This is the sermon I prepared for Holy Cross Lutheran Church, Beatrice, Neb., for the Twentieth Sunday after Pentecost, Oct. 10, 2010.
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Readings
2 Kings 5:1–3, 7–15c
Psalm 111 (antiphon v.1)
2 Timothy 2:8–15
Luke 17:11–19
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Prayer
Father in heaven, open our hearts to embrace your grace shown to us through your Son, Jesus Christ, and by your Holy Spirit, move us to gratitude for your gifts. Amen.
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Message
I had no idea.
So I was surprised
when I read the Wikipedia article on leprosy.
It claims that the World Health Organization
estimated that two to three million people worldwide
were permanently afflicted with leprosy in 1995.
And since then, over fifteen million people
have been cured of the disease.
I learned that leprosy is actually an upper respiratory infection.
One of its symptoms shows itself through skin lesions.
It does not make body parts fall off.
It is treatable with medication,
and once treatment begins, the individual is no long contagious.
Even so, in some countries, leper colonies still persist.
People with leprosy are feared and ostracized
both because of irrational worries about infection
and because of the stigma attached to their appearance.
We might want to believe we live
in a progressive, enlightened era and culture,
but just as with beauty, when we behold disfigurement,
we make judgments that only go skin-deep.
And that’s true of so many conditions
in which people find themselves,
whether we look at fitness, finances, or philosophies,
politics, morals, or faith.
It’s true.
We may not speak of our skin-deep judgments,
but when we pay attention to that flicker of thought
that flashes across our consciousness
when we see someone
who embodies difference from ourselves,
who speaks of strange thoughts,
who lives in unusual ways,
then we know that we judge others…quickly.
For the sake of decorum and decency,
if not for the cause of truth and honesty,
we censor ourselves on most occasions,
and do not bring to voice
those flashes of instant judgment.
So it’s easy enough for us to get inside the heads
of the people in today’s Gospel from Luke
who lived in that region
between Samaria and Galilee.
Like in any borderland, any country on the crossroads,
the people living there were a mixed multitude,
claiming a variety of ethnicities,
practicing various faiths,
and living in diverse ways.
And on the outside of that rich ferment of cultures
lived the lepers,
discarded and disregarded by all,
whether Jew or Samaritan.
But then Jesus, in his travels, came near to a village.
We can imagine the buzz that preceded him.
He was the one who rebuked a fever (Luke 4:39, NRSV),
exorcised demons from the possessed (Luke 4:41, NRSV),
cured a leper of his disease (Luke 5:13, NRSV),
raised a widow’s son from death (Luke 7:15, NRSV),
healed a boy with epilepsy (Luke 9:42, NRSV),
and made well a crippled woman (Luke 13:13, NRSV).
The rumors and the stories and the wonderment
passed like a wildfire through dry grass,
as only word-of-mouth can
when it gets started in a small town.
So, before he even crossed the border to enter the village,
ten lepers, banished beyond the edge of town,
called out to him from a distance,
“Jesus, Master, have mercy on us!” (Luke 17:13, NRSV)
He looked at them; he saw them from a distance.
Their disease and disfigurement were obvious.
And strangely to us, perhaps,
he did not go to them,
he didn’t lay his hands on them,
he didn’t tell them to go and bathe in special water,
or make mud with dust and spit
and wipe it on their sores.
He said only one thing:
“Go and show yourselves to the priests.” (Luke 17:14, NRSV)
Why? Why did he tell them to do that?
As a faithful Jew, Jesus knew the Law of God.
And in Leviticus, the great Holiness Code
describes how people with skin diseases
must show themselves to the priests.
And the details of the Law outline
the procedures for inspecting the lesions,
for watching and waiting for sores to get better or worse,
and the ways to decide whether someone was clean or not.
That was the Law Jesus followed.
He sent the ten to the priests
for them to determine whether the lepers were clean or not.
In obedience to Jesus,
the ten went on their way to the priests;
they were made clean.
That is how grace can work in human life—
freely, at the command of the Lord,
even at a distance, poured out on all who need it,
showered upon people on the margins.
What is the response to grace?
For the ten, the first response was out of their hands.
They did nothing to be made clean,
to be healed of their leprosy.
Jesus healed them as a gift.
But of the ten, one responded differently to that gift of grace.
He “…turned back,
praising God with a loud voice.
He prostrated himself as Jesus’ feet and thanked him.” (Luke 17:15–16, NRSV)
Maybe the nine had feelings of gratitude
for the miracle of healing Jesus had worked in them.
Maybe, but their gratitude was only skin-deep.
For this one, gratitude ran much deeper,
going all the way to his heart, his spirit.
The passage says he praised God.
The Greek has him “doxologizing God.”
And the man also thanked Jesus.
In the Greek he “eucharistized Jesus.”
Those words of worship don’t show up by accident.
It’s clear that Jesus’ gift of grace
lead this marginalized man,
the one judged unclean by his community,
to throw himself on his face before his Savior
and to worship him as God.
And the kicker?
He was the one Samaritan among the ten.
That meant he was despised and distrusted
by the people of Israel, God’s people.
The Law said he unclean because of his leprosy.
But worse than that, he ultimately was uncleanable,
not because he had leprosy
but because of who he was,
because of his identity.
He could be cured of his disease,
his healing verified by the priests,
but he could not be rid of his own self,
his Samaritanness, his otherness,
and still be the man he was.
And in the face of that fact,
Jesus said to him,
“Get up and go on your way;
your faith has made you well.” (Luke 17:19, NRSV)
And there the Greek word for “well” also means “saved.”
And then the questions come, to you and to me.
Am I one among the nine?
Do I take Jesus’ words of grace for granted, or at least too lightly?
Yes, I do.
Do I follow his instructions, like the ten,
and discover he has made me clean,
but then continue on my way?
Yes, much of the time.
When do I not see that he has had mercy upon me,
speaking a word of grace
that makes me clean and whole?
Most of the time, regrettably.
And so let’s go back to the beginning.
We see Jesus come down the road toward us.
He approaches our small group.
He is here in our midst, in the flesh.
We cry out to him from a distance,
“Jesus, Master, have mercy on us.” (Luke 17:13, NRSV)
And he speaks to us.
By this water and Word our Father adopts you.
Your sins are forgiven.
Listen; this is the Word of God.
Take and eat; this is my body.
Drink this, for it is my blood.
Go and witness to me, for I am with you.
And this time, as we pray for his grace,
may it be said of you and me,
“When they saw that they had been made whole,
they turned back from the way they had gone,
singing doxologies to God with loud voices.
They bowed down at the feet of their Lord
and made their sacrifices of thanksgiving.”
And our Lord Jesus Christ said,
“Your faith has made you well and saved you.” Amen.