The Gospel of Luke (#43) The Parable of the Good Samaritan 11/05/2023

First Baptist Church Leominster

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Lawyer, that's how Luke describes a scribe, an expert in the law of God, the

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Mosaic law, a Jewish scribe, and it was regarding a question he had posed to Jesus.

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The lawyer attempted to test Jesus, is how the scriptures describe his motivation.

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Perhaps his motivation was to discredit Jesus, maybe to do so before the crowds, or maybe the lawyer was attempting to determine our

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Lord's orthodoxy, according to his view of the scriptures. He was testing him.

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So the scribe had asked Jesus, teacher, what shall I do to inherit eternal life?

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He was asking Jesus how a person was to live in this world. If he were to inherit eternal life at the end of his life, but in Jesus in response to the scribe showed forth his authority by putting the scribe on the defense.

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And so not only did Jesus foil the man's intention to test him, but Jesus brought forth the scribe's own failure to live in a manner that would enable him to enter eternal life.

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And so the result was that the scribe's test of Jesus resulted in Jesus's test of the scribe, in which the scribe showed forth his error.

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And so here again are the verses that we addressed last time. Behold, a certain lawyer stood up and tested him, saying, he said to him, what is written in the law?

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What is your reading of it? So he answered and said, you shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, with all your soul, with all your strength, with all your mind, your neighbors, yourself.

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And he said to him, you've answered rightly, do this and you will live. But he, the scribe, wanting to justify himself, said to Jesus, and who is my neighbor?

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As we pointed out, the question of the lawyer was not how he may obtain God's forgiveness of sins.

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That wasn't the nature of the question. And Jesus certainly wasn't acting as a legalist, teaching this man that he could obtain

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God's forgiveness of his sins if he lived in this prescribed manner, conforming to God's law.

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Rather, the scribe was inquiring of Jesus how God would have his people live out their lives in this world.

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During their earthly sojourn with view to entering eternal life at the end of life in this world.

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And we explained last time, it would be easy to misunderstand this question and our Lord's answer, and many have in their comments regarding this passage.

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Most evangelicals equate obtaining eternal life with the first receiving the forgiveness of sins.

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That is when the believer becomes justified before God through initial faith in Christ as Lord and Savior.

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But the scribe was not asking Jesus how a sinner may obtain God's forgiveness of his sins. He was asking

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Jesus how God would have his people live out their lives in order to inherit eternal life at the end of their life in this world.

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There is a way God would have his people live, and there's a significant difference.

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To tell people they have to live a certain way in order to obtain the forgiveness of sins is legalism, that's heresy.

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On the other hand, the scriptures do lay out a way that we are to live as his disciples.

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It's a, it's a, we go through a narrow gate and we follow a narrow way that leads to life.

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And the scribe was asking what the nature of that, that narrow way was, that difficult way that leads to life.

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And so the scribe was inquiring of Jesus what kind of life a citizen of the kingdom of God was to live in this world.

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And Jesus gave forth the answer that is set forth in the Old Testament, but is also set forth in the

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New Testament scriptures. The disciple of Jesus Christ is to order his life according to the law of God.

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Summarily stated, and the two maxims described rightly stated to Jesus, you shall love the

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Lord your God with all your heart, with all your soul, with all your strength, with all your mind, and your neighbor as yourself.

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That's how God would have you and I live as Christians. With view to entering eternal life at the end of our life here in this world.

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Matthew Henry described our Lord's instruction in this way, and I thought it was a very good description of what it means.

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We must love God with all our hearts. We must look upon him as the best of beings, in himself most amiable and infinitely perfect and excellent, as one whom we lie under greatest obligations to both in gratitude and interest.

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We must prize him and value ourselves by our elation to him. Must please ourselves in him and devote ourselves entirely to him.

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Our love to him must be sincere, hearty and fervent. It must be a superlative love, a love that is as strong as death, but an intelligent love and such as we can give a good account on the grounds and reasons of why we love

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God. It must be an entire love. He must have our whole souls and must be served with all that is within us.

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We must love nothing besides him, but what we love for him and in subordination to him.

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That's a good way to describe what it is to love the Lord, your God, with all your heart, with all your soul, with all your strength, with all your mind.

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What about the corollary to that? We are to love ourselves, our neighbors as ourselves.

