The Ten Lepers - People Jesus Met Part 22

Hey, you know, this past summer, Brenda and I celebrated our 35th wedding anniversary, which is an enormous testimony to the grace of God and to the patience and long suffering of my wife, because I am not an easy man to live with. You say, well, how do you know that? Well, I know it because Brenda tells me that all the time.

That's how I know it. You know, I remember our wedding, even though it was 35 years ago, very well. I remember how nervous I was and I remember how radiant my wife was and still is. And I remember how just as she was getting ready to walk down the aisle with her father, he turned to her and said, now, Brenda, if you're not 100% sure this is the right thing to do, we can stop this right now.

Honest, he really said that. You know, there is one bad memory I have of our wedding, and that is thank you notes. Oh, the dreaded thank you notes. I mean, months later, we were still writing these thank you notes. And I remember suggesting to my wife several times that we knock it off because people probably had forgotten they'd even given us anything by then. And she said to me very wisely, she said, no, she said, Lon, being grateful and showing it is very important in life.

And she's right. You know, this is what we're going to talk about today because we're in a series entitled People Jesus Met. And today we're going to see Jesus meet 10 lepers.

He healed them all, but only one of them came back to say thank you. And we're going to go back 2000 years in time and talk about that event. And then I want to bring all of that forward and have us answer the question. Well, what difference does that make to you and me today?

So that's our plan. Luke chapter 17 is our passage. And we begin at verse 11.

The Bible says, Now, as Jesus was going to Jerusalem, he traveled along the border between Samaria and Galilee. And as Jesus was going into a village, 10 lepers met him. Now, we've all heard of this disease, leprosy, but I'll bet most of us know very little about it. Leprosy or Hansen's disease is actually a contagious bacterial disease that is an upper respiratory infection, really. But it manifests itself because of the damage it does to people's skin.

It causes lesions on people's skin and often their body parts are severely disfigured and sometimes literally they even fall off. Now, today, leprosy is curable by a multi-drug antibiotic treatment. But of course, in the days of the Lord Jesus, this disease was incurable. And as a result, leprosy was one of the most dreaded diseases in all the ancient Near East. The rabbis, because it was contagious, decreed that no leper was allowed to approach within 50 yards of a healthy person. Leviticus chapter 13 in the Old Testament said that lepers had to wear torn clothing. They had to cover their face and they had to cry out, unclean, unclean wherever they went to warn healthy people to stay away from them. Leviticus 13 also says that as long as they have the infection, lepers must live alone outside the camp. And as a result of this, in the days of Jesus, most people that had leprosy lived in leper colonies where they were isolated from their family, their friends and the rest of society.

Well, let's go on, verse 12. So these lepers stood at a distance, remember the 50-yard rule, right? Okay, they stood at a distance and they called out in a loud voice, Jesus, Master, please have mercy on us.

You can get the picture here. These guys are screaming at the top of their lungs. They're not bashful, they're not ashamed, they're not embarrassed because they've heard about this fellow named Jesus who can actually cure people with leprosy. And now here he was in their town. This was their one chance to get their life back and they were not gonna lose it because of being too timid. Verse 14, and when Jesus saw them, he said to them, go, show yourselves to the priest. You say, Lon, why in the world would he say that to them? Why didn't he say, okay, you're healed or what?

Why did he tell them this? Well, it's because in Leviticus 14 in the Old Testament, God says that if a leper ever experiences a divine healing, a supernatural healing, that person is to go immediately and present themselves to the priest. And the priest then will corroborate the healing, lift the quarantine on them, and they will then be allowed to rejoin normal Jewish society.

Look here now, look here. This is so important that we understand this, that when Jesus tells these 10 lepers, go show yourselves to the priest, what he was really promising is that he was going to heal them. He said to them, by the time you get there, you'll have something to show the priest because I'm gonna heal you before you get there. There was a promise here in what Jesus said to them. Verse 14 continues, and it came about as they were on their way to the priests that they were cleansed from their leprosy.

