Down on the Pavement

“DOWN ON THE PAVEMENT”

A Sermon on Luke 10: 25-37 Lake Joseph Community Church 

Rev. Dr Michael Brooks

 It is said that confession is good for the soul. So, here is mine: A couple of weeks ago, I felt like a Levite. I was driving along, happily thinking about church life and all the things I was looking forward to this summer. You see, the term Levite describes various people with responsibilities in the Temple. Singers. Liturgists. Treasurers. All the people who contribute to the life of a faith community. Now you might wonder why I didn’t feel like a priest. But no, my mind was distracted by the tasks that typically belong to the Levites.

It was a few weeks ago. I was driving home from our cottage on Lake Huron. I was on a rural road, driving around the speed limit. It’s hard to do much more on that particular stretch of road (not that I ever think of speeding, of course!). But it’s busy and hilly. And all of a sudden, as I was driving along, out of the blue, three or four slick-looking motorcycles came racing by me on the left-hand side. One was bright green. One was red. One was a shiny yellow. They were clearly part of a group, and they were in a hurry. I didn’t think anything of it, but two or three minutes later, traffic suddenly slowed down right in front of me. We crept along for a minute or two, and then I noticed a woman up ahead who was trying to direct the traffic to the right, onto the shoulder. It became obvious that something had happened on the road, and traffic needed to use the shoulder to get through. Well, you guessed it, as I got closer, I could see the red motorbike lying on the pavement. The other bikes and their riders were gathered around. And my heart sank. As we slowly drove by, the driver was lying on the road.

Fortunately, he was moving his arms and his hands. I thought about stopping. But I didn’t. There were already a lot of people attending to him, and there was no easy way to stop safely. The shoulder wasn’t available as it was the lane for traffic. So, I drove on. But as I drove on, I felt like a Levite.

Now to say that I felt like a priest might have been one step better. You see, in those days, if a priest came across a dead corpse, he would have a duty to bury it. That road from Jerusalem to Jericho was notoriously dangerous. Casualties and even fatalities would not have been uncommon. So,perhaps, not knowing whether the man on the side of the road was dead or alive, the priest didn’t want to take the gamble. It’s easier to cross to the other side and turn the other way. At least the priest might have had a reason to pass on by, as selfish as it was. But the Levite? Just distracted. Distracted by all the things that still distract us today. All the reasons we won’t tend to stop. I’m running late. I’m tired. Others are already there. I can’t help. I’ve got other things to do. I don’t want to get involved. I don’t want to risk any liability.

Yes, some of that crossed my mind as I drove along that curb a few weeks ago. I was late. I was tired. I had other things to do. I felt like a Levite. Have you ever felt that way? What are the situations you remember in which you could have stopped?Now, of course, most of us know this parable well. It’s been enacted in dramas and with little felt figures back in kindergarten Sunday school. You might remember them. I guess I’m dating myself. And I realize that, often, I get hung up on the lawyer asking the question that starts the whole thing. It is true that Jesus isn’t particularly kind to lawyers. They are the ones that challenge the interpretations ofthe law. Are there any lawyers here today that care to admit it? (wait). Would you like to wait outside for the rest of the sermon?! I remember the last time I preached on a scripture passage involving a lawyer, and I took a bit of jab at them in jest. After the service, one of the lawyers in the congregation said to me on the way out the door, “You know, Michael, I was a person before I was a lawyer.” So that put me in my place, and rightfully so.

But you know, if it weren’t for the lawyer’s further question of Jesus in order to justify himself, if it weren’t for that, we may have never come to know the Good Samaritan. The whole bit about who the neighbour is – it’s all in response to an unnecessary question. And I imagine that Jesus is just sitting there, patiently, waiting for the man to end his justification. Waiting patiently for him to finish, so that Jesus can simply say, “Go, and do likewise.” Yes, the encounter could have ended with the Great Commandment. But it is the lawyer’s further question that prompts the parable as we know it.

