Sermon: The Ten Lepers: The Excessive Ingredient
Text: Luke 17:11-19
Occasion: Trinity XIV
Who: Mark Woolsey
Where: Arbor House
When: Sunday, August 28, 2005
May the words of my mouth and the meditation of my heart be acceptable in Thy sight, O Lord, my strength and my redeemer. In the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.
I. Intro
Last time we met we used our imagination to bake a plate of cookies. Today I would like us to think about something equally pleasant, homemade bread. We mix the flour, water, salt, egg, yeast, and other ingredients, making sure that unlike last time we leave nothing out. We knead it, let it rise, and finally put it in the oven. The house is filled with a heavenly fragrance. The buzzer goes off, the oven door comes down, and out comes a golden loaf. Your knife slices off a thick slice and slathers on the butter. It’s in your mouth and WOAH, THAT’S SALTY! What happened? You think back and you know you added the cup of salt it called for. It was a CUP of salt, wasn’t it? Oh ... . Yes, you screwed up again. Not leaving out, but adding too much salt. This is a danger today as we interpret our Gospel passage. Many times, when the story of the 10 lepers is told, the emphasis is given to the thankfulness of the Samaritan. Certainly that is a legitimate point, and certainly we are not nearly thankful enough in our own lives, either to God or to others. But in interpreting this passage, many times the preacher latches on to this one aspect and misses other, more important points. So what are the salient points of this passage?
II. Leprosy
Before we can understand what this passage teaches us, we must undestand some of the various elements it contains. One of these is leprosy - what it is and what it represents. Although today with proper medical treatment this disease is not too difficult to contain and cure, such was not the case 2000 years ago. Once infected, you were afflicted in both body and soul. You became a kind of living death, forced to live apart from the rest of the community. As the condition progressed your extremeties - nose, fingers, toes, etc - began rotting off, much as if you had died and your corpse was rotting away. Nor is this a fanciful comparison; Leviticus 13 & 14 give detailed laws concerning this scourge, calling the person who has it unclean. The Hebrew word itself is sara`at which literally translated means "a smiting" or "a scourge". In many sermons today this is the point at which the preacher will usually say something like, "The Jews of the time considered it to be a curse from God because of sin, but today we know it is caused by a bacteria. Today we do not ostracise sick people, as if the malady was their own fault, but at that time they knew no better". However, such a condescending view of our ancestors is simply chronological snobbery. Worse, it reveals a complete misunderstanding of the nature of sin, it’s pervasive effects, and God’s right to judge. Before we get any further let me clearly say that leprosy, although it’s proximate cause is a bacteria, is assuredly a judgement from God for sin. While there is a rather dangerous tendancy to spiritualize the Scriptures such that they are almost unrecognizable, this is a legitimate inference from the text. The Jews were right about this because this is what the Bible teaches. The word itself means "a smiting", and the people so afflicted were required to warn others from afar off, calling out, "Unclean! Unclean!". Indeed, it was a priest, the one who usually dealt with people’s sins, that was specifically commanded by the Bible to spot the disease and cast out the smitten lest they infect others. Where the Jews were wrong was to ascribe this disease to a particular sin of that person. They assumed God was punishing this person because of some especially evil deed he did. This attitude allowed the unafflicted to look down upon the sufferrer as especially wicked while he himself was obviously approved by God. In reality the leper may have been no more sinful than the next person; the reason everyone is not similarly smitten is not because they are better than the leper, but because God, in His mercy, forbares to stike us all as we deserve. Leprosy, then, is a visible picture of the judgement of death upon sin.
III. Jesus’ Sovereignty over sin and judgement
Having this Biblical perspective, we now can see the conflict presented to us. Jesus was confronted with sin, judgement, and death in the form of leprosy. Thus, the first point to be made in this story is Jesus’ utter sovereignty over sin, death, and hell. Satan, through Adam, brought evil, sin, and death into this world; Jesus completely defeats them. It’s no contest. He doesn’t even break into a sweat. In fact, He does not so much as even tell the lepers that they are healed. He just commands them to go to a priest, which was necessary if they were to be declared clean and allowed back into society. Their healing, although not instantaneous, was thorough. It happened at a distance, so even that is not a barrior to our Lord’s power. Our first lesson, therefore, is that Jesus is Lord over even the most intractable situation, the most evil sin, and the most desparate of circumstances. He has no match. Another way in which this point is brought out is the way that the lepers address Jesus. They call him Master. Many of their contemporaries addressed Jesus respectfully, calling Him Rabbi, Teacher, Sir, and so forth. But these outcasts recognized something that the well-to-do and well-taught failed to see. Jesus is Master, Lord. In this country we are for the most part affluent, healthy, well-educated, and so on; yet we fail to see or bow to this simple, yet profound insight grasped by the scum of society. In fact, much of the time we use this learning to avoid Jesus’ demands. Soren Kirkegaard is a mixed bag, but I think he addresses this point right on the money when he says:
Take any words in the New Testament and forget everything except pledging yourself to act
accordingly. My God, you will say, if I do that my whole life will be ruined. Herein lies the real place
of Christian scholarship. Christian scholarship is the Church’s prodigious invention to defend itself against the Bible, to ensure that we can continue to be good Christians without the Bible coming too close.