Would you notice that they went and started on the way to the priest while they were still lepers before they had been cleansed and healed? Now friends, this is the way true biblical faith always works. Number one, God makes us a promise. Number two, God asks us to believe his promise and to act on it like these lepers did.

And then number three, God keeps his promise. This is the way it worked with Abraham when God asked him to leave his homeland of Ur. This is the way it worked with Moses when God asked him to go back to Egypt and face Yul-Brenner. This is the way it worked with Esther when God asked her to go into the king uninvited. This is the way it worked with Ruth when she stuck with her mother-in-law Naomi and with Joshua when God asked him to march around Jericho seven times while the walls were still up.

This is the way it worked with the 10 lepers. Jesus asked them to do something based on his promise before he actually fulfilled the promise. They believed God first, all these people did, and they stepped out in faith first, all these people did. And then God kept his word and did great and mighty things for each one of them.

Now, friends, the problem is that you and I, we are always trying to reverse this order. We always say, God, show me and I'll believe. And God has to say, uh-uh, I'm sorry, that's not the deal.

You believe, and then I'll show you. This is why the apostle Paul said, 2 Corinthians 5 verse 7. He said, for we walk by faith.

That is, we believe God first. We don't walk by sight. And may I say that if you're a follower of Jesus here today and God is asking you to walk by faith in some area of your life, God is asking you to step out on his promises before you can actually see or figure out how he's ever gonna keep those promises. I'm here to urge you to do it.

Don't be afraid to do it. I'm here to urge you to follow in the footsteps of the 10 lepers who did it because God reserves his richest, deepest blessing for people who will walk by faith and believe him first. Well, let's get back to the story. Verse 15. Now, one of the lepers, when he saw that he had been healed, came back to Jesus, praising God in a loud voice. He threw himself at Jesus' feet, and he thanked him. And this man was a Samaritan. This leper was on the way to see the priest, and suddenly he realized he was healed, and he said to himself, you know what? The priest can wait. The priest didn't heal me.

I'm going back to say thank you to the person who did. Verse 17. Then Jesus said to him, were there not 10 lepers who were cleansed? Where are the other nine? Is no one but this foreigner, this Samaritan, is he the only one who came back to give praise to God? Jesus said to this guy, hey, gee, I thought I healed 10 of you guys.

Where are the other nine? This is actually kind of funny. I mean, it's humorous. It's Bible humor, which is why you don't get it. But this is really funny, what Jesus said to him.

He said, how come they didn't come back to say thank you like you did? Verse 19. Then Jesus said to him, rise, go your way. Your faith has made you well. Now that's the end of the passage for today, but we want to stop now because it's time to ask our most important question.

Ready? Here we go, nice and loud. One, two, three. So what? Come on, you can do better than that.

One, two, three. So what? Oh, there you go.

Doesn't that feel good? You say, Lon, so what? I mean, I don't understand what differences makes for me. I'm not a leper. I don't even know any lepers. What difference does this make to me? Well, let's talk about that, shall we? You know, the question Jesus asked, verse 17, he said, were there not 10 lepers who were cleansed?

Where are the other nine? Folks, this is a rhetorical question, meaning Jesus didn't ask this question to get an answer. Jesus asked this question to make a point. And the point that he wanted to make is that way too often people fail to thank God for the kind and merciful things he does for them. And by the way, too often we fail to thank other people for the kind and merciful things they do. Now, can we be honest here together for a moment and admit that all of us are a lot like the nine lepers many times in our lives? Can we be honest and say that?

And there are three areas where I think primarily this is true. Number one, we all tend to be like the nine lepers, first of all, when it comes to God. You know, we pray, oh God, if you'll just get me out of this mess, oh God, if you'll just get me out of that mess, if you just get me out of the other mess, oh God, if you'll just do this wonderful, great and mighty thing for me, and then God does it, and he never hears from us again until we need something else. We never come back to say thank you. We never express any gratitude.

