On one occasion an expert in the law stood up to test Jesus. "Teacher," he asked, "what must I do to inherit eternal life?"
"What is written in the Law?" he replied. "How do you read it?"
He answered: " '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, 'Love your neighbor as yourself.
"You have answered correctly," Jesus replied. "Do this and you will live."
But he wanted to justify himself, so he asked Jesus, "And who is my neighbor?" (Matthew 10:25-28)
I"ve been thinking lately about how easy it is for us to go about our lives without really paying much attention to the substantive needs around us. Jesus famously told the story of the Good Samaritan to press this point. We all like to think of ourselves as good Samaritans, but occasionally may be shocked to see that we are as guilty as the Levite who callously walked past.
That happened to me recently.
Last week News 9 did a story about hunger at Putnam City West High School. Not just about poverty or declining enrollment or diminishing parent participation, but HUNGER.
P.C. West is my alma mater. It is a school in the shadow of our church. It is the school that many of our students attend and many of our church members either attended, had children who attended or are currently teaching or coaching there. Many of us would say that PC West is OUR school.
And according to the News 9 report, there are young people who come to class and go to after school activities every day who have gone without food and are seriously malnourished. The problem is so bad that several players on the football team suffered broken bones last year not because of hard hitting, but because their under nourished bodies couldn't take the contact.
How could I have walked past this?
It's hard for me to describe the emotion I've felt since watching this news report. It is somewhere between sadness and shame and then finally determination. I am sad that this kind of thing is happening in our community. I am ashamed it is so close to us and I've not paid enough attention. I am determined that we do something about it.
Apparently many of you feel the same way. Since the report aired hundreds of people from around the community have responded. Many of our church members have been networking and calling and working together. Alumni have formed facebook groups and have organized and are beginning to mobilize. Connection Classes are responding.
We have church members who are already heavily involved, like Coach John and Tammy Jensen and Corey Tennell who were highlighted in the news story. There is also our Bridge Ministry leadership including Corey, Amy Milner, Chris Allen and Beth Dempsey and our High School and Middle School pastors Michael Butler and Micah White. We have people in place who can make a difference and who are making a difference. The challenge for us is to determine what can be done and how it can be done most effectively. We are working as a staff to find solutions (some examples here). We are asking the administration at West what we can do to help. We will bring many of those answers to the congregation in the weeks ahead. Our intention is to work toward long term solutions, not just the quick fixes we may be tempted to gravitate toward when our emotions are running high.
But the first step for all of us is to see the situation in our community in the way Christ sees it and the way the Bible teaches. When Jesus used the parable of the Good Samaritan to illustrate the meaning of "our neighbor", He raised the bar on the conventional understanding of community responsibility. He was saying in affect, "the desperate needs of the least of these in the community are the responsibility of everyone who is a part of me." (Matthew 25:40)
In his book Ragamuffin Gospel
, Brennan Manning told a compelling story about the famous former mayor of New York City Forello La Guardia that I think illustrates this point in an unforgettable way. La Guardia is a legendary giant of New York City history who is now memorialized by the international airport. Back during the depression La Guardia would barge into municipal courts and take the gavel from the presiding judge and hold court in order to make examples of petty criminals. It was his way of keeping the order and sending a message during the desperate, dark days of the depression. He was such a force of personality that simple courtroom rulings would often turn into front page news. According to Manning, on a cold night in 1935 a grandmother was brought before La Guardias makeshift court in one of New York City's poorest districts. She was charged with stealing bread. The desperate elderly woman pled with Mayor La Guardia that she had no other way of feeding her grandchildren than to steal the bread. The grocery store owner was not willing to drop the charges, explaining to the Mayor that it was a very rough neighborhood and he couldn't afford to back down.
La Guardia looked at the woman and said, "I have no other choice, the law must be upheld, ten dollars or ten days in jail." But even as he was saying it he reached into his pocket and extracted a ten dollar bill and threw it in his famous black derby hat and then called out to the courtroom, "Here is the ten dollar fine I now remit; and furthermore I fine everyone in this courtroom 10 cents for living in a city where a woman has to steal bread in order to feed her grandchildren!"
We should not forget that the pertinent question answered by the parable of The Good Samaritan is "Who is my neighbor?' It was as if Jesus were saying, "Your neighbor is that person in need. The one over there on the side of the road you have been ignoring. The one you wish you hadn't seen. The one you have chosen not to look at- the one who desperately needs your attention! Yes, that one, the one who is going hungry- that is your neighbor. And loving him is what I mean by loving your neighbor as you love yourself."
In many ways I think this News 9 report was for us church family. It was God's way of saying to us, "Look over there, on the other side of the road, look at your neighbor."
