The Christian Life Luke 10:25-37
What Does God Want Us to Do?
What is the purpose of a sock factory? If you said to make socks, you are wrong. The purpose of a sock factory is to make money. What is the purpose of a Christian? Why did God convert us? Why are we on this planet? If we do not know what God wants, how can we do it? If we aim at nothing we will most certainly hit it. Worse, we wind up aiming at the wrong things and fail to be and do what God wants.
Not Religion- If we look at what it means to be a Christian in Evangelical churches the answers is – to be religious. People in our churches will answer this question by telling us to do what they are doing.
The soul winner will says win souls; the Bible student says study the Bible; the Presbyterian says worship God; the TV healer says send your money to God at his address; holiness folk say, “Don’t smoke, don’t chew and don’t go with girls who do.”; and the Baptist will say get busy in your church. “Mary had a little lamb/ It would have been a sheep /But then it joined a Baptist Church / And died from lack of sleep.”
The truth is, these things are mentioned in the NT but not emphasized. For example, take the three most emphasized religious duties in the Baptist church- supporting the church, Bible study and soul winning. Do these three things and you are Deacon material and Sunday School teacher material. There are very few verses telling us to do these. We already know more Bible than we are doing. Helmut Theilicke says,
“One of the best ways to keep God at arm’s length is to study and discuss Him”.
But the biggest problem is this is exactly what the Pharisees did, and they called Jesus a devil, and had him killed. They were in church every week. Jesus said they “searched” the Scriptures (Jn. 5:39). And he said they traveled land and sea to make converts and made them two times the child of hell they were (Matt. 23:15)
We can go soul winning every night, study the Bible every day, go to church, worship God, give our money to God, serve on seventeen church committees and go to hell. The Pharisees did all these and more.
What God Wants- What then does God want? He wants faith. Hebrews 11:6 says.
“Without faith it is impossible to please Him. For he who comes to God must believe that He is, and that He rewards those who diligently seek Him.”
God wants obedience. I John 2:2-4 says,
“The one who says, ‘I know Him’ and does not do what He commands is a liar and the truth is not in him.”
And finally, God wants love for Him and our fellow man.
In our text a Bible teacher (scribe) asked Jesus how a person receives eternal life, e.g. becomes right with God. Jesus asked him what his Bible said. The man quoted Lev. 19:8 and Dt. 6:5,
“You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, soul, mind and strength and love your neighbor as you love yourself.” Lk. 10:
The Priority of Love
The Bible makes it clear that of these three- trust, obedience and love- love is primary. Paul listed faith, hope and love and said love was the greatest (1 Cor. 13)
In Matt 22:37-40 another Scribe asked him, which of the commandments is the greatest and Jesus quoted these same verses and said,
“This is the greatest commandment. On these two commands you can hang all the Law and the Prophets.”
The “Law and the Prophets” was a Jewish phrase for the Old Testament. The Amplified Bible says these two commands “sum up” the Old Testament.
Romans 13:9 says,
“There are many commands but all are summed up in the word love.” (Rom. 13:9)
1 Jn. 4:21 says,
“The commandment God has given us is to love God and love each other.” (1 Jn. 4: 21)
Two Stories-
I love the story of the man hunting at night who fell into an old well. Clawing and scratching on his way down, he managed to catch hold of a root. He was a Christian, so he prayed in the inky darkness. “Oh God are you up there?” Amazingly, a voice answered back, “Yes, my son, I am here, what can I do for you?” The terrified man said, “Father, tell me what to do.” The voice gently answered, “Turn loose my son turn loose.” There were 10 seconds of silence and the man yelled again, “IS ANYBODY ELSE UP THERE?”
Now here is another one:
A young man is in a hotel that is on fire. The fire is behind him and he is looking out a window at the end of a hall. All he can see is black smoke. Beyond the smoke a fireman is yelling for him to jump into a net held by other firemen. Unable to see the net or the firemen, the boy is afraid. Suddenly another voice comes over the mega-horn, “Jimmy, this is day. We need for you to jump son. The firemen are there and they will catch you. After a few moments, Jim gets the nerve and jumps.
The difference between these two stories is relationship. Jim had a loving, trusting relationship with his father and believed he would only tell him what was good for him. Love produces trust and trust produces obedience. Because we love God we trust God. And because we trust God, we obey God.
Love will produce Bible study. We will go to it as our manual for life, asking God what we need to do, to do the loving thing, and the right thing. We don’t go so much for knowledge, which the Bible says, “puffs us up” but for wisdom to live a life that pleases God.
This will produce worship because, to life the Christian life, in a wicked world, unfriendly to Christ like people, we need the strength, encouragement and wisdom that comes from fellowship with other Christians and from a man of God called to teach and apply the Scriptures to daily life.
This will produce soul winning. It may or may not be visiting and sharing a “plan of salvation”. That is a good ministry for some, but it is not for all. But if we truly love all people and try earnestly do what is good and right around them, we will be interested in their spiritual welfare, we will pray for their salvation, we will pray and study our Bibles as seek ways to get through to them that God loves them. And with our love and goodness toward them we will be building a bridge between them and the Lord. We will be making the gospel believable and attractive.
“People do not care how much we know until they know how much we care.”
