‘We All Need a Good Samaritan’

Everyone wants a miracle — but no one wants to need a miracle.

Pastor Mark Batterson, lead pastor of National Community Church in Washington, D.C., says someone else’s miracle is on the other end of our obedience.

The Good Samaritan is of course the picture of Jesus Christ.

One Sunday we read in the Gospel the very familiar story of the Good Samaritan. I must have heard it a hundred times, but this particular Sunday, I heard it with new ears. Every now and again, God does that — takes the familiar and makes it new. (I like that about God! We can never come to the end of the newness of Him.)

We have a new pastor at my church. I am not sure if it was the sound of a voice I did not recognize ringing in my ears or something else — but God got my attention through him.

He simply said, “We all need a Good Samaritan.”

Funny, I had never really thought of that before. I have always looked at the story through the eyes of BEING the Good Samaritan, not in being in NEED of one.

This really got me thinking.

Why did the Samaritan stop and render aid? Could it be because as an “outcast” — as that is what the Samaritans were, “half-breeds,” disdained and dismissed — he was accustomed to being passed by people on their way to something or someone “important”? When he saw the man in need, did it strike a chord deep inside of him as he knew how it felt to be left alone, hurting and bleeding (physically or figuratively) on the side of the road? Did his own woundedness compel him to reach out in compassion to one in whom he saw his own reflection?

The Good Samaritan is of course the picture of Jesus Christ — and I think we can all agree we are most assuredly in need of Him in our lives. Amazingly, just as the Good Samaritan had compassion and pity on the one in need, so too Christ has for us. Why? Because He too has been passed by, disdained and dismissed by this world. He is very familiar with our very human condition, because He, unlike us — chose it.

Now I see that God does not waste what I would consider my “misery, brokenness or littleness” — He will use it to give me new eyes to see others who are in need, just like myself.

Related: If You Feel Adrift, Take Heart

And just like the Good Samaritan was the answer to this man’s prayers, so can we be for others. What the world may call our “weaknesses” can be used by God to move us to become a “miracle worker.”

We are all in need of a Good Samaritan.

“They stripped and beat him and went off leaving him half-dead … But the Samaritan traveler who came upon him was moved with compassion at the sight … Go and do likewise.” (Luke 10:30, 33, 37)

Dear Lord,
I have never thought that You could use my brokenness for Your good, but I see in this story that You choose for me to use all that You have allowed in my life for Your Glory. Let me not harden my heart, becoming proud, puffed up or calloused, despising what I see of my brokenness in others, but instead, use it to quicken my heart to do good, my feet to run to do mercy and my hands to bring blessings.

I ask this in the Name of the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit. Amen.

Melissa Overmyer is founder of  Something Greater Ministries in Washington, D.C., and has taught the Bible for over 30 years.