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And so Henry wrote, we must love our neighbors as ourselves, which we shall easily do if we, as we ought to do, love

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God better than ourselves. We must wish well to all and ill to none, must do all the good we can in the world and no hurt, and must fix it as a rule for ourselves to do to others as we would have, should do, have they do to us.

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And this is to love our neighbor as ourselves. Good description, good definition of life according to the law of God.

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But this command to love your neighbors yourself was a problem for the scribe. He no doubt believed sincerely he loved

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God with all his heart, with all his soul, with all his strength, and with all his mind. He gave his whole life to the study of the scriptures.

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But the second matter, that he loved his neighbor as himself, well, he would need clarification and qualification for that one.

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He could not justify himself with respect to this commandment of God if it were to be applied to everybody and anybody.

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It must only be applied to a very narrow group of people, namely other devout Jews. He's my neighbor.

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So one described this lawyer's response to Jesus. The lawyer is depicted as wishing to justify his earlier question and regain initiative after the command which he has just received.

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He looks rather foolish having asked a question to which he himself has been forced to give the answer.

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Jesus has said in effect, you have no need to ask me the question about eternal life as a lawyer, you know the answer.

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All you have to do is practice the law until its meaning has been clarified. The commandment speaks about loving one's neighbor.

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But where are the limits of this duty to be set? And so the question, the question of the scribe, well, who is my neighbor?

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Implies that there can be a non -neighbor that you don't have to love as yourself. And therein lies the problem.

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And so our Lord answered the lawyer with this parable of the Good Samaritan which is so familiar to us.

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We'll read the parable beginning with once again reading the lawyer's question, verse 29.

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But he, wanting to justify himself, said to Jesus, and who is my neighbor? And Jesus answered and said, a certain man went down from Jerusalem to Jericho, fell among thieves, who stripped him of his clothing, wounded him, and departed, leaving him half dead.

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And now by chance, a certain priest came down that road, and when he saw him, he passed by on the other side.

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Likewise a Levite, when he arrived at that place, came and looked and passed by on the other side.

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But a certain Samaritan, as he journeyed, came where he was, and when he saw him, he had compassion.

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So he went to him and bandaged his wounds, pouring on oil and wine. He set him on his own animal, brought him to an inn, and took care of him.

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And on the next day, when he departed, he took out two denarii, gave them to the innkeeper, and said to him, take care of him, and whatever more you spend, when

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I come again, I will repay you. So which of these three do you think was neighbor to him who fell among the thieves?

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And he said, well, he who showed mercy on him. And then

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Jesus said to him, go and do likewise. And so what becomes clear in our

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Lord's parable is that you are to be a neighbor to another person. Not because of our nearness to someone ethnically or geographically or even doctrinally, but we become a neighbor to someone when we show them mercy and attempt to relieve them from their suffering and help them.

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To safety and security. Alexander McLaren described one's neighbor.

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We are not to love because we are neighbors in any geographical sense, but we become neighbors to the man farthest from us when we love and help him.

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The relation has nothing to do with proximity. If we prove ourselves neighbors to any man by exercising love to him, then the relation intended by the word is as wide as humanity.

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You are to be a neighbor to anyone in need that you have the capability capacity to assist.

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Well, in considering this parable, we'll first give our attention to the injured man's condition. And then secondly, we'll examine the absence of mercy on the part of these two devout

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Jews. Third, we'll consider the action of the good Samaritan who was a true neighbor to the injured man.

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And then we'll consider our Lord's concluding question and his word of instruction to the scribe.

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And then lastly, we want to consider the love and mercy of God to which the command to love your neighbor is patterned.

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We are to love others as God loves us. He is the pattern for being merciful to other people.

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And so let's consider the parable of the good Samaritan. First, the injured man's condition.

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Jesus began to answer the scribe's question, Who is my neighbor? With the parable that begins by describing a man abused by thieves, by Roberts.

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Verse 30. And Jesus answered, said, A certain man went down from Jerusalem to Jericho, fell among thieves, who stripped him of his clothing, wounded him, and departed, leaving him half dead.

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Now, if you'll notice that the man who had suffered the maltreatment of these

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Roberts is not specifically identified as a Jewish man. He's just a man.

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The Lord must have intentionally left the man unidentified and undescribed. He was simply a man.

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The scribe and those Jews listening to Jesus, however, would have probably assumed that Jesus was referring to a

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Jewish man. The man was traveling from Jerusalem to Jericho. The road that descended from Jerusalem to the east, or Jericho, was 17 miles in distance and dropping a total of 3 ,300 feet in elevation.

