Grace and peace to you from God our Father and our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ. Amen
The text for this meditation is written in the 17th Chapter of the Gospel according to St Luke: Verses 11 – 19:
Now on his way to Jerusalem, Jesus travelled along the border between Samaria and Galilee. 12 As he was going into a village, ten men who had leprosy met him. They stood at a distance 13 and called out in a loud voice, "Jesus, Master, have pity on us!" 14 When he saw them, he said, "Go, show yourselves to the priests." And as they went, they were cleansed. 15 One of them, when he saw he was healed, came back, praising God in a loud voice. 16 He threw himself at Jesus’ feet and thanked him—and he was a Samaritan. 17 Jesus asked, "Were not all ten cleansed? Where are the other nine? 18 Was no one found to return and give praise to God except this foreigner?" 19 Then he said to him, "Rise and go; your faith has made you well."
This is a familiar story. Jesus rids ten men of their leprosy. Leprosy was a very deadly disease. Those who had it were basically exiled to live outside of the population centres and considered to be already dead. Leprosy was, to those people in a time of the medicinal ‘dark ages’ always fatal. The diagnosis was a death sentence.
It is a fairly common outcome, when a study is done on this Biblical passage, that the general consensus is on how ten lepers were rid of their leprosy, while only one of them comes back to thank Jesus. This usually results in parallel being drawn between us and the nine lepers, with the premise being that we are often not so thankful for God’s love and grace, when we should be. Whilst we can find no fault with the premise that we are often lacking in our thanks and praise to our Triune God; it seems that there is more to this biblical passage than the obvious conclusion.
In Luke 17: 17 Jesus asked the question “Were not ten cleansed?” The original Greek word for ‘cleansed’ is actually "katharizo", which is where we get the English word "Catheter". You know what a catheter does, don’t you? It removes things from the body; When we go through a "catharsis", it is getting rid of the bad, or to be more precise the body is being ‘purged’ of impurities. That’s what Jesus did for the Lepers. There was a "catharsis" or purging of the disease from the lepers, and they no longer had leprosy. We could also say they were cured of their leprosy.
Another word that is important to note appears in verse 15, "One of them, when he saw he was healed...". I think there is an intentional distinction made between ridding the lepers of their disease and claiming that they were healed. The Greek word translated here as "healing" (iaomai) means: Quote: “healing, particularly as supernatural and bringing attention to the Lord Himself as the Great Physician”. Unquote
This ‘healing’ revelation experienced by the Samaritan was that not only was he free of disease, but also implies of him being at peace with himself and his God. This points to the very heart of this text, something important. It is possible to be cured (rid of the disease) without being healed. Ten lepers were cured. Only one was healed. The healed leper was the one who came to give thanks to God, because he had come to a point of recognising the true value of the miracle.
The third word in this story relating to what happens to the lepers is found at the very end, verse 19 “Then he said to him, "Rise and go; your faith has made you well." That’s the NIV. Literally, the word is "saved". One translation says, "your faith has saved you." Another says, "your faith has made you whole." This puts the purpose of Jesus’ miracles into perspective. Was the leper glad to be cured? Yes. But what happened to him went far beyond cure. It went to being healed, being made whole, being saved. Miracles were certainly God’s way of doing good. But they had a far grander purpose. That’s why the Bible actually calls them miraculous signs, which mean that they point to something greater. In this case, they are pointing to Christ and His work, that Jesus is the long-promised Messiah Who has come from God to bear the world’s sin on the cross of crucifixion and take take the full punishment for them in our stead.
The bottom line to this is, being "saved" or being "whole" or being "healed" is not the same as being cured. Being cured is to be rid of a disease. Being made whole or healed, yes, being saved, involved more than just curing the body of an ailment. It means that a person is trusting confidently in God’s care, and that can happen regardless the person’s health. That’s what the preaching and teaching of God’s Word in truth and purity is all about. Avid prayer and biblical teaching so often does not provide a cure for a person’s diseases. Quite often this generates disappointment and anger with God. Take heart!! God saving Word accepted in the faith of its’ purity and truth, truly heals; It makes us aware of the whole nature of our being in unity with our Triune God. Creator, Redeemer and Sanctifier, it gives us a peace that is beyond all human understanding, regardless of our circumstances, and reassurance that we will dwell with Him beyond the bonds of this earth into eternity.
In the light of Jesus’ message to us in this text, we can understand that there are a lot of people who walk away from medical treatment cured but they are not whole. Conversely, there are a lot of people undergoing medical treatment who are healed or whole, who still have terrible diseases that will never be cured.
Often, I run into people who can talk about their situation as being "bad". These are people with cancer or a loved one with cancer. These are people who have all kinds of health problems. They are people who have family troubles. They are people who have lost their jobs. They are people who have any number of reasons to be disappointed in life. I will meet with them and we will talk some about their situation and then they will say, "But I am very thankful." Now, how could that be? How could someone with terminal cancer be thankful?
How could Pastor Martin Rinckert in Germany write the Thanksgiving hymn, "Now Thank We All Our God"? Between the Thirty-Years War and the Black Death in the 1600's, he was conducting over 30 funerals a day. The story goes that he wrote the hymn in 1636 about being thankful after he buried his own wife one day as one of the Thirty funerals.
The most complete answer that I can supply to that question is written by St. Paul who tells us (Romans 8: 28 -39)“And we know that in all things God works for the good of those who love him, who have been called according to his purpose. 29 For those God foreknew he also predestined to be conformed to the image of his Son, that he might be the firstborn among many brothers and sisters. 30 And those he predestined, he also called; those he called, he also justified; those he justified, he also glorified.
31 What, then, shall we say in response to these things? If God is for us, who can be against us? 32 He who did not spare his own Son, but gave him up for us all—how will he not also, along with him, graciously give us all things? 33 Who will bring any charge against those whom God has chosen? It is God who justifies. 34 Who then is the one who condemns? No one. Christ Jesus who died—more than that, who was raised to life—is at the right hand of God and is also interceding for us.35 Who shall separate us from the love of Christ? Shall trouble or hardship or persecution or famine or nakedness or danger or sword? 36 As it is written:
“For your sake we face death all day long;
we are considered as sheep to be slaughtered.”
we are considered as sheep to be slaughtered.”
37 No, in all these things we are more than conquerors through him who loved us.38 For I am convinced that neither death nor life, neither angels nor demons, neither the present nor the future, nor any powers, 39 neither height nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God that is in Christ Jesus our Lord.”
The returning Leper gave thanks because he had faith. We can conquer all things because of the One Who came to conquer sin for us. We can defeat all things because of the One Who defeated sin for us. Jesus has won the victory. That victory is ours as we trust in Him. We can be thankful no matter what we experience in this life because of the wonderful love that is a free gift from Jesus Christ. No matter what sorts of diseases come; no matter what sort of bad things happen to us, God is with us! God lives in us; He will take care of us. We are His people. Amen.
The love and peace of our Great triune God that is beyond all human understanding, keep your hearts and minds in Christ Jesus. Amen
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