NewCity Orlando Sermons

Guest Preacher: Irwyn Ince | Luke 10:25-37

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Rev Dr Irwyn Ince preaches about our love life from Luke 10:25-37.

Speaker 1:

Hello everyone, this is Pastor Damian. You're listening to Sermon Audio from New City, orlando. At New City, we believe all of us need all of Jesus for all of life. For more resources, visit our website at NewCityOrlandocom. Thanks for listening.

Speaker 1:

And behold, a lawyer stood up to put him to the test, saying teacher, what shall I do to inherit eternal life? He said to him well, what is written in the law? How do you read it? And he answered you shall love the Lord, your God, with all your heart, with all your soul, with all your strength and with all your mind and your neighbor as yourself. And Jesus said to him you've answered correctly. Do this and you will live. But he, desiring to justify himself, said to Jesus and who is my neighbor? Jesus replied A man was going down from Jerusalem to Jericho and he fell among robbers who stripped him and beat him and departed, leaving him half dead.

Speaker 1:

Now, by chance, a priest was going down that road and when he saw him, he passed by on the other side. So likewise, a Levite, when he came to the place and saw him, passed by on the other side. But a Samaritan, as he journeyed, came to where he was and when he saw him he had compassion. He went to him and bound up his wounds, pouring on oil and wine. Then he set him on his own animal and brought him to an inn and took care of him. And the next day he took out two denarii and gave them to the innkeeper, saying take care of him and whatever more you spend, I will repay you when I come back. Which of these three do you think proved to be a neighbor to the man who fell among the robbers? He said the one who showed him mercy. And Jesus said to him you go and do likewise. This is God's word. Thanks be to God you may be seated.

Speaker 2:

Good morning, new City, orlando. It is good to be with you again in what is kind of becoming an annual thing now. This is my third time with you on my trips down here to Orlando with RTS and, as Pastor Damian said, we've become friends and I always enjoy spending time with him and worshiping here when at least one of the Sundays while I'm in town and you heard the passage of our sermon focus this morning. We are familiar parable and story of Jesus to you and I want to speak to you this morning on this subject. How's your love life? How's your love life Now? My wife and I have just entered a new and what we hope will be a blissful season of our lives together. We just dropped off our fourth and youngest child to college a couple of weeks ago and have now become empty nesters. Yes, bless the Lord.

Speaker 2:

In raising four children we have celebrated a lot of birthdays, thrown a lot of birthday parties and when the fourth child we was a little bit younger, we had a party for him at a place in our community called Pump it Up. Now the folks at Pump it Up are smart. They played music from like the 1990s and like some even from the 1980s, because they knew that that's what the parents of these children would kind of groove to. The kids don't really care about the music. All they really care about is the slides and the obstacle courses and the moon bounce. We had a great time at this party, but if you're a parent, you know this about throwing birthday parties for your children. And even if you're not a parent this morning, you've probably experienced this yourself growing up.

Speaker 2:

When it comes to birthday parties, you've got to be selective. You can't invite everybody to the party. Our son couldn't invite everybody from his class at school, everybody from church, everybody from his Krav Maga group, everybody from the swim team. There's this thing called a budget and what that means is we are spending X amount of dollars on this party, so you get to invite X amount of people and no more. Now he's got to choose. And what we're saying to him is son, you got to discriminate. You got to select from all the circles the people you want to extend an invitation to, and now he's got to have a set of criteria in his mind I'll invite him and not him, I'll invite her but not her. And look, we do this all the time, every day.

Speaker 2:

In some way we are being selective and discriminating on who we spend our time with. In some cases, it's because of work or school or my activities. I got to spend time with you because I work with you or we go to school together and we're in class, but in other cases, we are selective on who we spend time with, based on our preferences. Thank you, and that's actually how we like it to be. That's really a natural thing.

