“The Stranger”

Meditation on Luke 10:25-37

July 14, 2013

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      Just then a lawyer stood up to test Jesus. ‘Teacher,’ he said, ‘what must I do to inherit eternal life?’ Jesus said to him, ‘What is written in the law? What do you read there?’ The lawyer answered, ‘You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your strength, and with all your mind; and your neighbor as yourself.’ And Jesus said to him, ‘You have given the right answer; do this, and you will live.’ But wanting to justify himself, the lawyer asked Jesus, ‘And who is my neighbor?’ Jesus replied, ‘A man was going down from Jerusalem to Jericho, and fell into the hands of robbers, who stripped him, beat him, and went away, leaving him half dead. Now by chance a priest was going down that road; and when he saw him, he passed by on the other side.  So likewise a Levite, when he came to the place and saw him, passed by on the other side. 

      But a Samaritan while travelling came near him; and when he saw him, he was moved with pity. He went to him and bandaged his wounds, having poured oil and wine on them. Then he put him on his own animal, brought him to an inn, and took care of him. The next day he took out two denarii, gave them to the innkeeper, and said, “Take care of him; and when I come back, I will repay you whatever more you spend.” 

      Which of these three, do you think, was a neighbor to the man who fell into the hands of the robbers?’ Jesus asked. The lawyer said, ‘The one who showed him mercy.’  Jesus said to him, ‘Go and do likewise.’ Luke 10:25-37.

***

    Asma Gull Hasan knows what it is like to be “the stranger.”  The one who stands out from the crowd, even in America, the great “melting pot.”

    The Pakistani-American woman writes of her experiences in her book, “Why I am a Muslim.” As I share with you an excerpt from her book today, I invite you to consider what it might be like to walk in her shoes.

   Asma writes, “When I was a baby, my grandmother told me the story of Asma bint Abu Bakr and her own sister Asma. She spoke to me in Urdu, the language of her home country Pakistan, while I dozed in and out of naps as a baby does.  As a child, my parents spoke to me in the tongue of their youth—British-Pakistani English.  But when they wanted to tell each other secrets, they spoke in Urdu, not realizing that I had already dreamt in the language as a baby.  I grew up in Pueblo, Colorado, where the locals spoke to me in Spanish, though I knew hardly a word.  When my mom talked to her siblings on the phone, she sometimes spoke in Punjabi, a secondary language of Pakistan.  I spoke American English, the language taught in school.

    “With all these languages in my head, I guess I could not keep them straight.  In first grade my teacher told my mother that I was ‘retarded.’ My mental disability, she said, meant I would never learn to read or write English without special help.  I sat quietly as my teacher told my mother I was retarded.  I had a disease, my first grade self thought. I accepted it.  I knew that all the other kids in the class knew the alphabet better than me.  It took a lot longer for them to say it than for me: ABCKLVZ was my alphabet, roughly.

      “My mother was defiant at my diagnosis. She said to the teacher, ‘My daughter can read. You just don’t know how to teach her.’

     “That day, before we had dinner, my mom called me downstairs to the playroom in our basement. ‘Sit down here,’ she pointed to a spot next to her on the couch. She had a book of the alphabet in her lap.  I began learning British English from my mother every day after school for an infinitely long hour.  English had, until then, been a haze to me, a blur of black and white letters and pages, out of focus and flashing by me.

    “ ‘Make the sounds,’ my mother would tell me. ‘C sounds like cuh, cuh.’

    “ ‘Cuh!’ I said breathily one afternoon. ‘ah-tuh. Cuh-ah-tuh.’ Recognition shook my entire little body. I knew what that was!

    “‘CAT!’ I squealed proudly.

    “‘That’s right,’ said my mom.

    “When the Prophet Muhammad received the first Qur’anic revelation, he had been meditating alone in a cave…He was a religious man without a religion.  He had heard of Christians and Jews and wondered why his people did not have a movement like those.  Out of nowhere, an apparition appeared before him. It was not a person, but it looked like one.  The apparition squeezed him hard. Muhammad felt like he couldn’t breathe.

    “‘Read!’ the apparition commanded him. It was the angel Gabriel…

    “Muhammad knew very well he couldn’t read. He was illiterate. Having been born an orphan into a poor family, he was not educated.

     “‘I can’t!’ he must have thought, pleadingly.

    “The angel insisted again, ‘Read! …  Read in the name of thy Lord who created You.’

