Where are the Nine?
Luke 17:11-19
October 6, 2013
Someone once said that the definition of a pessimist is
someone who looks at a box of candy and says, “Rats, it’s half empty”. The optimist looks at the same box and says, “Great,
it’s half full.”
It is the same box of candy, but two entirely different
perceptions. People are like that. Some seem to be thankful for the least crumb
of bread, and some will never be satisfied no matter how much they have.
I saw a story a while back that said the richest county
in the United Sates is in California, near Hollywood, which is probably no
surprise to anyone. That county has more
millionaires per square foot than any other place in the world. It also has more psychiatrists, more
alcoholics, more broken homes. All that wealth
has not bought them happiness. They
still see their candy box as being half empty.
I also know a family who face a very uncertain future,
with little more than the clothes on their backs, yet are thankful for even the
smallest of blessings.
Why? Why is
that? Why do some see the box as half
empty and others as half full? Why do
some only complain about those things they don’t have, while others count their
blessings?
Jesus seems to ask the same question in the scripture we
read today? Ten lepers are healed, but
only one came back to say, “Thanks.”
Jesus asked, “Why? Where are
the nine?”
One
man, Martin Bell, who is neither Methodist nor Presbyterian, but Episcopalian,
of all things, answered the question this way.
The first was frightened.
He did not understand what had happened to him. All he had known and really understood was
his disease. He understood the ravages
of leprosy. He understood the looks of
scorn thrown his way like cruel darts.
That was a part of his life. It
was expected.
Jesus was not expected.
His compassion and generosity was not expected. Certainly his ability to heal and restore his
broken body was not expected. And so he
did not understand. He was like many,
fearful of that which he did not understand.
So, he was afraid of Jesus. And
so he did not return.
The second leper was offended. He did not like to be obliged to anyone. Yet, Jesus had given him this gift right out
of the blue. He had done nothing to earn
this favor. He had not followed any prescribed
formula for prayer and fasting. He had
not proven himself righteous to Jesus before he was healed. He had done nothing to deserve it. He did not like it. “You get what you pay for” was his
motto. So, he did not understand “grace”. So he felt obliged and did not like the
feeling. He did not know how to say “thank
you”.
The third leper had not really wanted to be
cleansed. Leprosy was his life. It was his crutch. People pitied him. He liked the pity. He liked to complain. Jesus took the pity away. Now there was nothing to complain about. He did not return.
The fourth leper forgot.
He was so happy to be released from this scourge that he just ran off in
sheer joy. That’s not unusual. Every year the Post Office receives thousands
if not millions of letters from children to Santa Claus. In those letters children pour out their
holiday dreams for dogs and dolls, Nintendo and Nikes. After Christmas, the Post Office reports,
only a trickle of letters come in to Santa to say Thank you. When in the midst
of crisis prayers come fast and furious.
But, thanks are often slow to come.
It’s not that the people are ungrateful.
It is just that they are so anxious to begin their new life; they hit
the ground running and just keep going.
The fifth leper never said “Thank you” to
anyone. He had been shunned too many
times. He had been ignored too many
times. He had been put down and shut
out. And the scars had grown thick and
the calluses too thick. He had been
given charity before, but there were always strings attached. So, he had built a wall, in impenetrable
wall. And no one could break through, no
matter what. He did not return
The sixth leper was a woman – a mother. Her disease had separated her from her
family. Now she was free. So she hurried home to hold the children she
had missed so much.
The seventh leper did not believe in miracles. For him it was all so much hocus-pocus. He believed in the world. He believed in what you could see and touch
and measure with a yardstick. He did not
know how it came to be that he was healed, but he was sure there must be some
logical and scientific explanation.
Jesus was not part of that logic.
He couldn’t have had anything to do with it. He did not return.
The eighth leper did believe. He believed that Jesus was the Messiah, and
so went to tell his neighbors.
And the ninth?
Well, whatever the reasons, they were his reasons.
So, what’s the point?
Is it that 10 were cleansed and only one returned? Or is it that 10 were cleansed? Sometimes there are good reasons why people
do the things they do. Sometimes the
reasons are chap and petty and selfish.
But, we don’t know.
