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Title: Where Are the Other Two-Hundred?
Text: Luke 17:11-19
Thesis: The extent of our gratitude is proportionate to our understanding of
God’s goodness.
Introduction
Are people grateful by nature? Does a person have to learn to be grateful?
Are most people appreciative of the good God makes possible in their lives and do they make an effort to express their gratitude to God and others?
Deborah Norville writes in her new book, Thank You Power, “In dozens of randomized, controlled experiments, people who focused on the things they were grateful for were happier, healthier, and more successful.” (Thank You Power, Deborah Norville, Thomas Nelson, 2007)
Norville, who professes to have been a Christian since she was fifteen, cites gratitude as an attitude that actually makes you smarter. She writes, “Practicing gratitude activates the dopamine receptors in the cerebral frontal cortex – the place in the brain where reasoning and logic take place. And activating that actually makes you smarter.” (http://msnbc.com/id/2111898/site/newsweek /page/o/)
I don’t know if thankful people are smarter than ungrateful people, but I do know they are nicer to be around. However, we acknowledge that life is sometimes hard and gratitude does not always come easy.
I. Some people live in the borderlands… I wonder if most people feel marginalized at one time or another?
As Jesus continued toward Jerusalem, he reached the border between Galilee and Samaria. As he entered a village there, ten lepers stood at a distance… Luke 17:11-12
In the Old Testament book of Leviticus, we are told why they stood at a distance. Those who suffer from any contagious skin disease must tear their clothing and allow their hair to hang loose. They as they go from place to place, they must cover their mouth and call out, “Unclean! Unclean” As long as the disease lasts, they will be ceremonially unclean and must live in isolation outside the camp. Leviticus 13:45-46
Leprosy is an ancient disease we know as Hansen’s disease. Hansen’s disease is a chronic infectious disease caused by the bacterium, mycobacterium leprae. The skin may become blotched or develop lesions. The bacterium attacks peripheral nerves resulting in loss of sensation, which results in unfelt injuries that, left untreated, results in the deterioration of tissue.
There were two leper colonies in the upper forty-eight states. One was on an island in Buzzards Bay, Massachusetts and the other in Carville, Louisiana. Carville is an unincorporated community on the Mississippi River, about sixteen miles south of Baton Rouge, Louisiana. Carville is the hometown of political personality James Carville and the village was actually named after his grandfather. (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Carville,_Louisiana)
Under the pretense of using the land as an ostrich farm, Allen Jumel, who was a member of the House of Representatives of the state of Louisiana, arranged for what would be the purchase of a rundown parcel known as Indian Camp Plantation which then served as a leprosarium. That was 1894. In 1916, the United States Congress acted to create a National Leprosarium and The Louisiana Leper Home was purchased from the state of Louisiana in 1921. It is recorded that since no other transportation could be arranged for the “unfortunates”, the first lepers to move to the leprosarium were towed to the leprosarium on a coal-barge by a tugboat. (Excerpted from A Profile of the United States Public Health Service 1798-1984, Bess Furman, Washing, D.C.: U.S. Government Printing Office)
No one wanted to be near them in Jesus’ day and no one wanted to share a boat with them in 1894. I suspect that the stigma attached to the lepers of Jesus’ day was akin to that attached to those who were first diagnosed with HIV in our country.
But, you don’t have to have HIV or leprosy to feel isolated. Your borderlands probably is not a leper colony. However, you may feel or have felt the isolation, marginalization, or the stigma of poverty, unemployment, receiving food stamps or having to sign up for reduced or free lunches for your children. Perhaps your borderland was one of discrimination for your race or ethnicity. Maybe your borderland was a matter of gender. People in the borderlands know what moral failure feels like. If you’ve been through a divorce, you know about the borderlands. Many people with disabilities live in the borderlands. Maybe you’re short or tall or skinny or fat. Maybe you are too young or too old. Some folks feel the stigmas of being odd or quirky. When you are in the borderlands, you know it. You feel isolated, marginalized, and stigmatized and people give you a wide berth.
Borderlands exist and people live there. There is no crime in being there. And, there is no crime in wanting to get out of the borderlands. Sometimes people get religion, so to speak, when they are in the borderlands.