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In fact, yesterday I went on YouTube and I typed in a search, the road from Jerusalem to Jericho.

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And there were a handful of videos that actually showed this trail.

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And actually three men walking this trail. They walked from Jericho up to Jerusalem.

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It was quite good. I remember driving down that road from Jerusalem to Jericho years ago with a tour group.

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There were ten of us with my son -in -law, Darren. And the hills are very rocky and very barren.

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It seemed like there wasn't a tree within 20 miles. And that's the Judean wilderness.

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And as you drive down this now four -lane freeway, you can look up into these canyons. The mountains were quite steep, but you'd see little, you'd see

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Bedouin living there. Sometimes you'd see huts or little corrals with goats and sheep. And you wonder how they could have possibly survived.

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There's not enough, you know, grass around there to feed anything. And yet, there they are. But it was a place that could shield or harbor thieves.

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In fact, it was known for the danger that it posed to travelers. In fact,

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Jerome in the 5th century wrote even then that that road from Jerusalem to Jericho was a dangerous road to travel because of the frequency of encountering thieves.

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Jesus described this man having experienced a three -fold misery at the hands of these thieves. He was first stripped of his clothing.

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Clothing was not that easily obtained in those days and was therefore quite expensive to purchase or replace.

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And so clothing was easier taken from another rather than purchased for oneself. And so they took his clothing.

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And then secondly, the thieves had wounded the man. Perhaps he had attempted to defend himself. He came out the loser, however.

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The further he was but one, they were more than one. There's a plurality. We don't know how many there were.

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But it appears that he was rendered and left incapable of lifting himself up. Perhaps he was unconscious, maybe not.

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And then third, we read the man was near death, leaving him half dead. And so the man was helpless and unable to recover himself without aid from someone.

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But then we read of the absence, the common absence of mercy, even a devout Jews, a priest and a

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Levite. Jesus tells of three people having come across this man in his helpless and miserable condition.

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Now by chance, a certain priest came down that road. When he saw him, he passed on the other side. Likewise, a

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Levite, when he arrived at the place, came and looked. He did more than the priest.

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He came and looked and passed on the other side. But a certain Samaritan, as he journeyed, came where he was.

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These three men exhibit three different attitudes and degrees of concern and compassion for this man. The first, the priest exhibits complete indifference to the injured and abused man.

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He passed on the other side of the road. The second, the Levite showed some interest, that is curiosity, but he too failed to bring aid to the man.

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Some reason that he was actually more guilty than the first. He went over and saw firsthand the condition of this man but chose to nevertheless go on.

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And so the third man, the Samaritan, had sympathy and showed mercy for the injured man. He did what he could to bring relief to the injured man, expending his own resources and time in doing so.

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So let's consider each of these three men. First, a Jewish priest happened by. Now by chance, a certain priest came down that road and when he saw him, he passed on the other side.

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Jericho is a city in which numbers of Jewish priests live. One authority on the subject wrote that at this time in history, there were above 12 ,000 priests who lived in Jericho.

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And when these men were called to be on duty, which was once a month, they would travel to Jerusalem from their hometown of Jericho and then return home the same way.

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And so this priest may have been traveling to Jerusalem in order to serve in the temple or perhaps he had just completed serving as a priest in the

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Jewish temple and he was on his way home. I think this latter scenario is likely. Luke says the priest came down and with the change in elevation, it would seem he left

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Jerusalem, was traveling downward to the Jordan River Valley where Jericho was located. The priest saw the man but was unmoved by his plight.

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He passed by on the other side. Commentators have surmised the priest's motivations.

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And by the way, I didn't even touch in these notes the common attempt to make an allegory out of this parable.

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They find meanings, you know, for the donkey on which he set the inn, you know, the oil and the wine poured on and that's a poor way to interpret this parable.

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But indeed we read that he was fearful of being ambushed by the robbers.

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I think that's probably clear, perhaps, by the priest. He hurried past. Others suggest that the priest may have assumed the man was dead.

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So he passed the other side of the road for he did not want to be ceremonially defiled by coming in contact with a dead body.

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But that's assuming that he was traveling up to Jerusalem to serve. But he wasn't. Clearly the

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Lord spoke with this priest in this manner to show the priest's indifference to the man who was in need of his help.

