Thankfulness
Does anyone know what Hansen’s disease is? Anyone ever hear of it?
How about if I use the other name it’s known by, Leprosy?
Leprosy, or Hansen’s disease, has been around for a while and it is still ‘a thing’ in many countries, including here in the U.S. We can read accounts of it in scripture and in other texts, but did you know that there are about 200 new cases reported every year in the United States?
Leprosy is still around.
And although it’s curable today with a regimen of several drugs administered over a period of about six months, it’s no small feat to get rid of it.
Did you know that a person infected with leprosy typically won’t have symptoms for a very long time?
Some sources state it can lie dormant without symptoms for between 5 and 20 years. When it does manifest, the symptoms exhibit themselves in several notable ways – general weakness, nerve damage and it can even affect the eyes. The nerve damage often results in loss of feeling in extremities which can cause minor cuts and abrasions to become infected because they will often go unnoticed.
In many cases, the disease causes disfigurement – notably of the hands, face and feet, but discolored blotches of skin will appear on arms and legs and the torso. Tellingly, the disease is named from the Greek word for scale. Those suffering the long term effects of the disease have very visible disfigurement, and were shunned from open society – forced into leper colonies and separated from everyone else.
In 2016 there were about 216,000 new cases reported worldwide – most coming from just 14 countries, with India accounting for more than half. In the last 20 years, 16 million people have been cured of leprosy.
Leprosy brings with it not only the physical suffering but also the old social stigmas that remain even today, and like many other diseases, the stigma is one of the main barriers to self-reporting and early treatment.
While things have changed a great deal in our ability to identify and tackle diseases, Leprosy remains a factor even today and, if we want to observe something revealing of human nature, it makes for a great study in scriptural truth.
One such study can be found in the Gospel according to Luke – where we find Jesus on his way to Jerusalem passing along through Samaria and Galilee in chapter 17, verses 11 through 19.
Let’s read about this encounter: [Read LUKE 17, 11-19]
Notice how they were keeping a distance, and the lovely scriptural way of saying they shouted, ‘lifting up their voices.’ They kept a distance because the law required those with leprosy to keep their distance.
So here’s 10 lepers calling out, ‘Jesus, Master have mercy on us.’
So what did Jesus do? Did He turn his back on them, tell them to stay away? Go get a job and a haircut?
No, we see Jesus making this interesting command, “Go, and show yourselves to the priests.”
Why to the priests?
Well, if you have read the Old Testament book of Leviticus in chapters 13 and 14, it was the priests who were charged with declaring people clean or unclean. God had given the law to Moses, and the law not only set out what the priests were to look for, but prescribed the precise methods around dealing with and isolating those with or those suspected with cases of the disease.
There is even prescribed dealings with the leprosy found in the walls of homes and in clothing.
So Jesus tells them to go show themselves to the priests – and not just priest, but the plural form, priests, because being cured of Leprosy was a big, big deal. These people’s lives were ruined – condemned to be shunned, separate and live in isolation – by law.
In those days, a cure was pretty much unheard of and certainly due to the seriousness of the consequences of the disease, letting these 10 guys loose into the general population would cause quite the commotion and disruption – so Jesus told them go show themselves to the priests.
Go get examined – the purpose clearly here, was to be declared clean. This was a life-altering, life-changing moment for these 10 men, because as we read, they were cleansed as they went.
Imagine having this horrible, horrible disease back then.
Nobody wants to be near you, nobody can be near you except other lepers. The law mandates that you live away from the general population – separated, removed from any social gatherings, you can’t even touch your own children. Life was pretty harsh as it was, but to be a leper in those days made it even worse.
Then along comes Jesus; you cry out to Him, begging Him to have mercy on you.
And He listens and …. you’re cured.
Cured. Absolutely CURED.
That’s pretty amazing – and now you’re off to show the priests that you’re clean and to be declared clean. But wait… wouldn’t you be thankful?
Now as we read here in verse 15, only one of them, noticing that he’s been healed turns back. He turns back to thank the one who saved him.
He praised God with a loud voice and fell on his face at the feet of Jesus, giving thanks and praise.
Scripture here also goes out of the way to mention something else – the man who turns back is a Samaritan. And we know that the Samaritans and Jews were not the best of friends – Jews in those days would routinely go completely out of their way to avoid traveling through or near Samaria.
So the healed leper is a Samaritan – and this makes it all the more interesting because he would not be expected to show any gratitude toward a Jewish healer whatsoever. If any of his Samaritan friends or relatives saw him thanking a Jew, he’d very likely and quickly be ostracized by his own countrymen.
Just look at the tongues wagging when Jesus was seen talking with a prostitute or a tax-collector. Oh my.
Back then, as is also true today, your associations; the circle of friends and people you are involved with, determined in many ways your ‘standing’ in society. You get known for the company you keep. Hang with the wrong crowd, and not only does your reputation suffer, so will your freedom.
Going out of your way and prostrating yourself in front of everyone at the feet of a known Jewish healer was pretty much social suicide for a Samaritan.
Today, the man’s thankfulness serves as a powerful testimony to a heart of gratitude.
