St James' Church of Scotland, Lossiemouth

For Christ, For You

Lossiemouth Church of Scotland

Prospect Terrace, Lossiemouth, Moray IV31 6JS.

The Union of the former Parishes of St. Gerardine's High Church and St. James' Church

Minister: Rev. Geoff McKee.

  • Home
  • About
  • How Can We Help?
    • Notices – and Dates for your Diary
    • Baptism or Christening
    • Warm Space for community at St. James’ Church Lossiemouth
    • Good News Club (Sunday School)
    • Summer Holiday Club
    • St James’ Guild
    • Indoor Bowling at St James’ Church
    • Praise Group
  • FAQs
  • Blog
  • Podcasts
  • Contact
  • Find Us
  • Login
You are here: Home / Sermons / The Parable of the Good Samaritan

The Parable of the Good Samaritan

July 14, 2016 by 2

This is the text of Rev. Geoff McKee’s sermon of 10 July 2016 – on the Parable of the Good Samaritan – with the relevant scripture (Luke 10: 25-37 – NIV) at the beginning. If you would like to download a pdf version of the text of the sermon, you can do so by clicking here (download begins immediately; 78kB).

25 On one occasion an expert in the law stood up to test Jesus. “Teacher,” he asked, “what must I do to inherit eternal life?”

26 “What is written in the Law?” he replied. “How do you read it?”

27 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 neighbour as yourself.’”

28 “You have answered correctly,” Jesus replied. “Do this and you will live.”

29 But he wanted to justify himself, so he asked Jesus, “And who is my neighbour?”

30 In reply Jesus said: “A man was going down from Jerusalem to Jericho, when he was attacked by robbers. They stripped him of his clothes, beat him and went away, leaving him half dead. 31 A priest happened to be going down the same road, and when he saw the man, he passed by on the other side. 32 So too, a Levite, when he came to the place and saw him, passed by on the other side. 33 But a Samaritan, as he traveled, came where the man was; and when he saw him, he took pity on him. 34 He went to him and bandaged his wounds, pouring on oil and wine. Then he put the man on his own donkey, brought him to an inn and took care of him. 35 The next day he took out two denarii and gave them to the innkeeper. ‘Look after him,’ he said, ‘and when I return, I will reimburse you for any extra expense you may have.’

36 “Which of these three do you think was a neighbour to the man who fell into the hands of robbers?”

37 The expert in the law replied, “The one who had mercy on him.”

Jesus told him, “Go and do likewise.”

Bob Holman, the Christian academic and community activist, who died on 15 June 2016 was one of the most unsettling people I have ever met.

He came to lecture at a college I was attending in the 1990s.

Here was a man who gave up a very good job as Professor of Social Administration at the University of Bath to move to the Southdown council estate in Bath, to live among and to
serve the poor. Later, he moved to Easterhouse, outside Glasgow, one of the most deprived housing schemes in Britain, and gave the remainder of his life to helping the poor and disadvantaged.

One day he came to give a lecture to a very middle class bunch of students who would have been good at ‘saying the right things’ but would have struggled to really understand the
radical call of the Christian life. And, from the moment he began to speak, I can remember feeling very uncomfortable. He was telling stories that made sense, but he was telling them in a way that challenged my sensitivities.

How Jesus unsettles us

Likewise, Jesus seemed to have had a profoundly unsettling impact on those who saw him and heard him. Even among those people who would come to see him as their friend, Jesus had the uncanny knack of making them feel distinctly uncomfortable. In the familiar surroundings of Israel, where so much was predictable, Jesus had a habit of making people feel uncomfortable.

I suppose it’s a bit like deciding to move the living room furniture around one afternoon while your husband is out for the day. What’s it going to feel like for him when he returns? It’s the same room, with the same outlook, but it feels entirely different …

Jesus’ unsettling impact was experienced, of course, often through the telling of strange stories. Now the stories were strange, not because they appeared to be unusual or difficult on the surface, but because they didn’t quite sound right on reflection.

What exactly was Jesus talking about when he told the story of the man on the road from Jerusalem to Jericho?

Well, the answer is easy, isn’t it? He was encouraging people to look out for folk in need and go to their aid. Furthermore, because of the history of conflict between Jews and Samaritans, he was making the point that religious and racial prejudice needs to be challenged by action and these barriers can only be broken down when we put love into action. Doesn’t that seem right? That’s the way these stories have been traditionally understood.