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This priest, who was supposed to be a man of God, who had dedicated his life to God, had no compassion, had showed no mercy toward this injured and abused man.

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And really it's the quality of mercy that is the predominant issue here in this parable, as we will see.

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The behavior of the priest was somewhat duplicated by the Levite. Likewise, a Levite, when he arrived at the place, came and looked and passed by on the other side.

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This Levite was a man who was a member of the tribe of Levi, obviously, one of the twelve tribes of Israel.

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The men of this tribe had the responsibility to maintain the temple and supervise the liturgy of the ceremonies that took place in the temple and in Jerusalem.

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All priests were from the tribe of Levi, but not all Levites were priests. A priest not only needed to be a

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Levite, but he also had to be a descendant of Aaron, who was also a descendant of Levi.

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And so it was required that a priest was descended from Aaron, the ancient high priest, who was also a Levite, in order to be qualified for priestly service in the temple.

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And so this Levite was not a priest. This Levite seemed to show some initial interest toward the injured man, for he came and looked upon him, but he failed to act on behalf of the man.

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He was just as the priest, he passed on the other side. Now one would have thought that if anyone would have stopped to help this man, one of these two would have done so.

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They didn't. But in spite of all their form of religion, they did not have compassion. They did not show mercy to this man.

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They did not keep the law, for neither one of these men loved their neighbor as themselves. And in mentioning a priest and a

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Levite, Jesus was not only identifying for the scribe who was a neighbor, but also who were not neighbors.

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This priest and Levite were not neighbors. But the third man that came upon the scene was a

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Samaritan. Very significant. But a certain Samaritan, as he journeyed, came where he was.

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And so Jesus tells of a certain Samaritan, one who was hated, despised, rejected by all

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Jews, who happened by this broken man. Samaritans lived in the region between Galilee in the north and Judea in the south.

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They were the descendants of people that the Assyrians, we were talking about Nineveh and Nahum, that the

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Assyrians had forced to relocate from other parts of the world to settle in Palestine. They took all the people from Israel, the northern kingdom, scattered them to the nations, took the people from the nations and brought them into Samaria.

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This occurred in the 8th century BC. These people had not been in the land long until they concluded they were not being blessed by God because they were not worshiping the

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God of the land in which they were forced to live. So they got themselves a

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Levitical priest, set up a religion that was patterned somewhat like the Jews' religion, and they began to worship, or so they thought,

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Jehovah, the God of the Jews. They set up their own temple on Mount Gerizim, which the

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Jews destroyed in 165 BC. That contributed to the hatred between these people.

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They established their own priesthood. They embraced the first five books of Moses as scripture, and there they lived and established themselves alongside the

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Jews. They were in continual conflict. We read of the origin of the

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Samaritans. This is interesting, 2 Kings 17. Then the king of Assyria brought people from these various places, placed them in the cities of Samaria instead of the children of Israel, and they took possession of Samaria and dwelt in its cities.

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And it was so at the beginning of their dwelling there that they did not fear the Lord. They were pagans from other countries.

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Therefore the Lord sent lions among them, which killed some of them. He regarded that land as His.

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So they spoke to the king of Assyria, saying, The nations whom you have removed, placed in the cities of Samaria, do not know the rituals of the

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God of the land. Therefore He has sent lions among them. Indeed, they're killing them because they do not know the rituals of the

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God of the land. And then the king of Assyria commanded, saying, Send there one of the priests whom you brought from there.

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Let's get us a Levitical priest. Let him go and dwell there and let him teach them the rituals of the

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God of the land. Then one of the priests whom they carried away from Samaria came, dwelt in Bethel, and taught them how they should fear the

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Lord. However, every nation continued to make gods of its own and put them in the shrines on the high places which the

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Samaritans had made, every nation in the cities where they dwelt. So they were worshiping the

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Lord, but also their own gods. The men of Babylon made Succoth, Benoth.

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The men of Quth made Nergal. The men of Hamoth made Eshimah. And the Abbots made

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Nibhaz and Tarkhach. And the Seraphites burned their children in fire to Adramalek and Anamalek, the gods of the

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Sefer Vahim. So they feared the Lord from every class. They appointed for themselves priests of the high places who sacrificed for them in the shrines of the high places.

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They feared the Lord, yet served their own gods. Sounds like a lot of professing Christians today.

