Sunday, March 7, 2010

My New Understanding of the Parable of the Good Samaritan

Tonight I had the enjoyment of attending a talk at my church for our parish renewal. It was about understanding the call to discipleship. The speaker for the night, Fr. Dennis. He talked about our faith life should be like a journey... There are three parts... the door, the road, and the destination. Since I am really tired this evening I will focus more on the "door" part in this entry and talk more about the other two tomorrow.

For the door he focused on the Good Samaritan parable from Mark's gospel. He talked about how most of the time the priests will always say, "who are we supposed to be most like in this parable? The good samaritan of course." Well the truth of the matter is that we are not the good samaritan. In reality God is the good samaritan in the story and we are the stupid one who thinks it is a good idea to go through a dangerous place and make it out ok. When we don't and we get hurt the moment we realize who that person is (God) we automatically recoil away and don't want anything to do with Him, but that does not stop Him from coming down and saving us. After going through that parable Fr. Dennis said that the only way we can leave the door is when we know who we really are and once we know who we are we are ready to go onto the journey.

It was interesting to hear his take on that parable, but it makes complete sense. I know that I make stupid decisions thinking I know what is the best for me, even though it may be very stupid... I end up getting what I deserve when I do that and sometimes do not want to admit that I messed up, so when I know I have to turn back to God I don't want to... I recoil from it, but that doesn't stop Him from still coming down and dying for me to save me... it doesn't stop Him from forgiving me over and over for stupid things I have done. He will not let anything stop Him from loving me. It was a great talk.

As I said at the beginning, I have had a longer day today and I am pretty tired, so I will focus on more of this talk tomorrow night.

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