By chance a priest came along. But when he saw the man lying there, he crossed to the other side of the road and passed him by. A Temple assistant walked over and looked at him lying there, but he also passed by on the other side. [Luke 10:31-32 (NLT)]
Yesterday’s devotion got me thinking more about the movie War Room. Elizabeth is a woman whose marriage is crumbling and Miss Clara is a fervent prayer warrior. Clara could easily have done her “Christian duty” for Elizabeth by offering to pray for the young woman’s marriage in her “war room” of prayer. Instead, Clara asks Elizabeth to give her one hour a week and offers to teach her how to fight for her marriage with the right weapons. With her offer, Clara lays herself open to rejection, being called a busybody (or worse) and the inconvenience and challenges that come whenever we become enmeshed in another person’s messy life. In short, Clara does more than pray for this troubled woman—she takes action.
I saw parallels between Miss Clara’s actions and those of the Good Samaritan in Jesus’ parable. A Judean is attacked by thieves and left naked and half-dead on the side of the road. When a priest sees him, he crosses to the other side of the road and passes by his fellow countryman. When a Levite passes, he goes over to look at the man, and then walks to the other side of the road to continue his journey. Both men heard the man’s groans and yet these supposedly religious men of good character ignored their Jewish brother’s needs. Neither one wanted to be delayed, get involved or dirty his hands. I wonder if either man assuaged his conscience by saying a prayer for the man which would have been faster and easier than getting involved. In this case, however, the dying man needed more than prayers—he needed immediate help and both the priest and Levite were capable of giving him assistance. It was the despised Samaritan who bandaged the man’s wounds, let him ride on his donkey, took him to an inn, nursed him through the night and paid the man’s expenses. It was the Samaritan who, instead of offering prayers, sacrificed his time and money to help a stranger.
Although Jesus’ purpose in telling this story was to answer the question, “Who is my neighbor?” it got me wondering whether the two supposedly pious men might have promised the dying man their “thoughts and prayers” before going on their way. In Letters to Malcom, C.S. Lewis points out that our prayers for others often “flow more easily than those we offer on our own behalf.” But, he adds, that’s not necessarily out of Christian charity. While praying for someone else’s faults is easier than working on our own faults and failures, it also is easier to pray for others than to do something for them! “It’s easier to pray for a bore than to go and see him,” says Lewis. Indeed, offering only our “thoughts and prayers” is far easier that actually offering our time, hands, hearts, or finances as did the Samaritan and Miss Clara. Prayer is not a substitute for action when action is what is needed!
There are many divinely ordained opportunities when more than our prayers are required. I often say, “I’ll pray for you,” but there certainly are occasions when I should be doing far more than that. None of us want to be considered busy-bodies or meddlers but sometimes, like Miss Clara and the Samaritan, we need to offer more than our prayers to someone in need.
Lord, help us discern those opportune moments when you want more than our prayers—when you want us to turn our petitions into exertion and our compassion into action.
God does not need your good works, but our neighbor does. [Martin Luther]
Last week, after posting the second of two devotions mentioning David Bennett, Sr. (who received a pig’s heart in a ground-breaking transplant), I checked news links for an update on his condition. I was surprised to learn that 34 years ago, when Bennett was just 23, he was convicted of stabbing Edward Shumaker seven times, a violent assault that left the 22-year-old paralyzed and in a wheelchair. Bennett was sentenced to 10 years in prison and served 6 of those years before returning to society and moving on with his life. As for Shumaker, after enduring 19 years of staph infections, sepsis, bedsores, a stroke, and moving in and out of nursing homes, he died a week before his 41st birthday.
“They are to be pitied, not….” Not what? Author C.S. Lewis did not complete the sentence and I don’t think the omission was by accident. When I read the above passage, I thought of the words I (as a Christian) should use to replace the ellipsis; they are not to be reviled, hated, judged, condemned, berated, scorned, abused, or despised. Regretfully, my initial reaction upon running across the scum of the earth—the rapists, molesters, traffickers, exploiters, extorters, attackers, murderers, deceivers, hate-spewers, and tyrants that seem to populate our world—is more likely to be the exact opposite. Rather than a feeling of pity, compassion, mercy, forgiveness, or love, it’s one of outrage, loathing, and disgust.
When the religious scholar asked, “And who is my neighbor?” Jesus answered with the parable of the Good Samaritan in which he made it clear that one’s neighbors can be strangers—even enemies. Sometimes, however, our neighbor really is the guy next door or the couple sitting in the pew behind us at church.
“A children’s story which is enjoyed only by children is a bad children’s story,” said C.S. Lewis. I agree and admit to enjoying the seven books comprising Lewis’ The Chronicles of Narnia both as a child and an adult. Even though the Narnia books take place in a make-believe world filled with talking animals, mythical creatures, and magic, there are Christian overtones to the entire series. For example, the first book calls up images from Genesis when Aslan, the Great Lion, sings Narnia into existence and evil is introduced to the land. In the second, Aslan willingly dies so that the sins of one boy are forgiven but comes alive again. In another book, Eustace, who had “greedy, dragonish thoughts” becomes a dragon. When Aslan strips away the boy’s scales and throws him into the water, the repentant boy is transformed and images of rebirth and baptism come to mind. Resembling the last book of the Bible, the final story in the series tells of a beast, a false prophet, Narnia’s fall, and a Narnian paradise (where sadness and weariness do not exist).
Hundreds of years ago, when Las Posadas was first celebrated, people gathered piñon pine branches into square piles to burn small vigil fires called luminaria to light the way for the Peregrinos as they searched for lodging. On Christmas Eve, bonfires were lit along the roads and in the church yard to guide people to midnight mass. Just as Las Posadas moved into the southwestern states as the Spanish and Mexicans came northward, so did the luminaria. When inexpensive flat-bottom paper bags appeared on the Santa Fe Trail in the 1870s, people started folding down the bag tops, anchoring the bag with a few handfuls of sand, and setting a small candle inside. Better than using precious fire wood, these luminaria (also called farolitos) became the popular tradition that continues in the southwest today.
Devotions of the Heart 