Love leads us to obey all of God’s commands. Romans 13: 9 says,
“There are many commands but all are summed up in the word love.” (Rom. 13:9)
The Problem with Love
We have a real problem when it comes to love, first, because most of us don’t have a clue what love is. To most of us it is:
-a warm affectionate feeling, and
-something that usually gives us pleasure
It may include these, but also, it may not. There were four Greek words for love:
(1) Eros- Romantic love
(2) Phileo- friendship or brotherly love
(This is a warm affectionate feeling)
(3) Storge- Family love
(This too is a warm affectionate feeling)
(4) Agape- Active good will
To describe God’s love for us and the love we are to have for Him and others, the Holy Spirit did not use the terms for a warm affectionate feeling, but the little used word agape. The KJV recognized this distinction and translated it with the word charity.
The Picture of Love (Lk. 10:30-37)
Jesus, when he answered the Bible teacher’s question, pictured Christian love in the story of the Good Samaritan.
Agape (Christian) love seeks the highest good for others and works to make that happen.
This is better described than defined, because love is seen by its actions.
It is not as much a feeling (although it can be); as it is a way of life we choose to practice when we feel like it and when we don’t.
1) Love cares about all human beings and wants what is best for them. 2) Love reaches out and pays the price to help. 3) Love does not expect a reward. It helps because it is right to help
1) Seeing and Caring
The two religious Jews passed by the beaten man like they never even saw him. Perhaps the Levite was in a hurry to prepare the lighting in the Temple, and the Priest was in a hurry so he could use that light to teach a Bible lesson on love.
Our love is like that of the lady in the Old South who sat at a play and wept over the way negroes were mistreated in slavery days, while her African American driver was sitting in the car freezing, because she had the car keys in her pocket. We are so wrapped up in ourselves and our needs that we don’t see the needs of others.
No one, says David Redding, is better than the church, at keeping people at arm’s length. We see “our kind” of people and their needs, because we empathize with them. But the color of a man’s skin; the alcohol on a man’s breath; the divorce in a man’s past; and the cigarette in a woman’s mouth; blinds us to their needs. We are like the Queen who live in luxury, and when she was told that her people were hungry, answered, “Let them eat cake.”
When Jesus gave the parable of the good Samaritan to illustrate love, he made the Samaritan the hero. Jews looked down on Samaritans and were extremely prejudiced towards them because they were a mixture of Jew and Gentile. This is the real tragedy of the modern churchl; the people of the world we look down on sometimes show more love and compassion to hurting people than we in the church do. The lesson is crystal clear: Jesus loves the little children / All the children of the world / Red and yellow black and white / They are precious in His sight
And their mommies and daddy’s are too!
2) Feelings
Agape love may, and in time, should involve a warm, affectionate feeling and should bring us pleasure. But they are not essential for true love. God command us to love.
“The commandment God has given us is to love God and love each other.” (1 Jn. 4: 21)
And commandments are something we are to obey whether we feel like it or nor, and whether or not it brings us pleasure.
We see this in God’s command to love those who hurt us and hurt those we love. Jews despised Samaritans and the implication is that this Samaritan was helping a Jew. Most of us cannot generate a warm feeling of friendliness for people who hate or hurt us. If we wait until we feel like helping them, we never will.
Feelings and pleasure come- But the wonderful thing is, when we obey God and show love and forgiveness, and they apologize, we will experience one of the greatest joys of our lives. And on the other hand, if they reject us, we will have the inner joy and peace from knowing we did the right thing and our life is not a hindrance to their getting right with the Lord.
3) Taking Action
The Samaritan tended the man’s wounds and paid for his further treatment. Love is not a feeling it is what we do.
A song is not a song until we sing it.
A bell is not a bell until we ring it.
Love isn’t put in our hearts there to stay.
Love is not love till we give it away!
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Mommy I love you said little Nell
I love you more than words can tell
And away through the garden gate she flew
Leaving Mommy all the work to do.
If a man is hungry, love feeds him. If a man is lonely love takes time with him. If a man is lost love tells him about the Lord. If a man is unkind to you love will be kind to him.
Tough Love- Sometimes we have to hurt someone to help them. Doing it doesn’t bring us or the person we help immediate pleasure. An example is parenting. “Loving” parents often say, “I love my children so much, I can’t spank them.” The Bible says the opposite, “Whoever spares the rod hates his son (or child). But whoever loves him will be careful to discipline him.” (Prov. 13:24)
To prepare our children for life we must teach them choices have consequences everywhere. If we really care about them and want what is best we will prepare them for life by controlling and disciplining them. Bill Gates, speaking at a graduation ceremony gave some life rules. On was, “If you think your mother was tough, wait until you get a boss.”
The Anger of Jesus- When Jesus drove the dishonest money changers out of the Temple (Jn. 2) or called Pharisees hypocrites (Mt. 23:13), these were acts of love. He wanted to wake them up to who they were so they would repent and be forgiven and changed.
4) God Likeness
“This is how we know what love is: Christ gave His life for us. We too, then, ought to give our lives for our brothers.
(1 Jn. 3:16)
Jesus is the Good Samaritan. He saw us bleeding and broken in sin by the side of the road. And he did not pass by. He cared, He came to the old rugged cross and paid the price for our salvation. Her is another definition of love.
“Love is treating others the way God treats us.”
In one episode of the TV show The Jeffersons. George Jefferson, a black man, went to meeting room where the KKK was having a rally. The speaker, spitting out his hatred for people like Jews and African Americans, grabbed his chest and had a heart attack. George went over, gave him mouth to mouth resuscitation and he lived. When he learned what happened he looked at Jefferson and said, “I wish you had let me die.” The good part came later when the man’s son, who had been taught hatred all his life, visited George Jefferson and said, “Thank you Mr. Jefferson for saving my dad’s life” and shook his hand.” George Jefferson did not have to have a “warm affectionate feeling” or even like this man to show love. Amen!
