who is my neighbour? (part 1)

But he wanted to justify himself, so he asked Jesus, "And who is my neighbour?"
Luke 10:29

I mentioned in passing the stupid thing I did at my local. It's difficult because it is very very local. Now I get nervous walking in, which I never felt before. It also has CCTV. Oops.

I watched the Nooma DVD Dust this week, with Rob Bell. The running visual theme is of someone shovelling snow; at the beginning of the film Bell talks about doing the "small, unnoticed things. Like helping my neighbour to clear the snow off their driveway." He then sits in the warm and does an engaging exegesis of the story of Jesus walking on water.

He doesn't, at any point, go out with a large spade and help his neighbour to shovel snow.

In fact, the film was made in high February temperatures and the snow had to be carted in using 8 dump trucks (not sure of the English equivalent, maybe 'very big trucks'). So the reconstruction of reality was particularly acute. Bell had snow delivered in order to make the film and still decided not to help shovel snow. Is there a message in this?

The story of the good Samaritan is that anyone could be your neighbour at any point in time, should you choose to recognise both their need and the ways you can help them.

There's a wonderful urban legend of an actor being hired to pretend to be a victim in the corridors of an American Theological College. No one stopped to help. Perhaps because they were too busy doing engaging bibilical exegesis.

I'm being cynical. But then my thoughts for today is that actually your neighbour is as much someone you don't hurt in passing as it is someone you take the opportunity to help.

Sometimes it doesn't matter how kind you try to be to the people you love, it's the hurt you cause the people you don't know that reveals how far from saved you really are.