In the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit. May the words of my mouth and the meditation of my heart be acceptable to you, Lord, my rock and my redeemer. Amen. (Psalm 19:14)
What an awesome healing story in today’s Gospel! I’m not referring to the cure; I’m referring to the healing. In a cure, what troubles us is fixed. In healing, what troubles God is fixed.
Healing makes us spiritually whole. Sometimes that includes a cure; but often God cleans our souls while our particular infirmity remains. In our Gospel passage from Luke today, Jesus heals the 10 lepers, but they become cured later on.
The passage is so short we’re tempted to rush through it to get to the action, but Luke often includes a major theological point in just one sentence, moving on to the next point right after it.
Luke says the 10 lepers called out, “Jesus, Master, have mercy on us!”
There’s a simple word that we use today to describe that particular act. Anyone care to guess what it is? (Pause for response)
Prayer.
They were praying to Jesus. We often don’t realize that because the Gospel says Jesus was with them, and the lepers approached him.
But isn’t it the same for us now? After all, in Matthew 18:20 (CEV), Jesus tells us,
“Whenever two or three of you come together in my name, I am there with you.”
And just in case we don’t think he meant us, he tells us again in Matthew 28:18-20, also known as the Great Commission (NLT),
“…, ‘I have been given all authority in heaven and on earth. Therefore, go and make disciples of all the nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit. Teach these new disciples to obey all the commands I have given you. And be sure of this: I am with you always, even to the end of the age.’”
So they prayed to Jesus, and then what? Jesus responded!
What a concept! We pray to God and he responds!
But he responded differently from how they or we might have expected, didn’t he? Jesus did not say, “Be healed,” or “Your disease is now gone.”
Instead he had them step out in faith. He told them to go show themselves to the priests. Besides being lepers, as if that wasn’t bad enough, we see that one of these guys was a Samaritan. Jews in Samaria had intermarried with the local women, and were shunned by the rest of the Jews.
Samaritans weren’t even allowed to help rebuild the Temple in Jerusalem, and any good Jew traveling between Galilee and Judea would go miles out of his way to cross the Jordan River, walk through what are now Syria and Jordan, and then cross back over the Jordan River into Israel, just to avoid entering Samaria.
As lepers, they had to live outside the village, and shout “Unclean! Unclean!” whenever anyone approached them. Imagine what that will do to your ego after just a short time.
Yet Jesus tells them to go see the priest. He had a reason for that. Under Mosaic Law, the law that God gave to Moses for Israel to obey, the priests determined the severity of any skin disease, and the appropriate remedy including banishment from the city or village.
Any major skin disease was considered leprosy, and was a sign of being cursed. When Aaron and Miriam criticized Moses for his choice of wife, God’s response was direct and included a physical indication of his displeasure with their actions.
In Numbers 12:10-11, we read,
“As the cloud moved from above the Tabernacle, there stood Miriam, her skin as white as snow from leprosy. When Aaron saw what had happened to her, he cried out to Moses, “Oh, my master! Please don’t punish us for this sin we have so foolishly committed.”
Moses prayed for her, but she still had to leave the camp for seven days as the law required. Miriam suffered with the skin disease for a week, and then she was able to return to the camp.
The Book of Leviticus describes the guidelines the priest must follow. Chapter 13:3 says,
“The priest will examine the affected area of the skin. If the hair in the affected area has turned white and the problem appears to be more than skin-deep, it is a serious skin disease, and the priest who examines it must pronounce the person ceremonially unclean.”
Chapter 10:10 says,
“(8) Then the Lord said to Aaron… (10) You must distinguish between what is sacred and what is common, between what is ceremonially unclean and what is clean.”
Jesus tells them to go into the village from which they are banished and show them selves to the priests, while they are still lepers!
At the point they choose to obey Jesus, to do his will instead of their own; not relying on their own judgment, but rather simply doing what God tells them to do, even though it makes no sense to them.
