And who is my neighbor?

But wanting to justify himself, he asked Jesus, "And who is my neighbor?" (Luke 10:29)

The parable of the Good Samaritan…possibly the best known story Jesus told. A man asks Jesus, “What must I do to inherit eternal life?” and Jesus asks him what the Bible says. He responds, correctly, with what Jesus has given as the summary of all the law: love God, love your neighbor. But this is too open-ended for the questioner; he wants a boundary, a border…a fence…so that he can justify himself, secure in the knowledge that he only has to love as a neighbor those on the inside. Anyone outside the boundary, he’s off the hook—no need to love them, they’re not his neighbor. Jesus, as he always does when someone wants to know the limits of God’s love, or the limits of our responsibility, replies with a story. When we want something cut and dried, a contract we can use to prove we’ve done enough, Jesus always responds with a story. Stories have great power to indict and inspire us. So, Jesus tell this story we know so well: Once upon a time, there was a traveler…He was robbed and left in the ditch for dead, and a priest saw him and walked by on the other side, as did a Levite, a Jewish altar server. Only the despised, foreign Samaritan stopped to help the man. “Who was neighbor to this man?” Jesus asked. “The one who showed him mercy” is the reply.

I’m going to follow Jesus’ example and tell a few more stories today. Once upon a time…the late 1960’s…Here in Omaha, there were days on end of violent race riots. In Alabama, Jonathan Daniels, an Episcopal seminarian, was martyred while registering people to vote, shot while saving the life of a young black man. Nationally, magazines and newspapers had a photo of children in a motel swimming pool, screaming in pain while the manager was pouring in acid because it was illegal for whites and blacks to swim together. It was very clear to many people who their neighbors were, and who their neighbors weren’t. But there was one man with a swimming pool who understood the story of the Good Samaritan, and who wanted to make sure others would too…It was a very hot day in his neighborhood, and Mr. Rogers had brought in a kiddy pool and he was cooling his feet. An African-American in Mr. Roger’s neighborhood, Officer Clemmons, walked by, and Mr. Rogers invited him to take off his shoes and socks, and cool off his feet in the pool, too. Mr. Rogers sprayed both of their feet and legs from the hose, and talked about sharing and kindness and being a neighbor. Fred Rogers knew the power of story and image, and he told a different story than the dark tragedy of hatred and fear that was so prevalent in the news. Mr. Rogers knew that the right question is not “But who is my neighbor?” No, the right question to ask, the one the Good Samaritan asked, the one Mr. Rogers asked of everyone he met is: “Won’t you be my neighbor?”…”Won’t you be my neighbor.”

Reaching out to people and asking, “Won’t you be my neighbor?” is what our youth mission trip this past week was all about. Let me tell you a few more stories we learned and saw and participated in, from our trip.

Once upon a time…140 years ago…the Ponca tribe, after decades of broken treaties, was forced to march hundreds of miles from around the Niobrara to Oklahoma. Two days into this journey, an 18-month old baby girl, named White Buffalo Girl, died. Her family was not given time to bury her, and her father was despondent. The people of Neligh offered to bury the girl in their cemetery, and to tend her grave. This is a promise they have kept ever since, and the grave is never without flowers. The Ponca have said that this act of simple kindness, this offering by the people of Neligh who said, “Won’t you be my neighbor?” is quite possibly the only promise every made to them that has been kept.

Once upon a time…this past Monday…Teresa, a woman who works two jobs to make ends meet, talked to me while we were all eating lunch in Neligh. She complimented the kids on their behavior, and for giving their time to help out with flood repairs…and she wrote me a check for $50 to help pay our expenses. “Won’t you be my neighbor?” She asked.

Once upon a time…Wednesday morning in Bassett…some of us went to help Sharon. Sharon is an elderly woman on a fixed income who is battling Multiple Sclerosis. She rescues homeless dogs, and, last year for several months, she rescued a homeless man with Alzheimer’s. Sharon’s basement had been flooded, and she had been cleaning it out all on her own. She has a walker on her main floor, and another in her basement. Because of her MS, in order to get to the basement, she has to lower herself to the floor and crawl down the stairs. The kids emptied out her basement, and we bought her a dehumidifier…and then they sat around her while she told them stories of her life, and brought out keepsakes from her travels for them all to take home…a pendant with a 1910 dime, a rosary from a trip to Lourdes, a mother of pearl cross…and after that, Sharon bought lunch for our entire group…”Won’t you be my neighbor?” we asked her and she asked us.

Once upon a time…Wednesday evening…we shared Eucharist and then supper with the people of St. Mary’s Bassett. One of the members there said, “This was such a wonderful and blessed time, and it has meant so much to us that you all came this far to be with us. Let’s see if we can find some way to become sister churches and create an on-going bond with each other.” “Won’t you be my neighbor?” we said to each other.

Once upon a time…Thursday…we ate lunch at a café in Verdigre purchased a couple of years ago my Mike, a 20-something young man…purchased so that this town of 800 would continue to have a restaurant. In March, his restaurant was flooded above the height of the tables and chairs, and he lost everything. On this day, he insisted that he give us all lunch for free, to say thank you for all the hard work the kids were doing for his town. “Won’t you be my neighbor?” we said to each other.

Jesus asked, “Which of these…do you think, was a neighbor to the man who fell into the hands of the robbers?" The man answered, "The one who showed him mercy." This past week, all of us on the youth mission learned about being a neighbor…about offering ourselves and being present alongside others, who offer themselves back to us. We learned to ask not, “But who is my neighbor,” and to ask instead, “Won’t you be my neighbor.” “Won’t you be my neighbor.”

And Jesus said to him, "Go and do likewise."

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