This story is not intended to lead us to judgment or
cynicism. It meant to show us the glory
of God. You see, the only thing that we
can give to God, which God has not first given to us is worship and praise and
thanksgiving.
That is what the tenth leper knew by instinct. Did you catch the order of events in this
story? First, Jesus heals all ten and
then commands that they go and show themselves to the priests. The reason for this is so that these victims
may receive official confirmation that they are now cleansed. Only the priest could give them the clean
bill of health they would need to join the community. Otherwise, healed or not, they would still be
shunned by those who they most loved.
Now that was all Jesus asked of them. But, this tenth leper “turned back
glorifying God with a loud voice.”
This tenth leper to the surprise of Jesus’ Jewish audience was a
Samaritan. So, this one had been an
outcast in more ways than one. Yet, it
was to this one Jesus said, “Rise and go, your faith has made you well.”
There were all healed.
None of them bore the marks of leprosy.
Still, this tenth leper had been made well in more ways than one. You know and I know that a healthy body is
one thing, but a healthy spirit is another.
Remember, some people look at the candy box as being half empty, and
others half full.
So, we yearn for that attitude which the Apostle Paul
described when he wrote, “Rejoice always, pray with out ceasing, in
everything give thanks; for this is the will of God in Christ Jesus for you.[1]
When it comes down to it, this is really a choice. And it is a choice that is always available
to us.
“When your son comes home with purple hair and rings
in his nose, you’ve got a choice to make.
You can get upset, because you don’t really like purple hair. Or you can
be thankful, that he came home, that he is healthy, and that he is so obviously
a creative soul. When your boss tells
you that you’re being transferred to the Midwest, you can get furious that
you’re going to have to move – again. Or
you can choose to be thankful that you have a job. Later in life, when the time comes to see the
big family house and move to a retirement home, you can get struck in what you
are losing. Or you can choose to give
thanks for the wonderful memories created in that house, for the adventure that
still lies ahead, and for the grace of having a place to go. You are not homeless.
When we choose gratitude, we are choosing not to be
victims. We are determining our own
response to the volatility and unpredictability of life. We defy our disappointment by finding reasons
to be thankful[2].
When we give thanks we rely on the belief that God is
bigger than any problem we might face.
William Law, an eighteenth-century English theologian
said, “If anyone can tell you the shortest, surest way to all happiness and
perfection, he must tell you to make it a rule to yourself to than and praise
God for everything that happens to you, for God can turn anything into a
blessing.”
Corrie Ten Boom a Dutch evangelist, who passed away a few
years ago, used to the story of the days when she and her sister, Betsy, were
kept prisoner in a Nazi concentration camp.
Their family had hidden Jews from the Germans out of their sense of
Christian responsibility. They were
discovered and so were sentenced to the same fate and those whom they were
protecting.
One of the greatest fears the women had in their barracks
was that the German guards would come in at night and rape those women they
desired. One of the greatest hardships
was fleas. They infested the place. They were in their clothes, their
hair…everywhere. Betsy, in particular,
was repulsed by the fleas; but Corrie used to read from the Bible, “in all
things give thanks.” But, even she
had a hard time giving thanks for the fleas.
She used to tell that story as a traveling evangelist,
and after one service a German man came up to her. He confessed that he had been one of her
guards, and he said he had come to confess Jesus Christ as his Lord and
Savior. He had come to ask her forgiveness. She offered it, as that was her nature and
her faith. Then in their discussion that
followed he asked her if she knew why the guards had not come into her barracks
in the middle of the night, as they had in so many others. She said she had no idea. He said – “It was the fleas. We knew your
barracks was infested with fleas, so we never came in.” At last Corrie said, she could truly give
thanks for the fleas.
That is what
that tenth leper understood so well.
That is why Jesus said; his faith had made him well.
By your presence here you have made a choice to give thanks. It is obvious others are absent. And they are absent for various reasons, some
of them good and others not. But, that
is not our concern, nor our focus. Our
aim is to give thanks to God from whom all blessings flow. That’s our choice, and Jesus said such a
choice will truly make us well. It is as
we give thanks that we come closer to understanding the meaning, the real
meaning of God’s grace in our lives.
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