In this study of the Parables of Jesus, we are reading many of the stories Jesus used to teach hearers about how to live as His followers. Each day we’ll read parables in their immediate context, focusing on a different category of parables each week. Then we will work through a series of questions to understand the meaning of the text and take to heart the “secrets of the kingdom.”
Editor’s Note: In this Parables study, Jesus Himself is telling us stories—stories He wants us to reflect on and process. Rather than asking our writers to write their own stories about Jesus’ stories, we thought it would serve you and the text better to provide questions to help you dig into the meaning of each day’s parable. If you find a parable or passage particularly confusing, stop and pray. Ask the Lord to reveal Himself to you in His Word, and thank Him that we can know Him without knowing all the answers to our questions.
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Week 3: Parables about following Jesus
Many of the parables Jesus told have to do with what it means to follow Him in this life. Addressing topics from anxiety and fear, to compassion for our neighbors and commitment to the truth, Jesus uses common scenarios and familiar places to teach His disciples how to live as His people. Each parable in this week’s daily readings speaks to the Christian life in some way. Use the questions below to help you dig deeper into Jesus’ teaching.
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Day 15 Reading: Luke 10:21-37
Questions:
1. Today’s parable is fairly well known. As you read the text, what are some things you never noticed before about the story of the good Samaritan?
2. What specific situation is Jesus’ parable responding to, and what is the parable’s outcome?
3. What is the central point of this parable?
4. What is your response to this parable?
Been praying that God would show me someone I can share the Gospel with. I thought about doing it with my brother in laws parents last week at Thanksgiving, but I didn’t…I feel bad about it because for my school we need to do a witnessing report on how we shared the Gospel with someone, but I haven’t yet. And I want to be intentional about it, I don’t want to just share it just because they’re making us. I could call my brother in law’s parents, but I feel like it would be weird to just tell them straight out and it would sound blunt. Plus, I don’t want to just share the gospel with them flippantly, I would want to have a face to face conversation. I’m probably going to go on a servant evangelism trip Saturday, so hopefully I can talk with someone that I meet there. If you could all please pray for me that the Lord would show me who He wants me to share the Gospel with, and that I would be confident and kind when I do. Love you all!
You are leaning the right way…but maybe you were trying to do it on your own. No need to force it…you will know who you are to share with and how if you just leave it to God. Rest and then just put up your antennae and be ready!
I prayed for you. May we all remember to call on the Holy Spirit to fill us and guide us and make us brave and bold. Blessings ❤️
I prayed for you. May we all remember to call on the Holy Spirit to fill us and guide us and make us brave and bold. Blessings ❤️
I think it can be scary to share the gospel with people when you’re thinking in terms of just point blank asking someone what their faith life is like. I’m not discounting evangelical outreach in the least, but I think that the most effective way of sharing the Gospel is through your lifestyle. Especially in today’s political climate. There are so many extremist ways of thinking that obstruct the light of the true gospel. The Gospel is loving people and being kind to them and treating them with respect. If you live your life like that, you’re already sharing the gospel. People will notice, I promise. And when they ask questions, it’s the perfect opening to share how God has changed your heart and life.
Praying for Gods direction and guidance for you in this and every area of your life. May He bless you greatly
The first time I shared the gospel was on a plane and I wast talking to the man sitting next to me. He laughed at me and told me I was just young and naive and would soon learn the ways of the world. Lo these many years later I guess I’m still naive, albeit not so young. I’ve learned the ways of the world and I still cling to God. I’ve wondered whatever happened to that man, but I just put him in God’s hands. I agree with the others that you shouldn’t force it but let God guide you to who He wants you to witness to. His ways are perfect.
Love in action ❤️
You can have all the desire in the world and knowledge of God.. but if we don’t act and don’t love, we are nothing. The priest walked by; someone who teaches the very word of God to others and he moved to the other side of the street to avoid being “priestly.” Then, a Levite came along; someone who’s devine purpose is to serve in the temple and be near to God, saw the broken man and avoided eye contact…
Then, a Samaritan; a sworn enemy of the Jews since the age of the Patriarchs, not only stopped and helped the broken man up, but paid for his recovery.
