When Jesus Sent Amateur Missionaries Into the Lions’ Den
What’s Luke 10 about?
This is the chapter where Jesus sends out seventy-two ordinary people on what looks like an impossible mission, then tells the most famous story ever told about helping strangers. It’s about discovering that God’s kingdom breaks every rule we thought we knew about power, success, and who counts as “neighbor.”
The Full Context
Luke 10 sits right in the middle of Luke’s famous “travel narrative” – that long section where Jesus is journeying toward Jerusalem and his inevitable crucifixion. But this isn’t just geographical movement; Luke is showing us Jesus systematically preparing his followers for a world-changing mission that will continue long after he’s gone.
The chapter opens with Jesus commissioning seventy-two disciples (not the famous twelve, but a much larger group of ordinary followers) and sending them out as advance teams to every town he planned to visit. This happens shortly after the dramatic moment when Jesus “set his face to go to Jerusalem” (Luke 9:51), and the urgency is palpable. Then, after the missionaries return with wild stories of success, a lawyer tries to test Jesus with a question about eternal life, which prompts the parable of the Good Samaritan – arguably the most influential short story ever told.
What the Ancient Words Tell Us
The number seventy-two is fascinating. Some manuscripts say seventy, others seventy-two, but both numbers carried deep symbolic weight in Jewish thought. Seventy represented the nations of the world (from the table of nations in Genesis 10), while seventy-two matched the number of translators who worked on the Greek Septuagint. Either way, Luke is signaling that this mission isn’t just about Jewish villages – it’s about the whole world.
Grammar Geeks
When Jesus says “I send you out as lambs among wolves” (Luke 10:3), the Greek word for “send” is apostello – the same root we get “apostle” from. These aren’t just volunteers; they’re officially commissioned representatives with full authority to act on Jesus’ behalf.
The instructions Jesus gives are startling: no money, no bag, no sandals, no greetings on the road. This wasn’t poverty for poverty’s sake – it was a deliberate strategy. In a culture where hospitality was sacred, arriving with nothing forced people to make a choice: welcome these messengers or reject them outright. No middle ground, no polite neutrality.
When the seventy-two return, they’re practically bouncing off the walls with excitement: “Even the demons submit to us in your name!” (Luke 10:17). But Jesus’ response is intriguing – he celebrates with them, then immediately redirects their focus: “Don’t rejoice that the spirits submit to you, but rejoice that your names are written in heaven” (Luke 10:20).
What Would the Original Audience Have Heard?
Picture this scene in the first-century Holy Land. Jesus has just sent out seventy-two people – including women, tax collectors, former fishermen, and various other “nobodies” – with authority to heal the sick and cast out demons. The religious establishment would have been horrified. Healing and exorcism were serious business, typically handled by trained priests or recognized holy men, not by random disciples who’d been following this controversial rabbi from Nazareth.
Did You Know?
The phrase “shake the dust from your feet” (Luke 10:11) wasn’t just symbolic – it was a powerful ritual rejection. Devout Jews would literally shake the dust off their feet when leaving Gentile territory to avoid bringing ritual impurity back into the holy land. Jesus is telling his disciples to treat rejecting Jewish towns like pagan territory.
The lawyer’s question about inheriting eternal life (Luke 10:25) was loaded. The Greek word kleronomeo (inherit) implies something passed down through family lines, not earned through good works. He’s essentially asking: “What’s my birthright as a child of Abraham?” Jesus’ response – pointing him back to the Shema and the command to love one’s neighbor – would have been familiar ground for any educated Jew.
But then comes the twist. When the lawyer asks “Who is my neighbor?” he’s not looking for information – he’s looking for limits. The rabbinic discussions of his day were full of debates about how far the obligation to love one’s neighbor extended. Fellow Jews? God-fearers? Proselytes? Where do you draw the line?
Wrestling with the Text
Here’s where things get beautifully subversive. Instead of answering “Who is my neighbor?” Jesus tells a story that completely reframes the question. The parable of the Good Samaritan isn’t really about identifying who qualifies as our neighbor – it’s about becoming the kind of person who acts neighborly to anyone in need.
Wait, That’s Strange…
Why does Jesus specifically choose a Samaritan as the hero of this story? Samaritans and Jews had centuries of bad blood between them – theological disputes, territorial conflicts, mutual accusations of heresy. To Jesus’ Jewish audience, making a Samaritan the moral hero would have been as shocking as making your worst enemy the good guy in a story today.
The priest and Levite who pass by the beaten man weren’t necessarily being callous. They had legitimate concerns about ritual purity – touching a corpse (which the victim might have been) would have made them ceremonially unclean and unable to perform their temple duties. Their religious obligations arguably required them to avoid contact.
But the Samaritan stops. He doesn’t just help minimally – he goes all out. The Greek word splagchnizomai used to describe his compassion literally refers to a gut-wrenching, visceral response. This isn’t polite sympathy; it’s the kind of deep empathy that compels action regardless of cost or convenience.
How This Changes Everything
The genius of Luke 10 is how it demolishes our categories. The seventy-two mission shows that God’s kingdom isn’t limited to religious professionals or the specially gifted. Ordinary people, armed with nothing but Jesus’ authority and the simple message that “the kingdom of God has come near” (Luke 10:9), can turn the world upside down.
“Jesus isn’t asking us to identify who deserves our love – he’s calling us to become the kind of people who love without first checking credentials.”
The Good Samaritan parable completely redefines neighborliness. It’s not about proximity, ethnicity, or shared beliefs. It’s about seeing need and responding with extravagant compassion, even when it costs us something significant. The Samaritan doesn’t just bandage wounds and offer a ride to town – he pays for ongoing care and promises to cover any additional expenses (Luke 10:35).
This radically expands our understanding of what it means to “love your neighbor as yourself” (Luke 10:27). Jesus is saying that anyone who needs our help becomes our neighbor, regardless of who they are or how they ended up in trouble.
Key Takeaway
The kingdom of God isn’t advanced by the powerful and professional, but by ordinary people who are willing to go wherever they’re sent and help whoever they find along the way – even when it’s inconvenient, expensive, or socially awkward.
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