The Good Samaritan: Forgotten Symbols

It was a neat experience for me this week in institute to begin to explore the parable of the good Samaritan in an out of the ordinary manner. After reading through the Ensign article "The Good Samaritan: Forgotten Symbols" several new interesting ideas came into my mind. First of all because of the high risk of being attacked by robbers while traveling in the ancient world, people would have rarely traveled alone, as the characters in the parable of the good Samaritan do. This for me is symbolic of the principle that salvation is something personal. Just as the "man" came down from Jerusalem (what could be considered the presence of God) we too travel to our earthly experience to be tried and proven alone. Just as the other characters acted and made decisions alone, so must we use are agency personally. But it is important to know that just as the "man" needed the good sameritan, so we must have faith in the Lord's aid to carry our burdens and ultimatlly pay the debt for those times in our lives when we fall into "thieves".