City Life Starter

Luke 9:51-56 (NIV)

Samaritan Opposition

51 As the time approached for him to be taken up to heaven, Jesus resolutely set out for Jerusalem.

52 And he sent messengers on ahead, who went into a Samaritan village to get things ready for him;

53 but the people there did not welcome him, because he was heading for Jerusalem.

54 When the disciples James and John saw this, they asked, “Lord, do you want us to call fire down from heaven to destroy them?”

55 But Jesus turned and rebuked them.

56 Then he and his disciples went to another village.

By Stefan Johnsson

So here we are in Luke 9 and the disciples still do not get it. This is one of the few times that Jesus has to rebuke the disciples for what they said. What we have in this story are three different actors where each shows how we have racial and ethnic tensions and how it is played out in our society. It also shows us a solution to the problem.

The first actors are the Samaritans. The village that the disciples and Jesus were going to happened to land in Samaria. Now, normally the Jews who were heading to Jerusalem would take the long way around Samaria. Though in this instance, Jesus did not decide to take a long way around, he planned to head right through the area.  They were unable to complete the journey, so they had to stay in the next village. Upon the Samaritans hearing that Jesus and the disciples were heading to Jerusalem, they would not welcome them or let them stay. They had an underlying hate of the Jews who ignored them, mistreated them, and above all, would not allow them to worship in Jerusalem. We do not know why the people in this village reacted the way we do, but we know that they did not like any Jews who were heading to Jerusalem.

The second actors are the disciples. They, as Jews, were the reason that there were underlying tensions with the Samaritans, to begin with. When the Jews came back from their captivity in Babylon, the Samaritans had settled in the area of Samaria. Instead of accepting them and treating them like people, the Jews treated them as enemies and would not associate with them. Instead of trying to bridge this barrier, the disciples felt that this would be a great justification to burn the village to the ground. They believed Jesus would agree because of who the Samaritans were. They felt they were better as being God’s chosen people.  They believed that the Samaritans did not deserve to be given the same sort of treatment.

The third actor in this group is Jesus himself. We do not know what he told the disciples, but rebuking them was to correct their behavior. Jesus came to heal people, both physically and spiritually, and to bring people to himself. He was there to heal racial and ethnic hatred that was caused by sin. Jesus knew why the hatred between the two was there and that fixing it did not mean to burn the village to the ground. There was a purpose for these people and the disciples did not realize it at that time.

So, we see three different actors. The Samaritans, the disciples, and Jesus. The Jews, as shown through the disciples, hated the Samaritans for who they were and what they represented. The Samaritans who felt the hate of the Jews over the past centuries would then refuse to associate with the Jews, esp. if they were going to Jerusalem. Then we have Jesus who came and looked to bridge the divide between the two. This we see in how, after the disciples received the Holy Spirit, went into Samaria to preach the gospel.

It took people filled with the Holy Spirit to break the racial and ethnic divide and to begin the healing process. To turn people to follow Jesus and to love others more than themselves. Hmm, doesn’t that sound like what we are all called to do?