We never publicly give him the credit and the honor for what he did. Folks, this dishonors God, this offends God. I think it's clear here in Luke 17 that Jesus was irked by the ingratitude of these other nine lepers. You say, well, then why didn't he just take their healing back? You know, why didn't he just say to the one leper, you know what, it's good you came back.

Those other nine, I'm taking their healing away right now. Why didn't he do that? Well friends, he didn't do it because our God is a good and merciful, kind God. And even when our behavior is undeserving of his goodness, God is still good to us anyway. Hey, praise the Lord, amen for that, huh? You guys agree? That's a good thing. But listen, that doesn't excuse us for not going back and thanking him for what he does.

There's a second area where we tend to be like the nine lepers. And that's when it comes to our parents. You know, there was a time in each one of our lives, my friends, when a week's worth of neglect would have killed every one of us. And the people who took care of us in those years, who took care of us through the fevers and the flus and the colds and the sleepless nights were our parents. But I wonder how many of us have ever gone back to express to our parents the proper level of gratitude and respect that they deserve for what they did for us. And some of us have aging parents, but we're too busy to call them and we're too busy to visit them and we're too cheap to fly them in to visit us.

Hey, you know what? It's a really good thing that our parents didn't treat us the way a whole bunch of us are treating them. Finally, there's a third way in which we're a lot like the nine lepers sometimes. And that's when it comes to other people who've helped us along our way in life. You know, friends, teachers, counselors, bosses, relatives who've done things for us that changed the very direction of our life for the good, things we could never possibly repay them.

And yet have we ever gone back and thanked them or written them even a thank you note or given them any tangible expression of our gratitude for what they've done for us? Listen, this is the point that Jesus is making in Luke 17, namely that all of us are prone to be like the nine lepers. All of us are prone to be ungrateful. It's simply a part of our sinful human nature. But that doesn't make it right. In fact, you know what you'll find interesting is that in the Bible, did you know that over 100 times God commands you and me to give thanks, to be thankful, to express our gratitude both to him and to other people?

Did you know that? Hey, for example, Psalm 100 verse four says, enter God's gates with thanksgiving. Give thanks to him and bless his name. Colossians chapter two in the New Testament, Paul says that as followers of Christ, we are to be overflowing with thanksgiving. In Ephesians chapter five verse 20, the Bible tells us we are always to thank God, give thanks to God for all things in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ. And remember, look here, remember that biblical thanksgiving, biblical giving of thanks is an act of our will. It is not a feeling. God never commands us in the Bible to feel any way about anything, but he commands us a hundred times to give thanks.

Why? Because biblical thanksgiving is a deliberate act of our will, which means that we can give thanks for things that we don't feel thankful for. We can be in a situation where we feel very unthankful for the situation, but we can still, the Bible says, rise up, we can on the wings of faith and thank God for the situation by faith anyway. You say, all right, Lon, okay, take a breath.

Okay, listen, I understand what you're saying. A hundred times, God tells me to give thanks, I got that. But my question is, why is this such a big deal? I mean, I don't understand why God thinks this is so important that a hundred times he tells me to do this.

Well, that's a great question. And there are three reasons why God considers it so important and I'm gonna tell them to you and with that, we're done. Reason number one is because true thanksgiving honors God. When we are outwardly grateful about everything in life, it exalts God. I love what Paul says, 2 Corinthians 4.15, he talks about thanksgiving, which overflows to the glory of God.

You say, I don't get it. How can my being publicly thankful to God give glory to him? Oh, my friend, listen, when we're publicly thankful to God for everything in our life, no matter whether it's good or bad, this is a public recognition. This is a public acknowledgement that there is a good and kind and merciful and gracious God running the world, not fate, not coincidence, not happenstance, and certainly not us, but God is in charge of his world and God is doing what is best for me and for everybody else in his world. And when I acknowledge that publicly in front of people everywhere I go, my friends, that honors God, that exalts God, that turns the spotlight on God, that gives credit to God, that gives fame to God, and so this is the first reason why God tells us to do it. But there's a second reason, and that is because it brings the peace of God to our lives when we are truly thankful for every circumstance we're in. Listen to what Paul said, Philippians 4.6, he said, be anxious about nothing, but in everything by prayer and petition with thanksgiving.

