more thing to do over here.
We don’t know what the Samaritan’s calendar looked like for that day, but he was moved in his gut and he loved his God with all that he had and he followed it and then he loved his neighbors. He was a neighbor who Loved. but he was moved, and he acted.
Empathy is hard. Empathy has been a hard thing. Empathy has been in the news. There have been some who have even suggested recently that empathy is a sin. The sin of empathy. It can lead to confusion, compromise, and difficulty understanding “right” from “wrong.” And honestly, that sounds to me like you might be kind to the “wrong” people. You know the kind. Some have suggested that empathy can be weaponized, I presume that it means one is weak.
Empathy has been studied and written about. And I know knowing someone else’s feelings can be hard for some. But we’re going to work off the idea that empathy innate and learned. Empathy is listening, holding space, connecting, and letting another know they are not alone.
And here’s a thing I read the other day, there is a general decrease in empathy. It’s getting harder and harder for professional sociologists and psychologists to study. Because empathy requires that you don’t think first about yourself, and we live in a society that is about me… well the self. We center in our own phones, in our own self, in our own world, in ourselves.
This parable made news recently when one of our public elected officials suggested that there is an order to love an ordering of love, a priority of neighbors beginning with your immediate family, then the people physically closest to you, and then your nation. Then, if there’s still enough love to give to the rest of the world, everyone else. This is a poor or cynical interpretation of Augustine and Aquinas. Augustine said there was an order of love, yes, but it begins with love of God or love of yourself–and those are held in contradiction. You cannot fully love God if you are prioritizing loving yourself. Kandis would be the one who would go out to say that love is not limited, but you’re not going to love in the same way. And you have limited resources, it does not mean that your love stops at a certain place, it means you find other ways to move forward and love more. You learn to love differently, the people who are even farther away.
Which brings us back around to Martha. Because Martha like the Samaritan was doing something; and Simon the Pharisee several weeks ago was criticized for not being a good host and Martha’s trying to be a good host. She probably wants to make sure there’s enough food, everyone has a place to recline at the table, and they don’t run out of wine. And maybe she enjoys this but maybe she didn’t think she was going to be doing it by herself. Maybe she peeked around the corner to see what was happening and saw Mary there on the floor, listening to Jesus, and thought, “Must be nice. I’d like to sit and listen to Jesus.” Then I imagine her being like, “Oh, I heard that story before.” I wonder if the feeling that she had in her spleen and I don’t think it was pity or compassion or empathy. Jesus said she was worried about many things. I think she was full of rage and he was just trying to ease it a little bit. She’s irritated and frustrated. She felt it in her gut and it grew. Until she had to say something to Jesus about Mary.
I don’t think if you love God with all of your heart and soul and your mind and your strength which in your whole being, your emotions, your character, thoughts, your actions, I don’t think you can love God and be unkind to your fellow human being. I don’t think you lead with bitterness like Martha and really love God.
Now, that isn’t to say that Martha didn’t love God with all of her heart. It’s that sometimes she didn’t focus on the one thing most important. I think loving God has to be a choice that you make all of the time that helps you make the choice to love and be a neighbor to everyone else. And sometimes we don’t. Sometimes we fail to love God or our neighbors. I think Jesus was reminding Martha that her motivations matter and how she’s doing things matters. And that it matters how and why she’s doing something, even when it is the right thing, like being a good host and good hospitality.
And I wonder if the clergy discussion that we were having when everyone was deciding when they would and would not stop for someone on the side of the road–triaging the situation as they drive by–if we’re just not making excuses for ourselves because my gut can have compassion, my gut can have empathy because I have been the person on the side of the freeway changing the tire while people speed by and no one stops, but when it’s someone else, I’m moved in fear or convenience or my own calendar and my own sense of urgency
Every reason we have makes absolute sense, but I think it’s going to stay with me a while. I think that’s the point of a good parable–that ruminates and turns and isn’t easy, it teaches you something new and challenges you another way. It certainly doesn’t mean it’s comfortable.
The late Methodist preacher and author Ted Loder suggested that maybe love is a willingness to be interrupted
I might add inconvenienced, uncomfortable, a little unsafe
There are 8 billion people who can be divided into millions of categories, all of whom need someone to be a neighbor for them.
We know we can’t put all of them on our donkey and carry them to the next hotel, there are just too many. But we do can on the path that we walk, with the people that we meet, in the communities that we can, knowing that we do this work together because we walk this journey of life in this church body, UCC across the country, as the church universal around the world, every subgroup being ourselves a part of are able to help those walking paths far away, people will never meet. We can be their neighbors, too.
Mother Teresa is quoted as saying two small things. Great love. Jesus is asking Martha to check her gut, to see her motivations, does she move of love of God and neighbor and not out of a focus on herself that led to bitterness.
You cannot love God and be cruel to another human being and sometimes we need to be reminded. Sometimes it’s only when our actions play out by whatever moves us has moved us in the world that we realize where our heart and our mind, our soul and our strength have been. And I think the story of Martha reminds us that, and also, that there is grace, forgiveness, and an opportunity to love anew again.
Look, I’m not telling you to make yourself unsafe, but I wonder if we really asked the question in the moment: Is it because we fear for our safety because we would be inconvenienced or interrupted?
Recognize where our heart is. answer the call to love God with all that we are, and give ourselves, and each other, grace when we don’t.
May the teachings of Jesus live in you, challenge you, and change you toward love.