GO AND DO LIKEWISE!

Sermon for Proper 10 C RCL 7-11-2010, Offered by Nathan Ferrell for Trinity Episcopal Shared Ministry

Texts: Amos 7:7-17; Psalm 82; Colossians 1:1-14; Luke 10:25-37


Christen White Cranford was a young woman in her early ‘20’s who died from a heart ailment in 2002. At the time, her father, Dr. Stephen White, was serving as the chaplain of the Episcopal Church at Princeton University. In the eulogy for his daughter, he shared a remarkable story of an experience that he and Christen had together in NYC. She was 15, and they had gone into Manhattan for a day trip just after Christmas. It was a bitterly cold and windy day and Christen was wearing her favorite coat. It was a long woolen coat with black and white checkered pattern on it. At one point, they stopped in an Eddie Bauer store where Dr. White bought a new parka for Christen. She put it on and placed her favorite coat in the shopping bag.

As they walked on outside they came across a young woman with a cup asking for money. She was very thin and wearing only jeans and a light cotton sweater. The sweater was pulled down over her shoulder and they could see that her bare skin was nearly gray from the cold. Dr. White pulled out some loose change in his pocket – a few dollars and coins – and dropped them into her cup. But when they crossed the street, Christen stopped and said, “Dad, we have to do something for her.”

“What would you like to do?” he asked. “I want to give her my coat.” “What! Your favorite coat?”

“Dad! She needs it more than I do, and anyway, I’ve got two coats!” She said this with that teenage “I can’t believe you’re so stupid” tone of voice.

“Okay, let’s go,” he said. They crossed back to the young woman and Christen helped her to put the long coat on. Once that was done, Dr. White was ready to keep moving in that cold wind, so he turned to leave. But Christen stayed and called to him, “Dad, she’s hungry too!”

“Right! Okay, I’ll go into that deli and get something. You stay here and keep an eye on her in case she moves off and I’ll be right back.”

Dr. White purchased some hot soup and bread in the deli and returned to the corner in less than five minutes. But when he returned, the young woman was gone!

“Christen, where is she?” “She’s gone – she disappeared!”

“What do you mean she disappeared? Didn’t you watch her?”

“Yes! I only looked over my shoulder for a split second to see if you were coming and when I turned back, she was gone. I went to the corner and looked up and down the street and across the street, but I couldn’t see her anywhere. She just disappeared!”

So they walked on. In a few minutes, they came upon another homeless person sitting on the ground, and Christen gave him the soup and bread with a smile. And as they walked, she and her father talked about the time, in the Gospel of Matthew, when Jesus said, “whatever you do for the least of my brothers and sisters, you do it for me.”

I share this story with you because, here in this young girl, in Christen’s attitude – in her ability to see – we have a glimpse of what Jesus is going after in this famous and fantastic parable of the good Samaritan.

What Jesus hopes to see is a change in vision, a change in the lens through which we view other people.

It is exemplary that Christen was able to see this young homeless woman and to be moved by pity into action. Unfortunately, do you know what usually happens when I see homeless people asking for money? I think to myself, “Forget it, pal. All my extra money is paid in taxes. Go ask the government for money! There are plenty of agencies around that can help you!”

I’m being honest with you. I’m not holding myself up as any kind of example. Because what goes on in my head, I think, is probably the same process of justifications that occurred in the minds of the priest and the Levite who passed on by that bloody man in need on the side of the road.

Those justifications in their heads told them that they have no direct obligation toward this suffering person, that their own personal business was much more important than the clear and obvious need right in front of them. But they were wrong, and most often, when I justify myself, I am wrong as well.

What is remarkable about how Jesus responds to this inquiry from the lawyer is that, of course, he does not even answer the question! “And who is my neighbor?” Instead, he responds with a story and with his own question which serves to re-direct the entire discussion.

Jesus throws away that entire law-based question about the boundaries of neighborliness: who is, and who is not my neighbor. Meaning, who am I obligated to treat with love as a neighbor, and who am I allowed to ignore, to pass by without show of mercy.

As long as we continue to think along these lines – of obligation, of duty, of law – then we will continue to miss the mark of God’s will and purpose for our lives! Jesus said that when the Samaritan saw the half-dead traveler lying on the side of the road, “he was moved with pity.” But in the Greek, it literally means that his bowels were moved. This has nothing to do with bodily functions, of course. What it means in the Greek is that his entire insides were wrenched and torn! That he was physically not able to coldly walk by! Because his heart was tender, and he could feel his neighbor’s pain, and he was not able to NOT respond with mercy!

And he didn’t stop and calculate whether or not he was obligated to help this man! Love forced him to act! It flowed out, and he couldn’t help himself!

That’s the kind of people that Jesus wants us to be!

The questions that the Lord puts before us today are these: who is it that I keep passing by? Whose pain and struggle do I feel more comfortable ignoring than taking seriously? Whose suffering do I see every day and yet am unwilling to lift a finger to assuage?

Each one of us will have different personal answers to those questions, depending upon the life situation in which God has placed us, but the big answer that is common to this entire community is very clear to me: it is the city of Camden.

As long as we try to pass on by and go about our business, and try to ignore the mass of human suffering and hardship which exists every day just a few miles up this road, we are insulting the very name of Christian which we bear.

But even more than that: as long as we sit back and allow Camden to fester and decay, we are allowing that catastrophe to drag all of our communities down as well, and we are doing nothing but passing along these problems to our children!

If practical reasoning cannot move us to respond to the need right in front of us, then perhaps the love of God can compel us into action! Because this truth seems clear to me: we must find a way to fix the city of Camden. We must do it.

This much I know for certain: Jesus will not allow us to simply and coldly pass by on the other side of the road, going about our business as if nothing is happening. As if thousands of children right here in Camden are not hungry and scared and sick and in danger every single day!

I confess that I do not have a solution for the plethora of problems that plague Camden, but – my friends – pity and mercy and love do not wait for solutions!

Which one was a neighbor to the man who fell into the hands of robbers? The one who showed him mercy.

What is our calling as the people of God in this time and place? Go and do likewise. Amen.