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According to the rituals of the nations from whom they were carried away. And to this day, this was back in 2

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Kings 17, they continue practicing the former rituals. They do not fear the Lord, nor do they follow the statutes or their ordinances or the law and commandment which the

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Lord had commanded the children of Jacob, whom he named Israel, with whom the Lord made a covenant, charged them, saying,

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You shall not fear other gods, nor bow down to them, or serve them, nor sacrifice to them, but the Lord who brought you up from the land of Egypt with great power and an outstretched arm.

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Him you shall fear, him you shall worship, and to him you shall offer sacrifice. But they did not do that.

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Verse 40. However, they did not obey, but they followed their former rituals. So, these nations feared the

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Lord, yet served their carved images. And also their children and their children's children have continued doing as their fathers did even to this day.

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That is the day when that writer penned 2 Kings. Well, you can understand the hatred, therefore, of the

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Jews hated Samaritans. They were heretics. They were cultists. And they were certainly not neighbors, ones with whom the

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Jews had relationships. The point is this, our Lord was revealing to this tribe that he had no concern, no compassion for anyone but his own.

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He was not even living to the standard of a heretic, for this Samaritan had observed the law of God, but the priest and Levite had not done so.

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The Samaritan loved this man as he loved himself. They didn't. The Jews did not believe that God's commandment to love thy neighbor as you love yourself required them to love

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Samaritans. They're not neighbors. Matthew Henry recorded the common attitude of the

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Jews towards Samaritans. What was the corrupt notion of the Jewish teachers in this manner?

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Dr. Lightfoot quotes their own words to this purport. Where he saith thou shalt love thy neighbor, he accepts all

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Gentiles. Gentiles aren't neighbors, you don't have to love them. For they are not our neighbors, but those only that are of our own nation or religion.

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They would not put an Israelite to death for killing a Gentile, for he was not his neighbor.

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They indeed say that they ought not to kill a Gentile whom they were not at war with, but if they saw a

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Gentile in danger of death, they thought themselves under no obligation to warn him or help him to save his life.

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Such wicked inferences did they draw from that holy covenant of peculiarity by which

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God had distinguished them, and by abusing it, thus they had forfeited it. God justly took the forfeiture and transferred covenant favors to the

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Gentile world to whom they brutishly denied common favors. The scribe asked,

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Jesus, who is my neighbor? And so the manner in which the scribe was thinking and living with regard to other people was not the way to live so as to enter eternal life.

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We might consider our Lord's words in the Sermon on the Mount as applicable here. Jesus said, I say to you, unless your righteousness exceeds the righteousness of the scribes, that's where this man fell, and Pharisees, you will by no means enter the kingdom of heaven.

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Their religion was external and always in a limited fashion, and you will not inherit eternal life if you live that way.

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This scribe, although an expert in the law of God, would not enter the kingdom of God upon his death. He did not live a life of faith, believing and obeying the law of God.

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Well, let's consider the action of the good Samaritan. After Jesus first described these two

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Jewish religious leaders who failed to order their lives according to the law of God, he described a Samaritan who did so.

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But a certain Samaritan, as he journeyed, came where he was, and when he saw him, he had compassion.

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And so he went to him, bandaged his wounds, poured on oil and wine. He set him on his own animal, brought him to an inn, took care of him.

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On the next day when he departed, he took out two denarii, that would be the equivalent to full day's wages for a common worker, gave them to the innkeeper, said to him, take care of him, and whatever more you spend when

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I come again, I will repay you. Now this Samaritan would have had no natural affinity to this, we would assume,

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Jewish man he found abused and broken. For again, generally, Jews have no dealings with the

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Samaritans, as our Lord himself stated in John 4, 9. And we also may assume that Samaritans had no dealings with the

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Jews, as is clear from several accounts in the Gospels. But this

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Samaritan had compassion and showed mercy to this Jewish man, he seemed to exhibit behavior consistent with our

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Lord's instruction to his disciples in the Sermon on the Mount, recorded back in Luke 6, not that many chapters before Luke 10.

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Jesus said, but I say to you who hear, love your enemies, do good to those who hate you, bless those who curse you, pray for those who spitefully use you, to him who strikes you on the cheek, offer the other also, from him who takes away your cloak, do not withhold your tunic either, give to everyone who asks of you, and from him who takes away your goods, do not ask them back, and just as you want men to do to you, you also do to them likewise.

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Love your neighbor as you love yourself. Many reasons. But if you love those who love you, what credit is that to you?

