Originally published February 14, 2025 for our End-of-Month Issue of Mindful Intelligence Advisor. Subscribe to get semi-monthly issues.
By Paul Collier, Editor
“Jesus replied, ‘A man was going down from Jerusalem to Jericho, and he fell among robbers, who stripped him and beat him and departed, 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, as he journeyed, came to where he was, and when he saw him, he had compassion. He went to him and bound up his wounds, pouring on oil and wine. Then he set him on his own animal and brought him to an inn and took care of him.
And the next day, he took out two denarii and gave them to the innkeeper, saying, “Take care of him, and whatever more you spend, I will repay you when I come back.” Which of these three, do you think, proved to be a neighbor to the man who fell among the robbers?’ He said, ‘The one who showed him mercy.’ And Jesus said to him, ‘You go, and do likewise.’” – Luke 10:30-37
On January 30, 2025, newly sworn-in Vice President JD Vance had a moment when speaking with Sean Hannity that kicked off a whole host of “debates” (some in good faith, some in bad faith) about the nature of Christian love. He was speaking specifically about the illegal alien invasion of the country and the President’s plan to deport them all.
First, here’s what JD Vance said that kicked off the dust storms:
“[A]s an American leader, but also just as an American citizen, your compassion belongs first to your fellow citizens. It doesn’t mean you hate people from outside of your own borders.
But there’s this old-school [concept] – and I think a very Christian concept, by the way – that you love your family, and then you love your neighbor, and then you love your community, and then you love your fellow citizens in your own country, and then after that you can focus and prioritize the rest of the world.”
The go-to counter by the left is to appeal to Luke 10, the Parable of the Good Samaritan, to counter this notion that the Homefront comes first. In this story, a Samaritan, who is considered by many at that time to be a stench on the land, finds a poor (presumably) Jew who had been beaten, robbed, and left for dead. Before the Samaritan (the stench of the land) found him, a priest saw him and passed him by, so too did a member of the tribe of Levi, a Levite (which is the priestly tribe).
In this story, then, we have a non-descript Jew who is near death, and two Jews from the most “holy” of tribes, with one being an officer in one of the highest sacred positions in the land. We have the earth, the below, in the beaten man, and wisdom from heaven, the priest and the Levite, intersecting, and the highest of the highest who is a brother to this Jew walked on, left him for dead.
But the lowest of the low, the stench of the land, the Samaritan, bent down and picked up the earth, the Jew, though he was his enemy. The leftist uses this passage to back up the claim that “Christian” love means we love everyone equally, and so those who are without, whether they be family or fellow citizens, strangers or foreigners, we give first to those with the most needs. The good Samaritan gave to the man who hated him because that man had a greater need than his own.
Of course, this takes the gospel out of the story, as this writer sees it, a story that works to show us the nature of true Christian love, to love your enemy as yourself, but it also shows that this spirit, this Christian love, is what makes you a priest, a high position in a family that crosses all racial and ethnic boundaries.
The priest and the Levite were lower in the earth than the man left for dead, though they walked in the whitewashed tombs of a legacy of true priests and Levites.
That love is possible because Christ loved his enemies as he loved himself at an unfathomable scale, giving His life and suffering the torment of the sins of billions of enemies so that they might be saved, for Christ died for us while we were yet his enemies.
That love was reflected in the Samaritan, who risked death himself, walking into Judean towns. It might be the fact that he was helping a Jew that he himself wasn’t robbed and beaten and left for dead.
The Samaritan was like others in Christ’s gospel from outside the 12 tribes who would show Israel that the righteousness of God in men is what made them high places in His Kingdom declared, a Kingdom among those who follow Christ, not their genetic heritage.
In Matthew 8, Jesus says of the faithful centurion who knew his servant could be healed with but a word from Christ, “Truly I tell you, with no one in Israel have I found such faith. I tell you many will come from east and west and recline at the table with Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob in the kingdom of heaven, while the sons of the kingdom will be thrown into the outer darkness. In that place there will be weeping and gnashing of teeth.” (Matthew 8:11-12).
