Lent 3 Year C – March 2019

Proverbs 23:29-35; Psalm 63:1-8; Romans 7:13-25; Luke 10:25-37

Lance Armstrong

In today’s gospel, we hear a lawyer, a scholar of Torah, trying to trip up Jesus regarding Jewish law.  As usual, Jesus turns the tables on him and makes him answer his own question.  The response to “what must I do to inherit eternal life?” is “You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your strength; and your neighbor as yourself.”  But being a good lawyer, this man wants to quibble over details and asks “Who is my neighbor?”

Jesus responds with the story of the Good Samaritan – probably one of the best known parables in the Bible.  Now Jesus just referred to the traveler as “a Samaritan” – we are the ones who have added the word “good” to that description.  In Jesus’ time, the Jews would have considered the only ‘good’ Samaritan to be a dead Samaritan.  According to the Jews, the Samaritans read the wrong scriptures, worshipped on the wrong mountain, and married the wrong people.  Violent confrontations between Jews and Samaritans were common throughout the first half of the first century.  Contact between the groups was forbidden by religious leaders on both sides.  Neither was to enter the other's territories or even to speak to each other.    So the idea of a Samaritan traveler stopping to help a man from Jerusalem by the side of the road would have been absolutely incredible to Jesus’ audience.

Let’s take a look at the people in this story.  First, a man was traveling from Jerusalem to Jericho.  The Jericho Road was called “The Bloody Way” due to the frequency of violence along the route.  It was a steep and rocky fifteen mile stretch of road.  We don’t know much about the man from Jerusalem but it’s safe to assume he was a Jew and had an important reason for traveling the Jericho Road alone.  He would have been minding his own business and just trying to reach his destination safely.

Next we have robbers who stripped him, beat him, and left him half dead.  They lived by the law of the jungle and the way of the world - “what’s yours is mine and I’m gonna take it”. 

Then we have the priest and the Levite – the religious leaders for the Jewish people.  We can suppose they would have been living by the Jewish laws that the lawyer knew so well.

Then we have the Samaritan traveler.  On the surface he is much like the man from Jerusalem – probably a successful businessman with a good reason for traveling the Jericho Road alone.  But to Jesus’ audience, the cultural barriers to relating with the Samaritan were insurmountable.

Finally we have the innkeeper.  Again, just an ordinary businessman who has this injured traveler left in his care.

What would have been going through the minds of these people in the story?  The gospel reading is driven by questions; and I wonder what questions they were asking themselves?

-          I can imagine the poor traveler from Jerusalem asking “Why me Lord?”

-          I can imagine the robbers asking “How much can we get from this traveler?”

-          The priest and the Levite should have been asking themselves “Is he still alive?” or “Does he need help?”  Their obligation to help an injured traveler or at least protect his body until it could be properly handled should have overridden any ritual purity concerns.

-          But I suspect they had other questions to justify avoiding their obligation, such as:

o   Are the robbers still around?

o   What will happen to me if I help this man?

o   I don’t have time for this.

o   It’s his own fault that he’s in the ditch.

o   Or any one of a hundred other excuses we use for not getting involved.

-          The Samaritan didn’t ask the self-centered questions.  He was moved with pity, and the question he asked was “What will happen to this man if I don’t help?”

-          The innkeeper may bring us full circle and like the man from Jerusalem ask “Why me?”  But he was assured that he would be repaid for his efforts to care for the traveler; and I would like to think that he then asked “Why not me?”

Let’s reconsider the same question that the lawyer asked Jesus – “Who is my neighbor?”  I would like to suggest that my neighbor is the one with a need who is right in front of me.  I don’t believe the parable means that we need to solve all the ills of the world.  We don’t see the Samaritan traveler establishing hospitals for injured travelers everywhere.  But I do believe that it means when I encounter a man in the ditch, that I am to show him mercy.

