Were There Not Ten Cleansed?

As we get started this morning, I want to ask if you, I want you to think in your own minds about a time where you received a gift. And I don't mean a birthday gift or a Christmas gift or an anniversary gift. I don't mean any of the normal gifts. I mean something you just didn't expect at all because you didn't deserve it, because you didn't think it was possible, that kind of gift. As you think about that sort of gift, it's the kind of gift that ought to bring you to tears. And it'll be a different gift for each one of us, maybe more than one, hopefully more than one. But the kind of gift I'm talking about is the one that you just, you don't know what to do with it. You're so floored by the fact that it would be given to you. And once you've got that in your mind, I want you to think about what that gift causes in you.

toward the giver. When I think in my life of this sort of thing, when I've received these kinds of gifts, and the one I'm thinking of is very, very simple. What it did was it secured in my mind a love and a gratitude for that man that nothing can take away. It's like a permanent, if that gift... If my sentiment toward him was a concrete floor, it's a sealer on that floor that nothing can penetrate. Nothing can get through. It can get dirty. It can get stuff piled up on top of it. It can lose its shine. But when the floor is cleaned, it's there just as it always was. There's a certain gratitude and a certain affection that receiving good gifts ought to instill in us.

And no matter what happens later on after you've received that gift in your life, that gratitude, that foundation of thankfulness remains. That's what we're going to be looking at and studying this morning is what gratitude is. What does it look like? How ought we demonstrate it? We're going to be reading and studying Luke chapter 17, verses 11 through 9. Would you please stand now for the reading of God's word? This is the word of the Lord, and it is eternally true. While he was on his way to Jerusalem, he was passing between Samaria and Galilee. As he entered a village, ten leprous men who stood at a distance met him, and they raised their voices, saying, Jesus, Master, have mercy on us. When he saw them, he said to them, Go and show yourselves to the priests. And as they were going, they were cleansed.

And he was a Samaritan. And he said to him, Stand up and go. Your faith has made you well. This is the word of the Lord. You may be seated. Now, it's a pretty straightforward text, right? Jesus enters a city. There's a group of men who are leprous, standing off at a distance, and they cry out to him for mercy, and Jesus heals them. One of them comes back and thanks him. I want us to go through this text, and I want us to see more of what's going on, and I want us to start with... the lepers cry, Jesus, master, have mercy on us. One of the things that we can see is that all of these men, when they had a need, they cried out for mercy. And this is common among all men, whether they're Christian or not, young or old, it doesn't matter. When we have a need, something's going on in our life, to cry out to the Lord is a common thing. When there's something that we want, that's the normal thing for people to do.

I remember before I was a Christian doing this very thing. Something I was scared about or something that I wanted. I remember specifically praying, not about mercy, but about a state track meet. At my senior year of high school, I wanted to go to the state track meet, and I was at sectionals. And I remember praying, I know I don't deserve it, but I'd really like to go to state. Would you help me? And it was just something simple like that. And at that time, I couldn't have. I didn't know the difference between the Old and New Testaments. I knew nothing. But I was compelled, because I had a want or a need, a desire, to pray and to ask for something. And this is a reality that's true for all of us, for all mankind. And so all of these leprous men cried out together, Jesus, Master, have mercy on us. And it's interesting that they called Jesus their master.

Because master carries with it, it's a title, it carries with it a job description or an expectation. And we all understand what a master is. It means that they have the power to command, to dictate, they're to be obeyed. And so when they cry out to Jesus, Jesus, master, have mercy on us, what they're saying is tell us what to do. We have a need, tell us what we need to do. And these men who've called out, it was a mixed group. We know later in the text from the one man who comes back that there was one Samaritan. And that given where Jesus was at on his way to Jerusalem between Samaria and Galilee, we can reasonably understand that the rest of these men were Jews. And so this mixed group of Jews and one Samaritan acknowledge who Jesus is, their master, and they plead for his mercy. Now, if you had leprosy, What would you ask for? What would you ask Jesus for? Healing, most likely, right? I have this ailment. Please fix this ailment. Now, you notice that's not what they prayed for, what they asked for. They didn't ask for healing. They asked for mercy. Now, why is that? That's a strange thing. Well, at that time in history, when someone got leprosy, which there's all kinds of different leprosies.

