While traveling in South Carolina last week, I had the opportunity to watch a few minutes of the local news. One of the stories was about a tow truck driver who responded to a stranded motorist. Upon arriving on the scene, the tow-truck driver began the process of hooking the woman up for the tow when he noticed a Bernie Sanders for President bumper sticker.
In an interview with WLOS-TV, the tow truck driver said, “Something came over me, I think the Lord came to me, and he just said get in the truck and leave.” He went on to say how good he felt about his decision to leave the handicapped and infirmed woman to fend for herself.
While the Trump supporter justified his actions and even invoked the idea that God may have told him to do it, the Bible has a very different take on how we should treat people who aren’t like us.
In Luke 10, Jesus tells about the Good Samaritan. In this story, a man is robbed and beaten and left on the road to die. A priest and temple worker both passed by being sure to avoid the desperate man. A Samaritan however, had compassion on the man, cleaned his wounds, bandaged him, took him to an inn and cared for him. Having to leave, he paid the innkeeper to take care of the wounded man until he could return.
With all due respect to the South Carolina Tow Truck Driver, I’m pretty certain that God did NOT tell him to strand that woman on the side of the road to “feel the burn.” (Yes I meant to spell it that way)” If he felt that “her kind” were enemies who harmed him in some way, perhaps he should have considered Jesus’ instructions from Luke 6, “Love your enemies, do good to those who hate you, bless those who curse you, pray for those who mistreat you…”
Father God, may we all set aside our petty agenda’s and tit-for-tat politics and embrace Your Kingdom standards.
Shalom!
Rodney