“WHERE ARE THE NINE?”

Not only was Jesus a great storyteller but a story maker as well, providing his envoys with rich resources to draw upon for the stories they old. In writing to a nobleman named Theophilus, Luke the physician, “after carefully going over the whole story from the beginning,” told the Story by recounting numerous stories about Jesus, as well as stories Jesus himself told. And it was Luke more than any other gospel writer who realized the power of storytelling. Only he passes along to us the stories of the prodigal son and he good Samaritan, and it is only in Luke that we learn about Zacchaeus, he judge and the widow, the crafty steward, and the publican and the pharisee who went to the temple to pray.

And only Luke tells us that pregnant little story of Jesus healing ten lepers, a story too important for us to have missed. The Lord was on his way to Jerusalem to die, which he realized, even if his disciples did not. While passing through Samaria and Galilee he entered an unnamed village. It was here that he met ten lepers, all men, who stood at a distance and cried out, Jesus, Master, have mercy on us!”

The leper was a pitiful creature, not only because of his most dreadful disease, but also because he was an outcast from society. The law required lat he be kept apart and that he keep his mouth covered. He was to keep is hair disorderly and his clothes torn so as to be easily spotted. In the event a healthy person inadvertently wandered his way, the leper was to cry out, unclean, unclean!, as Lev. 13:45 stipulated. They usually moved about in small groups, helping each other the best they could. When Moses’ own sister Miriam became a leper, at the judgment of God, she too was separated from the others. Aaron begged that she might be healed, for she looked like a monster coming from its mother’s womb with flesh half corrupted (Num. 12:11).

It was pitiful souls like Miriam who stood at a distance in a dusty village and pled with the Christ for mercy. While they had enough faith to cry out for pity, Jesus, as he nearly always did, gave them something to do that would demonstrate their faith. He instructed them to present themselves to the priests, a necessary step for their rehabilitation, for only the priests could certify their fitness to join society. It must have blown the minds of those priests when ten well-known lepers showed up clean. It may help to explain why Luke later reported that “a large group of priests made their submission to the faith” (Acts 6:7).

The record reveals that one of the lepers, seeing that he was healed, turned back, apparently before reaching the priests. He returned to Jesus to express his gratitude, and he praised God (the Greek word shows it was in a loud voice) every step of the way. It is this urgent, spontaneous, joyous response that is at the heart of real faith. Those who are inclined to take God for granted have something important to learn from the grateful leper. His heart was so full of praise and thanksgiving that he fell down on his face in the presence of Jesus.

It is at this point that Jesus asked the question that deserves a place in history. Where are the nine? Only one of the ten returned to thank God and he was a despised Samaritan. The overall Story that Luke is telling, the gospel story, continually assaults Jewish self-righteousness. They were certain that the Samaritans were especially wicked while they were especially good. It is no accident, therefore that the hero of this story as well as that of the good Samaritan are designed to show the Jews that there is a big difference between being righteous and being self-righteous. The nine, probably all Jews, were literally obeying Jesus, and were even with the priests getting their certification as clean citizens. But Jesus finds their faith lacking, despite their literal obedience. What he wanted to see in all ten of them was what he saw in the heart of the lowly Samaritan. They were obedient, technically, but not really committed. What kind of faith is it that expresses no gratitude?

The lowly Samaritan leper was certainly a poor man, which brings to mind the words of Alexander Pope: “When I find a great deal of gratitude in a poor man, I take it for granted there would be as much generosity if he were rich.” It figures, doesn’t it? A grateful heart will be a generous heart. And it works the other way. If generosity is in short supply in our modern world, it is because of a lack of gratitude. The generous mind is always grateful. It realizes that it has a debt it cannot pay.

It is a worthy exercise in self-examination to ask ourselves if we are more like the thankful Samaritan or the unthankful nine. Had I been among the cleansed lepers, would I have turned back to thank God, or would I have hastened on into the busy world taking my blessing for granted? It is a sobering question. Perhaps many of us are like Simon the Pharisee, whom Luke also tells us about in chap. 7, who loved little because he had been forgiven little (as he saw it). If we are not really aware of the grossness of our sins, we have no way of being grateful for what God has done for us through Christ. The despised leper cried for mercy because he was well aware of his miserable condition. He saw in Jesus the wellspring of mercy. He did not ask for justice. In the presence of God who sues for justice? Have mercy on us! This must become the cry of our untoward generation and of our uncommitted modern church.

Wretched as it is, leprosy is a fitting symbol of sin. As leprosy corrupts the flesh sin corrupts the soul, and as leprosy drives one from family and society into utter abandonment, sin separates one from God and all that is pure and noble. As leprosy led to physical death sin leads to spiritual death. If we could see the leper-like qualities in our lives like Aaron saw his diseased sister, we too would be more inclined to cry out for mercy. Satan has deceived us into supposing that sin is not all that bad, after all. We are not likely to have hearts filled with praise, prayer, and thanksgiving until we have minds that realize the monster-like effects of sin.

The renewal of the church in our day calls for grateful hearts, a lesson we can learn from Israel’s great poet, in whose psalms every furrow is sown with seeds of thanksgiving. “I know my transgressions, and my sin is ever before me,” David could say, and so he could pray, “O Lord, open thou my lips, and my mouth shall show forth thy praise.” He came to see what God really wants: “The sacrifice acceptable to God is a broken spirit; a broken and contrite heart, O God, thou wilt not despise” (Psa. 51). David would have no problem in understanding the point Luke wanted Theophilus to see in the story of the ten lepers. David finally learned that it was not technical obedience that God wants, such as sacrifices, but a broken heart. In the same psalm the poet concludes that God will accept the burnt offerings, once he has the heart.

Jesus thought it proper for the cleansed leper to praise God and return to express his gratitude in humble prostration, even when he was not doing precisely what he had already told him to do. Indeed, he bestowed upon him something more. “Your faith has made you whole” was more than a diseased-free body. Yet he was still told to Go, and we can believe he went to the priests as Jesus had directed.

He may not have lined things up precisely right, but Jesus liked it! --- the Editor
 

GRATITUDE
 

If gratitude is due from children to their earthly parent, how much more is the gratitude of the great family of men due to our father in heaven. --- Hosea Ballou

He that urges gratitude pleads the cause both of God and men, for without it we can neither be sociable nor religious. --- Seneca

Let never day nor night unhallow’d pass,

But still remember what the Lord hath done. ---- Shakespeare