“TAKERS, FAKERS AND SHAKERS”

LUKE 10:25-37

25 And behold, a lawyer stood up to put him to the test, saying, “Teacher, what shall I do to inherit eternal life?”

26 He said to him, “What is written in the Law? How do you read it?” 27 And he answered, “You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your strength and with all your mind, and your neighbor as yourself.”

28 And he said to him, “You have answered correctly; do this, and you will live.”

29 But he, desiring to justify himself, said to Jesus, “And who is my neighbor?”

30 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.

31 Now by chance a priest was going down that road, and when he saw him he passed by on the other side.

32 So likewise a Levite, when he came to the place and saw him, passed by on the other side.

33 But a Samaritan, as he journeyed, came to where he was, and when he saw him, he had compassion.

34 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.

35 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.’

36 Which of these three, do you think, proved to be a neighbor to the man who fell among the robbers?”

37 He said, “The one who showed him mercy.” And Jesus said to him, “You go, and do likewise.”

Of all the sermons that I’ve preached over the years there’s one that people seem to remember more than all the others.  I think it’s because of some advice that I included in the sermon.  The advice came from a motivational speaker by the name of Jewel Taylor.  According to Jewel Taylor it’s a good idea every now and then to take an inventory of the people in your life.  It’s a good idea to do that she say because,

“Not everyone is healthy enough to have a front row seat in your life.  There are some people….(who) need to be loved from a distance.  It’s amazing what you can accomplish when you let go of or at least minimize your time with draining, incompatible, negative, not-going-anywhere relationships.

“Observe the relationships around you.  Pay attention.

Which ones lift and which ones lean?

Which ones encourage and which ones discourage?

Which ones are on a path of growth uphill and which ones are going downhill?

When you leave certain people, do you feel better or feel worse?

Which ones always have drama?

Which ones don’t really understand, know or appreciate you?

The more you seek quality, growth, peace of mind, love and truth around you….the easier it will become for you to decide who gets to sit in the front row and who should be moved to the balcony of your life.”

When was the last time you took an inventory of the people in your life?  If that’s something you need to do here’s a question that you might find helpful.  The question is simply this: When it comes to the people in your life who are the takers, the fakers and the shakers?

The Parable of the Good Samaritan can actually help you answer that question. All you have to do is look at the different people in the parable.  What did they do when saw that man on the road from Jerusalem to Jericho?  What would you have done?  One little girl knew exactly what she would have done.  She made it very clear what she would have done after her Sunday School teacher read the Parable of the Good Samaritan to her class.  “Now children,” the Sunday School teacher said, “What would you do if you saw a man laying along the side of the road battered and bruised with blood all over him?” The little girl immediately raised her hand and said, “I’d throw up.”

That’s not what the people in the parable did of course.  So, let’s start with the robbers.  The robbers were the takers.  They took the man’s money and they almost took his life.  Their attitude was simple. “What’s yours is mine I’ll take it.”  That’s what takers do. They’ll take your money.  If they’re emotionally needy they’ll take your time or your sanity if you let them.  I call them emotional black holes.  They’ll latch on to you and drain the life out of you if you let them.

It’s like the woman whose dog disappeared one day.  The woman put an ad for the lost dog in the newspaper.  The next morning the woman received a phone call from another who saw the ad.  “I’m calling about your dog,” she said.  As soon as she said that she started to cough and cough and cough.  “I’m sorry,” she said.  “I haven’t been feely very well lately.  In fact I haven’t felt quite right since my wonderful husband died three years ago.”  The woman went on to explain that she’d been experiencing a run of bad luck lately.  “Both my parents have Alzheimer’s,” she said, “and my sister is in the hospital.  My son is flunking out of college and I’ve been out of work for months.  The bills are piling up and I don’t know how I’m going to make ends meet.”  Well, the tale of woe went on for a good twenty minutes. Finally, the woman with the lost dog managed to get the other woman back on track.  “I’m sorry to hear that,” she said, “but what about my dog?”  “Oh,” the other woman said, “I don’t have him, but I figured you might be feeling a little sad.  So, I decided to call and cheer you up.”

Do you have any takers in your life? What about fakers?  Do you have any fakers in your life?  Fakers are the people who aren’t what they appear to be.  Now who do you suppose the fakers were in the parable?  If you said the priest and the Levite then give yourself a gold star.  The priest and the Levite were both holy men.  They were men who were supposed to embody God’s grace and compassion but what did they do when they saw the man?  They looked the other way and kept on walking.

Fakers don’t have a lot of integrity.  They aren’t what they appear to be and unfort-

unately, there are some fakers out there. For a long time Tiger Woods was a faker.  He may have been a great golfer but behind the sweet sounding swing of his club was a man who was selfish, unfaithful and dishonest.  Bernie Madoff was a faker who abused the trust of his clients.  Cardinal Law was a faker who abused the trust of parents all the way from Boston to Boylston.  A Christian who talks the talk but then doesn’t walk the walk is a faker. 

So, the robbers were the takers.  The priest and the Levite were the fakers and the Good Samaritan, of course, was the shaker.  When you look at what the Good Samaritan did you realize that a shaker is someone who brings God’s grace and goodness into the lives of the people around them.  In doing that a shaker makes the world a little better place in which to live.

It takes more than kind words though to be a shaker.  That’s the point that Margaret Thatcher, the former British Prime Minister, made many years ago during an interview.  This is what she said, “No one would remember the Good Samaritan if he'd only had good intentions; he had money as well.”  (Weekend World January 6, 1980) 

The Good Samaritan wasn’t a shaker because he stopped and offered a few encouraging words to the man along the side of the road.  The Good Samaritan was a shaker because he pulled out his wallet and used it to help the man along the side of the road. In fact, the Good Samaritan actually gave the innkeeper a blank check.   After the Good Samaritan brought the man to the innkeeper he said to him, “Take care of him, and whatever more you spend, I will repay you when I come back.”

So, it’s your words and your deeds that make you a shaker.  It’s like the young woman whose boyfriend wrote her a poem.  In the poem the boyfriend said he’d climb the highest mountain for her.  He said he’d walk across a scorching desert to be with her.  He promised to cherish her and protect her until the end of time. The young woman listened to the poem.  “That’s nice,” she said, “but will your love also wash the dishes for me?”

Some people are takers.  Some people are fakers and some people are shakers.  Jewel Taylor says it’s a good idea every once and a while to take an inventory of the people in your life.  While you’re doing that here’s another question for you to ponder.  It’s a question that you can ask yourself and the question is simply this: “Which one am I?  Am I a taker, a faker or a shaker?” 

Actually, that’s a question that you can’t answer for yourself.  That question can only be answered by doing the same thing that an Amish man did one day.  It happened when the Amish man was asked if he was a good Christian.  The question surprised the Amish man.  “Why do you ask me such a thing?” he said.  “I could tell you anything.  Here are the names of my banker, my grocer and my farm hands.  Go and ask them if I’m a good Christian."

Jesus knows that each one of us can be a shaker.  Because each of us has been created in God’s image Jesus knows that we all have the ability to bring God’s grace and goodness into the lives of the people around us. Jesus know that you can do it and he knows that I can do it.  Otherwise why would he have ended the parable by saying, “Go and do likewise”? Amen.

Rev. Dr. Richard A. Hughes

July 11, 2010