Good Samaritans

I have some friends who took someone into their home recently. They did more than I ever would have and were not really able to afford it, but trusting God and following His call to them. By our standards they got “burned.” The details aren’t important. Was their act of kindness obedience to God? Was it foolishness?

Another friend has taken in homeless, and been treated poorly, sometimes robbed. Was this act of mercy right or wrong?

Closer to home for most of us is helping someone out, sometimes a friend, more rarely a stranger. Sometimes they are so appreciative that we feel good for doing the kindness. Other times they don’t respond the way we want and we feel “used.” Sometimes they become a permanent fixture on our doorstep, looking for that proverbial handout.

When the rich lawyer asked Jesus who his neighbor was, so he knew who to love, he was given the story of the Good Samaritan. Now to refresh your memory, in case you don’t remember the saga in Luke 10, this man had been robbed and left to die on the roadside. Righteous (or so one would have thought) men walked past him, but a lower-than-life Samaritan (their standards, not mine) stopped and helped. He not only helped him, but made certain he would be tended to in the future. He spared no expense. He didn’t put a cap on how much could be spent on this stranger and his needs. There was no timeline.

The Bible doesn’t tell us what happened after. It doesn’t tell us if the robbed man ever knew his benefactor. It doesn’t tell us if there were permanent injuries that would need a lifetime of care. It doesn’t even tell us if he lived, or if it was money wasted on a terminal situation. And who was this guy? Did he deserve to be robbed and left? Maybe he was a thief whose buddies wanted one less division of the spoils! Obviously those aren’t important things in defining a neighbor.

If I love my neighbor, and my neighbor is any stranger in need, can I have words like “used,” “taken advantage of,” “disappointed in,” “conned,” etc. in my vocabulary? Do I only do God’s will if I see the benefits, or do I sometimes have to wait until I’m in His presence to know the results? Will human nature be rude and ugly sometimes? These are, of course, rhetorical questions, but ones I think we should consider when we worry about our own feelings while helping someone else. I know I’ve got a long way to go…what about you? More importantly, do you really believe we have a choice?