This lawyer wanted to know how to obtain (inherit) eternal life. Let us be reminded that Jesus offers this awesome gift of eternal life! The gospel of John especially focuses on this promise from the Father. John 3.16, says, “God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son that whosoever believes in Him should not perish but have everlasting (eternal) life.” So this is an appropriate question.
Jesus challenged the lawyer to answer his own question, which he did in excellent fashion by reciting the Shema from Deuteronomy 6.4, what Christians know as the greatest commandment. He added, as the learned Jews of his time knew to do, “and love your neighbor as yourself,” from Leviticus 19.18. Jesus accepted the answer and told him to do it so he could live!
Is it really that simple? All we have to do is follow those two laws? Yes, it’s that simple, but it’s not so easy. In fact, it’s impossible, because every one of us breaks these two commandments on a daily basis. If we honestly assess our hearts, we know we do not love the Lord our God with every fiber of our being every minute of the day, and many times we fail to show the compassion, kindness, and grace of the Lord towards our family members, our friends, and especially our enemies, whom Jesus called us also to love!
So just follow the highest laws of God in order to inherit eternal life. But it’s impossible to do.
The lawyer asked a further question “to justify himself,” because it seemed he already knew the answer to his own question. Surely he hadn’t taken up the great Teacher’s time with an easy question. Oh no–he needed to prove his sophistication and understanding of nuance and depth, so he asked, “And who is my neighbor?”
If he had to love his neighbor as himself in order to gain eternal life, he wanted to drill down into the details of exactly who that meant. After all, it would be upsetting to find upon entering eternal life that he had wasted love on people who weren’t even his neighbor! It would be good to know exactly who we must love and who we don’t have to.
So Jesus told the story of the Good Samaritan, who, at great personal expense, cared for an unidentified man (we assume was a Jew) who had been robbed, beaten, and left for dead on the side of the road. Jesus told of a priest and a Levite who both hurried by on the far side of the road in order not to have to stop and help the hurt man. The image was clear–the Samaritan proved to be a neighbor to the man in trouble and the priest and Levite did not.
“Which of these three proved to be a neighbor?” Jesus asked. The lawyer’s original question was “Who is my neighbor,” but Jesus showed him that was not a good question. The better question was, “How can you be a good neighbor?” Stop worrying about who you must love, and just start loving people. Indiscriminately. Just show mercy.
No one will enter eternal life who has not had his heart changed from a general selfishness and self-preservation to an open-armed love for all around him. Mercy triumphs over judgment. We must be like our compassionate Lord Jesus.
But it’s impossible, remember? We can’t love like Christ. We have become corrupt, selfish, hateful, and we don’t have the capacity to clean ourselves up. The rest of the story is that we need Jesus to clean us up, to give us the desire and ability to love God and our neighbor as ourselves. As Jesus said in another place when His disciples gaped at the extreme difficulty of a rich man entering the Kingdom of God, “The things that are impossible with people are possible with God” (Luke 18.27).
So go do it–love the Lord your God with all your heart, soul, mind and strength; and love your neighbor as yourself. But in all your doing, know you can only do it by the will and power of the Lord! So give Him thanks for your ability to love and for providing the way into eternal life.