Hello, with thanksgiving, present your request to God, next verse, and the peace of God, there you are, which surpasses all understanding, will guard your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus, Messiah Jesus. Listen, look here, look here, God's mercy runs through every single circumstance in our lives, the good, the bad, and the ugly, God's mercy runs through them if we will simply look for it. And when we do this, when we identify God's mercy in our circumstances, no matter how bad they look, and then we focus on God's mercy, and then we thank God for his mercy, we unlock God's supernatural peace in that circumstance. You know, a number of years ago, my middle son, Justin, who's now 28, he was a preschooler at the time, we were coming back one night from a softball game, it was around 10 o'clock, we were going around the loop at Nutley Street, getting on to Route 66 East to head up to the beltway and go home, Justin was sitting in the backseat with his seatbelt on, and as we went around this loop getting on 66, suddenly I heard air rushing in in the back, my mind raced to figure out what is going on, what Justin had done is unlocked his seatbelt, opened the door and rolled out of the car. My wife Brenda was in absolute shock, she turned to me and said, Lon, Justin just fell out of the car. I pulled over, ran back to get him, he was lying face down in the middle of the road on the ramp, cars were coming around the ramp, it was pitch dark, they were swerving at the last minute, not to run over him in the road, I finally got back up there, rolled him over, and he looked at me and went, Daddy, and I thought, okay Jesus, he's alive, we got a chance, ran back to the car, gave him to Brenda, we drove off to Fairfax ER, Fairfax Hospital, doing about, I don't know, 95, 100, I figure if any policeman got in behind me, he could follow me to the emergency room, it's kind of the way I looked at it. We got there, it wasn't real crowded, thank the Lord, they were able to rush Justin right back in, we immediately called, activated the McLean Bible Church prayer hotline, we had some friends who came over almost immediately to sit in the waiting room with us, and as I was sitting out there in the ER, not knowing whether my son was gonna live or die, I was upset, I was scared, I was anxious, and it was at that moment I sensed the Holy Spirit tap me on the shoulder and say, you know Lon, there's a lot of my mercy in this situation if you'll just look for it, and I was like, are you kidding me? You gotta be kidding me God, where is there mercy in this situation? But I said, all right, I'll look for it, and so I began to, and suddenly I realized that God was right. You see friends, it was mercy that we were going 25 miles an hour and not 55 miles an hour when this happened, and it was mercy that my son was still alive in the middle of the road when I got to him, and it was mercy that all of these cars saw him and swerved around him instead of running over him, and it was mercy that all of this happened so close to such a great hospital as Fairfax, and it was mercy that they weren't that busy and they were able to rush him right back in, and it was mercy that we had all these friends around McLean Bible Church praying for us, and it was mercy that we had people come right over and sit there so we weren't alone, and it was mercy that my son was in the hands of the great physician who can keep anybody alive.

I don't care what the injury is. And suddenly, as I began to realize all the mercy that really was here and began to thank God for it, all I can tell you is that the fears and the anxieties that I was feeling went away, and I was engulfed by the sweet peace of God. You say, Lon, that's not even logical. To be sitting in an emergency room waiting area not knowing if your child's going to live and to have peace? Well, friends, what does the Bible say? The Bible says it is peace that passes all understanding. This is supernatural peace.

It's not logical. It's supernatural. And we unlock it when we become grateful for God's mercy in every circumstance. You know, I still practice that today. Many times I'll get in bed at night, and my mind is racing about everything, and I'm getting myself all spun up.

And you know what? I've learned to say, okay, God, I need to stop now. And what I need to start doing instead of worrying about that is I need to start thinking about all the mercy You've shown me today and in my life and begin thanking You for all the good things that I've got. It's amazing how those other things melt away and the peace of God takes over. This is what the great hymn says. It says, count your blessings.