Speaker 2:

The fact that we're discriminating with regard to our time and our associations is not necessarily a bad thing. However, the truth of our natural discriminatory ways are what makes the parable that Jesus puts before us in our passage so so challenging to us. This parable about the good Samaritan is one that you may be intimately familiar with. The phrase good Samaritan is one that is used commonly in our society. You may have even used or heard of it yourself this morning, even if you would not claim to be a Christian.

Speaker 2:

But here's the deal as long as we live and as familiar as we become with this parable, we will never be completely comfortable with its implications. It will always, always challenge us because it pushes back against our naturally and sometimes good discriminatory practices. It will always challenge us because Jesus is calling us to a life of love, but it is a life of love that is based on the law of love. And this is love, the way that Jesus defines love, not the comfortable ways that we want to define it. So, three things I want to share with you from this passage. We're going to talk about the law of love, but three things I want to emphasize from this passage about the life of love. I want to say to you that the life of love is not clean, it is messy. Secondly, the life of love is costly. It is sacrificial. And third, the life of love is committed. Life of love is not clean. The life of love is costly. The life of love is committed.

Speaker 2:

Luke tells us in verse 25 of this passage that a certain lawyer stood up in order to test Jesus. He asks Jesus a question Teacher, what shall I do to inherit eternal life? And when you see the word lawyer here, don't think like the TV show Suits or Law and Order. You know Jack McCoy or Michael Ross in a business suit. No, no, no.

Speaker 2:

This gentleman was an expert in the law, but his concern wouldn't have been the Roman law. He was an expert in Jewish law, the Torah, the law of Moses, the first five books of the Bible. This man and others like him are normally referred to in the gospels as scribes. Every detail of Jewish life was to be regulated by the law of Moses, and so there were men whose lives were devoted to the study of that law. Their job was to study it, to interpret it, to expound upon it, to teach it in schools and synagogues, to decide upon questions about the law, to act as judges.

Speaker 2:

And so we understand the question then, what shall I do to inherit eternal life? He's not asking in order to learn from Jesus. He doesn't want to sit at Jesus' feet, he's not. What he wants to do is confront Jesus and trip him up and try to discredit him and his message. He is not seeking information. You already believe that he knows the answer. I know that none of you wonderful people in here ever do anything like that. You never ask anyone a question that you already know the answer to. We never seek to put anyone to the test to see if they're credible or legitimate. Of course we do. Of course we do. And so, before we try to say that this lawyer is all messed up for trying to question Jesus, we should admit how much of that same spirit might reside in us. But Jesus is saying I am not going to play your game, I don't play by your rules.

Speaker 2:

He asks this lawyer what is written in the law? How do you read it? And of course the lawyer does know the answer. And he quotes from Deuteronomy 6 and verse 5, known as the Shema, and he says you shall 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 then he quotes from Leviticus, chapter 19 and verse number 18, and you shall love your neighbor as yourself. And Jesus says to him you're right Now, go and do it and you'll live no problem. Jesus says this is the sum total of everything about life. This law that you're an expert in can be whittled down to this one phrase the law of love. It's simple Just love God with everything that you've got and love your neighbor like you love yourself, and all will be well.

Speaker 2:

And I have yet to meet someone who has a problem with me saying that the essence of God's law is love. The problem comes when I find out that I don't get to define what love is. See, I'm all right. I'm all right with the law of love if I can make the law of love out to be what I want it to be. And do you see how this shows up in the passage?

Speaker 2:

The lawyer asked the first question to Jesus because he wanted to put Jesus to the test. But he asked the second question to Jesus because Luke says he wants to justify himself. I can keep this law of love, jesus, if I get to do it on my own terms. So here's my next question who's my neighbor? As long as I get to pick who my neighbor is, as long as I have the final say on how and when I express love, I am all good with the law of love.

