Last fall there was a new TV program called “The Nine.“ I doubt that the creators of the show had this biblical story in mind, but there are some interesting parallels. Obviously, both feature the number nine. More significantly, both are about people whose lives were profoundly changed by a dramatic encounter. On the TV show, 9 people are trapped inside a bank during a robbery, and that experience forever changes their lives. In the Bible story, 10 people encounter Jesus Christ and that experience profoundly changed their lives. But we don’t get to see how the lives of the nine are transformed, because they walk away from their encounter with Jesus with nary a backward glance. We hear more about the one who returned with thanksgiving. His life is changed eternally, but the nine miss the rest of the blessing. I want to focus on the nine who skipped thanksgiving, because even in this disappointing story, God has a very encouraging word for us.
The opening words of the biblical story are deceptively simple. “Now on his way to Jerusalem, Jesus traveled along the border between Samaria and Galilee.“ There’s something deeper than geography in those words. They are a description of where these men lived socially and psychologically and spiritually. They lived on the border—the border between two cultures, Samaritan and Jewish. To the north were the pure—blooded Jews, to the south were mixed blood Samaritans, and between them there was nothing but bad blood on the border. Students of Bible history may recall that the Samaritans came into being centuries before this when the Assyrians dragged the cream of the Jewish people into Exile and deposited the dregs of their empire among the remnant back in the Promised Land. The children of that forced union were despised by the Jews around them, and they returned the bile. These 10 men who called out to Jesus lived on the border between those two cultures, in neither one because they were outcasts.
I call them outcasts because they had leprosy. They were covered with sores and carried with them the stench of decay and corruption, often missing fingers and toes and maybe even hands and feet, their faces wrinkled like a lion’s pug, their voices rough and ragged because of their disease. When they came close to any healthy people, they were required by law to shout in their hoarse voices, “Unclean, unclean,“ to keep people from coming close and becoming contaminated by the ancient equivalent of AIDS. They were forced to live outside of town, away from family and friends, away from the market and the church, away from life. Out there on the border, they were “dead men walking.“
But then Jesus came walking into their lives, traveling along the border not only between Samaria and Galilee, but also between God and man, between heaven and hell, on his way to Jerusalem. His face is set with determination and his heart is full of love for the lost he will die to save. These dead men have heard of him, living as they did on the border of Galilee where he had done so many miracles. So they raise their ragged voices in chorus, not now crying “Unclean, unclean,“ but “Jesus, Master, have pity on us.“ When he saw them standing there at a distance as they were required to do, he did just that. He called out, “Go, show yourselves to the priests.“
Why did he say that? Why didn’t he just say, “You are healed?“ Well, because leprosy couldn’t be healed. Everyone knew that. So if they claimed to be healed, someone had to verify that the healing was genuine. There was no National Center for Infectious Diseases back then, so God in his infinite care for his people had appointed the priests to determine what was leprosy and what wasn’t. With this command, Jesus says, in effect, “You are healed,“ even though they weren’t quite yet.
They weren’t healed yet, but because it was Jesus who said it, they went. “And,“ says the story, “as they went they were cleansed.“ No longer will they cry, “Unclean, unclean.“ Now they will shout “Praise the Lord“ the rest of their days. Except the nine don’t. Only one does.
One almost immediately turns around on his way to the priests and, praising God in a loud voice, throws himself at Jesus feet in an act of worship and thanks him over and over again. The nine skipped thanksgiving. They just walked away without a backward glance or a word of thanks. That is almost unimaginable. Why wouldn’t they return to the man who changed their lives and give thanks to him? We aren’t directly told, but if we think about our own lives, we may find the answer.
As you think back over the last year, or over the course of your life can you remember times when the mercy of Jesus changed your life as it did for the nine? Can you remember a time when you lived on the border, where there didn’t seem to be any hope? There is a perfect description of that desolate territory in John Knowles dark masterpiece, A Separate Peace. A high school student named Gene has caused an accident that crippled and finally killed his best friend Finney. Gene describes the guilt that has made him a dead man walking. “Until now,“ he says “I had welcomed each new day as though it were a new life, where all past failures and problems were erased, and all future possibilities and joys open and available…. Now, I began to know that each morning reasserted the problems of the night before, that sleep suspended but changed nothing, that you couldn’t remake yourself between dusk and dawn.“ Have you ever felt that way, hopeless like Gene and these men with leprosy?
Perhaps it was one event that put you there, as with Gene—the sudden death of a loved one or the unexpected loss of your job or your business. Perhaps you were living on the border because of health problems, removed from civilization by lingering illness, or because of broken relationships that left you feeling like an outcast. Then Jesus came traveling along the border, heard your distant cry, had pity, and everything changed, maybe even overnight.
Did you remember to return to give him thanks? Did you fall at his feet in gratitude? Did you make a new commitment to follow him? Did you dedicate yourself to some new form of service? Did you increase your giving to the cause of Christ’s church? Did you return to Jesus or did you skip thanksgiving? Thinking back, perhaps you can put yourself in the place of these nine. Perhaps you understand them all too well.