If you read in the Old Testament about it, the boils have hairs growing out of them and what color the hair is indicates all kinds of stuff. It's kind of gross and kind of interesting. But what you need to know about leprosy are a couple of things. One, it was contagious. And so what happened with people who were leprous, after the priests examined them, they would be sent away from the rest of the population. They would be quarantined so that it would not spread. The other thing that's interesting about their understanding of leprosy was that leprosy was a consequence or a punishment for some sin you had committed. And so when they cry out for mercy, they're crying out for more than simple healing. They believe that their situation was worse than simply having leprosy, and so they ask for mercy for whatever offense it is that they have committed. And so Jesus, hearing their cry, he heals them.

Now, he doesn't heal them immediately, right? You would expect that if you asked Jesus, if you could see him face to face, and you've seen people touch him, you've seen people brought in on beds, got up, walked out, carried their own beds away, you would expect that if you asked for mercy, healing, that it's within his power and his ability to do it right then, but that's not what Jesus does. What he says is, go and show yourself to the priests. And as I said, the priests were the ones who examined the leprous. And they were the ones that you had to go back and see before you could go back to your normal life. And so when Jesus sends them to the priests, he's saying, go and check in and have them judge whether you're clean. Now, you should think of a hospital for a second and having a ward of the hospital under quarantine. All the people are contagious. They're all locked up together, put away from the rest of the people.

What would it be like if everyone in that ward all at once was healed? It would catch your attention, would it not? What's that, John? It's a miracle. Yeah, the priests would go, what just happened? Yeah, unlock the doors, let them out. It would build some interest. What happened in there? And so you have to see in Jesus sending all of these people, these men to the priests, he's actually... cultivating interest in what he's doing. Because it wouldn't go unnoticed. All of these people's families, all of their friends, all of the communities that they come from would go, what just happened? How did they all get better? If you read in the law, there's a certain amount of time, depending on the type of leprosy you have, that you have to stay away. And then you can come and you can check in, and if not, you have to go away for another set period of time. And all of a sudden, all these men, all at once, are all healed. This is a miracle.

That's how it would have affected the priests. Now, consider for a minute the men who were sent. They're leprous. They can look at their skin and they can see, I'm not well. And Jesus' answer is, go present yourself to the priests. Now, if you were in that position, how would you respond to that? Yeah, why? Why should I go? I'm sick. And so if you were going to go, what would it require? Well, what it would require is some measure of faith that by the time you got there, you would be healed. Or else, why would you go? And so Jesus' command to these lepers is a test to them. You call me master. You believe that I have the ability to extend you mercy, to heal you. Will you do what I say? And they do. All of them go. Now, this is very similar.

to the account of Naaman back in 2 Kings 5. I want to read to you the account of Naaman. It says, Now Naaman, captain of the army of the king of Aram, was a great man. And you have to know that Naaman's not a Jew, and so the laws regarding leprosy that applied to the Israelites didn't apply to him, so he wasn't in quarantine. Naaman was a great man with his master and highly respected. Because of him, the Lord had given victory to Aram. The man was also a valiant warrior, but he was a leper. Now the Arameans had gone out in bands and had taken captive a little girl from the land of Israel, and she waited on Naaman's wife, so a little slave girl. And it's interesting that it says that he was highly respected because the Lord had given victory to Aram through him. And one of the things that the fruits or the spoils of his victory was this little slave girl being taken away from her family. Okay, so this is already not the kind of guy you're going, yeah, I want to be like Naaman.

He's a leper. He's stealing people's children. But because he's a leper, this little girl says to her mistress, I wish that my master, speaking of Naaman, were with the prophet who is in Samaria. Then he would cure him of his leprosy. Naaman went in and told his master, saying, thus and thus spoke the girl who is from the land of Israel. And so you understand from this that Naaman wants to be healed of his leprosy. As soon as some little slave girl says, I know how you can get better. He goes into the king and says, hey, you believe what this girl says? The king of Aram said, go now and I will send a letter to the king of Israel. He departed and took with him 10 talents of silver and 6,000 shekels of gold and 10 changes of clothes. He brought the letter to the king of Israel saying, and now as this letter comes to you, behold, I have sent Naaman my servant to you that you may cure him of his leprosy. When the king of Israel read the letter, he tore his clothes and said, am I God?