But here’s the thing I’ve been wondering about as I drove on, watching that bright red motorbike in the rear view mirror. Here’s the thing: Who else was there? Yes, we hear about the Levite – a keeper of Temple business – who was preoccupied and passed by. We hear about the priest who would have been obligated to bury a dead body and probably didn’t want to bother that day. And, of course, we are surprised by the arrival of a Samaritan who ends up being the medical first responder. Samaritans didn’t belong on that road. But who else was there? The Jewish practice of midrash invites the story telling around the story. Today, we might call it reading between the lines. I thought about that as others mingled around the man on the pavement. Who else was there? And as I thought about it, Helen’s story came to mind. Because Helen introduces us not to the Levite, or the priest, or even the Samaritan, but to someone else. This is Helen’s true story as published earlier this year in The Guardian Newspaper in the United Kingdom. It is the story of how Helen meets Sophia. “I could see the car and I knew I was going to hit it,” Helen recalls. “People ask: Did your life flash before your eyes? It didn’t. The only thing I remember thinking was: ‘oh well.’ In an instant, all those things I’d been worrying about until that point didn’t matter, because I was about to die.

There was nothing I could do. I was on my motorbike on a dark and rainy night in rush hour traffic when a car pulled across into my lane without looking. I couldn’t avoid hitting it. I couldn’t break. I was going to hit the car, and I was going to die. The next thing I knew, I was lying on the road. When I came to, I became aware of people starting to crowd around me. There were all these faceless feet milling all around, asking me my name and telling me I was alright. But no one wanted to move me or take my motorcycle helmet off in case I had some sort of spinal damage.

I’m not sure when Sophia came into the picture,” Helen writes, “but I do remember she laid down next to me on the road so I could see her face. She was the first person to do that. Sophia was the first person to meet me where I was. She asked me if I needed her to call somebody and I asked her to ring my husband. She did. Then, she came back to hold my hand and chat with me to try to keep me conscious until the ambulance arrived, which took about 30 minutes. All the while, she was right down beside me on the pavement. There was a humanness to the connection. She seemed to understand that I needed the safety of someone being right there at eye level.

Sophia came to visit me at the hospital later that night to see how I was. Miraculously, nothing was broken: I had a lot of protective gear on, which had saved me. I just had a lot of bruises and strains.

Sophia had been to the supermarket and bought me some snacks and magazines, rightly suspecting I’d be in there for a while and would need entertainment. But she hadn’t only thought about me. She’d come to see my husband, too. She had got him a sandwich and said: “I know it will be really late by the time you get home tonight and if you’re anything like my husband, you won’t have thought about yourself.

Sophia stayed with us for an hour. She was doing all of this while sacrificing a precious night at home with her own family. I couldn’t believe somebody so thoughtful could exist. I mean, what an angel. I think about the selflessness of the hours she so willingly gave up to help someone she’d never met before. Now, in many different situations, I think to myself, ‘what would Sophia do?’ She wasn’t the medical responder. And yet, what she offered was of such huge value. I never saw Sophia again, but I still can’t imagine anyone kinder.” (theguardian.com/lifeandstyle/2025/apr/07/kindness-of-strangers-a- woman-laid-down-on-the-road-beside-me-holding-my-hand-until-the-ambulance-came).

That is Helen’s story about Sophia. Not the priest. Not the Levite. Not even the Samaritan.

Someone else who was there just to be there. What was that value that Sophia offered? To me, it seems like the gift of being the presence of Ahad love in a tragic situation. A love that is so deeply rooted in the covenant with God, that it cannot escape us. A love that is shown in times of need. Of course, the Samaritan offers this love in the form of mercy. And Jesus says, “Go and do likewise.” But the Samaritan ends up being the “doer.” The medical responder. The bandager. The anointer with oil and wine to cleanse the wounds. All vital tasks. Sophia, however, is the one right down on the pavement at eye level, holding the hand, being the presence of Ahad, of loving-kindness.

We may not have taken a first aid course. We may not be the one directing traffic onto theshoulder of the road. We may not be the paramedic or the staff at the ER. But there may be times when all that’s needed is the presence of Sophia which, of course, ironically, perhaps, means “wisdom.” The wisdom to realize that all the temporal matters are being attended to, but what is really needed is the spiritual presence of mercy – God’s love.

I wonder if, a few weeks ago, someone, eventually, got right down on the pavement next to that motorcycle driver? I wonder if Sophia showed up on that rural Ontario road I happened to find myself on? I’ll never know. But what I do know is that the God of love made known in Jesus can show up on any road. The road from Jerusalem to Jericho. The road from Lake Huron to Burlington. The road from Port Carling to Toronto. The road from despair and worry to hope and life. Everywhere, in every time, there are the Sophia’s who care enough to get down on the pavement at eye level and hold the hands of the Helen’s. As we cross the crowded ways of this life, God invites us to be attentive to them. And there may even be times when God calls us to be those Sophia’s. For the sake of God and God’s mercy – a love divine that never lets us go.