Now, those moral nuggets are no doubt there in the story. We hear them and they have inspired countless numbers of people to act in kindness to help a neighbour in need. Clearly, that is a good thing but it’s a great shame to miss so much more. It is possible to hear these messages, as challenging as they are, and to pack the story away as ‘read and understood’. That has happened so often with this parable and with so many others as well. But it won’t do. You see, Jesus is not a mouthpiece for moral truth, as if moral truth has a life of its own detached from him. He was a living, breathing human being who believed he was in Israel for a purpose. That purpose could not be cut off from his words, his storytelling, as if he told stories to amuse and challenge, on the one hand, and journeyed to eventual arrest and death, on the other. We cannot possibly understand the stories – the parables – without seeking understanding in his own, purposely-lived life.

Sometimes people will claim allegiance to Christianity on the basis that they are happy to sign up to the great moral truths of the religion, but will reject the significance of the son of God dying for the world because God’s love for it is so great. But the one without the other does not make sense…

So, the key to understanding this parable is not to try and extract moral principles from the story but instead to try and understand how the story reflects the nature of the one who is telling it.

Remember the parable was told in response to a question about receiving eternal life.

The answer was to love the Lord your God with everything you have and to love your neighbour as yourself. It’s the love of God that is critical and it’s the one who was standing there, about to tell the parable, who is crucial in understanding what this love of God is all about.

How do you love God if not by loving the one sent by God, his Son, who will demonstrate God’s love? So, as we explore meaning in this parable we need to hold together the specific actions of the good Samaritan with the wider actions of Jesus who told the story.

So what was Jesus actually doing?

Well, he was on his way to an ultimate and decisive confrontation with evil. An evil that had gripped his own people Israel and so distorted their understanding of who they were that they had lost their way. An evil that was so widespread that the entire world was under its influence and control and only a decisive action of God was going to provide a rescue. And rescue could only be effective in himself, God’s servant, God’s Son; ultimately in the giving of his own life. It was as serious as that.

But getting that point across to an Israel that was becoming increasingly more obsessed with trivial concerns regarding national identity was proving very difficult indeed. So he told
a story about a man on a journey who got into trouble …

Can you recognise the ‘hated other’ as your neighbour?

You had better or a worse fate might befall you.

We all have a tendency to retreat into our safety zone. The place where our views are heard and reinforced by the people who think the same way as we do. It feels good in the safety
zone, but it’s really a dangerous place to be.

It was dangerous for me to sit and listen to Bob Holman and then instead of taking heed to search for reinforcement of my prejudices among my fellow students. We all indulged in that, but it was dangerous because it was denying the new life, the eternal life that inspired the lawyer’s question to Jesus in the first place.

Ahmed’s gift of life

On 11 November 2005, The Guardian newspaper reported the story of the shooting of a twelve year old Palestinian boy, Ahmed Khatib. He had been killed by Israeli soldiers while playing with his toy gun, during rioting in the West Bank. He was taken to an Israeli hospital where he died of his wounds two days later. His parents, refusing to allow their grief to overwhelm them, decided to donate his organs to Israelis. Six people received the benefit of his organs.

His mother said, “My son was dead but at the same time maybe he could provide life to others and maybe he could reduce their pain.” These parents, showing mercy and compassion were experiencing ‘the go and do likewise’ that Jesus spoke about and in acting in this way were living this new life; this eternal life that the lawyer was so concerned about.

It is in our treatment of one another that we find truth.

The truth about our spiritual state and the truth about the man who walked a lonely road to his death for us.

The lawyer was concerned about his state: “What must I do to inherit eternal life?” Jesus jolted him out of his self-preoccupation to look at the needs of others. You will not find answers gazing inwards but only as you get out and serve your neighbour in need. And don’t try to push the challenge away by narrowly defining your neighbour in a way that suits you. There’s your neighbour lying in the ditch. There. It doesn’t matter where he comes from or what he’s been up to. Serve him. Bandage up his wounds and bring him to safety.

Only then will you know anything about the new life, the eternal life the lawyer was asking about because, only then, can you be like the lonely man who walked to Calvary to give his life for the world.

Print Friendly, PDF & Email
Tweet
Share
Pin
Share
0 Shares

Filed Under: Sermons

WELCOME

Front-of-Church-Close-Up

Jesus Ascends to Glory

May 28, 2025 By 2

Sunday 25 May 2025 is Ascension Sunday.

Christians celebrate the time when Jesus ascended to heaven. Ascension Day itself is generally observed on a Thursday, the fortieth day after Easter.

Today’s Main Scripture

Jesus speaks to his disciples, following his resurrection at Easter and shortly before his ascension:

John 14 (from The Message Bible Translation)
The Road
14 1-4 “Don’t let this rattle you. You trust God, don’t you? Trust me. There is plenty of room for you in my Father’s home. If that weren’t so, would I have told you that I’m on my way to get a room ready for you? And if I’m on my way to get your room ready, I’ll come back and get you so you can live where I live. And you already know the road I’m taking.”