To kill and to make alive that this man is sending word to me to cure a man of his leprosy. Now, interestingly, who has faith so far in this story? Yes. Who really has faith so far in this story? The little girl. The little girl does. The Aramean king wants his commander healed. Naaman has some measure of faith to go. I mean, when you're suffering, why not try it, you know? But not the king of Israel. He's scared stiff. He thinks this is a ploy. He's coming here and expecting me to do what only God can do, and they're going to come and destroy us. He goes on, but consider now and see how he is seeking, the king of Aram, see how he is seeking to quarrel against me. It happened when Elisha, the man of God, this is the prophet that the little girl talked about, heard that the king of Israel had torn his clothes, that he sent word to the king saying, why have you torn your clothes?

Now let him, Naaman, come to me and he shall know that there is a prophet in Israel. So Naaman came with his horses and his chariots and stood at the doorway of the house of Elisha. Elisha sent a messenger to him saying, go and wash in the Jordan seven times and your flesh will be restored to you and you will be clean. Very simple thing, right? Now he's traveled. You realize he said he took 10 changes of clothes. He's traveled a long way. He's come with all his raiment, his soldiers and his chariots and all this stuff. And he's expecting something miraculous to be healed. And Elisha doesn't even come out to see him. He just sends a messenger to him and says, go wash in the Jordan and you'll get better. Go present yourselves to the priest. How did Naaman respond? But Naaman was furious and went away and said, behold, I thought.

He will surely come out to me and stand and call on the name of his God and wave his hand over the place and cure the leper. Are not Abna and Farpar, the rivers of Damascus, these are in his homeland, better than all the waters of Israel? Could I not wash in them and be clean? So he turned and went away in a rage. Then his servants came near and spoke to him and said, my father, had the prophet told you to do some great thing? would you not have done it? How much more than when he says to you, wash and be clean? So he went down and dipped himself seven times in the Jordan according to the word of the man of God, and his flesh was restored like the flesh of a little child, and he was clean. And so up to this point, Naaman fits right in with the lepers of Israel, right? He cries, he asks for help of the Lord. He's told to do something that seems to be unhelpful.

unnecessary. He took counsel with his servants and they say, if he told you to go get 200 foreskins of the Philistines, wouldn't you have done it? You know, some great thing. All he said was go jump in the river a couple of times. If you do such a great thing, why not do such a simple thing? So Naaman's compelled by this argument. What can it hurt? And he goes by faith and he's healed. These 10 lepers that Jesus sends away, go by faith, and they're healed. Every one of them was healed. But how does Naaman respond after he's healed? It says, when he returned to the man of God with all his company, the man of God being Elisha, and he came and stood before him, he said, behold now, I know that there is no God in all the earth but in Israel. So please take a present from your servant now. But he said, Elisha, As the Lord lives before whom I stand, I will take nothing. And he urged him to take it, but he refused. Naaman said, If not, please let your servant at least be given two mules load of earth, for your servant will no longer offer burnt offerings, nor will he sacrifice to other gods but to the Lord. So how did Naaman end up? Well, he did exactly what the Samaritan did. He came back to the one who healed him, and he thanked him.

And it's reasonable to say that Naaman came to faith through this process. So why did Naaman go wash in the river? Well, because he had some measure of faith at that point. Why not? Does it seem strange to you to call the rationale, well, why not, faith? Now, note, I'm not saying that's saving faith, but it is described here as faith. Why else would you go do it? And this is the case with the lepers. They had some measure of faith to go and to be presented to the priests, which would be a crazy thing to go and do. If you were sick and what you were to do was go back to the doctor and get a second opinion, and you had confidence that when you went back to get a second opinion, it was going to come back, what tumor? It takes some measure of faith even to do that, to go get a second opinion, to present yourself.

