Who is my Neighbor?

But he, willing to justify himself, said unto Jesus, And who is my neighbour? - Luke 10:29

We know that the second great commandment is to love our neighbor as ourself. To love someone as ourself is to assign the same priority to their needs as we do to our own needs. Loving someone as ourself does not mean that we assign their needs almost as highly as we do our own. When we subordinate the needs of others to our own needs, we will always fare better than our neighbor. We can be so quick to excuse the most gratuitous personal uses of resources as a deserved splurge or much needed break, and yet be extremely stingy when it comes to helping others, no matter how measuredly meager that help may be. When the needs of others are subordinate to our own, we are biased toward our own comfort; our comfort becomes more important than theirs. A poor man can say “I cannot feed that starving man because I barely have enough to eat myself.” Yet, if he were the one who was starving, he would accurately see that it would be better for two people to have a small meal than for one to starve and die while another has a full belly.¹ In calculating “sufficient for our needs,” we can use two formulas. The first is to consider what we lack compared to those who have more than us. The better is to consider what we surplus compared to those who have less than us.

Oddly, those with the least most often use the second metric, while comfort seems to decrease our sensativities to the needs of others. Comfort seems to blind our sense of what is fair and boosts our sense of entitlement. We must love our neighbor as ourselves. But who is our neighbor?

When this question was asked the Savior, he responded with the parable of the Good Samaritan. The protagonist in the story, traveling to a planned destination, happened to belong to the arch-enemy nation of the Jews. He reached out to a wounded enemy. He had to cross the road to get to the wounded Jew. He stopped midway in his journey to help. He paid of his own money to help. Clearly, Jesus was indicating that our neighbors are not just those in our family, nor those who live within close proximity, nor those who are our friends. Neither is the time to help always a convenient, cheap, assigned, or easy opportunity.

With a few minutes of research, one can be inundated by evidence that the Lord has poured out technological advancements exponentially since the Restoration. In Joseph Smith’s day, the probability that one person could do anything that would have an ev ect on someone on the other side of the globe was almost zero. In those days, only those who invented some extraordinary device, wrote some earth-shaking book or won some high public oHce could hope for any effect on someone in a distant land. Today, in nearly real time, an ordinary person from anywhere in the world can share ideas with almost any other ordinary person on the other side of the globe. The earth has become small, and is smaller every day, as it becomes more and more easy to communicate across the globe. In Joseph’s day, as limited as technology was, the Prophet still felt such an urgent responsibility for those in the world that he sent Elders to far-flung missions across the globe. If disciples of Christ in Joseph’s technologically poor days had such responsibility to the ends of the earth, how much more do modern disciples, who can reach across the globe in real time, have toward the ends of the earth?

Though we may be on different poles of the earth, separated by distance and culture, our responsibility toward those suvering in the world is extant and obligatory. They are all our brothers and our sisters. We are responsible for the suverings of those people whose suvering we have the power to relieve. Such a knowledge requires not only reaction while in our path, but, like the Good Samaritan, action to direct our path toward the greatest good that we can do while in this life. Just as the wisdom and great examples of others lay scattered for us to gather in diverse books, we should seek out the suverings of the human race, be they distant and hidden or near and obvious, and chart a course accordingly. In both cases, we must not ignore the low hanging fruit for its proximity, nor the distant opportunities for their difficulty. To anyone who has less than you—spiritually, temporally, educationally, vocationally, physically, socially, morally, or in any other way—you have the duty to lift them as far as they will be lifted.

It is easy to forget just how important the welfare of others is. “The Latter-day Saints have got to learn that the interest of their brethren is their own interest, or they never can be saved in the celestial kingdom of God.”² This is not just a Restoration doctrine. In a letter to the Hebrews Paul taught, “Remember them that are in bonds, as bound with them; and them which suver adversity, as being yourselves also in the body.”³ Do we comprehend the weight of this verse? Even with those in close proximity, do we truly react to their lack as we would if the deficiency were our own? When Brother Jones lost his job, did you dispense your means to him in the same way you would have if you had lost your own job? Do you seek to teach neighborhood children lessons about life with the same intensity as your own children? When the widow next door’s roof started leaking, did you respond in the same manner you would have if it were your own grandmother’s roof ?⁴ If we are lacking in close proximity, how do we perform when it comes to global needs? When was the last time you remembered those starving in other parts of the world? When was the last time you remembered those oppressed by tyrannical governments? Those enslaved by poverty? Sickness? Lack of education? If your circumstances were theirs, could anything else occupy your mind?⁵

You cannot use your time, talents, and everything you have been blessed with, or may be blessed with, for the building of the kingdom of God without searching out opportunities to do so. A United Order Bishop would consider the needs of his entire ward when deciding the disposition of his means. You should do the same, only your stewardship is not defined by ward boundaries, though it certainly includes those in your ward. Neither does it end at your front door, though it certainly includes your own family. Though there is a hierarchy of priority within your stewardship, it extends to include any and all that you have the means to help in any way—and to all those you could have had the means to had we exerted an evort to help extend your stewardship.

“And who is my neighbor?” you may ask, as did the lawyer.⁶ From the examples in the scriptures, it is clear that your neighbor is for whom the to Your anyone you possess ability help. consecrated stewardship includes the needs of yourself, your family, your friends, and everyone else you can help, ordered by expanding concentric circles of proximity.

Most of us are to feel when we good enough people badly hear of someone suvering. Yet, unless pressed to do so by a third party, we do not act. Brigham Young said, “Sin consists in doing when we know and can do better.”⁷ I would that wrong say sin is also doing nothing when you know of a need and can do something to fix it.

President McKay shared the following story: “I am reminded of a circumstance of the Russian woman who felt sympathy; she knew how to sympathize with the poor heroine on the theater stage. This Russian lady sat in her box, comfortable in her furs and silks, and as she looked at the performances she wept in sympathy with the heroine who was suvering imaginary torments; and while that Russian woman was sympathizing with the stage heroine, her own coachmen froze to death on the carriage seat outside, because of insufficient clothing. It is not enough to feel; we must act, so that it will benefit somebody.”⁸ Like the Russian lady, it is quite easy to ignore the real needs of your fellowman while you drown in comparative luxury. Let us do what we can to improve the situations of those we observe, and let us do more to seek out the needs of others—wherever they may be—in order to lift them as well.