Editorial September 28, 1974 Issue

Health and Unselfed Love

Carl J. Welz

When a lawyer tempted Christ Jesus with a question about attaining eternal life, Jesus concurred with his questioner's own answer from the Mosaic law: Love God, and love your neighbor. The lawyer pressed for further explanation, and Jesus related a parable of a Samaritan who went out of his way to give merciful aid to an injured man, when others did not.

The parable suggests that the others were religious people so occupied in their materialistic concept of God that they "passed by on the other side." But the Samaritan had compassion on the injured man and went to him. He did what needed to be done. When the lawyer agreed that the one who helped his neighbor was the one who obeyed the commandment, Jesus said, "Go, and do thou likewise."^{See Luke 10:25-37;}

Was Jesus telling us to find the kingdom of God—eternal life— in the dream of material life? No. He was showing us that the kingdom of God is found in giving of oneself to others, which is God's will being done "in earth, as it is in heaven."^{Matt. 6:10;}

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