Luke

Part 1: Taking the Long View | Part 2: Anticipating the Then | Part 3: Living in the Now—Confident Expectation | Part 4: Living in the Now—Patient Endurance

God has shown us a glimpse or two of how this life transitions to the eternal. The details are sketchy, but the overall picture is clear: we have perfect fellowship with the infinitely, eternally, unchangeably good God, and we serve him meaningfully and perfectly, having shed our personal flaws and having entered an unbroken cosmos. In the meantime, the Scripture tells us, we endure the difficulties of the present broken world because we are eagerly anticipating what is to come.

But we’re not just hanging on, waiting for the good stuff. And we’re not just passive, waiting for God to do what he’s promised.

There’s good stuff now. Lots of it. And there’s work to be done—joyously, effectively, redemptively.

Jesus himself told us how our energy should be directed during these days of anticipation.

Shortly before his death, he told a story about a nobleman who “went to a distant country to get royal power for himself and then return” (Lk 19.12). He gathered his servants, gave them resources, and said, “Do business with these until I come back” (Lk 19.13).

Our more familiar KJV renders that statement, “Occupy till I come.” The less formal NIV says, “Put this money to work until I come back.”

And the story ends with two servants being rewarded, on his return, for their diligence, and one being condemned for being more concerned with security than productivity.

Did Jesus intend for this story to guide our time as we wait for his return?

You think?

Jesus set the example himself. As a boy of twelve—too young to be a rabbi, at a time too early for the death his Father had planned for him—he wasn’t playing the 1^st-century equivalent of video games. He was about his Father’s business. When the family was in Jerusalem—as it likely was at least three times a year, for the pilgrimage feasts—he headed for his Father’s house. And he was surprised that his parents didn’t think to look for him there first.

The Father’s business.

The Father has invested in all of his people, in different ways. We’re all good at something—some of us at many things—and we can do those things for him, and his work, and his people. There’s great joy in doing something well; God has kindly set up the world so that our greatest joy is in doing well those things for which we are gifted—and thereby accomplishing his work, showing all who see us the glories of the invisible God.

I started life on a little family farm. There’s great satisfaction in working hard all day and then seeing the visible results of your labor—the plowing, the planting, the irrigating, the weeding, the piles of harvested corn, the shucked ears hanging to dry, the ground corn meal, the well-fed cattle, the milk, the butter, the cheese, the beef. Every day there’s a new opportunity for the joy of accomplishment and the visible and tasty fruits of your labor.

This week is Thanksgiving in the USA—the meal that takes hours to prepare and more hours to clean up after, but that lasts, seemingly, just 15 minutes. Yet we all know it’s worth it—not just for the 15 minutes of turkey and gravy and mashed potatoes and cranberry sauce, but for the shared experience and fellowship.

How much more is our lifetime of preparation for the eternal feast worth it? Even in the preparation there’s joy of visible accomplishment—changed lives, examples of mercy and grace—and joy of fellowship, working together toward a goal that’s bigger than all of us.

When The Day arrives, his servants shall serve him (Re 22.3).

Better get some practice.

²⁰The one who testifies to these things says, “Surely I am coming soon.”
Amen. Come, Lord Jesus!
²¹The grace of the Lord Jesus be with all the saints. Amen (Re 22.20-21).

Photo by Aaron Burden on Unsplash

One of the most famous stories in the Bible didn’t actually happen—it’s a parable—but like all of Jesus’ teaching, it shows remarkable insight into the way people think. And it reminds us that not much about us has changed since he walked the earth. There is, indeed, nothing new under the sun.

I’m speaking of the parable of the Good Samaritan. We all know the story.

There’s a man walking from Jerusalem to Jericho. That’s about 14 miles as the crow flies (and pedestrians don’t), down a steep and winding road through rugged, rocky, outcropped desert—what American Westerners would call Badlands. In the other direction, of course, it’s steeply uphill, a feature that in those days encouraged brigands. You hide behind a rock, and you wait for a lone (foolish) exhausted traveler to struggle pantingly by, and you make short work of him.

And so, where the robber meets the road, someone does that to this guy, leaving him shekel-less and beaten by the side of the road. A profitable day’s work.

And along comes a priest, somebody who really ought to care—but he doesn’t. He leaves the man helpless and dying in mid-desert under a hot sun. In essence, he kills him in his heart by leaving him to what can only be death.

Along comes a Levite, another full-time Jewish worker, another one who Ought to Care. And he doesn’t either.

Then comes the Samaritan.

This story doesn’t hit us the way it would have hit Jesus’ hearers, because we don’t revulse at the word. Maybe we should reset the story in our own culture.

Along comes a radicalized Muslim. A communist-sympathizing BLM agitator. An Antifa rioter.

Nancy Pelosi. Kamala Harris. AOC.

A Democrat.

You know, somebody like that.

And he defies all expectations. He is moved by what he sees, and he acts to help the man, providing first aid, taking him to medical care, paying his costs because he’s a robbery victim and has no means—and then he just leaves, not seeking anything in return.

He’s a friend—from the victim’s perspective, an invisible, anonymous stranger, but a friend.

You may be surprised to learn that my main point today isn’t this convicting story—though there’s plenty here for all of us to be convicted about.

My point, as reflected in the title above, is what happens before Jesus tells the story.

A lawyer—that is, a specialist in the Torah, the Law of Moses—asks Jesus what he needs to do to gain eternal life (Lk 10.25). Jesus says essentially, “What do you think?” The questioner dips into his area of expertise and delivers a perfect summary of the Mosaic Law—in fact, the same summary that Jesus Himself delivers elsewhere: love God, and love your neighbor (Mt 22.34-40). Jesus says, “You’re right; do that.”

And then the man, the lawyer, looks for a loophole: “Um, just how, exactly, would you define the word neighbor?” It depends, you see, on what the meaning of the word is is.

And now Jesus tells the story.

And he chooses as the protagonist precisely the person that every one of his hearers would have said is most certainly not his neighbor.

What’s the point?

Who is my neighbor?

It’s anyone who needs my help.

Anyone.

Most especially the surprising ones. The Others. The enemies.

In 2004 Vermont Governor Howard Dean was a candidate for the Democratic nomination for president. At a campaign event a voter chided Dean for speaking so harshly about his neighbor, President Bush. Dean replied, “George Bush is not my neighbor,” thereby nicely illustrating the very human tendency Jesus was combating with the parable.

We’re all for ethics, all for kindness, all for grace, when we’re the potential victim. But when grace is called for from us, we want to live by the loopholes. In this instance, you see, it’s different.

No. It’s not.

How different would our world be today, do you suppose, if Christ’s ambassadors represented him with the kind of grace that surprises and shocks precisely those who hate them? What if the behavior of Christians was actually … surprising? What if it didn’t look precisely like the behavior of everyone else on the battlefield?

What if?

Photo credit: The Good Samaritan, by Jacob Jordaens, c. 1616 – si.wsj.net, Public Domain, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=19655930

Dan Olinger

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How It Ends, Part 5: Living in the Now—Diligent Occupation

On Living by the Loopholes