Luke 17:11-19
For the last three weeks we have listened to Jesus’ intense teachings on money, forgiveness, and living with a servant mind-set. It is absolute and it is simple-in-a-difficult-way.
We cannot grasp for material gain alone. We can either serve God or Money.
It is also about the absolute mercy of God, (consider Lazarus and the Rich man), which is where we are heading today, but in a different context. Jesus and his disciples are back on the road to Jerusalem.
Our gospel this morning is I think, centrally concerned with mercy and also thanksgiving or gratitude. Our text opens with,
“On the way to Jerusalem Jesus was going through the region between Samaria and Galilee. As he entered a village, ten lepers approached him. Keeping their distance, they called out, saying, “Jesus, Master, have mercy on us!” (vv.11-13).
“Have mercy on us.” “Eleison” is the Greek here, as in the “Kyrie eleison” we say or sing at the start of our service: “Lord, have mercy.”
We’re asking the Lord to supply our needs, which are many, out of his great compassion and love for us, out of his mercy.
So these poor lepers call out to Jesus with their “Eleison,” their “Have mercy.” And as lepers, they really need it. Leprosy is a wasting skin disease that destroyed their flesh and ostracized them from their community.
It also kept them from going to the temple, because they were ceremonially unclean.
And so lepers were people who defined being marginalised. They had to literally live on the margins of society.
They were people on the fringe. Lepers had to keep away from normal, healthy people, for fear that they might infect others. They would call out “Unclean!” So people wouldn’t get too close.
Except here. When Jesus comes close, these lepers feel bold enough to ask for mercy, to ask for his help. Instead of calling out “Unclean!” they call out, “Jesus, Master, have mercy on us” (v.13).
There’s something about Jesus that has led them to expect great things from him. They have heard of his miracle-working power. They have heard of his deep compassion. And so they are bold enough to say, “Jesus, Master, have mercy on us.”
And Jesus listens. And he responds. His mercy moves him into action. Our text says, “When he saw them he said to them, ‘Go and show yourselves to the priests.’ And as they went they were made clean” (v.14).
Just with his word, his mighty word, Jesus cleanses the lepers. Christ’s word is a divine word, a creative word, powerful and effective. His word accomplishes what he says. He wills it, and he says it, and it is so. This is the eternal Son of God speaking here.
Jesus sends the lepers on their way, knowing that his word will do its work. The lepers are cleansed. But what’s this, “Go and show yourselves to the priests”? What’s that all about? Quite lot, I think!
The Law of Moses provided that when someone was healed of a disease that had made them unclean, that person was to go and show themselves to a priest to verify the healing.
And to admit the person back into access to the temple and all the intimate social relationships they had been excluded from.
It was a way to restore that person back into the community of God’s people. And while at the temple, the healed person would offer up a thank offering, a sacrifice of thanksgiving, to give thanks to God for the healing.
That’s why Jesus tells the lepers, “Go and show yourselves to the priests.”
But on this particular occasion, what else would this do?
By the priests verifying that these lepers were healed, they would unintentionally be affirming the divine authority of Christ.
Jesus was the one who had healed these men, and the priests would not be able to deny that this Jesus of Nazareth exercises undeniable authority from God.
So the ten head off to see the priests. Except for one of them, who turns around and comes back. Now something important is happening here.
To begin with, this man is a Samaritan, and that means he wouldn’t be a person who would even go to the Jewish priests. The Samaritans didn’t worship at the temple in Jerusalem.
This healed Samaritan leper had no priest to go and show himself to, yet he turns back to Jesus.
It’s good to have a little background on this whole Samaritan thing. After the reigns of Kings David and Solomon, the nation of Israel split in two, dividing into a northern kingdom, which took the name Israel which ended up becoming interchangeable with the name Samaria which was a city, and a southern kingdom, which was called Judah.
The temple was in Jerusalem, in the southern kingdom, as was the throne of the line of David. Thus, the legitimate temple and the legitimate king were in the south, in Jerusalem.
The northern kingdom, though, set up a rival shrine to Baal in the territory of Dan, and set up a rival capital in the city of Samaria.
From that point on, the northern kingdom, based in Samaria, had not one faithful and Godly King, ever, and fell into major and institutionalised idolatry.
Then, in 722 B.C. the Assyrian army swooped down on Samaria and defeated the northern kingdom. That was it for them. The northern tribes were taken into exile in Ninevah, or otherwise dispersed, scattered and driven out.
The Assyrians brought in other peoples to settle there, thus diluting the national and ethnic identity of the people who remained and resulting in animosity from faithful Jews. The Jews saw the Samaritans as neither ethnically nor religiously Jewish.
But now here, among the ten lepers whom Jesus cleanses, one of them is a Samaritan. A leper and a Samaritan? You can’t get much more marginalized than that!
Yet Jesus has mercy on him. He cleanses him. And, filled with gratitude and with faith in this Jesus, the healed Samaritan comes running back to Jesus, to give thanks to God. He shows himself to Jesus instead of the priests.
But look what is happening here, as a Samaritan, the healed man can’t go to the priests in Jerusalem so he goes to the great Priest, Jesus Christ, upon whom the whole Jewish priesthood is the pale human reflection.
Christ is our great High Priest. He intercedes for us with God, bringing back the great mercy of God.
He offers up the perfect sacrifice, the once-and-for-all sacrifice, to cleanse us from all our uncleanness, to heal us in both body and soul.
Just as the Samaritan leper shows us, the great calling of the Christian life is a running-to-Jesus, a seeking of intimacy with Jesus that we express through worship, prayer, praise, and very importantly, thanksgiving.
The great and pure goal of our faith is a deeper intimacy with God through this same Jesus Christ, in whom we rejoice in our healing and our dependence on him, just as the Samaritan lepper does.
The truth is of course that Godly gratitude is not an action. Gratitude is not something we do. Gratitude is a state of mind. It is a way of being, that is part of the way of being a servant. It is the wellspring for our own mercy.
Just as the leper was transformed physically, emotionally and socially; in the same way, Jesus wants to affect a physical, emotional and social transformation in each one of us.
And this is cleansing for both body and soul. Because our sins are forgiven, death has no power over us. In the resurrection of Christ, we see a vision of our own resurrection of the flesh.
Our bodies, now afflicted with illness and infirmity, aging, and decay, will be raised up whole and perfect and just right for enjoying eternal life. That is the promise held forth by the cleansing of the lepers. Wholeness, forever.
Cleansing for lepers. Salvation for Samaritans. Mercy for the marginalized. This is what we find in Jesus Christ our Saviour. Healing in both body and soul, for sinners like you and me.
So let’s call on him in all our troubles; “Jesus, Master, have mercy on us.” Let me pray…