25<\/sup><\/strong> On one occasion an expert in the law stood up to test Jesus. „Teacher,“ he asked, „what must I do to inherit eternal life?“ 26<\/sup> „What is written in the Law?“ he replied. „How do you read it?“ 27<\/sup> He answered, „‚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.‘ “ 28<\/sup> „You have answered correctly,“ Jesus replied. „Do this and you will live.“ 29<\/sup>But he wanted to justify himself, so he asked Jesus, „And who is my neighbor?“ 30<\/sup> In reply Jesus said: „A man was going down from Jerusalem to Jericho, when he was attacked by robbers. They stripped him of his clothes, beat him and went away, leaving him half dead. 31<\/sup> A priest happened to be going down the same road, and when he saw the man, he passed by on the other side. 32<\/sup> So too, a Levite, when he came to the place and saw him, passed by on the other side. 33<\/sup> But a Samaritan, as he traveled, came where the man was; and when he saw him, he took pity on him. 34<\/sup> He went to him and bandaged his wounds, pouring on oil and wine. Then he put the man on his own donkey, brought him to an inn and took care of him. 35<\/sup> The next day he took out two denarii and gave them to the innkeeper. ‚Look after him,‘ he said, ‚and when I return, I will reimburse you for any extra expense you may have.‘ 36<\/sup> „Which of these three do you think was a neighbor to the man who fell into the hands of robbers?“ 37<\/sup> The expert in the law replied, „The one who had mercy on him.“ Jesus told him, „Go and do likewise.\u201d <\/strong><\/p>\n Luke 10:25-37\u00a0 New International Version\u00a0(NIV)<\/strong>Holy Bible, New International Version\u00ae, NIV\u00ae Copyright \u00a91973, 1978, 1984, 2011 by\u00a0Biblica, Inc.\u00ae\u00a0Used by permission. All rights reserved worldwide.<\/strong><\/p>\n Brothers and sisters in Christ, grace and peace to you from God the Father and our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ.\u00a0 Amen.<\/p>\n What is the Law?\u00a0 In other words, what exactly are the things we are supposed to do to inherit eternal life?<\/p>\n Those are words of Deut. 6:4.<\/p>\n 4 Hear, O Israel: The LORD our God, the LORD is one.<\/p>\n 5 Love the LORD your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your strength. 6 These commandments that I give you today are to be on your hearts.<\/p>\n 7 Impress them on your children. Talk about them when you sit at home and when you walk along the road, when you lie down and when you get up.<\/p>\n 8 Tie them as symbols on your hands and bind them on your foreheads.<\/p>\n 9 Write them on the doorframes of your houses and on your gates. (Deu 6:4-9 NIV)<\/p>\n The law is love.\u00a0 Rather simple, yet so hard to do.\u00a0 This lawyer that stood up to question Jesus was a very devout Jew.\u00a0 He would have recited Deut 6 twice a day.\u00a0 He knew the law.\u00a0 But by being so focused on the law he forgot the most important part:\u00a0 That in order to love our neighbor, we start with loving God.\u00a0 The Shema out of Deut 6 does not begin with verse 5 \u201cYou shall love the Lord your god with all your heart, with all your soul, and with all your might.\u201d\u00a0 No, it starts with verse 4:\u00a0 \u201cHear O Israel:\u00a0 The LORD is our God, the LORD alone.\u201d<\/p>\n That preamble to the commandment of love is so important.\u00a0 If the LORD is our God, then we cannot be.\u00a0 That is what makes loving our neighbors so hard.\u00a0 Putting God first is in a way a test of faith.\u00a0 It is getting down on your knees and asking for help.\u00a0 It is humbling and scary.\u00a0 It makes you uncomfortable.\u00a0 And there is absolutely no way to prepare for what happens next.\u00a0 Jesus puts all this into words by telling the parable of the Good Samaritan, which is a parable that we are familiar with.\u00a0 This parable doesn\u2019t focus on the deeds of a fellow Jew, but instead on the deeds of someone who was considered an outsider.\u00a0 The Priest and the Levite, well, they both crossed on the other side of the road.\u00a0 But the Samaritan, a nasty, dirty, enemy of the Jews, was the one that showed pity to his fellow man.\u00a0 He checked his theology at the door, put his personal beliefs behind him, and knelt down to help a fellow human in need.<\/p>\n In a world that is so divided and polarized by race, ethnicity, social class, and religion, we need to hear this story more.\u00a0 While this parable provided a wonderful example for the lawyer, it also provides still a wonderful example for us.\u00a0 Did Jesus come into the world just for the Jews, for God\u2019s chosen people?\u00a0 Or did Jesus come into the world for the entire world?\u00a0 I remember a situation that happened my senior year of seminary.\u00a0 I, along with a classmate who is a now also a pastor, were heading up to Harbison.\u00a0 As we came down Monticello road, we got stopped at a stoplight.