Sand Mountain Sermonette 54
Matthew 5:41
Sand Mountain Sermonette 54
The Knee in Need
“Whoever compels you to go one mile, go with him two.” Matthew 5:41
On 1997 I had a same-day surgical procedure performed on my right knee at a local hospital about a mile or less from the parsonage home where we were living at the time. However, there were several challenges awaiting me following my surgery. First, I would have to use crutches. Second, my leg was tightly wrapped and fitted with a special brace designed to keep it perfectly straight and immobile. Third, we owned a Safari van which was more difficult to enter and to exit with my leg as it was. Fourth, our home had steps leading both to the front and side doors of the house with only the back door entrance being at floor level. This meant entering the back yard through the double doors of a chain link fence and pulling up to the back door via carefully maneuvering the car between a cluster of pine trees!
But God in His faithfulness provided a dear man who was a member of our church to bring me home in his car which was much easier to get into. Then, he drove his car around to the back of our house, helped me out, and in through the back door and into my den to a chair, I could sit in more easily. Then, he stayed and prayed for Nancy and me. Also, our friend checked back on me during the weeks ahead, and to this day, my wife and I are dear friends of this dear Christian man and his wife who had gone that extra mile for us!
Jesus spoke the words of our Scripture verse for today in His “Sermon on the Mount.” In doing so, Jesus was showing His followers the way His Father wanted His children to conduct themselves under the new covenant of grace which was being ushered in by His life and his death and resurrection to follow.
Historically, the phrase, “all roads lead to Rome” goes back to first-century Palestine. The Romans had amassed a superhighway system of more than fifty-thousand miles of road to and from the lands they had conquered. At each single mile there was a stone mile marker pointing directions including the distance to the next town and how many mile(s) it was to Rome, hence, “all roads lead to Rome.” Now, a Roman citizen or soldier could force one of its subjects to carry his backpack or load for one mile and one mile only at any time that citizen or soldier wanted that subject to do so. This would have had the ear of any Jew, for example, who would have been listening to Jesus’ sermon that day. And Jesus was saying, “Don’t just go one mile, go two!” In other words, desire to do more than is expected or required!
What an influence we have as Christians at home, the office, or at church to make a difference for the Kingdom of God when we choose to go the second mile; to carry someone’s burden in prayer; to help them home from the hospital! Jesus went the second mile when He went to the cross to die for your sin and mine- taking the burden of sin upon Himself. Who is God calling you to be a “Good Samaritan” to today or this week? He sent my friend to me, the one whose knee was in need. Let us do likewise!
Pastor Louie