Too much of the time we want Jesus as Saviour, but not as Lord. We want Him to care for us, but not command us; we want His laurels, but not His leadership; His help, but not His headship.
IV. Superiority of Gospel over Law
When Jesus sent the 10 to the priests to show their healing, they were all healed. However, their healing was not at the priest, but on the way, as they were obeying the command of Christ. Thus, the second major point of this story is to show the superiority of the Gospel of Christ over the Law. The Law can tell us if we have leprosy, but we have to go to Christ to be healed. The Law can point out the minutia of our sin, and how short we fall of God’s standard, but it brings with it no power to accomplish what it demands. One word from Christ, "It is finished", signalled our complete release from sin’s bondage. Unfortunately, this is a lesson that very few, maybe only one in ten, ever learn. Many people live their lives either not aware of Christ at all, or at best, only know of Him as a good man, a healer of their hurts. They find real mercy from Him, as He gives rain to the just and the unjust. However, His grace never overtakes them, and they stay in their own set ways just like the nine lepers. These lepers got their healing and obeyed the Law, but failed to be cleansed of something far more serious - their sins. Their actions indicate that they considered their healing to come from somewhere other than Christ. Perhaps they figured their obedience to go to the priest was the reason they got healed. Sure, God provided the means, but they had to be active participants for it to work. In some sense they healed themselves, just like someone who takes his medicine heals himself. How many of you go back to your doctor, & thank him when he prescribes the right medicine and you recover? I know I don’t go back and thank him. Neither did the nine lepers who were healed. Yet there was one who recognized where his healing came from; one whose actions reveal the grace inside.
V. Faith
This lead us to the third major point of this story; it was this man’s faith, not his obedience, that saved him. When he came back, Jesus said to him, "Your faith has made you well". This man knew he had no bargaining chip with Jesus. He knew that even his obedience to see the priest was not the source of his healing. When he felt the smooth skin, felt the change in his body that signalled something that he dared hardly to even hope for, he knew immediately that there was only one reason he was healed. This same faith that Jesus had healed him also led him right back to Jesus. He did not give thanks to the Law, as if that had healed him. His faith fueled his thanks. This is the way it always is with God’s people. Faith never appears by itself; it is always accompanied by gratitude and obedience. As soon as he was healed he raced back to the Healer to express his thanks. And what did the healer say? "Arise, go your way. Your faith has made you well". Not your petition, not your obedience to go to the priest, not your confession, not anything else. Simply your faith. And not only physically well, either. In the Greek, when it says, "Your faith has made you well", it can as easily be translated, "Your faith has saved you". In the original language, healed and saved are the same word. Since the leper had already been healed, I believe Christ was telling this man his faith not only brought his physical healing, but spiritual healing also. Not only in this world, but also in the world to come. And it all came thru faith. Faith and works are like the north and south end of a compass needle. If you know anything about a compass, you know it is powered by a magnet. This magnet always has a north and south end. You cannot have a north end on a magnet w/o also having a south. Yet it is ONLY the north end that points to the north pole. The south end never points north. Just as a south end must accompany a north, so works must always accompany faith. Yet it is always simply faith that justifies us, that saves us from our sins; never our works. Just as this man’s faith led him back to Jesus to give thanks, so our faith must lead us always to lift up holy hands in worship to our Lord.
VI. Thanks.
Thus, we are back to where we started, thanksgiving. While it is not the first point we want to see from this story, it still is a very important point. Saving faith in Christ will always lead to thanksgiving and worship. As I was researching this sermon, I read about ten or so on this passage. In several of these was this story:
There was an old man suffering from Parkinson’s disease. The disease made writing difficult for him since he could not keep his hands still. One day he approached a young man at the post office counter to write a postcard for him. The man gladly consented and wrote what the old man dictated to him, and even signed the mans name to the postcard. When he finished he asked the old man, "Is there anything else I can do for you?" The old fellow looked at the card, thought for a moment, and then answered, "Yes. At the end, could you just put P.S. Please excuse the bad handwriting!"
Let us not be like the old man or the nine lepers and show ingratitude for our deliverance. Let us imitate the one, the outcast among outcasts, the Samaritan, and fall at the feet of Jesus, giving Him thanks.
VII. Eucharist, the Great Thanksgiving.
In fact, lets not just give Him thanks, let’s join the Eucharist, the Great Thanksgiving. When you take this bread and drink this wine on earth, you are also in Heaven drinking real blood and eating real flesh. Through faith in His shed blood, Christ has forgiven all of your sins. Let us give thanks to our sovereign Lord for His great gift to us.
This is the word of God: Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. Soli Deo Gloria!