    “…Muhammad’s mouth began moving with the most amazing words: “‘Read in the name of thy Sustainer who has created—created man out of a germ cell! Read for thy Sustainer is the Most Bountiful One who has taught (man) the use of the pen—taught man what he did not know.’

    “Muhammad received the first revelation of the Qur’an.  Islam was born.  It would change the life of Muhammad, his wife Khadijah, and eventually the lives of over a billion people, including me.

    “Muhammad, despite receiving revelations till his death 22 years later, never learned to read. Reading was a luxury in Pre-Islamic Arabia.  In fact, even today most of the Islamic world is illiterate…

      “But I was lucky enough to be born to a mother who could read and taught me British English.  The homework my mother sent me off to school with would read ‘colour’” instead of ‘color,’ ‘theatre’ instead of ‘theater.’  I would return home with the graded paper, which my teacher had marked as incorrect with these spellings.

     “ ‘No wonder she thought you couldn’t read!’ My mother said. ‘She can’t even spell!’

    “By the end of the year, I was the strongest reader in my class… Not bad for a ‘retarded’ Mongolian.”

***

    In our gospel today, a Samaritan helps a stranger, a Jewish man, in need, after other Jewish people have passed him by.  The hatred between Jews and Samaritans had gone on for hundreds of years. Both sides claimed to be the true inheritors of the promises to Abraham and Moses and the rightful possessors of the land. These “enemies” lived in separate communities and avoided contact with one another. This helps to explain why the Samaritan woman at the well was so surprised when Jesus, a Jew, showed up and spoke to her as kindly as if she were his Jewish neighbor.      

     We Americans are blessed to live in a country that has made great efforts to overcome barriers between people.  Discrimination is illegal and crimes motivated by racial or religious hatred carry stiff penalties. But despite our progress, prejudice continues, even amongst Christians, commanded to love God with all our being and our neighbors as ourselves. And to show mercy to all people who are in need.

      Like the lawyer who questioned Jesus, hoping to uncover Jesus’ heretical views about the wide-reaching grace of God, some Christians try to convince themselves that it’s OK not to see people of different religions as neighbors, especially when it comes to our Muslim neighbors since the terrorist attacks of Sept. 11, 2001.

     Here in tiny Renville we have few if any Muslims living amongst us. Still, we only have to drive 25 miles to encounter Muslims in Willmar, who are Somali refugees.  They stand out from their neighbors of German or Scandinavian descent, with their dark skin, the bright fabrics the women wear from head to toe, and the language they speak.

     As a newcomer to Renville 2 years ago, though I am pale skinned and speak English, I still felt like an outsider—“the stranger.”  People would look at me curiously, point, and whisper amongst themselves when I walked into a store or the restaurant. And though I feel less like a stranger than I did, sometimes even now, something will remind me that I am not from around here and will always seem a bit odd to my neighbors who have lived here all their lives.

      So I wonder what it feels like to be a Somali refugee, to be SO different, the “stranger” who truly stands out from the crowd. How do they feel when people stare?  Do they wake up bewildered some mornings, asking themselves, “Where am I?”  How difficult it must be for them to adjust to Minnesota winters!  It’s hot year round in Somalia. They have four seasons—a dry season from January to March, a season of long rains from April through June, and 2 more seasons of short rains the rest of the year.

     When young Somali children go to school here for the first time, are they afraid? Do they think they have a disease, like Asma did, if they don’t learn to read English as quickly as their native English-speaking classmates? 

     I am sure of one thing.  When Jesus commands us to love God with all our being and our neighbors as ourselves, he means for us to love EVERYONE and have mercy for all, and especially for the stranger in need, the one whom others may simply pass by.

    Let us pray.

Gracious Lord, thank you for speaking to us through your Word, reminding us of your command to love you with all heart, soul, mind and strength and also our neighbors as ourselves.  Forgive us for failing to love ALL our neighbors as you call us to do.  Thank you for your love and patience for us every day, though we struggle to do what we know is right and be the ever generous, grateful, and gracious people you want us to be. Forgive us if we have ever been fearful, unfriendly, or suspicious of people who look and seem very different than us, who speak a language we don’t know and come from a faraway place. Open our eyes to the needs of people around us and to the needs of our neighbors across the globe.  Move us to acts of kindness. Lead us so we might be your hands and feet, voice and heart, mercifully serving as your Son has taught us to do.  In His name we pray.  Amen.