This question was not a question of curiosity, but a question in search of loopholes in the command to apply the law of God to our interactions with our neighbors. It’s a question that continues to be asked today. All of us know we haven’t loved our neighbors as ourselves. And, like the lawyer, we are exposed before a righteous God. 

Who Is My Neighbor?

He approached the controversial, itinerant rabbi seeking validation. He’d lived an outwardly observant life, adhering strictly to the Torah, so his question to Jesus wasn’t really a question. What would it take for this seemingly righteous man to inherit eternal life, he queried. What he hoped Jesus would say or rather, assumed Jesus would say, is You’ve kept the law faithfully. You are in (Luke 10).

Jesus asked the lawyer a lawyerly question: “What’s in the law?” Jesus didn’t ask this because he was ignorant of Moses’ words. Jesus, the Son of God, was present at the writing down of the commandments and, through the Holy Spirit, inspired this Word of God.

No, Jesus was trying the lawyer by his own self-justifying grid. He was standing before a judgment seat and didn’t know it. The lawyer repeated what he repeated every morning: Love the Lord thy God with all of my heart, soul, and mind and love my neighbor as myself.

Good, Jesus commends, “do this and you will live.” But suddenly the lawyer began to tremble. Deep down he knew that as much as he followed the law externally, in his own heart he had violated the law. He had not always loved his neighbor as much as he loved himself. So he asked a qualifying, self-justifying question:  Who is my neighbor?

This question was not a question of curiosity, but a question in search of loopholes in the command to apply the law of God to our interactions with our neighbors. It’s a question that continues to be asked today. All of us know we haven’t loved our neighbors as ourselves. And, like the lawyer, we are exposed before a righteous God.

To Love Is to See Dignity

Why is this commandment so important? It’s important on two levels. Because every human being—every neighbor of ours—is an image-bearer knit and sculpted with care by a loving God, we demonstrate our love for God by our love for fellow humans in our world.

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