The message of the Good Samaritan is NOT to give to those who need it the most, for if that were the case, Christ would have chastised the woman who came and washed his feet and used expensive perfumes to anoint Him with, an expense that could have gone to the poor instead. Christ says of her gesture, “Truly I say to you, wherever this gospel is proclaimed in the whole world, what she has done will also be told.” (Matthew 26:13).
The message of the Good Samaritan is multi-valent, but outside the shadow of Christ we see in the Good Samaritan, it demonstrates to believers what living out the love of Christ looks like in our lives, emboldening us to dare risk life and limb to rescue our enemies from harm. But that doesn’t mean we preclude the needs of loved ones in our lives or form a hierarchy of giving around “need” alone.
The Apostle Paul himself tells us in 1 Timothy 5:8 that “if anyone does not provide for his relatives, and especially for members of his household, he has denied the faith and worse than an unbeliever.”
We have a particular responsibility to provide first for our family, our friends, our associates, our fellow citizens, and then ever outward. When Christ came to walk the earth as the Son of Man, He demonstrated that stewardship responsibility to the inner circle, but yet called us to be impartial to those outside our inner circle.
We see an example of this in Mark 7 when Christ delivered the Syrophoenician woman’s daughter from demons because the foreign woman clearly demonstrated faith in Christ the Messiah even though he did not come to serve non-Jews. He judged her impartially, not as a foreigner, but as a daughter of Christ, for she clearly recognized him as the Messiah, calling Him Lord.
As he was leaving, he told them, “You will be witnesses in Jerusalem and in all Judea and Samaria, and to the end of the earth.” (Acts 1:8) He sent them out with a stewardship that began at home (Jerusalem) and extended outward (Judah, then Samaria, and then the ends of the earth) AFTER the home was served first.
On this, JD Vance was right. But he left out a distinction between stewardship and love. Stewardship is the fruit of love through Christ’s love; it is a certain responsibility love leads us to fulfill, but it’s not love itself. This, I believe, is closer to what JD Vance was describing.
This is an important distinction, and it could explain why JD Vance’s message isn’t more clearly understood (though it might reflect his own lack of understanding of the deeper gospel message, that love is about stewardship, but it’s also about impartiality, and even mercy).
Love does not mean I deprive my neighbors to provide for strangers. Love DOES mean that I show NO PARTIALITY to my neighbors over strangers. If my brother steals from a stranger, Christian love compels me to side with the stranger. Love DOES mean if someone is bleeding in front of me and they are my enemy, I stop what I’m doing and seek to come to their aid.
The left leaves out the stewardship responsibility we have to our inner circles, while JD Vance appears to have left out impartiality and mercy in his, equating stewardship with the totality of Christian love, which it is not.
What’s more, he uses this analogy to justify deporting millions of illegal aliens, some of whom might deserve impartiality and mercy when considering their unique circumstances. To be sure, the criminals (the ones who are criminals for more than just being here illegally) will have to go. To let this nation continue to be inundated with dangerous people who have no right to be here would be bad stewardship of our inner circle, our fellow citizens.
But somewhere in that mix are people who might be like that broken man, beaten and left for dead, in need of mercy, even if you imagine these people are our enemies (some of them are, but most of them are not).
In the last of the books of Moses, Deuteronomy, as Moses is preparing his people for his own death, he tells his people, as commanded to him by God “He executes justice for the fatherless and the widow, and loves the sojourner, giving him food and clothing. Love the sojourner, therefore, for you were sojourners in the land of Egypt.” (Deuteronomy 10:18-19).
It is not good stewardship, and thus not good Christian love, to sacrifice the well-being of your fellow citizens to take care of strangers, but now that they’re here, let us remember it is also not good Christian love to decline to give mercy, nor to decline to serve the ones beaten, robbed, and left for dead either.