Speaker 2:

And Jesus does not give us that kind of wiggle room. He doesn't give us the wiggle room to cram in whatever definition of love that we want to. What Jesus wants this lawyer to realize is that he can't fulfill the law of love. What Jesus wants us to realize is that we cannot fulfill the law of love. That's because the law of love is all consuming. You shall love the Lord, your God, with everything, all your heart, soul, might, strength, mind, all the time. You can't simply slip loving God into the compartments of your life. You can't simply be the person says oh hey, I have my come to church on Sunday compartment of God's love. Or I have my devotional and private quiet time every morning compartment of God's love. Or I have my, I provide for my family compartment of God's love. Or I help people in need compartment of God's love. Or I give to charitable causes compartment of God's love. Whatever your compartment is, the common denominator in all of the compartments is all about the eye. It's all about our desire and natural tendency to justify ourselves as if we could make ourselves look good to God. God is not interested in one compartment that you're willing to give over to him. He wants the whole thing.

Speaker 2:

Friend Scott read in his book the wholeness imperative says this. He writes God's character is whole, pure, full, rich and simple and it demands a response of whole, pure, full, rich and simple love. The love of the Lord should consume the whole of the inner person, the outer person and the effect of the person in the world. Jesus wants to transform our love lives to look like this kind of love. And so this lawyer is unknowingly trying to test the law giver about the law and he ends up being the one who learns a lesson.

Speaker 2:

The first part of the lesson was this the law of love is too hard. It's impossible for anyone to love the Lord, god, with everything. You need help. In particular, jesus is getting the point across. You need my help. The point of this second question who's my neighbor? Is to make himself feel good about himself, to look good in his own eyes.

Speaker 2:

And Jesus basically says listen, let me tell you this story. A man's traveling down from Jerusalem to Jericho and he fell among some thugs with bad intentions and they stripped him of his clothes and they beat him bloody. Then they left, leaving him practically dead. The road from Jerusalem to Jericho was about 17 miles of a journey, which treacherous, because there were plenty of caves where gangs could hide and rob people who were daring enough to travel alone. And on this 17 mile journey there was a place, through that journey you had to go, that was known as the pass of blood. Jesus says by chance, a priest was traveling down that road, and we hear Jesus say that and we expect to hear what we expect to hear. What that lawyer would have expected to hear is that oh, this priest is going to help his Jewish brother. He's in luck, his life is going to be saved. But the priest sees the man left for dead and doesn't even investigate the situation. He crosses to the other side of the road and leaves him. And then a Levite comes and comes by and you say okay, okay, now he's going to get some help. But the Levite does the man even worse. The priest wouldn't come close. The Levite, though, comes close to the place where the man was, checks out the situation and then decides to cross over and keep going. Are they so seemingly callous? They have places to go, people to see, things to do, no time to worry about a dying man. He's going to die anyway. Well, maybe, but I think there's more to it.

Speaker 2:

The priests and the Levites were set apart by God in the law. They had significant roles in the religious hierarchy. All priests had responsibility for the sacrificial offerings. The Levites had responsibility for the holy things in the temple, and to do their duty they had to keep themselves ceremoniously clean. Law said in Leviticus 21 and verse one that when it comes to the priest, no one shall make himself unclean for the dead among his people, except for close relatives. The restrictions on the Levites were not as tight. So the Levite gets a little closer, but he's still not willing to touch the man and become ceremonially unclean.

Speaker 2:

And here's the point the life of love that Jesus is describing is not clean, it is messy. Had the priest or the Levite decided to touch the man and enter into his mess, they would have had to go through the last at least seven days of ritual purification before they could go back to their jobs. They would have gotten messy themselves. They would have been inconvenienced by the mess of mercy. You can't do mercy without getting your hands dirty.

