Breaking Down the Barriers

Sunday Rewind is a 5-day Devotional based on the weekly sermon at Resonate Community Church

November 9th Sermon, Day 4

Perhaps the most shocking part of Jesus' parable was His choice of hero. The Samaritan was the last person anyone expected to be the good guy in the story. Jews and Samaritans despised each other. They had centuries of ethnic, religious, and cultural hatred between them. Yet this despised outsider became the example of what it means to love your neighbor.

Jesus was making a radical point: love doesn't ask who is like me. Love asks who needs me. We all have our barriers - people we find it easier to love and people we struggle to care about. Maybe it's based on politics, race, social class, lifestyle choices, or past hurts. We create mental lists of who deserves our compassion and who doesn't. But Jesus shatters these categories. The religious expert wanted to know who qualified as his neighbor so he could limit his responsibility. Jesus flipped the question entirely. Instead of asking who deserves your love, Jesus asks: to whom can you be a loving neighbor? T

his is both challenging and liberating. It's challenging because it removes our excuses and expands our responsibility. But it's liberating because it frees us from the exhausting work of judging who is worthy of our care. Everyone who needs compassion is our neighbor. Today, ask God to reveal any barriers in your heart that might be limiting your love. Who have you written off? Who makes you uncomfortable? These might be exactly the people God is calling you to serve.

Bible Verse

"If anyone has material possessions and sees a brother or sister in need but has no pity on them, how can the love of God be in that person?" - 1 John 3:17

Reflection Question

What barriers - whether cultural, social, or personal - might be preventing you from showing compassion to certain people in your community?

Quote Love doesn't ask, who's like me. It just says, who needs me?

Prayer

Lord, break down the walls in my heart that limit my love. Help me see all people as You see them - precious and worthy of compassion. Give me courage to cross barriers and show Your love to everyone You place in my path. Amen.