How many of us — really now, search your hearts — how many of us would have looked at our leprosy if we were one of those 10 lepers, then looked at the other nine who were also still lepers, having already endured the shame and humiliation of showing ourselves to the priest before, getting ourselves banished from the village and having to shout “Unclean! Unclean!” every time we saw another human being — how many of us would have jumped at the idea to go through all that humiliation again?
Yet they listened to Jesus. They did what Jesus told them to do, even though it made no sense to them. They obeyed Jesus. They were willing instead of willful.
The moment they decided to obey Jesus instead of following their own idea of how to behave, they were healed. They had to travel some distance before they were cured; they had to have traveled at least out of sight, which is a few miles in the open areas outside villages in the Middle East.
The one ex-leper who returned had to travel a pretty good distance again to thank Jesus. When Jesus asks where the other nine are, it’s a rhetorical question, but it still obvious from the context that they’re not within sight.
No one replies, “They’re about a quarter mile away, over yonder by that fig tree.” Since no one says anything about the location of the other nine ex-lepers, I imagine the one who returned was shrugging his shoulders and turning his palms up — the universal sign language for “I don’t know.”
The lack of gratitude from the others is insulting. The fact that the only thankful person was, in their minds, the half-breed, wannabe Jew, who wasn’t even good enough to carry stones to rebuild the Temple, had to have an effect on the rest of the crowd who had seen Jesus send the lepers on their way to the priests.
This Samaritan was a person who Jews would walk miles out of their way to avoid being near — even without leprosy — as though he had some sort of theological cooties. Yet a Samaritan was the only one who came back to thank Jesus.
Remember, they were made clean “as they went,” not when they were with Jesus, so the crowd didn’t see any cured lepers until this guy came back to thank him.
The healing was in his heart and brought others to see Christ’s glory. He fell at Jesus’ feet and thanked him. Everyone seeing that action realized that Jesus was the cause of this man’s changed life, physically with his cure and spiritually healed as well.
The other nine arrived in the village cured, but no one witnessed the glory of God’s presence in their lives as they just moved on.
God answers our prayers all the time. Sometimes the answer is yes, sometimes it’s now, and sometimes it’s “not yet.” No matter what answer we receive, it usually comes in a way we don’t expect, and often involves our showing faith in Jesus.
Faith is a funny, intangible thing. We can only see its effects, not faith itself. We can’t put faith in a box on our mantle and show it to people when they come to our homes. “Here’s my faith. I found some more of it last week in the garage, so we had to get a bigger box.”
People see our faith by our actions. Our demonstrated gratitude shows our faith that God is responsible for events in our lives. When we say grace, are we doing it because it’s the religious thing that we’re supposed to do before we eat, or are we really thankful that God has provided us with the means to have that meal? I think a lot of times we just recite a quick prayer to get it out of the way so we can eat. There’s no heartfelt gratitude involved.
Besides not showing gratitude though, we also tend to act as though we need to make things easier on God. He’s too busy running the universe for us to bother him. We should try things on our own until we either can’t get any further with it on our own, or botch it so badly we need help fixing the mess we’ve made of it.
We’ve taken the notion of God as our Father and attached some of the negative attributes of human parenting. Dad’s busy reading the newspaper and Mom’s doing laundry and we want to know how to draw a pony. Since Mom and Dad are busy, they tell us to try it ourselves first.
They teach us how to get dressed and tie our shoes so that we will be able to do it ourselves.
We train people at work to do certain tasks so we won’t have to do them.
And we’ve convinced ourselves that “God helps those who help themselves.”
Many people believe that’s even in the Bible. It’s not. In fact, I can’t think of anything more unbiblical than the idea that God wants us to try doing things without him, especially since he does tell us in the Bible that we can do nothing without him.
In John 15:5 Jesus says,
“Yes, I am the vine; you are the branches. Those who remain in me, and I in them, will produce much fruit. For apart from me you can do nothing.” (NLT)
Notice that in our Gospel passage today, Jesus did not ask the lepers if they had already tried healing themselves before coming to him. “Did you try using paste made with mustard seeds and Juniper berries? How about a good washing by the river? Why are you coming to me with your problem if you haven’t even tried fixing it yourself?”
