(This is an example of using the interactive reading strategy called using your sanctified imagination. I used it to help me understand the message of Luke 17:11-19, the story of the ten lepers, and 2 Kings 17)
One day, Jesus was traveling to Jerusalem when He encountered ten lepers. Now, it was not unusual in those days for lonely lepers to form little social groups because after all, no one else would come near them. It is ironic that their devastating disease became a great equalizer. You see, healthy Jews would have no contact with Samaritans if given a choice, but this particular group of ten lepers included nine Jews and a Samaritan. I guess, when you were a leper, it did not matter whether you came from the wrong side of the tracks or were descended from the bluest of blue-bloods; once you became a leper, you were the bottom of the barrel no matter where you began.
Anyway, these lepers had heard the rumors of Jesus’ ability to heal. In fact, it was said that Jesus had even healed lepers before! Thus, they began their pilgrimage in search of healing. When the lepers found Jesus, they approached as near as the law allowed and commenced yelling, “Jesus, Master, have mercy on us!” Remember, they were forbidden to come too near to healthy people, so they were probably yelling as loud as they could over a great distance. Ten men can make a lot of noise when they want to, so they easily caught Jesus’ attention. To their delight, all the shouting and commotion caused Jesus to focus His gaze on them directly, and he even responded to them.
When Jesus answered, He must have been shouting loudly as well since the lepers were still keeping their distance, so imagine Jesus loudly calling to them, “Go and show yourselves to the priests.” The lepers immediately obeyed. Some people lacked faith in Jesus, but not these lepers. With hearts overflowing with hope, they all turned and began their trek toward the residence of the nearest priest. You see, the scriptural instructions for people with various skin diseases was that if the symptoms disappeared, the recovered person must be examined by a priest to ensure that the restoration was complete. The healed person was not allowed to re-enter society until after the priest had officially declared him or her to be free of the disease. These ten lepers understood that if Jesus was telling them to show themselves to the priest, then He must mean that they would be healed.
The verses in Luke imply that the lepers were not disease-free when they started out, so their bodies were still rotting masses of sores when they obeyed Jesus and began trudging towards the priest’s home. Thus, they demonstrated great faith in immediately leaving to find a priest. On the other hand, their faith might not have been as great as it first appears. I wonder if it was the faith of desperation. They had nothing to lose by obeying Jesus and everything to gain. If they arrived at the priest’s house without being healed, they were no worse off than before, but if they were healed, they would have gained their lives back. In the end, I do not think Jesus cares whether we have desperate faith like these lepers or confident faith like the centurion whose servant was healed. Jesus might be amazed by confident faith, but He can work with any trust that you place with Him regardless of your motivations. Simply trust Him, and you can be blessed.
Anyway, as the lepers stumbled and limped and hobbled along the path, a change began. They felt life flowing through dead nerves, and when they looked down at their arms and hands, they saw new healthy skin where there had previously been sores and rotting flesh. Shouts of joy rang out from the group as they realized that they had all been healed. For the first time in years, the future appeared bright. The ten lepers had been raised up from their position as the scum of the world who were doomed to die ugly deaths and been liberated to become part of society again. Only one more barrier to freedom remained. They had to obtain the priest’s official seal of approval.
Have you ever planned a special surprise for someone you love, and then impatiently waited in anticipation for the joy that would light your loved one’s face when he or she saw the surprise for the first time? I think that God does that with us. I think that a lot of times, He tries to give us beautiful gifts, just to see us smile, so I can imagine Jesus keeping His eye out for the lepers, so He could see their happiness in being whole and share in their joy. However, this time Jesus would have to be satisfied with just one person’s joy rather than all ten.
Unfortunately for Jesus’ expectations, when nine of the lepers saw that they had been healed, their only thought was to hurry to find the priest as quickly as possible so that they could be declared clean and return to their former lives. The nine Jewish lepers were ready for their world to normalize again. (Kind of like I feel now during this pandemic.) Only one of the lepers, paused and considered the healer who had made his return to society possible. The Samaritan leper realized that this might be his only chance to thank Jesus since the life of Jesus was quite nomadic. The priest would still be easy to locate in an hour or so, but Jesus might depart soon, so the former leper turned back in the direction he had recently left and rushed to find Jesus. When the leper reached Jesus, he fell on his face at Jesus’ feet and started thanking Him for his healthy body and praising God that he was healed.