II. Being in the borderlands can bring out the religion in a person…
…ten lepers stood at a distance, crying out, “Jesus, Master, have mercy on us.!” Luke 17:12-13
The ten lepers who were living in the little colony outside the village were just like any person who finds himself marginalized. They see Jesus and knowing something of who he is and what he does, they cover their mouths and shout at Jesus, “Jesus, Master, have mercy on us!”
They did not ask to be healed. Their request was wide open… it was a plea for mercy. They were asking Jesus to give them some food, clothing, blankets, money… they were appealing to Jesus, asking him to show them mercy in some way, shape, or form.
When the homeless stand in line at the mission to receive a meal, they are asking for mercy. When the panhandler holds his sign on the street corner, he is asking for mercy. When a mother appeals to Inter-Church ARMS, she is asking for mercy. When someone needs assistance from our Samaritan Fund, they are asking for mercy. When the uninsured visit the emergency room at the hospital after hours, they are asking for mercy. When the accused stands before a judge, he is asking for mercy. When your son, daughter, grandson, or granddaughter gets in a jam and asks for help, they are asking for mercy. When you run out of gas on the freeway, raise your hood, pop your trunk lid, and stand there shivering in the cold, you are hoping for mercy. When someone hurts you and asks for forgiveness, they are asking for mercy. When the sick person asks for prayer, that person is asking for mercy. When we confess our sins to God, we are asking for mercy.
The ten lepers were not different from anyone who has been in need of someone’s help. They were unashamedly asking Jesus to help them in any way he would.
In a scene from the first season of the highly acclaimed TV show, The Apprentice, Donald Trump faces two of his apprentices. He is sitting at his boardroom table. On his left is Kwame, a polished Harvard MBA. On his right is Troy, a savvy risk-taker without a college education. One of them will be fired.
Trump turned to Troy and said, “In reality we’re dealing with multi-billion dollar companies here. The consequences of hiring a live wire like you could be costly and devastating. So I have to say, “You’re fired!’” (The Price is Height: The Apprentice, The Complete First Season DVD, Disc 4, Scene 4)
How different it is when we come before God. Jesus doesn’t say, “My, you’re really a bad money manager.” Jesus doesn’t say, “You know, you are a terrible risk. You have messed up so many times, why would I have mercy on you?” Jesus doesn’t say, “You know, there are a lot of people worse off than you, how dare you ask me for help?” Jesus doesn’t say, “Strike three, you’re out!” Jesus is not like the Soup-Nazi on the Seinfeld episode that angrily declared to anyone who did not order his soup correctly, “No soup for you!”
Whenever you are tempted to feel like your situation or your life is just too far gone for God’s mercy, read Psalm 103.
Praise the Lord, I tell myself, and never forget the good things he does for me. He surrounds me with love and tender mercies. He fills my life with good things. He has not punished us for our sins, nor does he deal with us, as we deserve. For his unfailing love toward those who fear him is as great as the height of the heavens. He has removed our rebellious acts as far away as the east is from the west. He is compassionate. He understands how weak we are; he knows we are only dust. The love of the Lord remains forever.” (Excerpts from Psalm 103)
Our story says that Jesus did indeed have mercy on the ten lepers.
III. Jesus was merciful in the case of the ten lepers…
Jesus looked at them and said, “Go show yourselves to the priests.” And, as they went, their leprosy disappeared. Luke 17:14
This was a momentous occasion. Only on two other occasions in scripture, prior to this event, had God healed someone of leprosy. Seven hundred years had elapsed since the last recorded healing of a leper.
There is the story of Miriam in Numbers 12. She and her brother Aaron were jealous of his leadership. They asked, “Has the Lord spoken only through Moses? Hasn’t he spoken through us, too?”
The bible says that God was furious with them and in a moment of time Miriam’s skin became like that of a stillborn infant. However, Moses interceded for her and after seven days in the borderlands outside the camp, she was healed.
The story of Naaman is found in II Kings 5. In this case Naaman was a military commander who suffered from leprosy. He asked the prophet Elisha to heal him. Elisha instructed to go and dip himself in the Jordan River seven times, as a demonstration of obedience and faith. He too was healed.
In February of 1997, Bill Gates, CEO of Microsoft and the richest man in America, spoke to the annual convention of the American Association for the Advancement of Science, which was meeting in Seattle. At the conclusion of his speech, there was a time for questions and a medical doctor in the audience asked this question: “If Bill Gates were blind, would he trade all his billions to have his sight restored?” Bill Gates’ reply was that he would indeed trade all of his money for his sight.