5 Thomas said, “Master, we have no idea where you’re going. How do you expect us to know the road?”

6-7 Jesus said, “I am the Road, also the Truth, also the Life. No one gets to the Father apart from me. If you really knew me, you would know my Father as well. From now on, you do know him. You’ve even seen him!”

8 Philip said, “Master, show us the Father; then we’ll be content.”

9-10 “You’ve been with me all this time, Philip, and you still don’t understand? To see me is to see the Father. So how can you ask, ‘Where is the Father?’ Don’t you believe that I am in the Father and the Father is in me? The words that I speak to you aren’t mere words. I don’t just make them up on my own. The Father who resides in me crafts each word into a divine act.

11-14 “Believe me: I am in my Father and my Father is in me. If you can’t believe that, believe what you see—these works. The person who trusts me will not only do what I’m doing but even greater things, because I, on my way to the Father, am giving you the same work to do that I’ve been doing. You can count on it. From now on, whatever you request along the lines of who I am and what I am doing, I’ll do it. That’s how the Father will be seen for who he is in the Son. I mean it. Whatever you request in this way, I’ll do.

The Spirit of Truth
15-17 “If you love me, show it by doing what I’ve told you. I will talk to the Father, and he’ll provide you another Friend so that you will always have someone with you. This Friend is the Spirit of Truth. The godless world can’t take him in because it doesn’t have eyes to see him, doesn’t know what to look for. But you know him already because he has been staying with you, and will even be in you!

18-20 “I will not leave you orphaned. I’m coming back. In just a little while the world will no longer see me, but you’re going to see me because I am alive and you’re about to come alive. At that moment you will know absolutely that I’m in my Father, and you’re in me, and I’m in you.

21 “The person who knows my commandments and keeps them, that’s who loves me. And the person who loves me will be loved by my Father, and I will love him and make myself plain to him.”

22 Judas (not Iscariot) said, “Master, why is it that you are about to make yourself plain to us but not to the world?”

23-24 “Because a loveless world,” said Jesus, “is a sightless world. If anyone loves me, he will carefully keep my word and my Father will love him—we’ll move right into the neighborhood! Not loving me means not keeping my words. The message you are hearing isn’t mine. It’s the message of the Father who sent me.

25-27 “I’m telling you these things while I’m still living with you. The Friend, the Holy Spirit whom the Father will send at my request, will make everything plain to you. He will remind you of all the things I have told you. I’m leaving you well and whole. That’s my parting gift to you. Peace. I don’t leave you the way you’re used to being left—feeling abandoned, bereft. So don’t be upset. Don’t be distraught.

28 “You’ve heard me tell you, ‘I’m going away, and I’m coming back.’ If you loved me, you would be glad that I’m on my way to the Father because the Father is the goal and purpose of my life.

29-31 “I’ve told you this ahead of time, before it happens, so that when it does happen, the confirmation will deepen your belief in me. I’ll not be talking with you much more like this because the chief of this godless world is about to attack. But don’t worry—he has nothing on me, no claim on me. But so the world might know how thoroughly I love the Father, I am carrying out my Father’s instructions right down to the last detail.

“Get up. Let’s go. It’s time to leave here.”

Sermon by Rev. Anne-Marie Simpson

To get straight to beginning of the sermon, click here.

Sermon Text

For 40 days after Easter morning, Jesus remained on earth.

We know of several occasions when he met with some of his disciples.

Mary Magdalene in the dawn Garden, the two walking the road to Emmaus. appearing more than once to those in the upper room. On the shore at sunrise, and now in this final time of parting.

We can only surmise how Jesus spent the rest of this time before his departure. How many others did he meet with, perhaps, who did not record the fact? How many lives did he touch in those final 40 days on Earth?

Just as it was vital for Jesus to prove his resurrection to his followers, so it was very important that he took his leave properly.

His appearances to them could not just stop suddenly. That would leave too much uncertainty in the minds of his friends. Nor could the story that we’ve heard today of this awesome ascension be omitted from the narrative.

People at the time needed to know this part most fully. Indeed, we need to understand exactly where Jesus has gone.

There have to be witnesses. There is much mystery to this story, ascending into a cloud seems, well, rather vague. We desperately want more detail.

Luke gives us a brief description in his gospel and another in the book of the Acts of the Apostles.

Yet, however brief this story is, it is so important for both the disciples and for us today.

The disciples needed closure for them. This is an ending, the end of their time spent with Jesus – i.e. the end of Jesus amongst them present here in this world.

Yet it is also a beginning. The beginning of a brand new chapter for the disciples.

Now they have been given final instructions. Wait here in Jerusalem and show you are empowered by the Holy Spirit, then go out and preach the good news of repentance and salvation to all the world.

They must continue Jesus’ work of justice and compassion, healing and acceptance, but now they must also preach their testament, make new believers and baptise them in the Holy Spirit, not just the people of Israel, but everyone, right around the world.

