Ever notice in your journey through the Bible that God likes the road less traveled? That the man or woman of the year isn’t likely to get a second look from God when He is casting the next act in the play? Who will father the nations of the world? How about a 100 year old man through his barren wife? Who will deliver God’s people from Egyptian slavery? A shy, quiet talking 80 year old exile. Who will become the giant-killer and the king who has a heart after God? A ruddy teenage shepherd who is the runt of the litter. Who will save us from sin, from evil, from eternal separation from God? That young Nazarene; you know, Mary’s oldest son.
So it is with ten lepers in the 17th chapter of Luke. In a body of outcasts, the lone person to get the message is a Samaritan leper; the most unlikely; the outcast of outcasts. His only qualification for admittance to this group was leprosy. Common misfortune had broken down racial and national barriers, and the Samaritan leper was allowed to run with this Jewish group. Like animals fleeing a flood and standing together on the high ground, these otherwise mortal enemies banded together out of need.
The story of the ten lepers can be found only in Luke’s gospel, and it is layered with themes. It is a story of ostracism. It is a story of the kind of cruelty that arises from fear and ignorance. It is a story of ingratitude. It is a foreshadowing of the message of inclusion of all in God’s kingdom. It is a story of obedience. Above all, it is a story of faith and love. Fittingly, it is told by a doctor, the most likely person to distinguish between relieving symptoms and actual cures; between temporary relief and real wellness.
Since the end of the 9th chapter of Luke, Jesus has been moving steadily toward Jerusalem Samaria
Do you know a leper? Chances are good that you do. Oh, I don’t mean someone with the actual disease. But leprosy had social implications as well. A leper could not mingle with “normal” people. The results of social leprosy are the same as the real disease. Our society has new words for this condition: weird, geek, punk, nerd. You can name other terms. Today’s social lepers are no different from those in Jesus’ time. They don’t fit. They make you uncomfortable. They’re not popular. They dress wrong, or they smell, or they’re loud, or…you fill in the blank. Sometimes they group together, but more often, they keep to themselves. They are virtually invisible to us, except for the times we are getting out of their way.
For Jesus, of course, no one was invisible. He not only sees them; he calls out to them. He tells them to go and show themselves to the priests. This is Jewish custom. For a leper to re-enter society, he or she must be declared healthy by a priest. Luke tells us that as they went, they were cleansed.
Luke’s account of this event is just a highlight reel. There are things we don’t know. Did the one separate from the nine and cross the border to go to a Samaritan priest? If he did, was it a shorter distance than the priest to whom the Jewish lepers went? Did the Jewish lepers have so far to go that they had not yet had time to return? According to Luke, all ten went, but only one came back. If all ten went, did they go out of obedience, out of faith, out of a “what have we got to lose” attitude? Luke doesn’t tell us. It’s fair to assume that initially, all ten had some grain of faith, because all ten were obedient to Jesus’ command and went. We really don’t know the whole story, but we are told what Luke wants us to know.
Healing is typical of Jesus’ ministry. Faith and healing should bring praise to God, but not here. The failure of the nine to return and give thanks was typical of the response He was increasingly receiving. People came to Him for help and physical healing, not for the deeper needs He came to meet. And sometimes, they kept going without even a thank you. So often, when we have gotten what we want, we never come back.
We are not strangers to this concept. How many times have you gotten help, only to get so busy in your new found success that you forgot to thank the source of your good fortune? Parents: think of how many times you have had to remind your children to say “thank you.” And how many times you have had a prayer answered, only to get on about your business, never getting around to really thanking God. Our memories can be incredibly short, and so can our loyalties.
Another theme here is that God’s grace extends beyond Judaism. Jesus repeatedly preached to the Jews. He lectured the Pharisees about their rigid and petty adherence to the letter, rather than the spirit, of Jewish law. He gave many signs and parables to the disciples. But Jesus didn’t stop there. He went further.
Jesus doesn’t care how tall you are, or how rich you are, or how tidy you are, or what side of the tracks you come from. He makes it clear here that the people of God are the people who come to believe in God. It is not through God that we see Jesus; it is through Jesus that we come to see God.
Now, we have talked about several themes that surface in this passage:
· The ultimate revelation of Jesus’ sacrifice in Jerusalem
· Jesus has mercy on social outcasts
· Obedience and faith come before real healing
· Faith and healing should bring praise to God
· God’s grace extends to all believers
But there is another theme here. I think it just might be the reason that Luke included this story in his gospel. To see this theme clearly, let’s look again at Verses 17-19:
17 Jesus asked, “Were not all ten cleansed? Where are the other nine?
18 Was no one found to return and praise God except this foreigner?”
19 Then he said to him, Rise and go; your faith has made you well.”
So we have ten lepers cleansed, but only one made well. Is there a difference? To get the answer, it helps to look at the original Greek words in this passage. In Greek, the word for cleanse is katharizo, which means “to make clean or purify.” The word for well is so-zo, meaning “healed, preserved, saved, made whole.” That is the word used for the 10th leper. Make clean or make whole? Do you see the difference here? All were made clean, but only one was saved.