It does not matter if you are Bill Gates or one of the ten lepers, everyone wants to be healthy and we will pay whatever we can to have it.
In 1995, the Washington Post reported that the White House had released figures indicating the Medicare prescription drug benefit would coast 1.2 trillion dollars. We will pay for health. (Washington Post, Cici Connolly and Mike Allen, February 9,1995)
More recently, President Bush vetoed the 35 billion dollar SCHIP bill (State Health Insurance Program) that would have expanded health coverage to ten million children whose parents cannot afford private insurance, but make too much money to qualify for Medicaid. We will pay for health. (Bloomberg.com, Laura Litvan, October 6, 2007)
We will pay for health and we will pray for health, just like the ten lepers whom Jesus mercifully healed on their way to see the priests.
We all know how disappointed we feel when we or someone we love is not well. Many of us know how discouraging it is to suffer from some disease or ailment. We also know how delighted we are whenever we receive a glimmer of hope.
Forbes Magazine carried an article in the September issue titled: Stopping Nonsense. Forbes reported that an experimental drug from PTC Therapeutics was showing great promise for sufferers of Duchene’s Muscular Dystrophy, a disease in which the body does not manufacture dystrophin, a glue that holds muscle tissue together.
In one of the case studies, a nine-year-old boy who had not been able to get out of the family car without assistance, now does so unaided. Families with children suffering from Duchene’s Muscular Dystrophy are ecstatic with delight and enthused with hope. (Matthew Herper, Forbes Magazine, Stop the Nonsense, September 17,2007)
One would think the normal response to a new lease on life would be heartfelt gratitude. However…
IV. Expressing gratitude is not a universal response to God’s goodness
One of the ten (a Samaritan), when he saw that he was healed, came back to Jesus shouting, “Praise God, I’m healed!” Jesus asked, Didn’t I heal ten men? Where are the other nine? Does only this foreigner return to give glory to God?” Luke 17:15-19
There are many layers to this story, but at the heart of it, one unlikely immigrant’s expression of gratefulness and the lack of it in nine others who had been similarly blessed.
A wonderful immigrant story emerges from all of those stories after the turn of the twentieth-century. The son of an immigrant shopkeeper complained to his father, “Dad, I don’t understand how you run this store. You keep your accounts payable in a cigar box, your accounts receivable stuck on a spindle, and your money in a cash register. You never know what your profits are.”
“Son,” the father replied, “let me tell you something. When I came to this country, all I owned was the pants I was wearing. Now your sister is an art teacher, your brother is a doctor, and you are a CPA. Your mother and I own a house, a car, and this little store. Add that all up and then subtract the pants and there is my profit.” Every bit of it was a gift for which he was grateful. (Bruce Larson, Communicator’s Commentary, Luke, 1983)
We know why the Samaritan returned. He knew he had received a wonderful gift from God, though not among God’s chosen. What we don’t know is why the other nine did not take time to say, “Thank you.”
Excuses are a dime a dozen.
One Sunday morning, two men are out in a boat. They had gone fishing. After several hours without even so much as a bite, one man says to the other, “You know, we probably should have stayed home and gone to church.”
The other man says, “Well, I could have stayed home, but I could not have gone to church.”
His friend asked, “Oh, why’s that?
”
“Well,” he said, “my wife’s sick, so I would have had to stay home to take care of her.” (C.T., Greg Huffer)
It’s like the guy who told his next-door neighbor, who had come over asking to borrow his lawn mower. “No, I can’t loan you my mower. They have cancelled all the flights between Denver and Los Angeles and I can’t loan you my mower.”
“What does the cancellation of flights between Denver and Los Angeles have to do with borrowing your lawn mower?” the neighbor asked.
“Nothing,” the guy responded, “I just don’t want to loan you my mower.”
Any excuse is good enough if you need an excuse.
I don’t know why the nine did not take time to swing back by Jesus and say, “Hey, this is great! Thanks!”
Maybe they were just insensitive or actually suffered from severe cases of ingratitude. Maybe they were like adult children of aging parents who have forgotten that someone took care of them, protected them, and provided for them during the years when human children cannot survive without the care of a parent. King Leer, speaking of his tragedy said, “How sharper than a serpent’s tooth it is, to have a thankless child!”
