October 9, 2022 – Pentecost +18C

¹On the way to Jerusalem Jesus was going through the region between Samaria and Galilee. ¹²As he entered a village, ten lepers approached him. Keeping their distance, ¹³they called out, saying, “Jesus, Master, have mercy on us!” ¹⁴When he saw them, he said to them, “Go and show yourselves to the priests.” And as they went, they were made clean. ¹⁵Then one of them, when he saw that he was healed, turned back, praising God with a loud voice. ¹⁶He prostrated himself at Jesus’ feet and thanked him. And he was a Samaritan. ¹⁷Then Jesus asked, “Were not ten made clean? But the other nine, where are they? ¹⁸Was none of them found to return and give praise to God except this foreigner?” ¹⁹Then he said to him, “Get up and go on your way; your faith has made you well.”Luke 17:11-19

I was talking with a pastor the other day, and he was telling me the story about a woman he went to visit while she was in the hospital. He went to visit her because she was diagnosed with cancer. He told me that he was with her and her mother, and prayed with them on the day that the doctors told her that she had no more than two months to live. He also told me that he went to visit her one year later – at her home. One year later the pastor was visiting her in her home – and she was cancer free. This woman, told a year prior that she was dying, was now living without a trace of the disease that had brought her so close to death.  The amazing part of this story is that she was also living without something else – she was living without G-d. Once she had been “healed” of her disease, she stopped coming to church. 

It seems that ten lepers were on a journey one day. We don’t know anything about these ten except that at this point in their lives they were considered lepers – and as such were in desperate shape. Our text tells us that Jesus was continuing his journey toward Jerusalem – in which the ending was to be an arrest, a trial, a crucifixion, and thankfully a resurrection. So their collective journeys, Jesus and the ten lepers, intersected in spectacular fashion. And in the end ten lepers were healed by Jesus. But the story doesn’t end there. Only one of the lepers stops to take stock of what has happened – to realize that something wonderful and dramatic has occurred that has changed his life – only one goes back to thank Jesus.

Ten lepers recognized Jesus – called him master – understood his authority – placed their lives in his hands – heard his words of healing – only one returned to bow and worship and submit again to that authority. G-d’s love is relational – is about relationships. In our relationship with Jesus we have opportunity after opportunity to hear about the love, mercy and grace of Jesus Christ that we experience in G-d’s word and sacrament, and then go forth out in the community to be in relationship with others – family and stranger, friend and enemy, Jew and Gentile, Leper or Samaritan or Aids patient – and will also have unlimited opportunities to share Jesus’ love, mercy and grace.

Pastor Dave