What is Jesus saying to us? Ten seemed to have faith. Ten seemed to be obedient. If anyone was disobedient, wouldn’t it be the 10th leper? Luke tells us that when he saw he was clean, he came back. Apparently, he never made it to the priest, although that is what Jesus told them all to do. Is it just that the Samaritan is rewarded for saying “thank you?” I don’t think so. If not, then what is Jesus saying to us?
Remember the story of Mary and Martha in the 10th chapter of Luke? Jesus comes to their home in Bethany, and Martha hurries around, making preparations, trying to be the good hostess. Meanwhile, Mary sits at the feet of Jesus, intent on listening to everything Jesus has to say. Martha appeals to Jesus to get Mary to help her. Jesus’ answer is that only one thing is needed, and that Mary has chosen what is better.
In these parallel stories in Luke, Martha is like the nine lepers, and Mary is like the 10th. Martha and the nine lepers mean well. They are dutiful. They are obedient. But Mary and the 10th leper are something different. They are engaging in loving worship. Mary sits at the feet of Jesus. Can’t you just see her? She sits, not across the room, or in the corner, but at the very feet of Jesus, looking up and hanging on his every word. For Mary, this is no time to think about supper! Martha worries and frets about the details, but only one thing is needed, and Mary knows what it is.
Likewise, in the story of the ten lepers, the nine do what they are told. They are dutiful. They are obedient. But the 10th leper is a different story. His is a lesson not only of obedience, but of loving, worshipping faith. When he sees what has happened to him, he comes back. He is no longer concerned with the ceremonial pronouncement of a priest. He’s not even concerned with the fact that his very re-entry into society lies in the pronouncement of that priest. He comes back, praising God in a loud voice. And he throws himself at Jesus’ feet. Only one thing is needed, and the 10th leper knows what it is.
Do you know what it is? Do you know the one thing that is needed? Barbara Brown Taylor, one of the most renowned preachers in America and the author of many books, tells a story of a fellow she encountered when she was serving in a downtown Atlanta parish. The fellow, disheveled and unkempt, came into her church one Monday morning and prayed at the altar all day long. Periodically, he would rise to his feet, extend his arms toward heaven, and offer praise out loud. He came every day that week. When Sunday came, Rev. Taylor had to ask him to move because the Sunday service was about to start. He rose and smiled and told her “That’s okay.” With that he left, never to be seen again. Taylor tells of the impression he made upon her. As she looked out over the congregation of well dressed, tidy individuals and families, all sitting just so in the pews to which they had become accustomed, Taylor’s mind wandered to the strange fellow who spent the week at the foot of the altar where she now stood. Looking out over that sea of ritual obedience, she thought: “But where is this strange fellow who worshipped here all week. He’s the one I’m interested in.” For her, he was Mary, or the 10th leper, the one who came back. He was the one who stopped what he was doing, who got off the bus, who fell on his knees and just loved back the God who first loved him.
How can you love Him back? We use words like worship and discipleship and stewardship. But what do we mean when we say these words? How do we show that? Stewardship for example. What is stewardship? It’s roughly synonymous with servanthood. I like that word. That word sounds like Jesus. So then, loving Jesus back is about serving him. We serve him not because we have to, but because we love him, and we want to show that love. But Jesus is in heaven. How can we serve him? He isn’t here. Don’t be too sure. Remember Matthew 25? “Inasmuch as ye have served the least of these, my brethren…” You know the rest.
So… how can we love Jesus? Any ideas? What can YOU do? You can pray for a friend, bake a cake, buy a friend a donut, visit a neighbor, walk someone else’s dog, help someone across the street, stop and talk with that person asking for a handout, and do so many more little acts of love and caring.
There’s nothing wrong with coming to the same place at the same time and sitting in the same pew every week. There’s nothing wrong with putting on your Sunday best to come to worship. There’s nothing wrong with building buildings and having lots of fellowship and singing the old hymss and in general taking comfort from the rituals with which we have grown up. If we didn’t have the Marthas of the world, there would be no church buildings in which to worship. But even Martha had to be reminded by the Master himself that only one thing is needed, and that one thing was what Mary and the 10th leper have to teach us.
The one thing that is needed is to sit, not in the corner or across the room, but at the very feet of Jesus. The one thing that is needed is to praise God in a loud voice and to throw ourselves at his feet. The one thing that is needed is to come back; to give back the love, not for the church, but through the church, to the God in whom we profess to believe.
Will you be one of the nine, who were cleansed, but not made well, or will you be the one who came back? For what Jesus wants from us is love, for him, and for our brother and sister, be they leper or Samaritan. And what he offers us is what the 10th leper found that day: not just to be cleansed, but to be made well.
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