Rev. J. Omar Jones at the church I grew up in preached a sermon on this passage maybe once a year. He would tell us that “a thankful heart is a cheerful heart” and how the additional blessing that one lone returning leper got from Jesus was the extra healing that the others missed out on. The others may or may not have gone to a priest for the official legal permission to live a normal life. But they probably did. In fact the one who stayed with Jesus ran the risk of not being granted social immunity by the right people. But maybe that’s why Luke tells us that this particular thankful man was a Samaritan – one who wouldn’t be able to go to the Temple priests in Jerusalem, anyway. It was better for this man to be a social outcast. He was like an illegal alien who couldn’t go to the INS to get legal. So his only option was to stay with the one who healed him and showed mercy like he asked. Jesus was his immunity for life.
But before Jesus came by they were just lepers – bound by the common bond of suffering and disgrace. Like team members with a consistently losing streak without any hope of ever winning or gaining any self respect.
All of them asked for mercy - not healing. Jesus gave them more than they asked for – like the time when one of Tom Bridges county jail inmates asked for prayer over his AIDS and HIV condition. Tom asked if the man had a personal relation with Jesus Christ. He said no, but that he wanted one. Tom baptized the inmate from the sink in the cell and then anointed him with oil during healing prayer. 6 months later that inmate was still in jail, but happily reported that he was completely healed from any signs of the deadly disease. Tom says that this man was so happy and thankful that he didn’t just continue to obey God with scriptural readings and living a changed and better life. He had a living – loving relationship with Christ, his immunity for life.
That inmate didn’t just move on when God asked him to move, by accepting the mercy and healing of God’s grace. He stepped out on faith like Abraham and all the patriarchs, even before he could see the answer.
Last Friday Focus luncheon Eva Newman shared her story of difficult and dangerous immigration to America with her family and her thankfulness for being a citizen even though she lost her husband to the jungles of Vietnam as a U.S. soldier, then raised their 4 boys alone. Like the returning leper, Eva is a model for responding to the blessings in our lives. Even in the midst of hard times, if we look we can find ways that God is blessing us. And God offers us the blessing of eternal life each day. As we recognize this and other blessings God bestows on us, we will want to say, "Thank you, God, for all your goodness and mercy." So, Jesus became Eva’s immunity for life.
I don’t have to just react to the legal demands of my traditional understanding of God like the other nine going to a Temple priest. I can be like Eva, Tom’s inmate friend, and like the returning leper. I can turn around and come back to Jesus and show my devotion and live out a true relationship with the guidance of the Holy Spirit.
Jesus is ready to become your real priest – the High Priest (Hebrews 5:1-10). Like Mary who chose the “better part” than Martha (Luke 10:38-42) we can choose to stay with Jesus. Like the Greeks who came to Phillip, you and I can say, “Sir, we wish to see Jesus.” The old negro spiritual says, “In the morning when I rise, give me Jesus, And when I am alone, give me Jesus, And when I am afraid, give me Jesus. You can have all this world, but give me Jesus.”
Paul tells the church in Galatia (Galatians 5:4-6) that was going to priests so as to be justified by the law like the other nine lepers, “You are severed from Christ, you who would be justified by the law; you have fallen away from grace. For through the Spirit, by faith, we wait for the hope of righteousness. For in Christ Jesus neither circumcision nor un-circumcision is of any avail, but faith working through love.”
So, when Jesus asks “where are the other nine?” we know that they were searching for the circumcision - the way of legalism in the law of Moses instead of the love and mercy of Jesus. This is the kind of faith that works on to continue to heal and purify – not just once, but for all times and places. It is a grace that perfects those who are healed, because we have Jesus to talk with, to walk with, and to be with.
We’re here to pause in this worship service, turn back, and thank Him who heals us – who shows mercy. “Serve the Lord with gladness: come before his presence with singing. Know ye that the Lord He is God: it is He that hath made us, and not we ourselves; we are His people, and the sheep of His pasture. Enter into His gates with thanksgiving, and into His courts with praise: be thankful unto Him, and bless His name (Psalm 100:2-4).”
Let the peace of God rule in your hearts, to which also you are called in one body; and be thankful (Colossians 3:15). When Jesus asks “where are those to whom I showed mercy and healed them,” some people might be staying away from showing thanks to God: “Because, when they knew God, they glorified Him not as God, neither were thankful; but became vain in their imaginations, and their foolish heart was darkened. Professing themselves to be wise, they became fools (Romans 1:21-22).”
So how do we immune ourselves from being like the unthankful ones, who go on without so much as saying thanks to those who show mercy like Jesus?
(1) Some of us show our thanks by living like the other nine healed lepers most of the time – occasionally serving up Thanksgiving turkeys like we’ll do in a month. In Jeremiah 29:1, 4-7 the prophet sent a letter to exiles already taken to Babylon. In that letter he encouraged them to give thanks by: (a) Building houses and living in them; (b) Planting gardens and eating what they produce; (c) Continuing to marry and have children; And by (d) Working for the "welfare" or good of the cities where they found themselves. If you don’t want a personal responsible relation with Jesus, then at least follow Jeremiah’s advice.
(2) In 2 Timothy 2:8-15 Paul describes the kind of life that may be suffering for the sake of the gospel. Paul was in exile in chains – worse than the Jews in Babylon. But Paul says that the Word of God cannot be chained. If we have died with Christ, we will also live with Christ; if we endure, we will also reign with Him. Sometimes suffering is unavoidable and our healing is going to be found in Jesus and not in magically finding ourselves cleansed of our ills. Jesus says that if we will stick with Him, then “our faith saves us and makes us whole” (Luke 17:19).
Dear Heavenly Father help us not to be “wrangling over words” when we see others walking on in obedience to what they honestly think You want them to do. Give us ways to worship you in truth and spirit without accusing others of falling short in some way. Help us to share Your love instead of carrying on needless theological debates about where the others who are healed have gone. Father, give me Jesus. Give us all Jesus. You may have all this world, but give us Jesus – in His blessed name, Amen.
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