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For even sinners love those who love them. And if you do good to those who do good to you, what credit is that to you?

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For even sinners do the same. And if you lend to those to whom you hope to receive back, what credit is that to you?

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For even sinners lend to sinners to receive as much back. But love your enemies, do good, and lend, hoping for nothing in return, and your reward will be great.

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You will be sons of the Most High, for he is kind to the unthankful and evil. And then we're going to draw attention specifically to verse 36.

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Therefore be merciful, just as your Father also is merciful. That's how you love your enemies, all of those verses there.

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Jesus wasn't saying that you have to have warm, fuzzy, affectionate feelings for your enemies, but you treat them in this loving manner.

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Loving your neighbor is how you treat them, not necessarily how you feel about them. Now this

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Samaritan was not a man of God, nevertheless he dealt with his injured man as a godly man would have done.

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This does not make this Samaritan a Christian by any means, but it does reveal that even non -Christians are capable of acts of mercy and kindness toward others in this fallen world.

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And history testifies of this. A friend of mine in Sacramento sent me a video the other day.

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It's entitled The Good Nazi. And this man and his wife were

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Germans and they lived in China and he was a devout Nazi. But he loved the

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Chinese people. And when Japan invaded China and were slaughtering off and abusing the people in Nanking, this

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German who was the acting mayor of the city, Nanking was the capital of China in the late 1930s when

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Japan invaded. Because of his influence as a Nazi, he carved out a region right in the center of Nanking and he held off the

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Japanese. 250 ,000 Chinese came into that region and they were protected by him.

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He saved that many lives and he used his authority as a Nazi to do so.

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So it was quite a paradoxical video frankly. But, you know, unconverted people can be moved to do very wonderful things amazingly and this

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Samaritan had done so. Again, this doesn't make him a Christian. Paul spoke about this capability of ungodly people to do good things in Romans 1.

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There he wrote of Gentiles who did not know the law of God but nevertheless acted in accordance with God's law.

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Romans 2 verses 12 through 16. For as many as have sinned without law will also perish without the law.

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As many as have sinned in the law will be judged by the law. We're going to be judged and assessed on the day of judgment by the knowledge that we have in this life of God and his word.

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For not the hearers of the law are just in the sight of God but the doers of the law will be justified or vindicated.

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For when Gentiles who do not have the law by nature do the things in the law these although not having the law are a lot of themselves who show the work of the law written in their hearts their conscience also bearing witness between themselves their thoughts accusing or else excusing them in the day when

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God will judge the secrets of men by Jesus Christ according to my gospel. Paul was not saying that these

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Gentiles had salvation and Jesus wasn't implying the Samaritan had salvation but then in respects of their behavior they acted in a manner consistent with God's law that had been written in their hearts by God when he created mankind.

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When God created Adam and Eve he'd written upon their hearts his laws and even after Adam and Eve had sinned there was knowledge of God's law upon their hearts although after they sinned they no longer had a natural love for God's law or ability to live consistently with God's law but nevertheless it was upon their heart that's what it is to be a human being.

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He's given every human being whether Christian or not a conscience and they have an intuitive sense as to what

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God requires. But when God causes a sinner to be born again

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God writes his law upon his heart giving him a better understanding of God's law and a love for that law a desire to conform his thinking and living to that law.

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And so we're not saying that this good Samaritan had salvation. The Lord Jesus did not suggest a thing through this parable but Jesus was showing that this

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Samaritan although the man was steeped in false religion acted toward this broken and abused man in a way that was commendable in a manner that was in accordance with God's law.

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If this Samaritan acted in this manner it reveals and aggravates the great failure and guilt of this priest and Levite who refused to show mercy to this needy man.

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You see the point? J .C. Ryle described well the manner of life that should characterize the

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Christian the true disciple of Jesus Christ. The lesson of this part of the parable is plain and unmistakable.

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The kindness of a Christian toward others should not be in word and tongue only but indeed in truth.

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His love should be of a practical love a love which entails on his self -sacrifice and self -denial both in money and time and trouble.

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His charity should be seen not merely in his talking but his acting not merely in his profession but in his practice.

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He should think it no misspent time to work as hard and doing good to those who need help as others work in trying to get money.

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He should not be ashamed to toil as much to make the misery of this world smaller as those toil who hunt or shoot all day long.

