Loving like the Samaritan

Helping others is not just an easy tagline that fits on a bumper sticker.  Helping others is an extension of our devotion and our love for God.  In fact, it is when we are serving others that God if most fully flowing through us.  The challenge to this ideal is that most of us are far-more apt to care and help those who are more like us and far-more likely to ignore or neglect helping those who are markedly different.  This becomes even more acute when those who need our help are the dregs, the disenfranchised, and the lowliest members of society.

Think for a moment of how easy it is to turn away from those who appear ragged and haggard.  But, in truth, these are the very people who we should help.  This is one of the most clear Christian ideals and yet, because of our natural bents towards entitlement and selfishness, many are too quick to dismiss charity altogether.  Unfortunately, charity has become a term for an organization, but in its truest historical sense, charity is love actuated.

Consider Jesus' Parable of the Good Samaritan (Luke 10:30-37).  A man leaving Jerusalem is mugged, stripped, and beaten, left for dead alongside the road.  A priest, a man who has given his life to the service of the Lord, sees the man and crosses the road so as to ignore his misfortunes altogether. Then a Levite, a man groomed from birth as a servant of the Lord, does the same thing, going out of his way to ignore his compassion for this crestfallen man.

Finally, a Samaritan man comes along the road.  Samaritans were considered lower-class Jews, half-breeds whose ancestors had mated with the pagan nations.  In fact, although the mugged man was in a worse physical state, he was still the cultural superior to the Samaritan.  Yet despite all this, the Samaritan man had compassion on the other man, binding his wounds, letting him ride his animal to the nearest village where the Samaritan even covered the other man's costs: true mercy, true compassion, and true godly love. 

Jesus confirms this ideal when He says, "Truly, I say to you, as you did to one of the least of these my brothers, you did it to me (Matt. 25:40)."  The idea is that we will not withhold our love and compassion from those who seem unworthy.  Instead, we will always love and have mercy, especially to those people who no one else will love.  This means that we will not turn away from the dregs or marginalized, but we will get into the trenches with them, by the love of Christ Jesus.

The Word that Helps

"God is our refuge and strength, an ever-present help in trouble (Psa. 46:1)."  The verse has made many a great hymn but the reality of the content should reveals something about both the Lord and His Word. For starters, this verse speaks volumes about the character of the Lord, particularly His comforting nature.

The infinite Creator God of the universe cares for each and every individual that He has created, holding and sustaining everything together by His powerful Word (Heb. 1:3; Col. 1:17).  Additionally, the Lord desires to actively care for His creation.  God is not inactive in creation but is engaged, particularly in caring for people.

No more is the caring for humanity more clear than in the supreme caring act in all of history, the death and resurrection of Jesus.  God so loved the world that His Son took on the very sin of mankind, thus removing the wall of relational separation that sin had built between man and God.  Although salvation is the ultimate act of care and compassion, covering the largest hindrance to all of humanity, God is concerned with the small things too.

In reference to the above Psalm, God is ever-present in trouble.  This is not an isolated theological concept, but it is confirmed throughout the breadth of Scripture: no matter the circumstance, God is present to help and care for our needs (see Psa. 10:14; 28:7; 33:20; 68:19; Isa. 50:1, 9; Heb. 2:18).  All this points to a God who actively and earnestly cares for us.

Moreover, implicitly Psalm 46:1 also points to the value of God's Word, namely as a comforter im times of trouble.  The Word serves purposes ranging from teaching, reproof and correction (2 Tim. 3:16-17), but, because the Word is so intimately intertwined with the character of the Lord, being in very nature God (1 John 1:1-3), then the Word is equally loving and compassionate.  Just a cursory reading of the Psalms reveals the vast wealth to encouragement and comfort to be found.

All this is to note the utter relevance that the Word of God has in any situation.  Think of the reality of the Psalms.  They were liturgical pieces that served purpose of encouragement and praise.  The whole of Scripture serves purposes, let us then strive to grow in the Word so as to grow in the Lord!