And so how can we understand these lepers' faith, the nine who didn't return? It was motivated by necessity, and it faded away once they were healed. People are often inclined to draw near to God in times of adversity. And that's true of us. That's true of you, and it's true of me. When things are difficult, in the moment, we're much more inclined to draw near to God and to ask for help. The danger that comes along with it is that when God is merciful, as he was to all of these lepers, that we would not respond to his mercy with any gratitude, but that we would take it for granted, that it would go away, it would fade away over time. Faith is not the sort of thing, saving faith, that lays dormant until it's necessary. Faith is something that's active. It's something that's growing, that's vital.

It's moving around. It motivates us always, not just in times of trial. So you have to wonder why Jesus healed these other men. Why did he heal the nine when he knew full well, being God, being omnipotent, he knew that they weren't going to come back and say, thank you. Why did he heal them? What I want us to see in this picture, an answer to this question is the extent of God's mercy and his love and his kindness to all of creation. He causes the rain to fall on the just and the unjust for a time. And he knew full well that these men were not going to come back and worship him and follow him and praise him. They were just going to go back to their normal life once their leprosy was healed. And yet he was still merciful to them. So are we that way with people? Not as we ought to be. Maybe a little bit, maybe sometimes, but not like we should be.

If we knew that our time and our resource and our energy and our love were going to go unnoticed, not paid back, how inclined would we be to do it? And I'm convinced that the answer is not very. And I want us to see that as a failure in us. And I want us to repent of it because it's not as it should be. So while the 10 of them are on their way, The one of them looks down and realizes, I'm better. It worked. And he turns around and he comes back to Jesus. And he falls down on his face. He prostrates himself and he praises God and he thanks him. And Luke puts in this interesting little thing at the end of verse 16. He says, and he was a Samaritan. Now, if all scripture is inspired by God and profitable for training, for reproof, for exhortation, so the man of God will be equipped, and every good thing. Why did Luke put that in there? Just this little, and he was a Samaritan. Well, consider for a minute. Nine Jews, one Samaritan. If you had to pick who was going to come back and praise God, who would you pick? You'd pick one of God's people. That's who the Jews were. The Jews hated the Samaritans because the Samaritans were half-breeds. They were only part Jewish, and they didn't maintain the pure religion. And the Jews...

They would go around Samaria instead of going through Samaria. They just hated them. Here you've got nine Jews and you've got one Samaritan, and the Samaritan is the one who comes back and praises God. So why is that in there? Why has Luke put it in there? Well, he puts it in there for us to realize you really don't know where the praise and worship of God is going to come from. You can't put your finger on it. And so you ought not to be so scrupulous. and who you give your love to. Because you can't put your finger on it. Man looks on the outward appearance, but God looks on the heart. And so if any one of us were going to look at this group of men and pick one of them out, well, not the Samaritan. I mean, they're not. And yet God has chosen the weak and foolish things of this world to despise the strong and the wise. You remember when Jesus was coming in to Jerusalem during the triumphal entry? And all of the people are...

whooping it up and having a great time, laying down palm fronds and calling out Hosanna in the highest. What did the Pharisees say to him? You tell those people to shut up. And what did Jesus respond to him? If these people are quiet, the rocks will cry out. The Lord will have his praise. He will have his glory. He will produce it. from wherever it is that he wants to produce it. And we ought not to stand in judgment. We ought to guard against it, standing in judgment of where and how Jesus Christ will be glorified. The other reason that the Samaritan is mentioned is that he's there to put shame on the Jews. You never would have expected praise to come out of a Samaritan. And that's surprising.

But when you contrast it with the others who were with him, they're put to shame by it because that should have been them, and it wasn't. So Jesus asks the question, were there not ten? Where are the nine? Was no one found who returns to give glory to God except this foreigner? And then Jesus turns to the Samaritan, and he says to him, Stand up and go. Your faith has made you well. Now, what did his faith make well? That's the question. Did his faith heal leprosy? Yes, no, kind of, sort of. Aren't these the best questions? Well, if we say yes, his faith made him, healed him of his leprosy, then you have to ask the question, well, what healed the other nine? Faith of a different type? Faith of a lesser, what, degree, strength? Jewish faith? You dispensational. What healed them of their leprosy was God's mercy.

