5th Sunday after Pentecost – Byron Tindall
I wanted to make absolutely certain I knew the definition of the word parable, so I went to the Merriam-Webster Website, and here’s what I found. “Parable – noun – a usually short fictitious story that illustrates a moral attitude or a religious principle – the Biblical parable of the Good Samaritan” Webster’s Ninth New Collegiate Dictionary defines the word exactly the same.
This parable is probably one of the better-known utterances Jesus made when he was wandering around Palestine while preaching the good news about the Kingdom of God. It has been the source for countless sermons throughout the centuries.
This morning, I’m going to try something a little different. I’m going to rewrite the parable into the 21st Century. I’m not going to touch the early part of St. Luke’s lesson, just the story itself. So here goes.
In the early evening, after normal business hours, a young white, Anglo-Saxon protestant professional man was getting his exercise on the Beltline Trail in downtown Atlanta, Ga. Suddenly, he was attacked by a gang of 4 Hispanic teens. They proceeded to beat him up pretty badly and relieved him of his watch, cell phone, wallet, and the running shoes he was wearing. They left him beside the trail and ran off to examine what they had taken from the man.
An Episcopal priest was also walking on the trail and saw the injured man sitting on the bank trying to get himself back together. “I should probably stop and help him, but I don’t have the time right now. I’ve got to get ready for the vestry meeting in about any hour,” he thought to himself. Consequently, he looked to the other side of the trail and moved over in that direction before heading to his meeting.
A little bit later, a Baptist minister was seen walking toward the scene. He noticed the poor victim but remembered he had a pre-marital counseling session scheduled for a little later. “I must get home and take a shower before I meet with that young couple,” was his excuse for not stopping.
A group of nuns was out for a stroll on the Beltway and happened on the incident. They stopped and discussed the situation among themselves. “If we stay here and call 911, we’ll be tied up for hours when EMS and the cops arrive. Just think of all the questions we’ll have to answer,” one of the nuns said. “I don’t think we should get involved,” said another. “Let’s just move on,” said a third member of the party. And they did just that.
About that time, an old black man was walking home along his usual route. He had just spent 12 hours at his job as a janitor and dishwasher in a fast-food establishment a few blocks away from where the attack took place. He looked and smelled like it had been a rough 12 hours. But he stopped and approached the man anyway.
“What happened? What can I do to help you?” he asked the young professional who was still trying to get his head around what had happened.
The man was still very confused about what had taken place. The old black man knew he had to do something. He stuck is hand into his front pocket and pulled out two crumbled, dirty $20 bills and his cell phone. “I’m going to get you to a safe place where you’ll receive good care,” he told the victim.
Knowing he had $40, the old man called for an Uber driver to pick them up a short distance down the trail where the trail and a street intersected. He had instructed the driver that they wanted to go to the homeless shelter where the old man had lived a few times between jobs. He hoped the manager he knew so well was still there.
When they arrived at the shelter, the old man was relieved to see his friend was still on duty.
“Here’s $20,” he told the manager. “Send someone out to get some dressings and bandages. Don’t forget the antibiotic ointment, either,” he said as they got the young man situated in a room. “I get paid tomorrow so I’ll drop by after work and settle up with you, if you spend more,” he said as he left the shelter.
Jesus’s parable was told to answer the question, “And who is my neighbor?”
There’s no need to comment on which individual in the 21st Century version best exemplified the State Farm Insurance company advertising slogan.
Our concept of who constitutes our neighbor has most certainly evolved substantially since St. Luke penned his gospel, and I personally don’t think that evolution is complete.
Here’s a good example of this change. When our children were growing up in the small, rural Lewis County, New York, the principal of their elementary school organized an over-night field trip to Ottawa, Canada, for the students. For some of them, that was the first time they had ventured out of Lewis County. Just as in Jesus’s time, people stayed close to where they were born and raised. Incidentally, some of their classmates still live in Lewis County.
My personal thoughts about the answer Jesus gave in response to the question the lawyer asked him have changed drastically with the advent of the communication tools we have today.
With the click on a link on my phone, my iPad or my computer, I can find myself almost anywhere in the world. If I want to view the beauty of the Scottish Highlands, all I have to do is virtually go to the Highlands. If I want to visit the Louvre in Paris, one of my devices places me in the center of that museum, and I never have to leave the comfort of my easy chair.
On the darker side, if I wonder what it’s like in a war-torn area of the world, I can visit most any place where there’s a conflict raging by way of the miracles of modern communication devices.
For me, every inhabitant of “this fragile earth, our island home,” is my neighbor. This includes those living with starvation and death as their constant companions. Those forced to live in hell holes like the “Alligator Alcatraz” or seeing their children forcibly taken away from them; those whose loved ones were swept away from them by rising flood waters – all of these follow human beings are my neighbors.
As the lawyer rightfully answered Jesus at the beginning of the Gospel Lesson today from Luke, “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.”
All of this begs the question, “How do we, as individuals, as a community of believers, as citizens of the State of Georgia, as residents of the United States of America, and finally as inhabitants of this island home of ours, demonstrate this love?”