I recently taught a Sunday School lesson to my preschoolers on the topic of the Good Samaritan.
Here’s what I learned: children are amazing. They can pick up things so quickly and easily. Things that are hard for us to understand are very easy for them to comprehend. They understand far more than we ever give them credit for. And if you sit with them long enough and ask hard questions, you’ll discover that they have a lot of good answers.
When I asked the kids if they thought a priest would stop to help a man who was laying on the side of the road bruised and hurt by robbers, they nodded yes in unison.
“Well, the priest didn't stop,” I told them. “He walked by on the other side of the road.”
“The other side of the road?!” one kid asked surprised. “I don’t believe it!"
“Do you know who stopped to help this man?” I asked.
They thought long and hard. It was a story most were very familiar with. “I think I saw this movie once,” one of the kids told me. “The Samaritan stopped.”
“Yes,” I answered. “The Samaritan man was looked down on by the religious people of that day. But when he saw this hurt man on the side of the road, he helped him.”
“How did he help him?” he asked.
“He took the man to a safe place to help him heal. He paid for the man to stay there and receive all the care he needed.”
“Woah.”
“When you walk by someone who is hurting,” I said very seriously, “do you think that you would walk by like the priest did or stop and help like the Samaritan did?”
“I would help him.”
It’s interesting when you ask kids hard questions. You eventually turn inward and begin asking yourself the same thing. And I wrestled with my own answer. But I settled on one thing: I would help to the very best of my ability.
That day, a group of little kiddos and I walked out of the room wanting to be like the Samaritan man. Not like a man who professed to know faith and good deeds, but when tested, failed.
And I discovered a timeless truth: this story is just as relevant today as it was two thousand years ago. Because though the problems are different, the answers are still the same.
What you send out into the universe will return to you. In one way or another.
"Do not judge, and you will not be judged. Do not condemn, and you will not be condemned. Forgive, and you will be forgiven. Give, and it will be given to you. A good measure, pressed down, shaken together and running over, will be poured into your lap. For with the measure you use, it will be measured to you." (Luke 6:37-42)
I've seen it enough times in my life to know that it is all too true.
If you put someone down because of their situation, you just might find yourself experiencing the same thing one day.
Your "tongue has the power of life and death" (Proverbs 18:21). If you judge a situation by what you see, you just might discover that you were very wrong when you find yourself on the other side of the fence.
It's why I do my very best to remember that I can't see behind-the-scenes of every situation. I can’t understand people’s choices fully and don't have an opinion if I haven’t been in the same exact situation.
It’s why I shake my head every time I see someone look down on a single mother on welfare. I shake my head every time I hear someone make a comment on the growing number of people on food stamps that need to buck up and get a real job. And I shake my head every time I watch people judge others who file for bankruptcy "because they never should have let it get that bad".
In all seriousness, if you don't like people needing government assistance--and I say this with much love and grace--offer the single mother a decent paying job. Pay for the groceries of the couple in front of you in line who have spent hours, days, and months trying to find jobs so they don't have to use food stamps to buy their groceries. And instead of sitting on your mountaintop, looking down on those who haven't been trained to be successful with money, offer a book, advice, guidance, a class--anything--to help get them on the right track.
Because the moment you look down and do not help, you are no better than the priest who passed by an injured man and did nothing.
That's not to say people don't abuse the system; I know that some do. But God reveals different truths to different people at different times. In the wise words of Reverend Billy Graham, "It's the holy spirit's job to convict, God's job to judge, and my job to love."
The next time you pass by someone who's in need, are you going to walk by on the other side of the road like the priest, or are you going to help in any and every way you can like the Good Samaritan? The choice is yours.
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