His health – and thereby his life – was restored to him, but he turned around and surrendered it to Jesus by doing the one thing that Samaritans were loath to do – thank a Jew, and so publically, so lavishly – so honestly, it was surely going to be the social death of this Samaritan.
To put it in perspective, it would be today’s equivalent of a Muslim man walking along the street, seeing a local news crew interviewing a Jewish doctor, and then interrupting them to bow down at the feet that same Jewish doctor – one who’d saved their life. Then publically and loudly thanking him and praising God for their healing kindness.
Picture that happening today – it is so unlikely that it sounds preposterous; yet, here a similar thing has been recorded for us in scripture. A Samaritan ex-leper stops, turns around having been healed, and very publically thanks the Jewish healer who’d cured him.
Now Jesus asks what almost looks like a rhetorical question. Who is he asking? Is he asking the cured Samaritan?
“Were not ten cleansed? Where are the nine?”
Look at verse 18.
“Was no one found to return and give praise to God except this foreigner?”
Well, there’s a zinger for you.
I think it’s clear that Jesus isn’t asking the Samaritan man – he’s speaking of him in the 3rd person, so no, he’s asking those witnessing what just took place.
I think Jesus clearly asks a rhetorical question here – and at to at least this preacher, the question indicates something of a telling attribute of the nationality of the other nine – or at least those witnessing these events; they had to be Jews.
His rhetorical question is directed at everyone else standing around watching these events unfold. In boldly asking this question, Jesus is also showing them something. And this is what I’d like you to consider this morning.
Should it be just the 10 men returning to Jesus to offer praise and thanks? Just those healed?
No.
But that is how we think today, that’s our culture. We think it should only be the recipient of the blessing that gives the thanks. At Christmas, while we’re all around the tree opening presents, do you ever see someone thank the person who gave a gift to someone else?
Why do you think that is?
Has God not poured out a blessing into the lives of those around you?
Stop for a moment and think carefully about this. In churches around this time of year, you will often hear the question asked, “What are you thankful for?”
Please don’t get me wrong - many of the responses are greatly uplifting and revealing of God’s hand working in our lives, but when have you heard someone other than the person receiving the blessing be thankful to the Lord for the blessing someone else received?
Is it rare?
Yes, at least in my experience, it is very rare.
I tell you this; it shouldn’t be so amongst us. It shouldn’t be so amongst the brethren.
Because that as sin affects the people around the sinner, so much more do the blessings of God affect the lives around the one blessed.
Or are we that blind to God’s blessings?
I’m not just talking about the ‘macro’ view of blessings – the country we live in, the freedoms we enjoy or the roof over our heads. I’m talking about taking time to look for, to perceive and to notice God’s work in the lives of those around us as well.
Here’s another question to consider, would you rather be affected by the effects of sin in someone’s life, or by the blessings of God in that person’s life?
So we should be thankful for the blessings in the lives of others – not just for selfish reasons, but also because it is a revealing of God’s care and action in all of our lives. At the very least, when we see someone receive a blessing, it is God speaking to us in the words of hope to our hearts that He does care, and that He is actively working in individual lives for His Glory.
So here in our text, only one of the ten healed returns to our Lord and Savior to give thanks when he’s seen that he’s been healed.
Do we see or perceive the blessings that God has given us? Personally, I think it’s sometimes like seeing our own faults – we’re often blind to them, until and unless we make time to take time and recognize all the things God has done. There’s a real danger in taking things for granted or taking credit for what God alone has done.
So how about the blessings that God has provided in someone else’s life?
Do we perceive them?
Are we even looking beyond our own condition? I’ll be honest, I can’t say that I always do. I recall several times feeling left out after seeing a breakthrough moment in someone else’s life. But slowly, over time I’ve listened and learned to see God’s work in not just my own life, but how His blessings work for the good of all.
I hope today you will too.
And it’s in this text that I think this is something of the lesson that Jesus was giving here.
Not only did the nine possible Jews who were healed of leprosy quickly forget Jesus, but His own countrymen in this town seemed oblivious to what miracle had just taken place.
“Was no one found to return and give praise to God except this foreigner?”
He wasn’t just referring to the other nine.
Was NO ONE found…
I think a lot of us might gloss over this scripture and miss this principle in Christ’s question here.
I’ve even read a few commentaries that seemed to have completely missed this whole point – that the blessings God pours out aren’t to be selfishly seen as individual presents to an individual person, rather, that when God acts – and to be sure, He does act in individual lives – He acts on behalf of the many, and not just the one.
The very act of Christ on the cross screams this principle across the pages of scripture.
Christ’s second command, love your neighbor as yourself, in Mark 12:31 speaks volumes about the nature of our relationship with God. A right relationship with God is to have God first everything we do and think. The next thing? The next thing in line is everyone else’s needs.
There’s no room for self when your heart is full of God. Jesus knows we can’t do it by our own power or strength, that’s why God must be first. But that’s not what the world preaches.
Our enemy speaks through the culture, he speaks through the flesh to tell you how bad you have it, how everyone else is blessed except you. How this person has that, or another has this thing or some special blessing and how you’ve been forgotten, left out, kicked to the curb.