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He should have a ready ear for every tale of sorrow and a ready hand to help everyone in affliction so long as he has the power.

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Such brotherly love the world may not understand. The returns of gratitude which such love meets with may be few and small but to show such brotherly love is to walk in the steps of Christ and to reduce to practice the parable of the

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Good Samaritan. We ought to have a beneficent attitude toward anybody and everybody.

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We desire God's best for them. Even the greatest of sinners we would want them to be saved from their sin and be redeemed by Christ.

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Well then our Lord gave posed a question a word of instruction to the strive in verse 36 and 37.

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Jesus asked a question which could only be answered one way. So which of these three do you think was neighbor to him who fell among the thieves?

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And the response of the lawyer was rightly the one who had mercy on him. Jesus said to him go and do likewise.

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I recall the illustration that Spurgeon gave in front of his church. He talked about how we should so love the

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Lord and seek to please him and be with him and he says it's like my two great days when

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I come home from the office. They're there to greet me and welcome me. They're so excited when I arrive home.

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Now some of you may react that I compare living as a Christian to my two dogs but when you've arisen to their level

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I'll find some other apt illustration to give you. I recall that.

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The Samaritan was the neighbor. The lawyer was to love his neighbor as the Samaritan. But not only did this scribe not love

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Samaritans because he hated them. He probably desired God's judgment be poured out upon Samaritans.

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He was strongly in favor of justice as he viewed it to be but was quite weak in mercy.

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We read of the scriptures that it is a noble, wonderful, blessed matter that mercy triumphs over judgment or justice.

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Some Christians are strong in the arena of justice but it's a rarity for mercy to triumph over justice in their thinking, their attitudes, and their actions.

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They are quick to tell you what is right and wrong and they do so frequently and consistently but they have little concern or willingness to help you to live in that prescribed way.

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They only regard and treat those who think like them and act like them to be their true neighbors. Everybody else is on the outside.

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And so they're much like those whom Jesus condemned. Woe to you, scribes, Pharisees, hypocrites! You pay tithe of mint, anise, cumin, have neglected the weightier matters of the law, justice, and here it is again, mercy and faith.

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These you ought to have done without leaving the others undone. Blind guides who strain out a gnat and swallow a camel.

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This is not good. We read in the word of God, it will not go well for them on the day of judgment who are of this nature.

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Judgment is without mercy to the one who has shown no mercy. There are professing

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Christians that go through the world with just this spirit, this vitriol, this hatred that seems to characterize them toward anybody and everybody except those of their own party.

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And that's a problem. How can you possibly be concerned for the lost in the world if you have that hardness of spirit toward them?

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We ought to have concern and compassion for the lost. As the

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Lord had compassion upon us and someone had compassion on you to tell you about Christ.

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This does not set aside justice, but it leaves justice where it belongs. In the wisdom and disposal of God with the authorities he's ordained to address those matters.

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We are to extend mercy in the same way that God in Christ has extended us mercy and has promised to do so for us on the day of judgment.

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Mercy triumphs over judgment. It certainly should in our lives. And so in our

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Lord's dealings with this lawyer, scribe, he showed him his utter failure in keeping the law of God. And thus the entire weight of the law was upon him.

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He was lost for whoever fails in one point of the law is condemned by the entire weight of the law. But further, our

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Lord gave this man a positive word of instruction. This lawyer was to act like the

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Samaritan. The Lord told him, go and do likewise. And we can say to ourselves in the same manner with the same force, go and do likewise.

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Amen? I do want to just take five minutes and deal with this matter, the love and mercy of God for sinners, because God is the pattern, the exemplar for the way we show mercy to others.

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The command of God to his people is to love your neighbor as yourself. And it's a reflection of God's own love in his dealings with people.

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Again, we read back in Luke chapter 6 of our responsibility to love our neighbors. And the final word of that is that we are to be merciful as our

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Father is also merciful. Do a study on the mercy of God.

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I read some things from Arthur Pink and John Gill about it, and mercy is a very common attribute.

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God's infinite in his mercies. Thy mercy, O Lord, is in the heavens, and thy faithfulness reaches onto the clouds.

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It's because of the Lord's mercies we're not consumed, because his compassions fail not. They're new every morning.

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Great is thy faithfulness. Faithfulness in mercies. Know therefore that the

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Lord thy God, he is God, the faithful God, which keeps covenant in mercy with them that love him, keep his commandments to a thousand generations.

