14th Sunday after Trinity – Luke 17:11-19
11 Now it happened as [Jesus] went to Jerusalem that He passed through the midst of
Samaria and Galilee. 12 Then as He entered a certain village, there met Him ten men who
were lepers, who stood afar off. 13 And they lifted up their voices and said, “Jesus,
Master, have mercy on us!” 14 So when He saw them, He said to them, “Go, show
yourselves to the priests.” And so it was that as they went, they were cleansed. 15 And one
of them, when he saw that he was healed, returned, and with a loud voice glorified God,
16 and fell down on his face at His feet, giving Him thanks. And he was a Samaritan. 17 So
Jesus answered and said, “Were there not ten cleansed? But where are the nine? 18 Were
there not any found who returned to give glory to God except this foreigner?” 19 And He
said to him, “Arise, go your way. Your faith has made you well.”
Lord, this is Your Word, and these are Your words, “Sanctify us by the truth; Your word
is truth.” Amen.
In the name of Jesus, dear fellow redeemed.
At this very moment. All of you are in the right place. You have gathered here to hear
God’s Word and receive His mercy. Like the lepers in our text, you have gathered at the
place where Jesus is. Jesus himself said, “Where two or three are gathered together in My
name, I am there in the midst of them.” We are gathered together here, and Jesus is in our
midst. It is also true that I would love to view all of you like the Samaritan in our text
who returned to give glory to God for the glorious and gracious gift of good health and
healing. You have all been made well through the gift of faith, which rightly praises
the God of heaven and earth for all the blessings He has bestowed, both physical and
spiritual.
Just think for a moment of all the things for which we have to be thankful. We are
surrounded and covered by God’s blessings even more than we are surrounded by air.
Our bodies and souls are the basic blessings that each of us has received from God. This
includes our reason and every power of the soul, all understanding and every member of
our bodies, every ray of light that falls into our eyes, every sound that penetrates your
ears, every breath that fills your lungs, every heartbeat, every bite of food that you eat,
every muscle fiber that enables you to compete, every drop of water that you drink, every
slumber that comfortingly shuts your eyes, every joy that refreshes one’s soul, every step
you take without misfortune, every moment spent, everything a person is and has is a
special blessing of God. For in Him we live and move and have our being. (Acts 17:28)
He has called us into existence; He preserves us and governs our life, and if He were to
withdraw His hand from us, but for a moment, we would perish. Because of this, it is
impossible to number the blessings God shows on us during even one hour.
But who of us vividly recognizes all these blessings as from God? I, for one, know that I
am guilty of failing to appreciate all these blessings. Are we like the Samaritan who bows
down prostrate where Jesus is? Or do we not often regard these blessings as inevitabilities
of life? Do we even think of them as the things for which God is worthy of praise? We
enjoy all these blessings without thinking about the source of every good and perfect gift.
When we are met with light misfortune, our hearts and mouths are filled with complaints,
and if there is so much as one blessing, we imagine that we are lacking; we suddenly
forget all the millions of other blessings we enjoy. Only when people lose a blessing do
they come to realize how great it really was. Good health is an amazing gift, but we treat
our bodies like they are indestructible and blame God or our genes when our bodies fall
apart primarily because of how we’ve treated them. It is as though we must lose sight,
hearing, or general health to realize how great it really was. Only when the heavens are
shut does the farmer remember the blessings of rain, and only when the crops fail do we
recall how great is the gift of fruitful weather.
If, however, the bodily blessings of God are for the most part unrecognized by us, how
much more so are the spiritual blessings ignored? Do we ever take the time to consider
how fortunate we are to have been redeemed by the blood of Jesus, to be made holy
children of God in Baptism, born into Christendom instead of among the heathen, called
into the kingdom of heaven by God the Holy Spirit, provided a bible and given the Holy
Sacrament for our spiritual nourishment? It is undoubtedly true that most of us take all of
this with a hardened heart.
Do we not regard spiritual things that take place in church, the services in God’s house,
Sunday School, Confirmation Class and the accompanying memory work as burdens to
bear in this world where we would prefer it if there were no God to serve, no word of
God to obey, and no eternity about which to worry? Do we care more about our
reputations than we do about what God thinks of us? Are we truly glad when the psalmist
says, “Let us go into the house of the Lord. The Lord is in His holy temple; let all the
earth keep silence before Him.” Do we really desire from the bottom of our hearts to
thank God continually in all that we say, think, and do?
No, we do not; we often act like there is nothing for which to be thankful, no one to
whom good deeds and service are owed. WE worship ourselves, we serve pleasure, and
we knowingly put ourselves into places and among people who would destroy our faith.