They are witnesses. They have a testament to share.

And if this work seems impossibly huge to undertake, so very difficult to achieve, then Jesus has promised them a helper. That will be given power through baptism in the Holy Spirit. And so the disciples are not overwhelmed by the task in hand, or cowed under the weight of their commission. Instead, they go back into Jerusalem filled with joy at what Jesus has promised. Filled with joy at what they have seen.

They know exactly where Jesus has gone. They’ve witnessed him rising to heaven with their very own eyes, and there is no room for doubt. Now they have a friend in heaven, a friend whom we believe presents our prayers at the throne of God and intercedes on our behalf. A friend who has sent them a helper, a friend who has always present with us, always available when we need help.

The human Jesus could only be in one place at any given time, but now as a heavenly being, Jesus transcends the spatial and the temporal qualities of this world.

He can be constantly with his disciples. He is constantly with us.

Furthermore, Jesus has promised them that they will follow where he has gone.

Before the crucifixion he has told them that he goes to prepare a place for them. Those words that we say at every funeral, I go to prepare a place for you. Now they understand what that means. One day they too will be in heaven, where they will see Jesus again and live in the presence of their Heavenly Father. They also know that Jesus is listening to their pleas and prayers. He might be out of sight, but he isn’t out of their hearing.

And Jesus has promised to return, to come back one day when everything will be put right, and the whole of creation will be restored to its original state of balance.

The early church watched patiently and diligently for the coming, believing it to be imminent.

But God’s time is not our time, as we are reminded in the second letter of Peter: With the Lord a day is like a thousand years and a thousand years are like a day.

The Lord is not slow in keeping his promise, as some understand slowness.

But we must keep watch and be prepared for this coming, for this event, so that we are ready to meet with Jesus on his return. Ready for whatever that will mean for us.

Jesus speaks of how his ascension has been written into Hebrew scripture in the laws of Moses, in the writing of the prophets, and in the Psalms, as we’ve heard in Psalm 93, and in Psalm 47.

The signs have always been there, but it would have been impossible for human minds to comprehend what was meant.

The story of death and resurrection and ascension is too full of wonder, too full of awe for us to fully understand. Jesus has ascended to sit enthroned at the right hand of the Father, where, as Paul tells us, he reigns supreme.

In the meantime, the disciples returned to Jerusalem in great joy to spend their time giving thanks in the temple, praying to God, knowing that they are heard, and knowing that whatever happens to them, Jesus awaits them with a place prepared.

And so what does this day of Ascension mean for us?

We’ve been promised everything that the disciples were promised.

We know that God, Jesus has gone before us, and we live in the hope that this and every other promise He has made will be fulfilled. that, through repentance, our sins will be forgiven, and we will go to take up that place, which He has prepared for us in his Father’s house, where we will live forever in the presence of God, reconciled and beloved for eternity.

And the second coming, what will that be like?

The angels in Acts have told us that Jesus will return in the same way as he left, descending from a cloud, perhaps, to the awestruck gaze of the people below.

Will you be there, as generations’-worth of prayers are answered, watching and waiting in joyful expectation, as your Lord and Saviour descends to bring the Kingdom that we pray for to come?

As it was in the beginning, is now, and ever shall be, world without end. Amen.

Recent Posts

  • Jesus Ascends to Glory
  • Holy Week Services in Lossiemouth Area Churches of Scotland 2025
  • What we can learn from Jesus being tested by the devil in the wilderness
  • Recent Church Services and Sermons
  • Why your current role in life is where you should be serving God
  • A Service for Everyone in Lossiemouth – World Day of Prayer 2025
  • Lossiemouth area Church of Scotland Services for Christmas 2024
  • Nine Lessons and Carols – Fourth Sunday of Advent
  • Why no one has hope until we all have hope
  • The numerous prophecies of the coming of Jesus
  • Watch for this – The time is coming
  • Christmas Carol Praise – Lossiemouth – 15 December 2024
  • Lossie Singers Autumn Concert – 06 October 2024
  • When you cannot even formulate the words to pray
  • A call to use our time wisely and fruitfully

Contact Us

We would be glad to hear from you. Feel free to contact our Minister, Rev. Geoff McKee, or attend one of the events or groups detailed on this website.

Our Minister

Our Minister is Rev. Geoff McKee.

Lossiemouth Church of Scotland is a registered Charity No. SC000880.

The Church of Scotland Logo

Our Mission

Our mission is to be a Christian community sharing the love of Christ, reaching out to the people in this area and encouraging them to worship God and grow in the knowledge of the care and love of Christ.

Search this website

Join Us On Social Media

  • Facebook
  • Twitter
  • YouTube

© 2025 St James' Church of Scotland, Lossiemouth · Rainmaker Platform