So, you know that sometimes we skip thanksgiving because we get so caught up in our new life, so overwhelmed with our blessings that we forget to give thanks to the one who gave them. Other times we don’t return because we are still dealing with the scars left by our old life—the missing fingers and toes, the broken relationships, the memories of being excluded, the financial effects of the past. The mercy of Jesus might have solved one problem, but there is still plenty else wrong with our lives and we’re too busy with the rest of life to return to Jesus with thanks. Or perhaps we skip thanksgiving, because we feel entitled to Jesus mercy.
That, in fact, is the only clue this story gives us to explain the nine. At the end of verse 16, it says of the one who returned, “and he was a Samaritan.“ He was not a Jew, not one of God’s chosen people, but one of those mixed blood mongrels, not one of the elect, but one of the excluded. That suggests that the nine were among the chosen few and maybe that’s why they skipped thanksgiving. As Jews, they were the children of Abraham, the children of the covenant, and, thus, the heirs of all the blessings God had promised his children. So they had grown up feeling privileged, entitled to the blessings of God. And when they had suffered as much as these nine had, and then finally good came their way, they felt that at last some justice had been done. For years they had complained with their prophets, “How long, O Lord? Why is this happening to us, O God?“ Now at last God had acted as he should have all along. God has finally done the right thing for these his beloved chosen children. So for them, mercy was experienced as merit, and healing as their just due. We won’t be very thankful if we are saying to God, “It’s about time you treated me the way I deserve.“
Regardless of the reason, I want you to hear what Jesus says to people who have skipped thanksgiving. He might have said, “Forget you! If that’s the way you want to be, good riddance!“ But that’s not what he says to them. In fact, you don’t hear him say anything to them, because they aren’t around to hear his word. But he says something about them and for them that we overhear as Jesus speaks to the only one who returned.
“Were not all ten cleansed? Was no one found to return and give praise to God except this foreigner?“ Do you hear the disappointment and the anger in those words? That’s what you’d expect, isn’t it, after Jesus had given them their lives back. But that’s not all Jesus said. Did you the heart of Jesus’ words? “Where are the other nine?“ Do you hear the grace there?
I say that because he is asking the same question God asked Adam and Eve in that garden so long ago. That first heartbroken question for the human race as it walked away from its Creator. “Where are you?“ In that question God reveals his seeking heart. You hear that question all throughout the Old Testament, as God’s chosen people turned their backs on him, after he had delivered them, and wandered off after other gods. God is always hurt and angry when that happens, but again and again he seeks them out and welcomes them back.
“Where are the other nine?“ Earlier in Luke’s account of the life of Jesus, Jesus told those gathered around him three wonderful stories about heaven’s joy when the lost are found. One was about a woman who turned her house upside down seeking a lost coin. Another featured a shepherd who left his flock of ninety—nine sheep back in the fold so that he could seek the one sheep that was lost. And the last story, the best one, focused on a wounded father running with outstretched arms to welcome back the lost son who had broken his heart. Each of those stories is about God’s love for the lost. Our story in Luke 17 shows us God walking on the border on the way to Jerusalem on his centuries old mission of seeking and saving the lost. Even after they skipped thanksgiving, the Son of God is willing to take the nine back, if they will return to him.
And not only take them back. There’s more, so much more. The nine have missed so much by not coming back to Jesus, so much that he wants to give them. Jesus summarizes it in those last words of our text, the words he longs to speak to ungrateful sinners. “Rise,“ said Jesus to the Samaritan. “Your faith has made you well,“ which really means “your faith has saved you.“ Not only was his leprosy healed, but he was raised up to a whole new life. His faith brought him back to Jesus to give thanks, and now by that faith in Jesus, he has received all the benefits of God’s comprehensive health care package. We don’t know how the rest of life went for the nine, because they skipped thanksgiving. But we do know that grateful faith, faith that fell at Jesus feet and thanked him over and over again, led to complete salvation.
I wonder how many of us live on the border of blessing, walking along between the experience of some blessing and the enjoyment of all the blessing Jesus longs to give us. We’re not happy with life. We wonder why there isn’t more, why God doesn’t bless us better. We wonder how long we have to put up with the state of our lives. From time to time we call out to Jesus to have mercy on us, but then we walk away and live our lives without him. If we’re honest, we’ll have to admit that most of the time we stay at a distance from him. We have received much from him in the past, but we’re missing so much more because we’ve skipped thanksgiving. Today, he is calling out for us. “Where are the other nine?“ Where are you?
The Son of God walked the border between a disappointed Father and his sinful children, between heaven and hell, on the road to the cross, so that we could have all the blessings God promised to his children. Jesus invites us to come close and fall at his feet in grateful faith, so that we can be resurrected and made completely well. My friends leave your pain, your sorrow, your anger, your disappointment, your sin at the border and come to Jesus with thanksgiving in your heart. “Rise, your faith will save you completely.“
Stan Mast
Stan Mast has been the Minister of Preaching at the LaGrave Avenue Christian Reformed Church in downtown Grand Rapids, MI for the last 18 years. He graduated from Calvin Theological Seminary in 1971 and has served four churches in the West and Midwest regions of the United States. He also served a 3 year stint as Coordinator of Field Education at Calvin Seminary. He has earned a BA degree from Calvin College and a Bachelor of Divinity and a Master of Theology from Calvin and a Doctor of Ministry from Denver Seminary. He is happily married to Sharon, a special education teacher, and they have two sons and four grandchildren. Stan is a voracious reader and works out regularly. He also calls himself a car nut and an “avid, but average” golfer.
More >>