Speaker 2:

We like to be neat and clean. We like to fit things within our schedule, we like to fit it within our own expectations, but the life of love that Jesus instructs us on does not do either of those things. I don't have the insight into the process of the priests and the Levite and to their thoughts, but it appears to me that they are more interested in the letter of the law than the spirit of the law. They're more interested in saying I've got to keep myself clean, I serve the Lord, god in the temple and my ministry is too important for me to be distracted by this situation and then be unable to do my ministry job. You cannot love the way Jesus calls us to love without getting your hands dirty. You know how we sometimes do this today. In a sense we, how we do, pass by on the other side, refusing to get messy and inconvenience right.

Speaker 2:

We will sometimes do stuff like drive by mercy. I mean by drive by mercy. Drive by mercy is me thinking let me be charitable and give money. Let me be charitable and buy canned goods and clothes to give to the shelter for those in need and look, those are good and necessary things to do. But it's a problem if I'm doing that because in my heart I don't want to get engaged in the middle of a mess. If I'm trying to do drive by mercy so that I'm never disrupted by the messiness of love, it means that I'm viewing people simply as problems to be fixed. So we'll give money to fix a problem. But people are not problems to be fixed. People are image-bearers of God to be loved, and what that means is that the life of love is not only not clean and messy, but it's costly. A neighbor is found for this man, an image-bearer of God, lying in his own blood about to lose his life. And this neighbor is the most unexpected neighbor you could imagine.

Speaker 2:

Jesus says in verse 33, a Samaritan who was on a journey came to where he was and when he saw him he was moved with compassion. This is what was missing with the priest and the Levite there was some internal movement, but there was no gut reaction of compassion in the right direction. They had an internal reaction. Right, you don't come across somebody who's almost dead and not have some kind of internal reaction as you process what you're going to do. But their reaction was not the right one. It wasn't what's at the heart of the law, which is love.

Speaker 2:

Being moved with a compassion is a response of love and that internal response worked itself out in the Samaritan towards a willingness to pay a deep cost, everything that the priest and the Levite weren't the Samaritan was. He embraced the mess. He touched the man. He had to in order to bandage up his wounds. He had to get messy if he was going to treat the trauma. Picture him getting blood on his own clothes as he pours oil and wine on the man's wounds. When he embraced the mess he went all in.

Speaker 2:

The man can't walk and Jesus says the Samaritan sat him on his own animal. I'm going to walk, you're going to ride. He got to an end and he didn't just drop him off and keep going on his journey. Jesus says in verse 34, he brought him to an end and he took care of him. What did the Samaritan have planned? I don't know what plans he had, but this stranger was more important to him than his plan and he paid the cost of his time. And then the next morning he went into his pocket and he gave the innkeeper the equivalent of two days worth of his salary, instructing the innkeeper to care for the man. And then he says if his care requires any more money, then go ahead and spend it. I will pay you back when I return.

Speaker 2:

Here's the thing, right. Here's the thing that would have been shocking. The Jewish people and the Samaritans were having enemies. They didn't have anything to do with each other. If anyone had an excuse not to show mercy, not to pay the cost of loving this man, it was the Samaritan. Who does that, who loves like that, who, in their right mind, enters into the messy, suffering condition of their enemy, who is moved with the type of compassion for his enemy that will cause him to enter into his enemy's suffering, getting blood on his hands, as he's willing to pay whatever cost is necessary to heal and to restore someone who would have wanted nothing to do with him.

Speaker 2:

And you know the answer. The answer is Jesus. The answer is God himself. We are the ones who ought to see ourselves in this position of left for dead. We are the ones who God looked at and saw us dead in our trespasses, in our sins, enemies of God by nature, children of wrath. And he didn't pass by on the other side. Rather, the Bible says that God, being rich in mercy because of the great love with which he loved us even when we were dead in our trespasses, made us alive together with Christ. By grace, you have been saved and raised us up with him and seated us with him in the heavenly places in Christ Jesus, so that in the coming ages he might show the immeasurable riches of his grace and his kindness towards us in Christ Jesus.