Listen, it says, when upon life's billows you are tempest-tossed, when you are discouraged, thinking all is lost, count your many blessings. Name them one by one, and it will surprise you what the Lord has done. Number three, why does God tell us to be thankful a hundred times? Because third and finally, a true spirit of gratitude in our life, my friends, protects us from sin.

It protects us from self-destructing in life. Think about it now. If Adam and Eve had been truly grateful for what they had in the Garden of Eden, they never would have eaten from that tree. And if David had been truly grateful for all the wives the Lord had already given him, he wouldn't have committed adultery with Bathsheba. And if Lot had been grateful for the possessions he already had, he wouldn't have gone down to Sodom and self-destructed his whole family. And if Bernie Madoff had been grateful for the wealth he already had, he wouldn't be in jail today.

Look here, look here. Friends, one of the greatest protections against sin and self-destruction in our life is for us to be truly grateful for whatever the Lord has given us right now. And this is why Philippians chapter 4, the Apostle Paul said, For I have learned to be content, to be grateful, to be thankful in whatever circumstance I am. This is why in 1 Timothy 6 he says, Godliness with contentment is great gain. You say, well, Lon, wait a minute though. Does that mean that it's wrong for me to work hard and try to improve my lot in life?

No, absolutely not. That's fine. That's good. So long as, listen, so long as we are so grateful for what God gives us at every point along the way that we're never willing to engage in biblical disobedience to try and get more. So let me conclude and say, how do you do this? How do we get to be grateful like this? How do we get this kind of thankful spirit in our lives? Ephesians 5, 20, where we always give thanks to God for all things in the name of the Lord Jesus.

How do we get that, Lon? Well, folks, it's simple really. This kind of attitude is based on having a biblical worldview of life.

You say, what do you mean? Well, friends, a biblical worldview says four simple things. Number one, it says God is in absolute control of every circumstance, every detail of my life.

You say, where do I find that out? In the Bible. Number two, a biblical worldview says that God loves me and knows what is absolutely best for me at all times. You say, Lon, where do I find that? In the Bible. Number three, a biblical worldview says if anything were better for me than what God has given me right now, God would have already changed it.

Where do I find that, Lon? In the Bible. And finally, a biblical worldview says, therefore, in light of these three things being true, therefore, I can thank God for whatever situation I'm in with the absolute assurance that I am right where I'm supposed to be at this moment in time. And where do we find that truth? Tell me. Tell me. In the Bible.

That's right. Folks, a biblical worldview means we believe what God tells us in the Bible without question, without hesitation, just like a little child believes what his mother and father tell him or her, without question, without hesitation. But what did Jesus say? He said, we need to have faith like a little what? Like a little child, huh?

Listen, friends, please, don't be educated beyond your intelligence, okay? Be like a little child. Just believe what God tells you without question, without hesitation. Build your worldview on that because a biblical worldview is the foundation for a grateful life. You can thank God for anything in your life if you run it through the lens of a biblical worldview. And folks, a grateful life is the foundation for a life that is richly blessed by God. Hey, let's just believe what God tells us and let's be thankful people. And it will be a benefit to us and it will be a glory and honor to the Lord Jesus.

Let's pray. Father, thanks for reminding us today that this world is right on schedule, that our lives are right on schedule. There are no surprises and, Lord, there is nothing that happens outside of your absolute sovereign control. And you love us, what is happening to us right now is best for us.

If it weren't, you'd do something else. So, Father, help us believe these biblical truths so deeply that we can rise up and on that foundation we can give thanks to God for all things in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ. Lord, change our lives because we were here today. Change the very way we see our circumstances and the way we react. That we might bring glory to you and that we might enjoy the blessings that come from obeying you and giving thanks in all things.

We pray these things in Jesus' name. And what did God's people say? What did you say? What did you say?