Maybe they felt entitled. After all, Jesus was a Jew and they were Jews, so why wouldn’t Jesus heal them? Of course, the Samaritan returned, he wasn’t entitled.
Maybe they didn’t know any better. We teach our kiddos to say “please” and “thank you” and “may I be excused”. Maybe their parents never taught them to say, “Thank you.”
Maybe they were just caught up in the excitement of getting their lives back. What would it be like to have been living in the borderlands with a bunch of outcasts, while your wife and children lived in the city? What would it have been like to beg in the borderlands, when your job was waiting for you down at the plant? What would it be like to have been untouchable, when you longed to hold your children in your arms?
All excuses aside, Jesus noticed that only one, and an unlikely one at that, expressed gratitude for his gift of healing and health.
The early church father, Athanasius said of Jesus in this story, “He loved the grateful one, but was angry with the ungrateful ones because they did not acknowledge their deliverer.” (Ancient Christian Commentary, N.T. III., Luke)
There are many things for which to be grateful to God. James reminds us, “Whatever is good and perfect comes to us from God above, who created heaven’s lights. He chose to make us his own children by giving us his true word. And we, out of all creation, became his choice possession.” James 1:17-18
The contrasting tensions that describe what God has done for us through Christ are numerous. We were once in darkness, but now we are in the light. Once we were dead, but now we are alive. Once we were lost, but now we are found. Once we were enemies, but now we are friends. Once we were sick, but now we are well. Once we were aliens, but now we are citizens… and more than that, children of God.
How can we be anything less than grateful, given the wonder of God’s goodness? How can we not: Shout with joy to the Lord, O earth! And worship the Lord with gladness? How can we not come before him singing with joy? How can we not acknowledge that the Lord is God and that he made us and we are his? How can we not enter his gates with thanksgiving; and his courts with praise, giving thanks and blessing his name? For the Lord is good. His unfailing love continues forever, and his faithfulness continues to each generation. (Adaptation of Psalm 100)
Jesus asked, “Didn’t I heal ten lepers? Where are the other nine?” This morning he might ask, “Didn’t I heal four hundred, where are the other two hundred?”
I don’t know where the other two hundred are. Maybe they are like the fan who said, “I stopped going to ball games because, number…
1. Whenever I go to a game, they ask me for money.
2. The other fans don’t care about me.
3. The seats are too uncomfortable.
4. The coach never visits me.
5. The referee makes calls I don’t agree with.
6. Some games go into overtime and it makes me late for lunch.
7. The band plays songs I don’t know.
8. I have things to do at game time. (and most important of all)
9. My parents took me to too many games…” (A Heart Like His, Barbour, 1999, pp. 182-183)
Conclusion:
It does not appear that Jesus dwelt long on his disappointment. In our text he immediately turned his attention back to the grateful man and said, “Stand up and go. Your faith has made you well.”
This is an interesting comment because earlier the text says that they were made clean or healed as they went. But, now he says to the one, “Your faith has made you well.”
It is easy to make the leap and ponder the possibilities. Maybe in making the man well, as some commentators suggest, his act of faith and expression of gratitude made him complete. Maybe the experience of physical healing was incomplete without the inward attitude and outward expression of gratitude? Maybe the other nine were made well physically, but were not made well spiritually. Maybe the Samaritan alone was given inner healing and salvation?
We cannot answer for the other nine or the other two hundred. We can only account for ourselves. So we each ponder, what difference does this story make in my life?
If I were one of the survivors of the Titanic the World Trade Center, or the Clear Creek Tunnel fire, would it make a difference in the way I feel about God and life? Would my gratitude make a difference in the way I live my life?
The Apostle Paul wrote, “Once you were dead, doomed forever because of your many sins. You used to live just like the rest of the world, full of sin, obeying Satan… all of us used to live that way, following the passions and desires of our evil nature. But God is so rich in mercy, and he loves so much, that even while we were dead because of our sin, he gave us life when he raised Christ from the dead. [It is only by his special favor that we have been saved!] Ephesians 2:1-5
Perhaps we would do well to activate the dopamine receptors in the frontal cortex of our brains by giving thought to those things for which we are grateful. As we “stand and go” this morning, may we do so, with grateful spirits.
Thanks be to God for his inexpressible and indescribable gift. II Corinthians 9:15