He was merciful to them. Is there anything that distinguished the Samaritan from the other lepers? Yes. He came back and he praised God. So did anything more happen for him? Was he made well in any other way than to have his leprosy removed? Yes. As Diane said, he was saved. He was like Naaman. Through his trial, and God's mercy, he became a Christian. He became one of the people of God. And that's the sort of gift, like what I described at the beginning of the service, the sort of thing that you receive that you were not expecting. Of the 10 who expected salvation, who would have been the Jews? But when you receive a gift such as he did, And it's interesting to note that the gift he received was the same gift that the other nine received. But God worked it out in him to produce salvation. He was grateful. And so we have to see that in ourselves, there's always going to be a temptation to need things, to seek them from God, and to go on our way when he gives us what we need. And we have to see that that's not how it ought to be.

That when we receive good things from God, common graces even, we ought to respond as the Samaritan did, with worship, with praise, with thankfulness, with gratitude. It doesn't mean that I'm not talking about some sort of cheap, shallow, happy, happy all the time kind of thing. Some of you are inclined that way. Some of you have met people like that. They always say they never ever have a problem and God's good in everything. And you wonder for a second, you're like, do they actually believe that? Because my life doesn't look like that. I have hard things going on. I have difficulties. There are times I want to throw in the towel and say this isn't worth it. This is too hard. This is more than I can bear. They don't seem to resonate with that. That's not the kind of thing I'm talking about unless it's sincere.

What I find to be more realistic is knowing that in this life you'll have trouble. You're going to have needs. You're going to have a cross to bear. You're going to have burdens. That's what we know because we live in a fallen world and we're sinful. And so when the storms are going on and you call out and you ask for God to be merciful, Jesus, Master, have mercy on us. When he is merciful. Respond by faith. Praise him for it. Don't take it for granted. You have to think for this Samaritan, it only made sense to him. You ever been put to shame by somebody doing something that was so obvious that it should have been done once they did it, but it never occurred to you to do it yourself? That's what it would have been like. So let's learn from him. I want us to give thanks to God in the midst of the difficulties because we're always going to be in the midst of it at some level. And it's not unholy to acknowledge that

This place is not our home, and we look for a better place and a better city and a place that's not ravaged by sin. As long as we're praising God now for sustaining us and bearing with us and providing for us now. Those lepers needed help then, and they received help, and the Samaritan praised God then. There's question of whether or not he went to the priest first in the commentaries that I've read about whether he went to the priest first and then went back to Jesus or whether he just turned around and went back to Jesus. And I disagree with Calvin. I think he just turned around and went back to Jesus right then because that's only befitting of true praise, of truth, of true gratitude. When you're given the sort of gift that he received, what else can you do but say thank you right now? I'll get to it.

No, you won't. No, you won't. You're like me. No, you won't. So that's the first application. I want there to be gratitude in us that flows out of his saving mercy. And that's there underneath all of the dust and clutter of life for every Christian. And so we have reason to give thanks all of the time. The second application, the last application. is that we ought to look for God's praises in places that we wouldn't expect it. And I mean specifically with regard to people. We all have a certain social class or people that we're comfortable around, people that we think would make good Christians. And the reason they'd make good Christians is why? Because they're like us. However we are, they're like that, and therefore they would make good Christians because we make good Christians. And isn't it funny that some of you knew what I was looking for? Look to see where God's at work.

and grow where you're planted. That's something I say often, at least in my house. I think I say it to you guys as well. Grow where you're planted. Just remember that. I need to grow where I'm planted because God planted me here. He planted me in this family. He planted me in this city. He planted me in this house. He planted me in this job. He planted me here. So I need to grow here. And so look to see where God is at work and look to harvest where he's causing growth. Don't despise it. You can imagine the Jews' response to this Samaritan. If you could have been on the road, there's nothing in the text about it, there's nothing in commentaries, but just think for a minute. If you were one of those 10, and you were the Jews, and he was the Samaritan, and you were healed, and he says, I'm going back, they would have just despised him. And you know they would have because they didn't come back with him. If he was praising God with a loud voice, do you not think that they would have heard that? And they rejected it. They despised it.

And so let's not be the kind of people who despise the mercy of God in other people's lives. Let's look for it and let's praise God along with them when we see it. Let's pray.