"BE EACH OTHER’S NEIGHBORS"
Gospel: Luke 10:25-37
Dear Friends,
The meaning of love is many times mistaken with different beliefs and opinions. However, Jesus teaches us the most important commandment of all which is “You must love the Lord your God with all your heart, all your soul, all your strength, and all your mind. And love your neighbor as yourself" (Luke 10: 26). Jesus uses the story of the Good Samaritan to illustrate to us the meaning of this commandment. In this parable Jesus presents to us a challenge: "Who is my neighbor?" The answer is clear: everyone is my neighbor insofar as they enter my life. Everyone who is in need is my neighbor. Everyone who has compassion on others and treats them with love is a neighbor to them. Jesus is very clear that he is not speaking just about the people next door!
In our lives we have encountered occasions when we forget who our neighbor is. We have sometimes forgotten to treat those in need with compassion, care, and understanding. Christ reminds us "who our neighbor is"--a person that needs support. We are invited to see an enormous challenge in helping others if we want to follow our Lord Jesus.
As the image of the unseen God, and as the Good Samaritan, Christ is close to us in all circumstances of life. This was the enormous insight of many saints: what I do to the other person, I do to Christ. God is Close to us. That is, in our neighbors. As a humble master, he is always available to us in simple ways and things. He is close to us in the scriptures, in the poor, in the just, in the pious, in the marginalized, in the sick, and in the weak. Like the Good Samaritan, if we search for God in these we will find Him. This is such an incredible insight that most of us know academically or in our heads, but so often we fail to realize this insight in our daily living. If we truly treated each other person as God Himself, our world would change in the twinkling of an eye.
Let us be like the Good Samaritan. Let us stop and reach out. The Samaritan is the disciple and the neighbor. May Christ open our hearts and minds so that we can see with eyes of faith, that we live lives of faith and that we are aware of the Divine Presence always and in everyone and respond to Jesus’ invitation to; “Go and do likewise.”
God Bless,
Rev. Father Frank Kyazze