He doesn’t say anything like that. They pray; he heals. That’s the way it worked. That’s the way it still works. We pray; he heals.
Sometimes our human logic astounds me. We think our problems are too small for us to bother God, yet somehow, if we screw it up it’s now large enough to warrant disturbing him. The most devastating problem we can possibly come up with is still going to be small for the creator of the universe.
We need to realize that even our biggest problems are not going to be challenging to God. We may be totally stumped, but God is not puzzled by our dilemmas. God is omnipotent and omniscient — He knows all and sees all. He doesn’t get distracted like we do. He doesn’t get preoccupied like we do. He doesn’t forget things like we do. And he wants to help us.
Just because we get tired of helping other doesn’t mean God does. We’ve all been in similar situations where we wished the other person would try to do by themselves whatever it was they wanted our help with before calling us away from the much more important thing that we were doing. No matter what it is. We don’t want to help people all the time. We think they should help themselves.
But not God. He wants us to talk to Him constantly, and it’s no effort on His part to help us. But think of the frustration we can save ourselves when we talk to Him before, during, and after whatever we do.
Why are we so afraid to ask God’s help before we try something? Why are we so afraid to pray? Why do we cling to the idea that God helps those who help themselves?
Maybe it’s the way we view prayer. Do we think of prayer as some kind of “Honeydew” list for God? You know, “Honey do this or Honey do that.”
Do we think of our Heavenly father as Popeye? As in, “Pop, I need some money. Pop, I need the car keys.”
We recite a list of things we want God to do for us, then sign off and get back to what we were doing that was much more interesting and important than praying.
God wants us to ask him for things. We’re His children. But he also wants us to stay on the line and listen to what he wants to say to us. Prayer is our opportunity to climb into our Father’s lap, knowing that He’s never too busy for us.
He knows what we need before we even think of it. Prayer is a gift for us, not for God. Through it we’re able to understand His will in our lives. Without it, we’re totally clueless, no matter how independent we think we are. You see — God doesn’t help those who help themselves. God helps those who pray.
The Bible talks about prayer 345 times. In the New Testament alone, we’re told 159 times to pray. Always and everywhere.
In Ephesians 6:18, Paul says,
“And pray in the Spirit on all occasions with all kinds of prayers and requests. With this in mind, be alert and always keep on praying for all the saints.
In Philippians 4:6,
“Do not be anxious about anything, but in everything, by prayer and petition, with thanksgiving, present your requests to God.”
In First Thessalonians 5:16-18,
“Be joyful always; pray continually; give thanks in all circumstances, for this is God’s will for you in Christ Jesus.”
And finally, James 5:13,
“Is any one of you in trouble? He should pray. Is anyone happy? Let him sing songs of praise.”
An English missionary doctor named Helen Roseveare, tells this story about an incident she experienced during her time in Zaire, Africa.
One night she had worked hard to help a mother in the labor ward; but in spite of all they could do the mother died, leaving them with a tiny premature baby and a crying two-year-old daughter. They had no incubators or even electricity so they used a hot water bottle to keep babies warm during the cold, windy nights. When one of the nurses filled the hot water bottle it burst due to dry rot. And it was their only hot water bottle. They wrapped the baby in a blanket and slept with it by the fire.
The baby made it through the night, and in the morning Helen gathered the other children to pray as she did each day. She explained the situation about the little two-year-old girl, who was crying because her mother had died, and her infant sister, and how the baby would probably die during the next night without a hot water bottle.
During the prayer time, one ten-year-old girl, Ruth, prayed with the usual bluntness of children who don’t know any better. “Please, God,” she prayed, “Send us a water bottle. It’ll be no good tomorrow, God, as the baby will be dead, so please send it this afternoon. And while You’re at it, would You please send a dolly for the little girl so she’ll know You really love her.”
