Luke 17:11-19
Seeing, Faith, and Gratitude
James Sledge October
9, 2022
Sarah
was feverishly opening the last of her birthday presents. Wrapping paper, bows,
and ribbon were everywhere. So were the gifts that had been in the many bags
and boxes only a little while earlier. Most anyone who looked in on the scene
would have been very impressed with all that Sarah had gotten. That is,
everyone but Sarah. As the last gift came out of the box, Sarah looked around
and said, “Is that all?” Her mother glared at her in a way that should have
frozen her, but still Sarah said, “Are there any more presents?”
JESUS MAFA,
The Healing of the Ten Lepers
Some of the aunts, uncles, and grandparents who had tried hard to find just the right gift for Sarah were obviously bothered by her obvious lack of regard for their gifts. After everyone had left, Sarah’s mother had long talk with her. Sarah had to call everyone who had brought her a gift and apologize for being rude. That was on top of having to write thank-you notes, too.
Sarah was furious. What was the big deal? Everybody had gotten burgers, cake, and ice cream. You have to bring presents when you go to a party. Why did her mom have to get all worked up over it? After all, they were her relatives.
She was still angry when she went to school the next morning. Her friend Danielle asked what was the matter, and Sarah told her about what had happened, and about the punishment she had gotten from her mother.
“How many presents did you get?” Danielle asked.
“Oh, I don’t know. Maybe ten or twelve.”
“Wow,” said Danielle. “If I had gotten anything close to that I would have been running around the room, jumping up and down, kissing everyone, and yelling ‘Thank you.’”
“What are you talking about?” Sarah asked.
“I only got one present at my birthday,” Danielle responded. My dad lost his job a while back. He’s been working at whatever he can find, but it just isn’t enough to make ends meet, so he couldn’t afford to buy me much. And I don’t have any relatives who live around here. I was afraid I wouldn’t get anything, so I was happy with the one that I got.”
“Oh, I see,” Sarah said rather sheepishly.
Have you ever noticed how people talk about seeing something when they aren’t really talking about using their eyes? “Oh, I see,” Sarah said to Danielle. But Sarah didn’t actually see anything. She meant that she understood, she got it, she knew what Danielle was talking about. But I wonder if she really did get it. I wonder if she really did see.
I don’t know if you caught it in our reading from Luke, but there is some seeing going on there as well. When the ten men with leprosy come out to meet Jesus, Luke tells us that when he saw them, Jesus said to them, “Go and show yourselves to the priests.” “When he saw them…” I wonder why Luke bothers to tell us this. Of course he saw them. They came out to meet him, yelling out his name, asking for his help. How could he help but see them?
The Samaritan leper also did some seeing. Luke writes of this one man how…when he saw that he was healed, turned back, praising God with a loud voice. I wonder why Luke bothers to tell us this. Of course he saw that he was healed. How could he not have? And he couldn’t very well have turned back praising God before he saw that he was healed. Why tell us he saw this? Surely the other nine who were healed saw that they were healed as well.
I wonder if Luke is talking about seeing in a different way, more like the way Sarah meant it when she told Danielle, “Oh, I see.” Maybe Luke is talking about is about understanding, about getting it, about realizing what is going on.
When Jesus saw the men with leprosy… when Jesus understood the lepers’ plight, when he realized the pain and rejection they suffered because of their illness, then he sent them on the way to the priests, sent them on their way to be healed.
The Samaritan leper, when he saw that he was healed…when he realized what had happened, when he understood the wonderful gift he had been given by Jesus, then he returned, praising God and offering thanks at Jesus’ feet. Nine others were healed. But they must not have seen, must not have understood how fortunate they were, must not have realized what a huge gift Jesus had given them, must not have gotten it.
“Oh, I see,” Sarah said to Danielle.
Do you think that Sarah really does see? Does she understand? Does she realize what Danielle is talking about? Or is Sarah like the nine men with leprosy who don’t really see, who don’t return to give thanks because they apparently don’t get it, don’t realize how thankful they should be?
It is tempting to think that whatever we have, we deserve. Very often, the more someone has, the harder it is to be grateful. The child with a closet full of toys has a hard time being impressed by the gift of one more. Perhaps the nine presumably Jewish lepers who are cured think they deserved it. Surely they were excited to be healed, but not grateful. God was supposed to take care of them. After all, they were God’s chosen people.
And we who have grown up in the church, who also see ourselves as God’s people, we can begin to think that God is more of less obligated to take care of us, to forgive us, to come to our aid. After all, we have been to church regularly. We have given faithfully. We’re entitled. And when we start to think that way, Jesus’ harsh words to the nine men who didn’t come back to thank him, are now directed at us. “Was none of them found to return and give praise to God except this foreigner,” except this outsider, except this one who has so little that he truly appreciates all that is given to him.
Only the Samaritan in our Scripture lesson “sees,” realizes what a wonderful thing has happened and realizes that God is responsible. Only the Samaritan shows gratitude. Only the Samaritan praises God and falls at Jesus’ feet. Funny, he is the last person the people of Jesus’ day would expect to “see,” to understand. After all, he was a Samaritan, from the wrong side of the tracks, from the wrong ethnic group, from the wrong religious community. But he understands the wonderful gift he has received, and so he praises God.
And in response, Jesus says to him, “Go on your way; your faith has made you well.” Or perhaps better translated, “… your faith has saved you.” All ten men with leprosy are healed, but only one is grateful, and only one is said to have a faith that saved him.
How is your faith? How is your spiritual health? If it seems to be in a rut, maybe this Samaritan offers some help. If you aren’t sure how it is, or even if you think it’s okay, maybe this Samaritan gives you a way to check and see. How is your faith? The Samaritan’s test: how is your gratitude?
As one writer puts it, “Here is a barometer of spiritual health: If gratitude is not synonymous with faith, neither response to God is separable from the other. Faith, like gratitude, is our response to the grace of God as we have experienced it. For those who have become aware of God’s grace, all of life is infused with a sense of gratitude, and each encounter becomes an opportunity to see and to respond in the spirit of the grateful leper.”[1]
How’s your faith? How’s your gratitude? Perhaps answering the second question answers the first. Do you show God gratitude? I know several ways to do so. One is worship and praise. Another is spending time with God in prayer or Bible study. Yet another is financial giving. And then there is doing concrete acts that share the love of Christ with those who need it.
How’s your spiritual health? How’s your gratitude? When we see what God has done for us in Jesus, really see, really get it, how can we not be grateful? And when we are truly grateful to God, we may just discover what it feels like to experience salvation.
[1] R. Alan Culpepper, in The New Interpreter’s Bible, Vol. IX (Nashville, TN: Abingdon Press, 1995) p. 28
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