The Why Game

Last Saturday my husband, his siblings, his siblings significant others, his Dad and I were all going to see the film Avatar. We all divided ourselves into different cars and my husband, Scott (my husband’s little sister’s husband) and I rode together. As the three of us were walking toward the theater I saw an empty McDonald’s fries container lying right in the middle of the beautiful, still miraculously green grass outside the theater. So, I picked it up.

My husband sighed and said, “What are you doing?”

Scott replied, “She’s being a Good Samaritan.”

That really struck me as odd. See, I didn’t think doing something as simple as picking up a single piece of trash and carrying it 20 or 30 feet to the nearest trash bin warranted the title “Good Samaritan”. To me that’s a pretty grand title.

The term ‘Good Samaritan’ comes from a parable of Jesus Christ. He tells the story of a Jewish man who is attacked by thieves on an isolated mountain road and left for dead. Two people, who are not only his countrymen, but religious leaders, happen along and both find reasons not to stop and help him. Finally a Samaritan, a minority Jewish sect persecuted and severely ostracized for their beliefs, stops and helps the man. He not only tends to the man’s wounds and carries him to the nearest city. Once there, he leaves money to pay for the man’s care AND makes the stipulation that if what he leaves turns out to be insufficient, he’ll be back by at a later date and will pay the difference.

THAT is a Good Samaritan. Actually, that is THE Good Samaritan.

The point of that story wasn’t to shame the predominantly insulated and self-agrandzing Jewish religious leaders of the time or to provide an example for people with regard to how we should treat each other. I’m pretty certain it accomplished both of those tasks and that was intentional but that wasn’t the main purpose of the story.

That story was told to answer a specific question which was the last in a series of questions that, honestly, reminds me of the ‘Why’ game my kids play sometimes.

(If you don’t have kids the game is a contest of wills. They ask why until they either they get bored, are satisfied or you lose your sanity.)

So, this guy comes up to Jesus and says, “You know what? We’ve got a lot of rules. A LOT of rules. Which is the most important?”

Personally, I think that was a pretty stupid question. It’s like. “There are a lot of laws in this country, Officer. Sure, I was breaking one but it wasn’t the most important one.”

Anyway, Jesus goes with it. He says, “Love the Lord your God with all your heart, mind, soul and strength…” Then most translations continue it this way “and the second is ‘like it/like unto it’, love your neighbor as yourself.” I hate the way this is translated.

I went to a Preacher’s school. Some people call it seminary. This one was called an ‘International Biblical Institute’. The point is, I studied Greek and that passage is not so simple and the concept is hard to put into words in English. I think the best I can do is ‘the second most important commandment is part of the first’. In my personal opinion and interpretation it wasn’t a ‘do this, and then that’ situation. It was an ‘if you do this then you will, by default, also be doing that’ situation. He wasn’t saying, “Love God first and then love your neighbor.” He was saying, “If you love God, then you automatically will love your neighbor.”

My kids get to take a single toy to day care every day. Today my son wanted to take the ambulance that his sister got him for Christmas. My husband said, ‘That one is extra special.’

Jonathan decided to start playing the Why Game.

“Why, Daddy?”

“Because it’s the one Emmy got you.”

“Why?”

“Because she loves you.”

“Why?”

“Because you’re her brother.”

“Oh.”

That stuck in my head. (You may have noticed that happens a lot. What can I say? I have a sticky head.) Why did this particular incident stick in my head? Because the Why Game session was so SHORT. Because the concept of brotherhood was so fundamental, even to my three-year-old, that it severely truncated a Why Game.

The concept of the greatest commandment and its runner up is that God is the father of humanity and that makes each and every human being on the planet siblings; family. The concept of universal brotherhood isn’t limited to a belief in God either. Whatever your beliefs, if you go back far enough we all came from the same place. We are all related to each other. We are all family.

Jesus in that commandment was saying, “If you love God, then you will love your neighbor. Why? Because God does. Why? Because that other person is just as much His child as you are.”

The parable is the answer to the question, “Who is my neighbor?” The main aim of the story of the Good Samaritan was to teach the questioner that shared DNA, skin color, nationality or even religious beliefs do not determine who your neighbor is. We are ALL neighbors. We are all family.

If the holidays teach us anything, they teach us that you don’t necessarily always agree with your family. You don’t necessarily always like all of your family. BUT you do love them. You make a conscious decision to overlook things in family members that you make a conscious decision not to overlook in people who are not family. Petty annoyances, social and economic differences, differences in religious and political beliefs; they all drive us crazy at the holidays but we put up with them.

Why?

Because they’re ‘family’.

Why?

Because our society decided they are.

Why?

Because we needed people looking out for us.

Why?

Because human beings apparently don’t look out for each other unless they feel obligated by the dictates of society.

Why?

Um...