\u00a0 We were approached by a man that said he needed money or food.\u00a0 He was homeless.\u00a0 While it is the human reaction to turn away and to keep on driving, this classmate of mine said:\u00a0 \u201cwell, I don\u2019t have any money.\u00a0 But if you want to ride, we will take you down here to the gas station and buy you some food.\u201d\u00a0 He hopped in and we went.\u00a0 We never saw that man again.\u00a0 I don\u2019t know where he is or what he is doing.\u00a0 But I know he didn\u2019t go hungry that night or the next day.<\/p>\n The gospel calls us to be good to our neighbor.\u00a0 To love our neighbor, whether we know them or not.\u00a0 So I want to extend to you a little challenge.\u00a0 I want you to help someone.\u00a0 It could be by donating food or items to Mission Lexington or another charity.\u00a0 It could be buying a few groceries for someone.\u00a0 It could be by paying for the meal of the person behind you in the drive thru.\u00a0 It may be by sending someone a card for no apparent reason, simply a \u201cthinking of you\u201d type message.\u00a0 You get to decide, and then you get to act.\u00a0 But here is the kicker:\u00a0 do it with the expectation that you will get nothing in return.\u00a0 And then let me know the stories.\u00a0 Tell me what happened and your reaction.\u00a0 Stories of love and grace are meant to be shared, not for personal gain, but for the glory of God.\u00a0 So as you leave today, be thinking of how you will honor God by loving your neighbor, then go, and do it, and pray that it keeps going.\u00a0 In the name of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit.\u00a0 Amen.<\/p>\n —<\/p>\n \u00a9The Rev. Dr. Judson F Merrell, STS<\/p>\n \u00a0\u00a0 judsonmerrell@bellsouth.net<\/p>\n \u00a0\u00a0 St. Peter\u2019s Lutheran Church<\/p>\n \u00a0\u00a0 Lexington, SC USA<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" The 5th Sunday after Pentecost | July 13, 2025 | A Sermon on Luke 10:25-37 | by The Rev. Dr. Judson F Merrell, STS | 25 On one occasion an expert in the law stood up to test Jesus. „Teacher,“ he asked, „what must I do to inherit eternal life?“ 26 „What is written in […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":24936,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[38,157,853,108,110,235,529,3,109],"tags":[],"beitragende":[],"predigtform":[],"predigtreihe":[],"bibelstelle":[],"class_list":["post-24935","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-lukas","category-beitragende","category-bibel","category-current","category-engl","category-judson-f-merrell","category-kapitel-10-chapter-10-lukas","category-nt","category-predigten"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.theologie.uzh.ch\/apps\/gpi\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/24935","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.theologie.uzh.ch\/apps\/gpi\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.theologie.uzh.ch\/apps\/gpi\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.theologie.uzh.ch\/apps\/gpi\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.theologie.uzh.ch\/apps\/gpi\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=24935"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.theologie.uzh.ch\/apps\/gpi\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/24935\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":24938,"href":"https:\/\/www.theologie.uzh.ch\/apps\/gpi\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/24935\/revisions\/24938"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.theologie.uzh.ch\/apps\/gpi\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/24936"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.theologie.uzh.ch\/apps\/gpi\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=24935"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.theologie.uzh.ch\/apps\/gpi\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=24935"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.theologie.uzh.ch\/apps\/gpi\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=24935"},{"taxonomy":"beitragende","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.theologie.uzh.ch\/apps\/gpi\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/beitragende?post=24935"},{"taxonomy":"predigtform","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.theologie.uzh.ch\/apps\/gpi\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/predigtform?post=24935"},{"taxonomy":"predigtreihe","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.theologie.uzh.ch\/apps\/gpi\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/predigtreihe?post=24935"},{"taxonomy":"bibelstelle","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.theologie.uzh.ch\/apps\/gpi\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/bibelstelle?post=24935"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}