Helen was in a tight spot. She knew that God can do everything. But there are limits, aren’t there?
The only way God could answer that particular prayer would be by sending her a package from back home in England, and in the four years she’d been in Africa, she’d never received a package from home. Anyway, even if someone did send a package, who would put in a hot water bottle? They lived on the equator!
Later that afternoon, a car came by and left a large 22-pound box at Helen’s front door. When Helen got home she saw it and gathered the children around.
They opened the box, and Helen began pulling out brightly colored clothing for the children, as well as bandages for the leprosy patients. Then she put her hand in and pulled out a brand-new, rubber hot water bottle!
Helen began to cry. She hadn’t asked God to send it, because she didn’t really believe He could. But Ruth, a little 10-year-old girl, did believe. She was in the front row of the children, and rushed forward, crying out, “If God has sent the bottle, He must have sent the dolly, too!” Rummaging down to the bottom of the box, Ruth pulled out the small, beautifully dressed dolly. She had never doubted!
Looking up at Helen, she asked, “Can I go over with you, Mummy, and give this dolly to that little girl, so she’ll know that Jesus really loves her?”
That parcel had been on the way for five whole months! Packed up by Helen’s former Sunday school class, whose leader had heard and obeyed God’s prompting to send a hot water bottle, even to the equator. And one of the girls had put in a doll for an African child — five months before — in answer to the believing prayer of a ten-year-old to bring it “that afternoon.”
Here’s a word from scripture: In Isaiah 65, verse 24, God says, “Before they call, I will answer!”
Helen was healed that day. She had no illness from which to be cured, but her spirit was healed by God. She had been looking for a worldly solution to her problem instead of praying for a Godly solution. Then God touched her heart.
God warns us against thinking we can help ourselves without him. In Jeremiah 17:5, the prophet tells us,
“This is what the Lord says: ‘Cursed are those who put their trust in mere humans and turn their hearts away from the Lord.’”
And in Proverbs 28:26 (NIV), we read,
“He who trusts in himself is a fool…”
So, since it’s not in the Bible, where did the idea that God helps those who help themselves come from?
It came from Greek mythology, in one of Aesop’s fables about a Wagoner and Hercules:
“A Wagoner was once driving a heavy load along a very muddy way. He came to a part of the road where the wheels sank halfway into the mire, and the more the horses pulled, the deeper sank the wheels.
So the Wagoner threw down his whip, and knelt down and prayed to Hercules the Strong: ‘O Hercules, help me in this my hour of distress.’
But Hercules appeared to him, and said: ‘Man, don’t sprawl there. Get up and put your shoulder to the wheel. The gods help them that help themselves.’”
Over the centuries, this phrase evolved to a single God and slightly better grammar. Yet many Christians today quote it, believing that it’s biblically based, without realizing it really comes from pagan mythology. And, of course, it’s not in the Bible.
Can we really have any doubt that a Father who loves us enough to have his only begotten Son die on the cross for us would be too busy for us? He brought us salvation to be with us forever, because He is in love with us. He always has time for us. He always wants to hear from us. And he has many things to tell us if we’ll listen long enough.
That’s the important lesson we should take home from today’s Gospel. Not that Jesus can cure lepers. You knew that before you came here today.
What we should know is that Jesus wants us to pray to him. That he is always with us. That he hears our prayers and answers them. That we need to have faith and obey him when he answers our prayers, even if we don’t yet understand his answer. That we need to be thankful and praise God publicly for all he’s done in our lives.
Through our own prayerful, faithful, and thankful behavior we become beacons to others, leading them to healing.
Curing is a welcome blessing for us, but it is always temporary. Our lives on this mortal plane are temporary, so any cure must be also. Even Lazarus, whom Jesus raised from the dead after four days, still died again. Curing is temporary.
Healing mends our eternal spirit, but it’s the part we emphasize the least. But the results of healing are eternal.
God bless you all.