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What specifically is the meaning of mercy? The quality of mercy can be described in several ways, but to show mercy is to refrain from harming or punishing someone with whom it is in your power to harm or punish.

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It is therefore a manifestation of kindness in excess of what may be expected or considered, what may be even fair or just.

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Mercy is not fair and just. It is gracious and kind and good.

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So mercy is seen in the exhibition of kindness, patience, compassion, extended to the undeserving.

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By definition, mercy is never deserved. It's extended to the undeserving.

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Mercy is shown in sparing the guilty from impending punishment or bringing an end to the suffering of the guilty that they are presently experiencing.

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By definition, persons who are the objects of mercy are not deserving of mercy. There's no such thing.

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Mercy is an act of grace on the part of the greater to the lesser. The lesser having no claims or basis of demand or expectation for mercy being extended.

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None of us are worthy of or deserving of mercy. Now, by our actions, we can somehow put ourselves in a position that will prohibit mercy from being extended to us.

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Paul, in his wretched treatment of Christians before his conversion, said that he received mercy because he did it in ignorance.

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He didn't deserve mercy, but he didn't forfeit mercy by doing things with a high hand.

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He did it in ignorance. As we look at mercy in the

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Bible, there's a general mercy that God shows to all human beings, but there's a more special mercy of God that he shows only to his elect, those that are in Christ from eternity.

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Arthur Pink wrote of the mercy of God. In endeavoring to study the mercy of God as set forth in Scripture, a threefold distinction needs to be made.

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If the word of truth is to be rightly divided thereon, first, there's a general mercy of God, which is extended not only to all men, believers and unbelievers alike, but also to the entire creation.

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His tender mercies are over all his works. He gives to all life and breath and all things.

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Even the brute creation he gives their needs, supplies them with suitable provision. But secondly, there's a special mercy of God, which is exercised toward the children of men, helping, succoring them, notwithstanding their sins.

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In other words, in spite of them. To them also he communicates all the necessities of life, for he makes his son to rise on the evil and on the good and sends rain on the just and the unjust.

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And then third, there's a sovereign mercy, which is reserved for the heirs of salvation, which is communicated to them in a covenant way through the mediator.

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And that's Jesus Christ, of course. It's the sole prerogative of God to choose to whom he will show or have mercy.

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Moses wanted to see the glory of God. I will show you my glory, God said. I will let my goodness pass by you.

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I will proclaim the name of the Lord before you and be gracious. I will be gracious to whom I will be gracious, will show mercy on whom

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I will show mercy. God is free to show, bestow mercy. He's free and just in not bestowing mercy.

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And he's sovereign in that. And God's mercy to some sinners and not to others is the manifestation of his sovereign good pleasure.

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The objects of his mercy are guilty sinners who forfeited any privilege or expectation of God's favor.

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You and I enjoy mercy in Christ because God determined to do it, to show us mercy, because there's nothing deserved.

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I hope you'll take time and read the notes, some of the comments John Gill wrote. He kind of wrote as the

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Apostle Paul, long, run -on sentences of subject and verb and then all kinds of phrases and subordinate clauses.

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That's how John Gill wrote. And he wrote some good words about the mercy of God. The bottom line, however, is that the

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Lord Jesus told this scribe, go thou and do likewise.

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We are to be merciful. This is a principle way that we love our enemies.

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We show them mercy. We desire their good. We pray for them that spitefully use us.

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We give them most of all the gospel of Jesus Christ by which they can be saved if they turn from their sin and believe on Jesus Christ.

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May the Lord help us. May this quality of mercy be characteristic of all of us. May the

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Lord take away from us any hardness of spirit, any anger or wrath toward others that don't conform to our expectations.

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But may we ask God to be merciful and may we display mercy toward them.

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Amen? Let's pray. Thank you, Father, for your word and for this very familiar and practical parable of this good

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Samaritan. Help us, our God, to act and live and think and relate,

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Lord, to others in the manner that this good Samaritan acted. Forgive us of our sins, our hardness of heart, our withholding mercy, when it's within our ability and power to do so.

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Help us to be more like Jesus Christ, more like you, our Father, for you are merciful and good and kind,

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Lord, even to those that live in rebellion to you. Thank you most of all, our

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God, for the mercy that you've given us, shown us in Jesus Christ, in which we've been pardoned of our sins and you've granted us everlasting life and inheritance and a joy in your