Jesus asked an expert in Jewish law how he read the law concerning how to “inherit eternal life” (Luke 10: 25). The answer given was pleasing to Jesus: “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 self” (Luke 10:27).

The expert wasn’t satisfied with Jesus approval, however, and, “wanting to justify himself,” (whatever that means), (vs.29), asked Jesus to explain to him exactly who qualifies as being a neighbor. Here Jesus gives what has come to be the well-known parable of the Good Samaritan.

A man is robbed, severely injured, and abandoned along a roadside. A priest and a Levite happen by and upon seeing the suffering man choose to move to the other side of the road and not make him a part of their life. Then a Samaritan, (an unappreciated and hated fellow from the other side of the tracks) happens by. And, wouldn’t you know it, he stops, extends mercy, tends to the suffering man’s needs, takes him to a motel, cleans him up, and pays the manager of the motel enough money to cover a couple of days expenses, with the promise that upon his return he would also pay for any other expenses incurred by the victim.

Then the parable takes a twist. Jesus asked, “Which of these three do you think was a neighbor to the man who fell into the hands of robbers” (vs. 36)? His point wasn’t that the victim was the neighbor in need of help. The victim simply gave opportunity to reveal what a good neighbor is like. The neighbor is the Samaritan “who had mercy” on the victim. To this Jesus said, “Go and do likewise” (vs. 37).

What do followers of Jesus look like? Jesus says they look like this Samaritan fellow who when he could have moved to the other side of the road, also, chose, instead, to extend mercy. “Go,” Jesus said, “and do likewise.”