A significant migration is taking place within the ranks of the Church. Over the last several years, people are waking up to a new reality and in that personal awakening, they are becoming relationally and spiritually brave no longer willing to toe the line of other people’s expectations. These awakened ones refuse to allow anyone, whether it’s the influence of a leader within the Church, the threat of rejection from a group, or telling them when or where they can travel in this life to love their neighbor as themselves.

We are beginning to see the story of the Good Samaritan played out within the ranks of the Church. A significant moment in the story of the Good Samaritan took place when people who should have known better “…crossed to the other side of the road and passed him by”  (Luke 10:31) leaving a beaten and wounded man to suffer alone. When we read the story of the Good Samaritan and see the people who ignored the suffering in an act of avoidance, we too quickly say, “That’s not me!”  But it is. Each of us has crossed over to the other side at various times distancing ourselves from our responsibility to love our neighbor, especially the ones we have been told don’t deserve our love.

Leading up to the story of the Good Samaritan, the Lord was questioned, “Teacher, what should I do to inherit eternal life?” (vs.25). Jesus pointed the inquirer to the Old Testament writings of Moses. The man rightly answered by saying that we are to love God will our entire being and the evidence of that love of God is to “Love your neighbor as yourself” (vs. 27).  

The proof of that kind of love is our willingness to alter our course of life to personally engage in the situations that have caused the suffering. That engagement happens when we address topics we’ve been told are off-limits, topics that disrupt the errant status quo. Some have said it’s not the calling of the Church to confront political and institutional wrongdoing, even while a nation is going down in flames, or when we are told to ignore those we perceive as our enemy. 

On the other side of the road are deceptive theologies, especially about Jesus and the way of salvation, that seem reasonable and acceptable to the biblically uninformed, but have become clubs of deception wielded by the devil seriously wounding the faith of many and destroying the integrity and witness of the Church. On the other side are government policies that serve no one but the politicians and their cronies who profit from their legislation. On the other side of the road are the enemies of all that is good – people we have been told are beyond redemption and don’t deserve the gift of mercy. We are told to just keep on walking. There’s nothing to see here.

Because the Church has been told to pass by and not cross over to the other side of the road to engage certain issues and individuals, the Lord will raise up the equivalent of “a despised Samaritan” (vs. 33). These Good Samaritans will do what many have failed to do because they have been told it’s not their calling or their business, or that evil people are getting their just reward.

Excuses used that give us permission to pass by the victims of heresies will not stand up. Neither will be ignoring the actions of governments nor the execution of their political agendas that lead people and entire nations into pits of sorrow. The same holds true for writing off people who have done great evil falsely thinking they are too far gone for God to reach them. The same prejudice that led to the cultural division between the Jews and Samaritans is alive and well today, just in a different context.