Jesus smiled down at the man at His feet, not because He liked people to be bowing down to Him, but because He loves to see His children happy and whole. However, this moment was also an opportunity to advance the kingdom of heaven. As Jesus returned his gaze to His Jewish followers, He knew that this was the ideal situation to teach a lesson to them.
The leper who returned was a Samaritan. Jews hated Samaritans. In some ways, they thought the Samaritans were worse than the Romans. The Romans were total pagans, but the Samaritans had a corrupted version of Judaism. Do you know where the Samaritans came from? Way back in ancient times, there were two kingdoms which were descended from the people that Moses led from Egyptian slavery–the kingdom of Israel and the kingdom of Judah. The capital city of Israel was Samaria, so the land was also known by that name. Well, the kingdom of Judah sometimes obeyed God, and sometimes they rejected God, but the kingdom of Israel consistently rejected God and served idols. No matter how many messengers God sent to the kingdom of Israel, the people of the kingdom never returned to Yahweh, so finally God accepted their decision and stopped treating them as His special people, which meant that He also stopped protecting them. Then, the Assyrians swooped in and conquered the kingdom of Israel. When the Assyrians would capture a city or kingdom, they would force march the people of that area away and settle them in a new land replacing them with conquered people from other nations. That is exactly what happened to the kingdom of Israel, so the land was full of pagans who knew nothing about Yahweh. Then something strange started happening. Lions started attacking the resettled people of Samaria, and the pagan immigrants took this as a sign that they had offended the god of the country. You see, back then people believed that gods were tied to specific locations, so the new settlers assumed that they needed to placate the god of this particular region in order to live there safely. When word reached the king of Assyria, he decided to send a priest of Yahweh to teach the people how to worship the God of Israel. That was how the Samaritans of Jesus’ day originated. The pagan peoples learned how to worship Yahweh, and they worshipped Him faithfully. Unfortunately, they never completely gave up their old gods and superstitions. Because of the mixture of paganism and true worship that resulted over the centuries, the Jews of Jesus’ day hated the Samaritans as much or more than the Romans.
Jesus needed to teach His followers that they had to stop despising other people and start treating them with love, so He used this opportunity to make them see the Samaritans in a new light. As the former leper bowed at His feet thanking Jesus for healing him, Jesus made a show of looking around and saying, “Weren’t there ten lepers that were healed? Where are the other nine? Why is this foreigner the only one who cared enough to come back and thank God?” Having made His point, Jesus returned His attention to the Samaritan at His feet. Jesus told the Samaritan to stand and that he should go on his way. Then Jesus said something interesting. He told the former leper, “Your faith has made you well.” Now, this would not have been strange if Jesus had said these words earlier, but the Samaritan had already been physically healed. You see, there was an extra healing for this tenth leper. When Jesus said, “Your faith has made you well,” He meant that God was working inside the Samaritan man’s heart. The other lepers had whole bodies, but sick hearts. The Samaritan had through faith and gratitude, not only received a healthy body, but now he was also emotionally and spiritually complete.
This is the message I want to share with you. Too often, we are like the nine Jewish lepers. We receive wonderful gifts from God all the time, but instead of turning to Him in gratitude, we take the blessings that He has bestowed upon us for granted and hurry on to our next appointment or TV show or meal or nap. When we rush off to our next activity, we miss the chance for a second gift. In contrast, when we remember and take the time to thank God for the blessings that He has given us, we receive a second healing–a second blessing. I do not know about you, but I am greedy for God’s blessings. I want as many as I can lay my hands on. I crave seeing Jesus smiling at me, so I want to take the time to thank Him for the gifts that He keeps giving me.
It is time that we make the decision to refuse to act like the nine Jewish lepers. We must stop taking the blessings that God gives us every day for granted. Make time in your busy schedule to stop and appreciate the multitude of gifts that you have received and thank God for them. By slowing down in order to praise God for His healing and protection, you will find that you have received a second, even more necessary blessing.