Trinity 14 – 2024 Bulletin↓ Our Savior Lutheran Church, Grants Pass, OR
↓ Faith Lutheran Church, Medford OR
Luke 17:11-19
FAITH & THANKS TO THE LORD
“UNCLEAN! UNCLEAN!” On His way to Jerusalem, where Jesus was going to die and rise for the life of the world, He was met by ten lepers. Leprosy was more than a medical condition, it was a social disease. It turned you into an outcast. It isolated you from your family and friends. You were forbidden to enter the temple courtyard, so you were cut off from worship. When you passed someone on the road, you had to cover your mouth and yell out, “Unclean! Unclean!” and keep as far away from people as possible. People would avoid all contact with you. They’d hide their children from you. The only community you had was your fellow lepers.
KYRIE ELEISON Ten lepers stood at a distance calling out to Jesus. They didn’t cry out “Unclean, unclean” as they were supposed to, but they called out, “Jesus, Master, have mercy on us.” They sought mercy. Likely healing. They’d likely heard about Jesus and His power to heal. They hoped and prayed He would do the same for them. They believed this much, that Jesus had the power to heal them of their leprosy and return them to their community.
[NO TOUCHING] The miracle is unusual. Usually, Jesus would reach out and touch the person, even if they were unclean. He touches the unclean, and they become clean. But this time, Jesus doesn’t even close the gap let alone cross the street. He just shouts back across the road, “Go and show yourselves to the priests.” The priests were like the health inspectors [like our COVID inspectors] who would verify that they were clean and could return to their homes and community. There would be a sacrifice of thanksgiving and a ritual of purification. And then, [if they passed the test] they could return home again.
ON THE WAY… Luke doesn’t tell us how this miracle happened. It appears that as they walked on the road to go to the priests, they began to notice that their skin was cleansed and their leprosy was disappearing. You can only imagine their faces as they looked at each other in amazement. They were probably absolutely giddy with joy, dancing and high-fiving each other over their good fortune and how lucky they were to have bumped into Jesus that day on the road between Samaria and Galilee. You know what it’s like when you get well after being sick
for a long time, or the diagnosis you feared turns out to be nothing. It’s like rising from the dead, like being born again.
1 OUT OF 10 One of them stopped and turned around. Instead of going on with the others, he went back down the road to where Jesus was. This time, he didn’t stand at a distance but came right up to Jesus and fell on his face at Jesus’ feet and gave thanks. He WORSHIPPED. And at this point, we learn that he was a Samaritan. Not only had he been a leper, he was one of those Samaritans. A double loser in the eyes of any respectable Israelite. Only this outsider to Israel, this foreigner, re/turned to give thanks to Jesus for the healing he had received. Ten out of ten lepers were cleansed. Only one out of ten “makes the Jesus Connection” and returns to worship and give thanks.
[1/10] FAITH TO SAVE And it’s to this one that Jesus says, “Rise, and go your way, your faith has made you well.” The Samaritan [formerly leper] knew Whom to trust, not only with his diseases but also ultimately with his death. You might say that ten out of ten had faith to be healed, but only one out of ten had faith that saved. And he knew at Whose feet that salvation rested. Faith makes the Jesus connection. Your faith has saved you; your Jesus has saved you.
DEATH-MARCH Lots of people are healed every day, some/many in recent years days of the Corona Virus. Some through the intervention of modern medicine, some by their own immune systems, a few spontaneously or miraculously. Regardless of how that healing comes, it all comes from Jesus, The Source of every healing. Physical healing is not an end in itself. If you stop and think about it, health is a rather dynamic condition that generally skids downhill the older one gets. And while diet and exercise may maintain and even temporarily improve one’s health, we are born stamped with an expiration date. That is the wages of sin [which is death], the condition we inherit from Adam as children of him.
S-IN/FECTS US ALL Sin is a leprosy of the soul. It isolates us, renders us unclean before God, its symptoms spread throughout our humanity. Everything we do and touch and say and even think is tainted with sin. It’s like a vast corruption of our software that has also infected our firmware and hardware. Body and soul are infected by the virus of sin and we can’t cure
ourselves. If not for the mercy of God in Jesus, we would be left in isolation, separated from God and isolated from each other.
OUR UNCLEAN-NESS [But] Jesus became sin for us. He took on our disease, our unclean-ness. He is the Lamb Who takes away the sin of the world. He is the atoning Sacrifice, not only for our sin, but for the whole sin of the whole world. All ten lepers are cleansed. There is not a leper in that bunch that wasn’t cleansed, if [9 out of 10] even the unbelief, or at least the lack of gratitude on the part of nine of ten – still, it did not negate their healing. Jesus didn’t send back their leprosy. They went on their way, thanks to Jesus … even without thanks to Jesus.
TRUSTED W/ HIS LIFE In Adam all die, in Christ all are made alive. In Adam humanity fell into sin and death, in Christ humanity is brought into forgiveness and life. As far as Adam’s sin goes, so far and further, do the perfect life, the death, and the Resurrection of Jesus go. One leper returns. He repents. He turns on his way to fall down at the feet of Jesus and worship. He happens to be a Samaritan, but [maybe] that’s largely irrelevant. The last will be first. He is not only healed, he is saved. The other nine trusted Jesus for their healing, at least insofar as He was capable of healing. This man trusted Jesus with his life.
BAPTISM CLEANSES US What Jesus did for that leper, He does for us. Like Naaman the Syrian general who was cleansed from his leprosy by the word of the prophet and the water of the Jordan, we have been cleansed of the leprosy of our sin by the Word and the water of Baptism. And like that Samaritan, we return to give thanks. We come back to the feet of Jesus to render our thanks and praise to Him Who called us out of darkness into His marvelous light. And while we aren’t yet “symptom free,” the cure has been applied. You have been joined to the death and life of Jesus. Baptism now saves you, not as a washing of dirt from the body, but as a cleansing of sin from body and soul.
FINAL TOTAL HEALING The healing comes finally to us in the Resurrection of our bodies on the Last Day. Then the cleansing will be complete, the leprosy of sin will be a thing of the past. Then Jesus will say to us what He said to that Samaritan on the road that day. “Rise and go your way; your faith has saved you.” Your Jesus has saved you. And even now Baptism now saves you. IJ’N, Amen