So, I want to ask you some questions today – you don’t have to raise your hands.  How many of you know someone who has struggled with an addiction – a family member, friend, or coworker?  I think most of us could raise our hands to that question.  Here’s another question - what does an addict look like?  Do you still have that image of an alcoholic as the guy in a dirty trench coat, living under the bridge, eating out of the dumpster, and drinking out of a brown paper bag?  I know I used to.  Today, the alcoholic looks like a banker, a lawyer, a doctor, a butcher a baker, a candlestick maker – or, a wife, a father, a son or daughter, or even a priest.   Opioid overdoses and prescription drug abuse are national epidemics.  In 2017, there were 47,600 opioid overdose deaths – that’s an average of 130 a day.  Almost ten percent of the US population have a problem with drugs and alcohol.

The truth is that the alcoholic looks like me.  Now I’m not supposed to be an alcoholic.  My parents were not alcoholics.  I did not come from a broken home.  I was not an abused child.  I had a roof over my head, food on the table, and clothes on my back.  Nevertheless, I became a fifth a night drunk.  I did well in school.  I was my high school valedictorian, National Merit Finalist, and Top 100 Scholar.  I graduated LSU, got a good job, married a beautiful woman, bought a home and everything looked good on the outside.  I hid in plain sight for years.  I was active at church.  I was Sr. Warden at St. Alban’s and at the service most Sundays.

But addiction is a disease of isolation and denial – for the victim and for their families.  On Sundays I was kneeling in the pew hungover, shaking, sweating, and totally alone even though I was surrounded by people that knew and cared about me.  I did not know how to escape the trap of addiction, I did not know how to ask for help, and it was not a topic that was ever discussed.  And it affects everyone around the addict – family, friends, and co-workers.  The three hallmarks of an alcoholic family system are don’t talk, don’t trust, don’t feel.

Now my next question is: What is addiction?  An addiction does not have to involve drugs or alcohol.  An addiction is any substance or behavior that we place ahead of God; and any of us can be addicted.  It can be work, or money, or sex, or social media, or video games, or any number of things.  In that sense, I think all of us struggle with addictions – with places where we want to do things our way, not God’s.  Addiction affects men and women of all ages, and all racial, ethnic, religious, socioeconomic, and educational backgrounds.  Addiction is not a matter of morals or will power or lifestyle choice.  It is a physical, mental, and spiritual illness.  This is a problem that touches many of our lives, and the chances are good that each of you know someone who has suffered from an addiction or who has dealt with addiction in their family. 

There is nothing new under the sun.  In the reading from Proverbs, Solomon wrote the perfect description of an alcoholic over 3000 years ago.  “Who has woe?  Who has sorrow?  Those who linger late over wine.”  Those who “seek another drink” as soon as they awake.  Mankind has struggled with these problems since we first crushed grapes. 

I want to stress the point that addiction is a spiritual disease – just as we all face a spiritual struggle with temptation and sin.  Today, St. Paul’s is celebrating a Recovery Sunday to promote awareness of addiction and recovery issues.  You may be asking yourself why are we devoting a Sunday to this when there are so many issues and so many illnesses that deserve our attention and compassion?

What makes addiction different is that the solution to the problem is spiritual.  There is no pill to cure addiction.  Many people affected do not want to go to therapists or employee assistance programs or 12 Step meetings.  They’re about as willing to accept help as a Jew would have been willing to accept help from a Samaritan.  This is one of the reasons that the church is in a unique position to help alcoholics and addicts.  There is no conflict between the 12 Steps of recovery and the precepts of our church.  The 12 Steps acknowledge our dependence on God, our need to confess our sins, repent and amend our lives, our need to make restitution for harms done, and our need to live a God-centered life.  A good recovery program and a good religious program go hand in glove – each can strengthen the other.

I want to thank our lector for wading through the tongue-twister from Romans.  Paul gives us a great picture of our common spiritual problem: “For I do not do what I want, but I do the very thing I hate . . . I can will what is right, but I cannot do it.  For I do not do the good I want, but the evil I do not want is what I do.”  I’m sure each of you can come up with examples where you knew what the right thing to do was, and chose to do something else.  These choices can range from relatively simple issues like gossip, road rage, or calling in sick for March Madness all the way to lying, adultery, or murder.  Most of us know what our character defects are, but we hang on to them because we’ve gotten comfortable with them.  We choose the easier, softer way of what’s familiar instead of the more difficult way of changing our behavior.  We make resolutions to eat better or exercise more but we don’t stick with them.  Alcoholics stay with their familiar addictive behaviors even when they are causing pain and problems. 

