Pentecost 21 Luke 17:11-19

October 13, 2013

How many of you had moms who made you write “thank you” cards to your grandparents, aunts, uncles, friends, and anyone else who gave you presents for your birthday or Christmas? It’s so hard to stop what we’re doing, sit down at the kitchen table, and come up with the words to say.

For the most part we have to be taught to be thankful. We like to be on the receiving end, but we don’t always consider that the person who gave us something didn’t have to do it. They did it because they wanted to. Our parents teach us to say “thank you” to help us remember that the most important part of the gift isn’t the gift itself.It’s the love and kindness of someone who cares for us.

Today we visit a familiar scene in Jesus’ earthly life that is often read in Thanksgiving services. Like our parents, God’s Word teaches us a lesson in saying “thank you”. We have received the most expensive gift we’ll ever get, and it comes from the God of overflowing goodness, mercy, and love. The question that begs to be answered here is, “What does it mean to me?”

He hears!

Jesus was slowly but surely making his way to Jerusalem, where he would take away the sin of the world by his suffering and death on the cross. No one was forcing him to go. He went willingly to do what only he could do. As he traveled along the border north of Jerusalem between Galilee and Samaria north some lepers stood at a distance and cried, “Jesus, Master, have pity on us!”

Leprosy was a general term for many different types of noticeable skin diseases, some worse than others, but once you were diagnosed with leprosy people were afraid they’d catch it from you…and in many cases they were right. In fact, people often concluded that leprosy was a punishment from God. So the reason these men stood at a distance and cried out is because they were not allowed to live among the general population.The closest you and I have come to feeling some of that isolation and unpleasantness is when we caught the flu or another contagious disease. Everyone wanted to stay away from us, but at least we had a home and someone to take care of us.

Seeing those lepers must have been a pitiful sight. Over time their clothes had turned to rags and they had nowhere to take a bath.They ate whateverthey could scrounge up. The Jews of Jesus’ day were more likely to throw rocks at lepers than to get anywhere near them, much less touch one. Yet these lepers knew that one person cared – the one who had compassion on the sick and demon possessed and healed their afflictions. They cried out to Jesus, and Jesus heard them.

The real problem they had – the real problem we all have – is not any physical disease but a spiritual condition. All sickness, suffering and death come as a result of man’s fall into sin. Jesus hears our cries for mercy when we are sick, but his heart is really tuned in to our ongoing need for forgiveness. In our first hymn today we sang, “Come to Calvary’s holy mountain, sinners ruined by the Fall…come defiled without, within; from infection and uncleanness, from the leprosy of sin.” When we think of the appalling sight of those smelly, dirty, desperate lepers, our sins are every bit as appalling to God and to one another. Yet the lepers cameto our Lord for help. And Jesus took pity on them and helped them. He never turns away anyone who comes to him for help in the midst of sin’s ugliness. So do not lose heart when things get ugly in your marriages, your families, and in all your relationships.We are all lepers. In the light of God’s Word we can recognize sin for all its appalling ugliness and still not give up on ourselves or each other.Just watch the lepers in Jesus’ day. Jesus hears our cry for mercy.

He heals!

When we read about Jesus’ healing miracles we find a variety of ways in which he did it. For instance, before this incident Jesus healed a single leper on the spot and then told him to go to the priest for an official clean bill of health. In this case Jesus sent the ten lepers away to the priest before they were healed. They were to take Jesus at his word that sometime before they arrived at the priest’s doorstep their leprosy would be gone. They went on their way in faith, and they were healed. No matter how he did it, in each case it was the power of his Word the delivered them from their disease.

With the cleansing power of his blood wrapped up in his mighty Word Jesus spoke and took away every trace of our sin. And he continues to speak that same powerful Word to us when it is preached, read, and taught. He proclaims it every time we bring our sinful offspring to be baptized. He proclaims it to us every time we receive the Lord’s Supper. He calls us to “wash our robes and make them white” and promises to “never break his covenant of blood, signed when our Redeemer died and sealed when he was glorified.”

We need to hear him speak because in this life we will always be plagued by our sin. AlthoughJesus set us free from its guilt and power, our sinful nature continues to wage war against our faith. There’s nothing good in that nature, so we can never expect anything good to come out of it. So we look with shame at the thoughts we’ve had, the words we’ve said, the things we’ve watched, the places we’ve gone, that the things we’ve done that God clearly forbids and condemns. When we are confronted with our sin, God is calling us to admit it, to see it as he sees it, and to turn to Jesus for forgiveness. When we turn to Jesus, he wants us to believe that we are forgiven!The lepers went to show themselves the priest so he could declare them clean and so they could live in the open society again.After Jesus declares us clean, he sends us out to display our “cleanness”, too, by letting our lights shine before all people in our lives.

We thank!

We might ask why the Holy Spirit gave us this incident in Jesus life. There are a number of reasons. In one big waythis miracle, like all of Jesus’ miracles, shows hisauthority as the Son of God and identifies him as the Savior. Another is that God shows compassion on those whom the world would otherwise ignore or reject. Another reason is the show the gratitude that comes from having the greatest thing happen to us – deliverance from sin – under God's mercy. But it also shows the sorrow that Jesus has when people do not rejoice in and thank him for his blessings.

Jesus doesn’t have us sit down in the pew each week and force us to say “thank you” to him with our hymns and prayers and offerings. Thanks can’t be forced, and it doesn’t mean anything if it doesn’t come from our hearts. No, Jesus invites us to worship so he can tell us how much he loves us and how much he has done for us. Whether people are thankful or not, Jesus gives us all our daily bread, guards and keeps our life, and showers us with more blessings than we can count. When we come to worship we take time to stop, listen, and think about how much our Godand Savior has done and continues to do for us.

After the thankful leper fell on his face at Jesus’ feet, Jesus literally told him to “Rise and go.” Go out and live your new life. A greater thing has happened to us. “We were …buried with [Christ] through baptism into death in order that, just as Christ was raised from the dead through the glory of the Father, we too may live a new life.” (Romans 6:4 – NIV) We are reminded of this in every worship service whenever we stand for prayer or to confess our faith or to receive the blessing. Through baptism we have been raised to live a new life, an everlasting life of gratitude and joy by faith in Jesus.

So it isn’t just a matter of stopping what we’re doing and coming to church to say “thank you.” Our “thank you” is in everything we do. Our whole life is a song of grateful praise to him who healed our broken relationship with God and gave us a new life. We no longer live under the stigma of sin. Jesus, our Master, has had mercy on us.

How will you say “thank you” in your life? Amen.