The league of the guilty

a prison sermon on the "good" Samaritan

¹ (see note)

(preached at New Beginnings Worshipping Community inside the Denver Women’s Prison)

The story of the Good Samaritan is what we call a parable – a story Jesus made up to make a point. But from what I hear, if you are visiting the Holy Land local tour guides are happy, for the right price, to show you the “exact spot” where the Good Samaritan helped the man found beaten by thieves. Many a gullible Christian has shelled out good money for this “authentic” Holy Land experience before remembering that the Good Samaritan was a parable.

But it’s one of the biggies…along with The Prodigal Son, this parable of a beaten and robbed man being shown kindness by a Samaritan is engrained in the cultural memory of even those who have never stepped foot into a church. There are laws named after it. Long term care facilities named after it. Even a Boy Scout merit badge named after it. And as happy as I am that at least some of the Bible is part of our cultural mythology, it can be hard to hear the real power of The Good Samaritan if we’re already so sure we know the story. Like for instance, the way we call it the parable of the Good Samaritan, like that’s his first name even though he is never called that in the text.

It’s especially hard to hear what this parable might offer us when we think we already know the so-called moral of the story, which, of course is “it’s good to be helpful”.

But I started to wonder this week if maybe the teachings of Jesus have just a little more to them than say, a flimsy moralism learned from “a very special episode of Saved By The Bell”. Maybe, just maybe this parable has more to it than the Samaritan was good so we should be good in order to inherit eternal life.

Because if anyone was saved in this story it was not the one who managed to do the right thing. The one who was actually saved in this parable was the one who couldn’t manage to do ANYTHING because he was half dead in a ditch. I’m fairly certain that the man who lay robbed and beaten in the ditch was not laying there attempting to be good enough to be saved… and when the nice religious people passed him by not willing to get their hands dirty or their schedules delayed, the man in the ditch laid there helpless while a Samaritan lovingly cared for his wounds and covered his bills.

That is a rough position to be in; receiving mercy from your enemy.

I mean, imagine being on the street and someone beats the crap out of you and steals your wallet and phone. And you’re in so much pain you cannot move. Then you see someone who used to be your roomie and she just walks on by. Then you see me and I literally do nothing but cross to the other side of the street. And then imagine whoever the worst person possible is to you: a Republican, or a Muslim, or an Evangelical, or a Trans person, or a snitch or a cop – whoever it is that you would least like to have help you, and they stop and gently bandage your head with their own scarf and put you in their car not even caring that you’re bleeding and they take you to the ER and give the front desk their credit card so that you don’t even have to pay for it.

OK, now at this point how important is their political party, or gang affiliation, or sexual orientation to you? Not at all right? Because when things are that bad, and we are in that much need none of that shit matters anymore. And I ask you, if it doesn’t matter then does it really matter now? I mean really?

And yet in our sin we hold on to so much garbage about other people. And they hold on to so much garbage about us. But God’s mercy is not bound to our garbage opinions. Thank God.

So was the man in the ditch’s salvation dependant on him in any way whatsoever? No. Because if we go back and look, Jesus told this parable not in response to the lawyer’s question what must I do to inherit eternal life? But to the question, who is my neighbor? The parable of the Good Samaritan is not Jesus telling us to be good so we can be saved, it’s about Jesus telling us that sometimes people who we are sure are the farthest thing from good are the one’s God sends to save our sorry asses. And sometimes we are the ones who get to show kindness to those who think we are trash.

Because, honestly, maybe God isn’t interested in making you a better person. Maybe God is interested in making you a new person.

Because being better people – being good-er Samaritans is something we can do on our own. But to become new people we need God. To become new people we need a God who daily drowns our old dying selves in the watery grave of baptism and raises us to new life. To be new people we need a God who offers us a way where there is no way. Becoming new people is what this whole Jesus-following thing is about. In this parable we see that sometimes it comes by being robbed. Robbed of our shame. Robbed of our opinions about other people. Robbed of our old ideas about ourselves. Maybe you are sitting here today with some pretty worn out old ideas about yourself. And if so, I hope you get knocked over by the holy spirit.

And sometimes becoming new people comes from being beaten. Beaten down by the impossibility of perfection. Beaten up by the bondage of resentment and victimhood. And sometimes it is from that ditch where you lay unable to rise to the occasion, unable to do for yourself, unable to justify yourself, unable to choose your mode of healing … that your salvation comes near you in the form of the last thing you’d expect. From the neighbor of last resort.

The one in this parable who receives new life is not the one who managed to be really super duper merit badge good. The one who received new life was the one who received real mercy. real grace. And here’s the thing. As Richard Rohr says, once you have received real grace…real mercy… you are no longer in the position of deciding who the so called “deserving poor” are.

When we have received grace, we develop compassion toward to anyone who is also in need of grace. This is how God’s kingdom works. It’s a league of the guilty. I bet you anything that the Samaritan wasn't just some merit badge level good guy. I bet he was someone who had also needed help at some point and just knew what that felt like. Maybe he himself had robbed someone and not “gotten what he deserved”. My money is on that explanation.

So the good news is not that you can be a better person if you just try harder so that then Jesus won’t have to keep being disappointed in you. The good news is that you can be a new person. That indeed you are being made a new person by God. And wait till you get a hold of who God is making you into, because it might just look like God is making you into a person who has experienced so much grace that you cannot help but come near to the one who lays robbed and beaten - God is making you into someone who shows mercy not out of your goodness, but out of your newness. And new people are what all Jesus’ best stories are about. I can’t wait to hear how yours turns out.

Amen.

1. a term shamelessly pick-pocketed from the unbeatable Francis Spufford