Grateful One

Grateful One

Luke 17:11-19

Online Sermon: http://www.mckeesfamily.com/?page_id=3567

“Now on his way to Jerusalem, Jesus traveled along the border between Samaria and Galilee.” (Verse 11)

The first thing we learn in Jesus’ healing of the ten lepers is that it occurs while He is heading to Jerusalem to endure immense suffering on the cross. Jesus knew that soon His three inner leaders, Peter, James, and John, would fall asleep while He agonized and sweat like drops of blood over atoning for our sins (Luke 22:39-45)! How much it must have hurt Jesus knowing that Judas would soon betray Him by calling Him Rabbi and giving Him a “kiss of death” (Matthew 26:47-56) to gain but a mere 30 shekels of silver (Matthew 26:15)! And would not Christ have felt even greater sorrow knowing that the leader of His disciples, Peter, would later deny Him three times and even go so far as call down curses on himself if he be lying when he claimed that He did not even know Jesus (Matthew 26:69-75)? And while it would certainly sting to have the Roman government even with all its gods turn a blind eye to justice, would not the high priest’s rejection of His identity (Matthew 26:57-68) and worse yet hearing His own people cry out “crucify Him” not sadden Him greatly (27:22)? To be flogged by the Roman soldiers, given a robe and crown of thorns to wear was going to be utter mockery and unbearable for the human side of Jesus (27:27-31)! As Jesus thought about hanging on a cross as One supposedly cursed on a tree (Deuteronomy 21:23) agony must have flooded His soul to know that only His mother, her sister, Mary the wife of Clopas, Mary Magdalene (John 19:25-27) and the disciple He loved, John, would be present and standing at a distance (John 13:23, 19:25-27). And what about the agony of knowing the crowds that were about to yell out “Hosanna to the Son of David” (Matthew 21:9) would soon cheer His crucifixion? And if these events were not enough to agonize over would not knowing He was about to take upon Himself the Father’s wrath for these very betrayers and the rest of humanity’s sins not weigh heavy on His mind (John 3:16)? In face of all this rejection and agony the question before us in this story is would Jesus still be willing to show mercy to those who might be ungrateful and worse yet later join in the chant “crucify Him”?

The Unlikely Candidates

“As He was going into a village, ten men who had leprosy h met Him. They stood at a distance and called out in a loud voice, “Jesus, Master, have pity on us!”

(Verses 12-13)

This cry for mercy contains a double level of cultural tension the first of which relates to leprosy. Leprosy was a big matter in Jesus’ day for a variety of reasons. First, it was an incurable disease that would eat up a person’s skin until they eventually died. Second, upon being pronounced with leprosy by the priest you had to seclude yourself by living in a leper camp outside of the nation (Numbers 5:2-3). For example, in this story we are told that Jesus was going to a village located somewhere on the border between Samaria and Galilee, most likely in the Decapolis for it hosted many Gentiles who were considered ritually unclean. Even walking amongst Gentiles the leper had to yell out “unclean, unclean” (Leviticus 13:45-46) and keep a fifty pace buffer between themselves and healthy people lest they contaminate them. Third, since you could not come into close contact with anyone, these lepers could not make a living and had to resort to constant begging. Fourth, leprosy was seen as a type of sin, a “divine curse” from God and as a result such individuals were not only relegated to the margins of society but written off as unredeemable! Imagine waking up one day and seeing the first signs of leprosy knowing full well you would never hug your friends or family again and the best you could hope for was to receive mere scraps from those who would most likely see you at best as a dog! These ten lepers who were isolated, poor, and ostracized were not looking for someone to feel sorry for them, for that they had seen often in the eyes of the “righteous,” but for someone to do the impossible and forever change their status! How they dreamed of being cured so that their whole world that fell apart the moment the priest declared them unclean, might be restored and they might go home! Would Jesus show them mercy despite being the lowest in all of society?

The second cultural tension that is mentioned in this story is the fact that at least one of the lepers was a Samaritan! When Solomon died and his son Rehoboam took over as king he listened to the advice of his younger advisors and made the “heavy yoke” of harsh labor unbearable on his people and as a result ten of the northern tribes of Israel broke free and made Jeroboam their king (1 Kings 12). In eighth century, the Assyrians conquered Israel and took many captives but left a remnant of both Jewish and some of their own to live in the land. The Jewish remnant broke God’s law and intermarried and took on foreign gods (Deuteronomy 7:3-6) and in doing so in Jewish eyes became a half-breed of those insensitive and rebellious to God! To make matters even more tense when the Samaritans offered to help rebuild the temple after the exile, Zerubbabel, Joshua, and the rest of the heads of the families returning from Babylon refused to let them take part (Ezra 4:1-3)! The mutual hostility between these two groups was even more pronounced over where was the proper place of worship (John 4:21-24), the Jews stating Jerusalem and the Samaritans stating the most holy place was Mount Gerizim. While the Jews accepted the entire Old Testament the Samaritans only accepted the Pentateuch as inspired and even rejected the idea of the Messiah coming from the house of David! Both groups excluded the other from worship, marriage between these groups was forbidden and both considered members of the other group to be “apostates who were loathed.” The best explanation of a Samaritan being found amongst the other lepers is “misery loves company” for it trumped the cultural divide between these lepers! At this point in the story we are left to wonder would Jesus, a Jew, show mercy to even a Samaritan despite the fact that Samaria had been a place of conflict and rejection earlier in Jesus’ ministry (Luke 9:51)?