Jesus was demonstrating the impotence of religion, and showing how the church of His day had lost the heart of God, and lost the purpose of God to connect His people, with the community, to be a channel of life, and healing, and power. Then He begins to talk about the Samaritan, He talks about the Samaritan. The Samaritan of course, was someone that they all hated, so this really was a poke in the nose to the religious people of the day. You know something? God can raise up anyone to meet the needs of the community, and He will do. He'll raise up anyone who is willing, and for us to stay with what God is doing, we have to be willing to engage with the needs of people. You can't just have experiences and worship, without actually catching and moving with the heart of God, which is to meet people.
I want to show you several things out of this next passage on the Good Samaritan. I want to just highlight for you several things that we'll open up and look at a little bit further, but I want you to see this guy. There's a certain Samaritan journeyed, came where he was, and when he saw him, had compassion. He went to him, bandaged his wounds, pouring on oil and wine, set him on his own animal, brought him to an inn and took care of him. On the next day when he departed, he took out two denarii, gave them to the innkeeper and said take care of him. Whatever more you spend, when I come again, I'll repay you. Notice first thing: he came where he was. So one of the first things that God is - God's heart is that His people be like the Samaritan. God's heart is WE be like the Samaritan. God's heart is for YOU to be like the Samaritan, so the first thing we need to understand, the church that Jesus is building is apostolic. Every believer is sent by God on a mission.
Every believer, wherever you are in the community, you are sent by God, so the first thing is, that we embrace our calling as a sent person. Where you are, you are empowered to minister. Wherever you go, you're called by God to be a minister. You're called by God to be His ambassador and representative. We are sent people. See, it says here he came where he went. Well every one of us meets people. I guarantee that within this week, if you were to position yourself with an open heart, and begin to look for the opportunities, God will bring someone to you who's battered, wounded, half dead, got issues inside their heart, waiting for someone who will not just cross to the other side, but will actually engage them, and reach out to them. I had a group of guys, at one point and I said, why don't you this week - I taught them just about asking questions and listening. I said don't talk so much, ask more questions, and listen. If you'll do that, people will open up their heart and tell you what they really are concerned about, and what is really happening.
But if you shut your heart up, and just want to talk about yourself, and be interested in yourself, you'll miss the opportunities. You've got to look for them. This man came where he was. Now in your life God is going to bring you to where people are wounded. You will come where they are. Why? That's God's plan. His plan for an apostolic church is that wherever people go, they will go where people are wounded, hurt, damaged, whether it's the businessman, who looks so good and seems successful, but his heart is broken, his marriage is failing, got all kinds of issues in his heart; whether it's some young person at school, whether it's some teacher. It doesn't really matter where we go. God sends us to people who are in need. Notice he saw him and had compassion. The second thing God calls us to do is to manifest the heart and the compassion of God. When we see people we feel moved. How do you feel moved? Because God's had compassion on you, because you're vitally connected to Him. You're actually open in your heart, and you feel needs, you feel the compassion.