It’s easy to love someone who is unknown to us, someone across the ocean, who we can imagine in anyway we please in our mind. It could be a starving child in Africa that we send a check once a month, for example. That’s easy love. How do we act toward the people who are near us, who we actually know (or know of); someone of a different race, different culture, customs, origin, political standing, sexual orientation, black sheep of the family, someone who is dirty in our eyes, someone who with a colorful history… How do I look at my neighbor? How often I avoid eye contact with a homeless person, or just politely nod at the person who lives just next door and plays his music too loud… What makes me better than that priest or Levite that walked to the other side of the street to avoid blessing someone in need, to avoid loving his neighbor.
God, please help me see my neighbor.
Great insight. Thanks for sharing.
In a book I have which provides commentary on all the parables of the Bible, the author ends his study of the Parable of the Good Samaritan this way:
“Did not God make humanity His neighbor? Seeing a world of sinners robbed of their true nature, stripped of divine ideals, wounded by sins, unable to rise, God came down in the Incarnation to where the sinner was and gave the world a corresponding example in the act of the merciful Samaritan. Christ, through His death and resurrection, covers our nakedness, binds up our wounds and heals them with a balm extracted from His own broken heart. Not only so, but He puts us in a place of safety, provides for our needs, and has promised to return and take us to Himself. Thus the parable is radiant with the beauty of the Gospel of Christ who, in His life and death kept all the injunctions given in this peerless parable.”
Praise be to God.
What book is this? Would love to read it.
I googled the quote and found it to be All the Parables of the Bible by Herbert Lockyer. You can read large excerpts from the book online.
Could you provide the source for that quote, including the name of the author and title of the book? It’s a beautiful summation.
I googled the quote and found it to be All the Parables of the Bible by Herbert Lockyer. You can read large excerpts from the book online.
This is so beautiful!
Love this!
Yes, it is “All the Parables of the Bible” by Herbert Lockyer!
One detail I haven’t noticed before—the expert in the law asked “who is my neighbor” in the context of his previous answer where neighbors are the folks we are called to love as ourselves. After the parable, Jesus asked who in the story behaved like a neighbor—it’s a subtle shift, but I think it’s important. We’re not being asked to figure out who it is that makes up the universe of people we need to love as ourselves in order to feel justified (which is how I read the scholar’s question), we’re being asked to be a loving neighbor, paying attention to and meeting needs God has equipped us to meet no matter whose they are. It’s like a shift to the question: “who would believe that I consider them my neighbor?” And the answer should continually be moving toward: “everyone.”
Well said, Beth. Thank you for pointing this out. I never noticed Jesus’ shift in the Neighbor question. He’s impressing on us all that it’s not about keeping the law, it’s about our hearts.
Thank you so much for sharing and explaining this insight- that’s something I had never noticed before!
Thank you for pointing out this shift. Love this.
Jesus answered the “expert in the law” very directly, plainly. Yet the man wanted to focus on a detail- “And who is my neighbor?” It looks to me like he was squirming under Jesus ‘ answer and so then attempted to distract from it. Love God and love my neighbor sounds pretty straight forward. But if I can deflect to who the neighbor is… Oh my. How often do I squirm under confrontation and attempt to deflect to another subject so I don’t feel so convicted? Oh my.
For me, the story of the Good Samaritan is the answer to verse 25…what shall I do to inherit eternal life? Jesus answers with the parable which is a salvation story. The neighbor is the One who found the man in the ditch, and didn’t pass by, but saved him and even gave him a room! We are the ones in the ditch and receive mercy as Jesus, our Good Samaritan saves us.
We then must go out and show the same mercy.
I have never thought of it that way. I guess there’s 2 ways to look at this story. Thanks for sharing.
If I know what the Bible teaches and what it’s whole message is, but I do not show love to those around me, than have I truly learned anything or has it changed me at all? I do not get to pick and choose what parts of the Bible I listen to and allow to change me: I take all of God’s word as inspired or none of it. I do not get to bend and twist things so they fit my worldview and allows me to live where I am comfortable as the pharisees did. My neighbors are not just those people that are like me that I am comfortable around. They are the people who believe as I do, but they are also those who do not believe as I do, they are the hurting, the oppressed, the poor, the rich, the constant, the passerby, the angry, the kind, the confused and searching: anyone my path crosses with is my neighbor. We are told to go into all the world to make disciples. All includes home. It is not necessary to go to a far country to do God’s work and make disciples, there is a mission field wherever God has placed my feet.
Amen.
True words straight to my heart. My choice is do I believe or not?
Truth.