Love Your Neighbor

Leviticus 19:1-2, 9-18

Last night, one of my friends hosted a house-warming party to have folks over to his and his fiancée’s new home. A bunch of their old friends came in from out of town. At one point I was talking with a young newlywed couple, and I asked the young woman what she did. “Oh, you’re never going to guess,” she said as she exhaled from her cigarette, “I’m a nurse. I know, I know you’re going to judge me for smoking.” “Of course I’m never going to guess if you just tell me like that,” I joked, “and I’m not going to judge you, that’s not a part of my job description. I’ll bet you can’t guess what it is I do, either.” She guessed ‘businessman’ of some sort. “No, I’m actually a pastor.”

Now this is the point in the conversation with most young adults where they find some excuse to leave the conversation. But these two were actually intrigued and comforted by this new knowledge, and my comment about “judgment not being a part of my job description” sparked a conversation that centered in on the theme of (surprise) ‘kindness’ and the challenge of showing it towards people who don’t seem to deserve it. “Mm, well that’s where grace comes into play,” I nudged, “an undeserved kindness. It makes us vulnerable to being taken advantage of, I feel that’s where most folks struggle with it.”

I had hit the nail on the head for this young woman. She explained her frustration with working so hard for a paycheck only to have a significant portion of it extracted in taxes to pay for programs to provide support to people that don’t even seem like they’re trying. I listened. Her husband echoed, sharing his own difficulty coping with this perceived unfairness. This is a pretty common complication for folks. It has always been. This call to show kindness and compassion to the poor and the foreigner, to help the hopeless, to aid the outcast, to love the neighbor.

After listening and clarifying this young couple’s frustrations, I chuckled and took out my smart phone, pulling up this Sunday’s text from Leviticus. I said, “you know, the frustration you feel reminds me a lot of the Scripture I’ve been working through all week.” I confessed to them that one of the greatest challenges of preaching the Gospel of grace, for me, has always been pitting God’s expectation of love against our willingness (or better put unwillingness) to show it. I think it was Martin Luther King Jr who once said something like, “the greatest sin is locating another person’s value in their usefulness to us.” This gets at our tendency to base the kindness we show others, or the love we share, on some system of merits.

Then I shared a little snippet from Leviticus 19, “It begins like this, ‘Be holy, because the LORD your God is holy.’ Tall order. Then, skipping ahead, it says ‘When you reap the harvest of your land, you shall not reap to the very edges of your field, or gather the gleanings of your harvest. You shall not strip your vineyard bare, or gather the fallen grapes of your vineyard; you shall leave them for the poor and the foreigner: I am the LORD your God.’” I looked up from the text and gently added, “I hear this portion of the text as words of challenge and encouragement to a community struggling with the vulnerability of showing kindness and generosity towards ‘others.’ Those who don’t follow the same laws, share the same traditions, know the same customs—those who don’t contribute to the life of the community on whom they depend for life. And this whole ‘I am the LORD your God’ phrase that keeps popping up throughout these commands is a reminder of the one who has shown and continues to show this community undeserved kindness. And then skipping ahead again, ‘You shall not take vengeance or bear a grudge against any of your people, but you shall love your neighbor as yourself: I am the LORD.’ These are words of challenge and encouragement for managing internal conflict within a community.”

“Be holy because God is holy.” These words begin what is known as the “Holiness Code” of Leviticus, an ancient code of ethics for the community of Israel based on the will and ideals of the LORD God. The next couple of commands that follow are very familiar, finding companion statements in the Ten Commandments given to Moses in the book of Exodus. Holiness was understood as a distinctive characteristic which set one apart. For example, the Holy of Holies, the room which housed the Ark of the Covenant, was a separate room at the heart of the temple, walled off twice and drawn shut with a curtain. God was literally set apart, made holy. What we begin to see in the Holiness Code, however, is God’s challenge to this literal interpretation of holiness, set-apartness. God doesn’t want us to be holy by removing ourselves from the lives of others, by walling ourselves off from the poor and the foreigner, by literally separating ourselves from our neighbors. God wants us to be holy by adhering to a code of ethics and behavior that distinguishes us as God’s people—to separate ourselves by a radical willingness to show kindness, generosity, and compassion towards others.

This holiness culminates in the life of Jesus Christ, through whom we see what it means to be holy as God is holy. Jesus separates himself from others by radically connecting with others: with the poor, with the sick, with lepers, with women, with foreigners, with people of other religions, with adulterers, with sinners, with tax collectors. The culminating verse of today’s Scripture reading, “love your neighbor as you love yourself,” is perhaps most popularly known through its reappearance in the 10th chapter of Luke’s Gospel, in the set up to the parable of the Good Samaritan. In this parable, Jesus famously expands God’s definition of neighbor. This parable challenges a concept of holiness that literally separates us from the needs of others. The Priest and the Levite who cross to the other side of the road to walk by the injured man would have been considered “holy men,” and their actions to avoid this man’s blood and bruises would have been understood as actions to preserve their holiness and their ritual purity. “If you think that is holy,” Jesus challenges, “think again.”

When the words “Love your neighbor” were first written to the Israelite community, it was easy to tell who was “in” and who was “out.” But as we’ve learned through studying Isaiah, this community is eventually disturbed, exiled, held captive, intermarried, and eventually returned to a homeland (though not all return). There is no temple and there is no clear sense of community between those who remained in Jerusalem and those who return from the exile. As time goes on the Roman Empire expands and trade routes bring foreigners throughout the community. This “diversity” is perhaps what sparks the young lawyer's question to Jesus, “But who is my neighbor?” It used to be easier to tell.

If we understand, as Jesus and this Lawyer did, that this question gets at the heart of the “Holiness Code” we can see it as a question inspired by a concept of literal “holiness”—“who is my neighbor, and from whom should I remain separate?” Jesus response again redefines holiness; “love of neighbor” is an ethic which separates us by a radical willingness to show kindness, generosity, and compassion.

On Friday, my 31st birthday, I found myself on a Habitat for Humanity worksite helping to install floor joists on the foundation of a new house. I like to consider myself “handy,” but by and large must confess I know next-to-nothing about building a house. I found myself deeply inspired by the site leaders, folks with a deep knowledge of construction who could be paid a lot of money for their knowledge instead volunteering their time and leadership to build a house for the poor. As I struggled with my hammer all morning, I was struck by the convergence of the literal and metaphorical foundation of neighborliness.

There I was wanting to think I was handy, yet I struggled to drive nails into floor joists at an angle that would connect them to the foundation. That young lawyer wanted to think he was holy, yet struggled to connect his understanding of neighborliness and compassion with God’s foundation of holiness: that foundation is grace, the undeserved kindness, generosity, and compassion which God shows us. Hear this, O blessed community: be holy as God is holy. Separate yourself by connecting to people, by showing generosity and compassion without boundaries and limits. Love your neighbor as yourself. Amen.