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I do my best not to obsess about news down south, but a story caught my eye. A small town American local made headlines recently. A case of hitchhiking gone wrong. 

Not unheard of, I’m sure you’ve seen folks out by the highway from time to time. It’s a common enough way to travel. But as you know, sometimes you find a good samaritan willing to give you a lift. And unfortunately sometimes you don’t. 

The fact is, you’re taking your life into your hands when you hitchhike - not everyone is out looking to do a good deed. This particular hitchhiker in the news story was seriously assaulted, robbed and left on the highway. 

The salient point, according to the news, is that the victim, a very active member of their local community, was an openly proud non-binary individual. Naturally questions and assertions about this being a hate-crime abound. 

But I think what brought this story to the headlines, I suspect, was the person who found the victim and got them to medical care - a truck driver. A local. I don’t know how else to describe him except as a good ol boy. Christian, white, conservative. The picture shown had the man wearing a red hat. Maybe a maga hat, it was blurry and shown too quickly, but it gave the impression. 

Anyway, apparently the truck driver brought him to the hospital and made calls on the victims behalf. He called the local Pride Society as well as St Mark's Episcopal (the victims' spiritual home). Unfortunately neither organization was in a place to directly help with hospital bills, though both made social media posts filled with a mix of outrage and prayers for their friend. 

The newsworthy tidbit is that the truck driver who found the victim ended up paying for the hospital bills. He’s committed to covering all his expenses and will be checking back with him when he’s completed his contracted routes and comes back around. 

Now a question naturally arises: 

36 Which of these three, do you think, proved to be a neighbor to the man who fell among the robbers?” 

37 He said, “The one who showed him mercy.” 

And Jesus said to him, “You go, and do likewise.”

The Parable of the Good Samaritan, adapted from The Gospel of Luke chapter 10