It’s a huge lie – one designed to get you to feel isolated, designed to stir up and foment or foster anger towards God. I mean, HOW DARE God leave you out?
Haven’t you done all these things for Him? Haven’t you been an obedient servant? And look, you get thrown some crumbs and God calls it good!
Ever feel like that? Ever start thinking that someone else has it better than you and you start feeling left out?
Christian, it’s an attack, plain and simple. Recognize it for what it is. Don’t be mislead.
Don’t let Satan lure you into his trap.
Don’t let him direct you to feed that wounded, selfish pride.
The trap of selfish desire and selfish promotion comes from the internal depths of our hearts which nourish and suckle pride. When we see someone receive blessings, material or otherwise, there is the flesh – the old man – waiting in the shadows for a chance to question God’s goodness and faithfulness towards YOU because, well, you’ve obviously been left out.
It’s a lie, a blatant falsehood designed very carefully to get you to move toward anger and bitterness toward those who have been richly blessed, because what you’re not seeing, what you’re not perceiving is how richly God is blessing you as well.
Once you start fostering this kind of anger you start harboring resentment and anger not only towards those who have received the wonderful gifts from God, but towards God Himself. This blinds us not only to our own blessings, but we can begin to question God’s goodness and mercy.
That’s what the deceiver and the father of lies wants. He wants you to doubt God. He wants us to start questioning God’s goodness and mercy – he wants to get a wedge in our relationship with God, so as to deprive us of the blessings of a faith growing in Christ.
The very last thing Satan wants is a happy Christian living in any kind of hardship.
Did you hear me? A HAPPY Christian living in hardship – well, what do you mean, pastor? We’re supposed to be happy in our trials? Well, to be sure, that’s exactly what scripture in James tells us, but I’ll point out that people expect you to be happy if everything seems to be going well for you.
But that’s the world.
What stands out? What gets noticed? Hint: It’s not happy people living in plenty.
What gets noticed is someone who lives their faith.
What really gets noticed is when the peace beyond all understanding is demonstrably REAL; when it’s not just ‘nice words in a scripture somewhere’, but witnessed in a tangible, effusive hope that screams from the life of a Christian peacefully enduring an otherwise unbearable burden.
That’s noticeable. And this is what Satan fears. He fears the reality of Christ getting through to people who are lost in sin and headed for death.
So what’s he do?
Because while Satan can’t separate you from God, he can and will do everything else he’s allowed to do to interfere with your witness.
He’ll harass you, he’ll tear you down, remind you of your failures, bring up your past, point accusing fingers at you and find his own willing servants to incite a sense of fear, to mock, intimidate, demoralize and defraud you from experiencing a close, trusting and faith-living relationship with God.
Because when you live your faith; when you trust in God no matter what’s going on, when everyone else expects you to roll over and die, they won’t have any excuse, accusation or mockery for the peace and for the joy that your life exhibits. The kind of peace and joy that only comes from the safety and security of the believer in our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ.
So today, brothers and sisters – open your eyes to see and perceive the blessings that God has provided not just in your own life, but rejoicing and giving thanks for the blessings God has provided in the lives of those around you.
Conclusion
Take a moment to consider this – what if, instead of bacteria being the cause of Leprosy, that our sins caused the same symptoms and physical deformation as leprosy?
What if our sins became like sores and lesions for any and all people to see? Anytime you sinned, a new sore, a new lesion or scale – your face disfigured, your hands curling up in agonizing, misshapen claws, your eyes grow opaque and bulging, your hair falls out and warts appear with every slip, misdeed or omission.
And so, through a lifetime of sin, we become hideously grotesque, repulsive rotting bags of flesh looking like monsters and smelling of death.
Would anyone want to be around you? Would you find work?
Could you go shopping and walk the aisles without people scattering away, speaking about you in hushed tones and whispers with horrified looks?
Would your children even allow you to hold them in your arms?
If scripture reveals anything about the reality of such a thing, it is there in Matthew Chapter 27, where we can read not just of the physical pain and suffering of the cross, but of the mockery of the chief priests and scribes, and even of the robbers being crucified with him. Verse 44 says they reviled him.
And then in verse 47, we read that even God the Father turns away from Jesus. Our savior cries out, “Eli, Eli, lama sabachthani?” – ‘My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?’
Even God the Father turned his face away from Jesus. He turned away because of what Jesus had become – Jesus, born of the virgin Mary, who had no guile or shadow within Him, the only Son of God who never once sinned nor trespassed, became sin on our behalf.
He had become the ugly, grotesque, monstrosity of all our sin which caused God to turn away from His only Son. He couldn’t look at Him.
What am I thankful for?
I’m thankful for Jesus – that he’d cure me the same consequence of my leprous sin, that he’d love a sinner such as me and call me to be a child of His own, and I’m very, very thankful it wasn’t just me He saved. He saved many and each and every one is a blessing to all of us. The saints of today and yesterday have blessed this nation and all nations with their obedience to God’s calling.
This Thanksgiving, let’s find someone in our lives that we are not only thankful for, but find something in their life that God has obviously blessed them with and give thanks to the Lord for their blessings as well.
Let’s pray.