Paul wrote that the law was not given so that we could check things off a list and earn God’s forgiveness and favor.  If we could do that, then Jesus’ sacrifice on the cross would have been unnecessary.  The law was given to make us aware of our sins and shortcomings and the inadequacy of our human efforts to overcome them.  The law showed people that only God can deal with sin, and the law paved the way for the reconciling work of Jesus.

As Paul wrote, we can will what is right, but we cannot do it.  If a man like Paul struggled with bad choices and wrong behaviors, is it any wonder that we struggle as well?  Alcoholics and addicts have the same struggles.  Abuse of drugs or alcohol is just a specific case of slavery to the flesh.  Most alcoholics know that their behavior is unhealthy and self-destructive.  Most are just like Paul when he says “I do not understand my own actions.” 

This is truly a spiritual battle.  Paul says, “I see in my members another law at war with the law of my mind, making me captive to the law of sin that dwells in my members.”  The real question is who are we going to surrender to – to sin or to Christ?  Our choices are sin (addiction) or salvation (recovery).

Moses told the people of Israel, “I have set before you life and death, blessings and curses.  Choose life so that you and your descendants may live, loving the Lord your God, obeying him, and holding fast to him.”  Recovery is truly a life and death choice - addiction is a fatal disease.  My choices were sobered up, locked up, or covered up.  If I had not stopped drinking, I would probably be dead by now.  I am standing here alive and sober today only by God’s grace; but our choice as Christians to live for God instead of living for ourselves is every bit as much a life and death choice.

Alcoholics are not usually living under the overpass with a brown paper bag.  According to The National Recovery Ministry about seventy-five percent of alcoholics still have jobs.  The impact on our communities is staggering:

-       Over half of all traffic accidents are drug and alcohol related

-       About 40% of hospital admissions are for addiction-related problems

-       One third of divorces include addiction-related issues

-       Fifty-three percent of Americans have one or more close relatives with an alcohol dependency problem

In short, alcoholics and addicts are our neighbors, too, and need our help.  The AMA recognizes that addiction is a disease - a primary illness that is progressive, incurable, and fatal

The next question then becomes “What can I do about it?”  The answer is to do what we’ve already committed to do in our baptismal vows:

-       proclaim by word and example the Good News of God in Christ,

-       seek and serve Christ in all persons, loving your neighbor as yourself,

-       strive for justice and peace among all people, and

-       respect the dignity of every human being.

In other words, carry the message of God’s love, His forgiveness, His grace, and the hope that we all share through Christ’s reconciliation.

No one is beyond redemption.  It can be a challenge to love someone who is acting in unlovable ways.  It can be difficult to reach out to someone who lashes out at everyone around him.  Yet that is what we are called to do.  At different times in your life you may be the Samaritan, you may be the innkeeper, or you may even be the man in the ditch.

Hopefully you know more about addiction and recovery than you did when I started.  Addiction is often the ‘elephant in the living room’.  There is still a tremendous stigma associated with alcoholism and addiction.  We don’t like to talk about it – especially if it’s a close friend or loved one.  We don’t want to look at the man in the ditch.  Several years ago, Linda was at one of her Bible study groups, and it was appropriate for her to mention that I was a recovering alcoholic.  One of the well-educated, mature leaders of the group said, “And I always thought he was such a nice person.”  Well, I am and most of us are. 

Lent is a time of self-examination and reflection.  When you leave here today, I ask you to remember how addiction may be affecting the people in your lives.  I ask you to consider how you respond to them and what your own prejudices might be about the stigma of addiction.  Remember that you actually have things in common with alcoholics and addicts in that you share many of the same spiritual struggles and you share the same spiritual solution.  Fr. Jim and I are both available to discuss dealing with addiction and recovery privately and confidentially.  There is additional information in the narthex.

Jesus concluded his discourse with the lawyer by asking “Which of these three do you think was a neighbor to the man who fell into the hands of the robbers?”  The lawyer said, “The one who showed him mercy.”  Jesus said to him, ‘Go and do likewise.”  AMEN.