Today is the third anniversary of Mercy Community Church of Little Rock, a multi-denominational worshiping community welcoming all people, especially those living on the streets. In that time, nearly 500 different people have worshiped with us in our tiny room in the Undercroft (Episcopalian for “basement” I’m told) of Christ Church in downtown Little Rock. We’ve sung and prayed together. We’ve dug deeply into the Bible, asking what it means to be Christians living in a system that forces some of us onto the streets while others have resources to spare.

Over the years, Mercy has become a small family doing our best to make our way in the world. We’ve seen some of our brothers and sisters make it off the streets. We’ve seen others locked up or trapped in their addictions. We’ve experienced the deaths of beloved members of our family, and we’ve welcomed new little babies into our midst. We’ve even had two marriage proposals take place during our service. We laugh with those who laugh and weep with those who weep, and we do our best to love everyone just as they are.

On this day three years ago, as our first Bible study, we read Jesus’s parable of the Samaritan (Luke 10:25–37). In that story, a Bible scholar tries to find the limits of God’s mercy. Knowing that the Torah commands the faithful to “love your neighbor as yourself” (Leviticus 19:18), the scholar asks Jesus, “Who is my neighbor?” He wants Jesus to tell him that he doesn’t have to love everybody—just the ones who technically qualify as “neighbors.”

One of the things I have noticed in my work at Mercy Church is that many people out in the world don’t consider homeless people to be their neighbors. They are not neighbors because they are poor. They are not neighbors because they are addicts. They are not neighbors because they are lazy and just want a government check. They are not neighbors because they are only suffering from their own poor decisions. The list of excuses for not treating them as neighbors goes on and on.

We all have our own ways of drawing limits around God’s mercy.

But Jesus isn’t having it. Telling the story of a Samaritan who helps a stranger beaten and robbed on the road to Jericho after two religious leaders have passed him by, Jesus asks the scholar, “Who was a neighbor to the man?”

“The one who showed him mercy,” he replies (Luke 10:37).

“Then go and do likewise,” Jesus says.

Interpretations of this story sometimes miss the fact that Jesus never answers the question about who is and is not a neighbor. Instead he answers the question with an instruction: Show mercy in the way the Samaritan showed mercy. That is, show mercy to whomever you encounter and in whatever circumstance. There is no “Who is my neighbor?” There is only mercy.

So it is with Mercy Community Church of Little Rock. We do our best to show mercy to everyone who walks in the door, whatever their identity and whatever their circumstance. There is no asking whether people deserve mercy (none of us do). There is only the recognition that God’s mercy knows no limits.