We justify our actions by thinking to ourselves, “a little compromise won’t hurt.” We like
the moderately Christian culture in which we live, but we fail to fight for it. We fail to
realize that a bunch of little compromises have a gigantic impact on our faith and that of
future generations. We come up with lame excuses like, “Church is too early.” “My
weekends belong to me.” “Doesn’t God want me to spend time with my family?” “I have
something else going on.” “I drank too much last night” or “I stayed up too late”…and
the list goes on and on. We even idolize good things, but they are still idols that usurp the
fear, love, and trust that belong to God.
When God’s people despise His Word over and over, he will eventually stop sending
them His Word. He’ll take away the preachers that preach it, and God’s judgment is just
because we would rather play with the wicked of the world than bow down at the feet of
our Lord. But in spite of all of this, “He does not desire the death of the wicked, but that
the wicked would turn from their way and live.” He actually wants us to turn away from
the wicked practices of the world and live differently than children of the devil.
When we cry out for Jesus to have mercy on us, he does just that. We receive more mercy
from Him than we could possibly count. His will is done, his kingdom comes, He gives
us our daily bread in abundance, he forgives us our sins despite our slowness to forgive
others, he protects us from temptation and gives us the strength to bear it, He keeps you
from evil. Jesus does have mercy on us every single moment of our lives, because of the
one historical act of mercy which He showered upon us by dying on the cross. Yet, He
does not praise the lepers who did not return to rightly praise Him for his mercy…not at
all, but he does praise the one who recognized the gift he received. He praised the one
who went out of his way to return to Jesus. If there were no other gift of mercy for which
we could praise Jesus, His one act of mercy would be enough.
Do you want to be praised by God or praised by the world? In truth, you cannot have it
both ways.
Just ponder for a moment the many blessings which we receive from God that we can
recognize as worthy of great thanks: protection and deliverance from great bodily danger,
the restoration of health after a long sickness, the revelation of innocence after a period of
unearned shame and scorn, the receipt of earthly goods following a time of poverty, and
the removal of strong pains and the fear of death. But while we realize that these things
merit loud and lifelong thanks, what do most of us do? We only call upon God in a time
of need and promise: “Lord, if You will help me this time, the thanks in my heart shall
never cease. I will become a different person. I will totally convert to You and lead a holy
life, forsaking the world and its vanity. I will serve You with body and soul, give You my
heart, and become and remain Your servant now and forever.”
But what happens when God has heard our cry of distress and helped us? With most of
us, it is the same as with the nine lepers. The heavenly Benefactor is quickly forgotten.
We ascribe the help to chance and our recovery to the doctor, our good nature, or the
right medicine. How many of us fail to fall down before God in thanks, but persist in
living our lives the way we did before? Such is the ingratitude of the human heart! How
unbelievably great it is!
If true and lasting change is to be made, we cannot just repent of it here and now on
Sunday morning, but we have to make actual changes in our life that model our current
loathing of sin. If something is keeping you from being in God’s house on Sunday
mornings, then change the thing that prevents you from doing so. If you find no interest
in the word of God, hear and read it anyway, because it is the only thing that will change
your heart and mind. “It is sharper than a two-edged sword.” And “Faith comes by
hearing.” Ask God to increase in you the desire for His Word, and he will. He promises
to do so. Reread and review today’s scripture throughout the week so that the word of
God dwells in you richly. If you think reading isn’t your thing, then take the time to listen
to Holy Scripture in one of the many platforms where it is available. If you’ve wondered
how to go about adding a daily devotion or prayer time with your family but were
concerned about doing it right, there is no magic formula. Just do it! Use your
catechism… read, mark, learn, and inwardly digest it with your family. Use what you
know as a starting point. Recite the commandments, the Apostles’ Creed, and the Lord’s
Prayer. Treat the holy things that take place in God’s house as more important than
anything else in your life. This is the place where God chooses to shower down His most
gracious blessing (forgiveness, life, and salvation). Let us be found like the leprous
Samaritan in our text, receiving Jesus’ mercy and glorifying God for it. Amen.
Let us pray:
Lord God, heavenly Father, by Your blessed Word and Your holy Baptism You have
mercifully cleansed all who believe in You from the fearful leprosy of sin, and You daily
grant us Your gracious help in all our need: we beseech You so to enlighten our hearts by
Your Holy Spirit, that we may never forget these Your blessings, but ever live in Your
fear, and, trusting fully in Your grace, with thankful hearts continually praise and glorify
You in all that we think, say, and do; through Your Son, our Lord Jesus Christ, who lives
and reigns with You and the Holy Spirit, one true God, now and forever. Amen.