Speaker 2:

This Samaritan living the life of love, reflecting the same compassion that God has given us in Jesus Christ, he's a neighbor to his enemies. You know that you don't get to choose who your neighbors are Like. I know you chose probably the neighborhood you live in for a number of reasons. You search for the right place to live. What's the community like? What's the school system like? What's the crime rate like? But from Jesus' point of view, you do not get to pick and choose who your neighbors are. Everyone in your life, from your most beloved friend to your most despised enemy, is your neighbor.

Speaker 2:

The lawyer, in his question, wanted to emphasize minimum obedience. I want a narrow field of my own choosing. I want to pick and choose who I'm merciful to. I want to pick and choose who I love. With the love of God, I want to decide on my own terms who's worthy of receiving my love and who is not. And Jesus blows the field wide open.

Speaker 2:

And there are no excuses in the life of love. Ethnicity is not an excuse. Relationship problems are not an excuse. Personal preferences and comforts are not excuses. There are no excuses. You cannot love without cost. You cannot love without mess. You did not receive God's love without cost. You did not receive God's love without mess. And so what makes us think that we can give it neatly? Love isn't given on the basis of the person being worthy to receive it. Last thing, last thing. That's why the life of love is not just messy and costly. The life of love is committed. And what I mean is that the life of love takes a spirit of God, empowered commitment. The life of love is not let me gin up my strength so I can love like this. Life of love takes the power and person and presence of the spirit of God at work in the people of God. It takes a spirit, empowered commitment.

Speaker 2:

Jesus asks the lawyer a second question down at the end in verse 36. Which one of these three do you think proved to be a neighbor to the man who fell among the robbers? And the lawyer has no choice but to say the one who showed mercy. And Jesus says you go and do likewise, you go and be indiscriminate when it comes to who is a neighbor. The challenge is, as one commentator puts it one cannot define one's neighbor, one can only be a neighbor. You can't define your neighbor in advance, you can only be a neighbor when the moment of mercy arises.

Speaker 2:

Remember the lawyer's first question. He was testing Jesus and he was only asking the question because he thought he already knew the answer what must I do to inherit eternal life? And Jesus puts him on the defensive by demonstrating to him that he couldn't keep the law of love. The demand is too high, and so the lawyer tried to put a limit on the law of love by limiting his neighbor to his ethnic group. And Jesus tells him about the life of love. And he's in a corner again. Go and do likewise.

Speaker 2:

And the conclusion is the same. I do not have it in me to go and do likewise in my own strength. I do not have it in me to reach out in costly compassion to everyone all the time, even to my enemies. We need the power and the presence of the spirit of God who Jesus gives to us when we come to him by faith, if we're going to live the life of love that Jesus calls us to. And do you know why? Do you know why? Here it is.

Speaker 2:

Last thing I'll say. Here's why we need the active, present, powerful, holy spirit of God to live like this. Because you and I will experience compassion fatigue living the life of love. You and I will grow tired of indiscriminate love if we're drinking from the well of our own strengths, if we're drinking from the well of our own desires. We must, we must, we must drink from the the never ending well of God's spirit, the well that does not run dry, if we're going to have our love lives transformed and live the life of love to the glory of God.

Speaker 2:

So I ask again how's your love life?

Speaker 2:

How's your love life? Do you know the boundless love of God in the person of Jesus Christ? Have you received, by faith, that love of God that is full and immeasurable and vast, and that comes with the power and presence of the spirit of God who transforms us to demonstrate that we've received this love in the way that we love others indiscriminately? May God make it so for us to his glory and praise. Let's pray. We thank you, lord. We thank you, lord, for your word that tells us God is love. We thank you for your word that tells us this is love, not that we loved God, but that he loved us and gave his son to be the atoning sacrifice for our sins. We give you every praise, god, for your love to us in the costly, messly crucifixion of Jesus Christ, and we thank you for the resurrection and the ascension and the outpouring of your Holy Spirit that our love lives might be transformed to your glory. May you make us people who evidence this in our lives and we will give you all the praise Amen, amen and amen.