Trinity 13 – 6 September 2009

Deuteronomy 6, Psalm 112, Galatians 3, Luke 10

Last week, whenever my son Gunder got into trouble, he would say, “Hi Daddy! Hi Mommy! I love you!” He has yet to learn that too much sweetness only gives a boy toothaches and cavities. Yet, we can see in Gunder’s reply a commonality between two year olds and adults: whenever we get into trouble we think love is our get out of jail free card, after all where we not raised with the Beattle’s song, All we need is love. The problem, however, is that we do not know what love means. In the last edition of Christianity Today, there was an insightful article about the impreciseness of words and modern Americans ability to make words vague to use words for their advantage.[1] Nowhere is the impreciseness of modern English more apparent than in our word “Love.” My Oxford American Dictionary has these definitions for the word “Love:” 1) a warm liking, 2) affection, 3) God’s benevolence, 4) a strong liking, 5) affectionate greeting, 6) a loved person 7) a score of zero in tennis. Which one of these definitions do we allude to when we use the word “Love?” Which one of these definitions does Gunder allude to when he uses the word “Love” in a vain attempt to escape trouble? This may seem like an interesting semantic problem, but it has unfathomable ramifications on our understanding of the Bible. When the lawyer (in Luke 10: 25-29) asked Jesus, “What must I do to inherit eternal life?” The correct answer was, “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 love your neighbor as yourself.” What definition of “Love” are we to use?

Fortunately, the Greek language is not as vague and imprecise as the English language concerning love. Our one word “Love” translates at least four different Greek words. The Greeks used the word στοργή (storge) to denote affection, especially towards family members or anyone else to whom you may be familiar. They used the word φιλία (philia) to denote a friendship or any strong bond between people with similar interests. They used the word ἔρως (eros) to denote a sense or feeling of being in love, it is a passionate love. Finally the Greeks used the word ἀγάπη (agapē, which some translations of the Bible translate as Charity) to denote an unconditional love that is not dependent upon any lovable characteristics or qualities in the person or object loved.[2] What Greek word for love is found in the Summery of the Law? How must we love God and our Neighbor?

The Greek reads, “Ἀγαπήσεις κύριον τὸν θεόν σου ἐξ ὅλης τῆς καρδίας σου καὶ ἐξ ὅλης τῆς ψυχῆς σου καὶ ἐξ ὅλης τῆς ἰσχύος σου καὶ ἐξ ὅλης τῆς διανοίας σου καὶ τὸν πλησίον σου ὡς σεαυτόν.” We are to ἀγάπη God and our neighbors. It is necessary for Christians to unconditionally love God and unconditionally love our neighbor. Anyone who has spent one nano-second introspectively reflecting on their love towards God and their neighbor knows that loving God and our neighbor in this fashion is difficult or rather it is impossible. Therefore, is Jesus just joking when he says, “Do this and you will live.” There is nothing in the text to suggest that he is.

To teach us how we can unconditionally love God and unconditionally love our neighbors, Jesus told the parable of the Good Samaritan. The key to understanding this parable, and all of Jesus’ parables for that matter, is recognize that this parable revolves around Jesus, it teaches us something about him. We know this parable well, it has been told countless times in Sunday school, Bible Study and in Church. A picture of this parable could even be found in our houses, great artists have beautifully painted it thousands of times. A band of robbers nearly beat a man traveling from Jerusalem to Jericho to death. A Priest passed by the man, but he refused to help. A Levite passed by the man, but he refused to help. A Samaritan, despised by the Israelites for their compromised Jewish ethnicity and compromised worship, passed by the man and unconditionally loved him.

The Priest, whose job was to offer the animal sacrifices in the temple, symbolizes the temple and its sacrifices. The Priest, however, failed to love unconditionally his neighbor and this exposed his failure to love God unconditionally. To put it bluntly, the Priest, even though he served in the temple and offered the appropriate animal sacrifices for himself and the people, failed to inherit eternal life.

The Levite, whose job was to maintain the temple and maintain the law,[3] symbolizes the law and those who attempt to love God and their neighbors by zealously adhering to the law. The Levite, however, failed to love unconditionally his neighbor exposing his lack of love for God. To say it bluntly, the Levite, even though he zealously adhered to the law, failed to inherit eternal life.

Jesus’ parable smote his contemporaries like the flat edge of sword. Eternal life was not (and still is not) inherited through the temple, the sacrifices, or the law, those very things his contemporaries zealously maintained to merit eternal life. The Samaritan, though, did unconditionally love the neighbor, thus confirming he unconditionally loved God, which proved he had inherited eternal life. The Samaritan did not have access to the temple, to the temple sacrifices or to the law. Therefore, the Samaritan faithfully relied upon God and God alone, in his worship, to be forgiven, and to love. The only way we can experience unconditional love and to love God and our neighbors unconditionally is through a faithful reliance upon God. Furthermore, God is known through Jesus Christ who is the word made flesh and the image of the invisible God. So we may say that to know Jesus is to know God. Thus, the parable of the Good Samaritan teaches that unconditional love, agape love, is only possible through a faithful reliance upon Jesus Christ.

This is because unconditional love is only possible when the weight of sin and the burden of our trespasses has been removed from our shoulders. Since neither the temple, nor the temple sacrifices nor the law can remove this burden, someone else must remove this burden: Jesus. He is the Lamb of God who has taken away the sins of world. He is the only person qualified to forgive us of our trespasses and quicken our love for God and for our neighbor. So in a sense, love is the great get out of jail free card, but only because Jesus, out of his great love for us, took our jail time upon himself, so that we may be free to love Him, the Father, and the Spirit in return and love others just as we have first been loved.

Our modern usage of words may often be imprecise and misleading, but there is nothing misleading about Jesus. Nor is there anything imprecise about his command to “Go and do likewise.” But best of all there is nothing vague or vacuous about his promise to forgive our sins and to give us his unconditional love so that we may love the Lord our God with all our heart, with all our soul and with all our strength and love our neighbor as ourselves.

[1] Marilyn Chandler McEntyre, Letting Words Do Their Work, “Christianity Today,” September 2009. pgs 54-57.

[2] These four definitions of love are based upon C.S. Lewis’s book The Four Loves.

[3] Exodus 32:25-29 “And Moses saw that the people [were running wild and that Aaron had let them get out of control and so become a laughingstock to their enemies]. Then Moses stood in the gate of the camp, and said, Who [is] on the LORD'S side? [let him come] unto me. And all the sons of Levi gathered themselves together unto him. And he said unto them, Thus saith the LORD God of Israel, Put every man his sword by his side, [and] go in and out from gate to gate throughout the camp, and slay every man his brother, and every man his companion, and every man his neighbour. And the children of Levi did according to the word of Moses: and there fell of the people that day about three thousand men. For Moses had said, Consecrate yourselves to day to the LORD, even every man upon his son, and upon his brother; that he may bestow upon you a blessing this day.” and Numbers 1:53 “the Levites shall keep the charge of the tabernacle of testimony.”