Tonight, I was watching this video of the parable of the good Samaritan that my church recently released. It's really fantastic and I am loving these Bible videos!
It got me thinking about a study I learned about in school. I looked it up to make sure I had my facts straight, because it was a few years ago. Darley and Batson did an experiment at Princeton University on undergrad divinity students. The students were told that they would have to walk to a different building and present an impromptu speech. There were a couple of variables: (1) they were told to either give a speech on employment opportunities after graduation, or the parable of the good Samaritan, and (2) they were told they were either late, had just enough time, or had a few extra minutes to get there. The kicker is, on their way to give the speech, they had to pass a man slumped over in an alleyway and clearly in need of assistance, and the study was set up to measure who actually stopped to help. Sadly, the thing that had the biggest impact on whether or not they stopped wasn't the speech topic, but the amount of time they had. One would hope that those students who are pondering on the good Samaritan would channel that charitable vibe and risk being a little late to their meeting in order to put the values taught in the parable into action. But, that's not human nature, I suppose.
And of course, all of this thinking has led to some introspection. Who am I not reaching out to in my life because I think I'm "too busy" or assume that they don't really need my help? How often am I focused so much on my petty life problems to not notice someone around me who is truly suffering and in need of a good friend? Perhaps it is human nature to hurry through life and care only about ourselves, but I really need to work harder to overcome that and reach out to other people and be more Christ-like.
It got me thinking about a study I learned about in school. I looked it up to make sure I had my facts straight, because it was a few years ago. Darley and Batson did an experiment at Princeton University on undergrad divinity students. The students were told that they would have to walk to a different building and present an impromptu speech. There were a couple of variables: (1) they were told to either give a speech on employment opportunities after graduation, or the parable of the good Samaritan, and (2) they were told they were either late, had just enough time, or had a few extra minutes to get there. The kicker is, on their way to give the speech, they had to pass a man slumped over in an alleyway and clearly in need of assistance, and the study was set up to measure who actually stopped to help. Sadly, the thing that had the biggest impact on whether or not they stopped wasn't the speech topic, but the amount of time they had. One would hope that those students who are pondering on the good Samaritan would channel that charitable vibe and risk being a little late to their meeting in order to put the values taught in the parable into action. But, that's not human nature, I suppose.
And of course, all of this thinking has led to some introspection. Who am I not reaching out to in my life because I think I'm "too busy" or assume that they don't really need my help? How often am I focused so much on my petty life problems to not notice someone around me who is truly suffering and in need of a good friend? Perhaps it is human nature to hurry through life and care only about ourselves, but I really need to work harder to overcome that and reach out to other people and be more Christ-like.
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