Not Too Hard

Deuteronomy 30:9-14; Luke 10:25-37
July 14, 2019
First Presbyterian Church, Sterling IL
Christina Berry

The reading from the Hebrew scriptures today comes from
the book of Deuteronomy, the fifth and final book of Torah.
This book is set in the plains of the land of Moab
as the Israelites are preparing to enter the promised land.
The setting and the scene afford Moses an opportunity
for a second giving of the law – remembering and renewing it’s promise.

Moses makes speeches throughout Deuteronomy, in between laws.
He knows that he will not enter the promised land,
and he wants to ensure that the people remember their past:
how they were not faithful, but God was.

In this section, in the middle of his farewell address,
Moses assures the people what God will do, and what they must do.
God will bless them, and all their works.
And they must obey God’s law with heart and soul.
Moreover, Moses wants to make them understand
that following the law is NOT beyond their ability,
NOT too hard for them to do.

Just as God is not a distant and impersonal deity, but YOUR God,
so the word – the Torah – is not far from you,
but in your mouth, and in your heart.

Listen for God’s word to you in Deuteronomy 30:9-14:

…and the LORD your God will make you abundantly prosperous
in all your undertakings, in the fruit of your body,
in the fruit of your livestock, and in the fruit of your soil.
For the LORD will again take delight in prospering you,
just as he delighted in prospering your ancestors,
when you obey the LORD your God by observing his commandments
and decrees that are written in this book of the law,
because you turn to the LORD your God
with all your heart and with all your soul.
Surely, this commandment that I am commanding you today
is not too hard for you, nor is it too far away.
It is not in heaven, that you should say,
"Who will go up to heaven for us, and get it for us
so that we may hear it and observe it?"
Neither is it beyond the sea, that you should say,
"Who will cross to the other side of the sea for us,
and get it for us so that we may hear it and observe it?"
No, the word is very near to you;
it is in your mouth and in your heart for you to observe.

God’s word for God’s people.
Thanks be to God.


Our Gospel reading today is from the Gospel of Luke,
a familiar story that most of us refer to as “The Good Samaritan.”
Many of us have heard this story so often that we think we know it,
and most of us tend to see ourselves as one of those listening
as Jesus takes a lawyer down a peg with this story.
Maybe it will help us to listen again today
with a view toward seeing how it is that WE can become a neighbor –
not only to those nice people down the block,
but to those we might otherwise ignore, oppose, or dismiss.
Let’s listen for God’s call to us in Luke 10:25-37:

Just then a lawyer stood up to test Jesus.
"Teacher," he said, "what must I do to inherit eternal life?"
He said to him, "What is written in the law? What do you read there?"
He answered, "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 your neighbor as yourself."
And he said to him, "You have given the right answer;
do this, and you will live."
But wanting to justify himself, he asked Jesus,
"And who is my neighbor?"
Jesus replied, "A man was going down from Jerusalem to Jericho,
and fell into the hands of robbers, who stripped him, beat him,
and went away, leaving him half dead.
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 while traveling came near him;
and when he saw him, he was moved with pity.
He went to him and bandaged his wounds,
having poured oil and wine on them.
Then he put him on his own animal, brought him to an inn,
and took care of him.
The next day he took out two denarii, gave them to the innkeeper,
and said, 'Take care of him; and when I come back,
I will repay you whatever more you spend.'
Which of these three, do you think,
was a neighbor to the man who fell into the hands of the robbers?"
He said, "The one who showed him mercy."
Jesus said to him, "Go and do likewise."

The word of the Lord.
Thanks be to God.


As I mentioned a moment ago, many of us hear this story Jesus told,
and we identify with the listening crowd.
Like spectators at a debate, we are rooting for Jesus
as he puts this imperious, arrogant, snarky lawyer in his place.
I’ve rarely met anyone who’d admit to identifying with the lawyer.
After all, it says he’s testing Jesus, wanting to justify himself.
But he’s a man of faith, a descendant of those people in Deuteronomy
who were told to honor God,
to obey the law – HEART AND SOUL!
He’s a man who’s done more than slavishly submit to every detail,
obeying the letter of the law but not the spirit.
He has genuinely and sincerely studied the scripture,
and the law is indeed in his heart and in his mouth.

And he thinks like a lawyer.
As someone who’s been told that I think like a lawyer,
I hear that as a compliment.

Thinking like a lawyer is being open to the logic on all sides of a question,
while finding and focusing intently on a main principle.
Thinking like a lawyer means you can follow all arguments
to their logical conclusion, whether or not you like them,
so that you can successfully make a case for why YOUR argument is right!

One former lawyer says, “The goal, of course, was for us to become rational, logical, categorical, linear thinkers—trained to separate what is reasonable from what is not and what is true from what is false.”[1]

That may sound tiring and tiresome to some people,
but growing up in my family,
that was just what happened at the dinner table every night.

So, let’s think like a lawyer for a minute – it’s not too hard!
Jesus, what do we need to do to inherit eternal life?

Jesus knows how to think like a lawyer, too, because he asks two questions:
What is written in the law? What does it say? AND
How do you interpret those words? What does it mean?

We know the law, so we respond with the core of the law, the Shema:
“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 your neighbor as yourself."
It’s the great commandment – on it hang all the law and the prophets.

Good answer, Jesus says.

But we aren’t done pressing our case, and Jesus isn’t done with us.
We ask, “Who, exactly, is my neighbor?”
Who, indeed. Jesus answers with a story.

The story he tells has been told and retold and retold,
and in many versions the Levite and the priest are the bad guys,
religious people who walk on by.
In other versions we hear about the historic hatred
between Samaritans and Jews.
In most versions, we’re encouraged to identify with the Samaritan;
in developing countries, in places where there is oppression,
Christian listeners identify most closely with the guy in the ditch.

But the Levite and the priest who walk by on the other side of the road,
the Samaritan and the guy in the ditch who is mostly dead,
the innkeeper – those are fictional characters.
In a parable.

Truth is, we’re more like the lawyer.
Maybe we are looking for a loophole.
Maybe we don’t really want to see our neighbor.
Maybe we genuinely don’t understand the Shema –
how to love God and love neighbor with our heart, soul, strength, mind.
Maybe we do think like a lawyer, wanting to justify ourselves.
So we ask these questions:

Why was this guy going down to Jericho alone,
on a road that everyone knows is infested with thieves and robbers?
What was that young woman wearing on the night it happened? 

Why did she wait so long to tell what he did?
Why doesn’t she just leave him?
Why didn’t that kid just walk, or run, away from the bullies?
Where was the mother/father/teacher/officer when that kid went bad?
Why didn’t that black man just do what the officer said?
Why do those people bring their children to our border?
What does any of this have to do with me?

Jesus calls us back to the heart of the matter,
the word that is your mouth and in your heart for you to observe:
love God and love your neighbor.
Jesus gives us a story to live by – a story that asks us
to think and feel and act in a way that may not be logical, or rational,
to think and feel and act in a way that rises above what is reasonable
and focuses on what is merciful,
on what is kind,
on what is loving.

It’s right there in front of us,
just a few steps to the other side of the road.

And it’s not too hard. It’s not too hard.

Go and do likewise.

[1] https://www.thebalancecareers.com/careful-a-career-in-law-could-change-the-way-you-think-2164370