exhorting our neighbors

Renée Antrosio – June 17, 2025 4 Comments

I don’t think of myself as a public speaker. My body sweats, my throat goes dry, my legs get wobbly. I skip over whole paragraphs, accelerating to the end to get away from the microphone. It seems that just as I began to achieve a degree of comfort with the stage at New Covenant, I was asked to speak elsewhere. My initial, internal response was, “No, thank you!”

But I paused before replying (a discipline that I am slowly learning), and reluctantly put it before God, scrolling to view the lectionary scriptures for the Sunday that First Mennonite Church asked me to teach. “You have the message,” I heard as I waited for my computer to load, “I already gave it to you.” Fine. What else could I say? I’ll do it. With as much joy as I can muster to get up on a new stage with a bunch of strangers staring at me. Well, not strangers exactly. Neighbors. That was the message, after all. 

“Whose neighbor am I?” A slight twist on the timeless question that prompted Jesus’ story of the “good Samaritan” as the expansive definition of how to love our neighbors as ourselves. Members of our own tribe, whose dandelion seeds blow into our yards, whose dogs bark too much, lights are too bright, and music is too loud. And the stranger we encounter on the road, beaten down and robbed. Go- out of your way, interrupt your journey, spend your own resources- and do likewise, Jesus said. Show mercy. 

But who were the first neighbors in the Bible? Surprisingly, God’s first use of the word neighbor was in Exodus, when the Lord appeared to Moses in the burning bush and asked him to lead the children of Israel out of slavery. (Moses didn’t think of himself as a public speaker either, but God was insistent.) Then the Lord reminded Moses of the plan to compensate the slaves for their unpaid labor and finance their freedom journey:

“Tell every man to ask his neighbor and every woman to ask her neighbor for all their silver and gold jewelry.” The Lord made sure that the Egyptians were kind to the Hebrew people. In addition, Pharaoh’s officials and the Egyptian people even came to honor Moses as a great and important man in the land. Exodus 11:2-3 (CEB)

The neighbor-to-neighbor plan of Reparations was the Lord’s. Thousands of years ago. Jesus expanded that call to be a neighbor- including those whom we know all too well. Remember Zaccheus, who had become rich from the over-collection of taxes from his neighbors, as the example of repaying unjust wealth- his response to Jesus’ inviting himself over to spend the night at his house. A response of salvation.

Then Jeff asked me to speak briefly at the Reparations Town Hall as one example of a local effort. Ok, Lord, I’ll just say Yes. And then the opportunity to speak to the County Board arose. Ok, put it on my calendar. The morning of the Town Hall, the lectionary scripture leapt off the page, one I’d never noticed, as it had certainly never applied to me.

…the Lord stood near Paul and said, “Be encouraged! Just as you have testified about me in Jerusalem, so too you must testify in Rome.” Acts 23:11 (CEB)

At the Church of the Living God, I looked out on a sea of faces, staring into the blinding lights on a much bigger stage, and shared the joy of stepping into the calling to be neighbors. To be able to acknowledge, apologize, commit to repair, and take action is a step towards shared healing. A gift God offers to us all. Getting into the car, I recalled the verse from the morning. Preaching to a bunch of church folk, that was Jerusalem. The County Board meeting? That’s more like Rome. Paul was given a message for both, and so was I. 

As Ron concluded in his excellent teaching last Sunday, the way of Jesus is a light burden and an easy yoke. The call to love our neighbors- in the most complete Biblical teaching- is an exhortation into the blessing of God’s commandments. Loving God with our whole selves is an invitation to mystery, and loving our neighbors as ourselves is an invitation to make that love complete. May we live more fully into this great love as we learn more deeply how very much God so loves this world, and sent His Son Jesus to personify that love for us. -Renée, NCF Pastor