The Reverend Harold A. Linn, Pastor

Private Thanksgiving is Not Enough

By Dr. Richard P. Bucher

The account of Christ's healing of the 10 lepers is often read at Thanksgiving services. It typically is the appointed Gospel reading for the day. It's not difficult to see why. It contains one of the most moving examples of giving thanks to God found in the Bible.

According to Luke 17, this is what happened. As Jesus was crossing the border between Galilee and Samaria, 10 lepers met him. Leprosy, of course, was a hideous disease that's slowly ate one's skin and bones away. Equally hideous were its social consequences. So contagious was leprosy that a leper had to move to a leper colony far removed from family, friends, and civilization. But these 10 lepers had heard about the one called Jesus, and hope was kindled in their hearts.

As the Lord approached them, the 10 lepers stood at a distance and shouted out, "Jesus, Master, have mercy upon us." Christ commanded them to show themselves to the priest, which, according to Old Testament law, was what a healed leper was supposed to do. But they were not yet healed! Thus the fact that the ten went anyway, revealed them to be men of faith. If the Master had told them to go to the priest, then somehow, some way, they believed they would be healed by the time they arrived. And as they had and hoped and believed, along the way they were healed.

One of them, a Samaritan, when he had discovered that he was healed, "returned, and with a loud voice glorified God, then fell down on his face at his feet, giving him thanks." When he saw the Samaritan, Jesus immediately wondered about the other nine. "Were there not 10 cleansed? But where are the nine? Were there not any found who returned to give glory to God except this foreigner?"

These words of Christ clearly show that He was disappointed in the nine. What displeased Jesus about them? Was it that they did not thank God at all? Hardly. It is difficult to believe that these men, so miraculously healed by Jesus, would not have been thanking God in some way. Few are that cold hearted.

It is much more probable that they, upon discovering their healing, were rushing like mad to get to the priest, so that they could go home! If you had been separated from your family and friends for months or years where would you want to go first? So let us not be too hard on these nine. And let us be precise about what they did wrong.

Their sin was not that they didn't thank God at all. Their sin was that they, unlike the Samaritan, didn't take the time to return to thank Jesus PUBLICLY.

Jesus took them to task for this. "Where are the nine?" He asks. How it is it that only this foreigner "returned to give glory to God"? Christ said this because the Samaritan was the only one who took the time to thank Jesus publicly. He did so with a "loud voice" and fell on his face at Jesus' feet.

The message from God is clear: private thanksgiving, though pleasing to God, is not enough: it is no substitute for public thanksgiving. Our Lord Jesus Christ expects us, demands of us, that we, like the Samaritan, return and publicly think him. For we also have been cleansed, but from a disease much more hideous than leprosy. We have been healed from the damning consequences of sin by the atoning blood of Jesus. He was publicly executed for us. We should find the time to publicly thank him for it.

And this on a regular basis, not just at Thanksgiving. The 100th Psalm speaks of the desire that all true Christians have to "enter into his gates with thanksgiving, and into his courts with praise. Be thankful to him, and bless his name." Those who are Christians want to thank Jesus publicly as often as they can.

This is a message that our private, isolationist, individualist culture doesn't want to hear but needs to hear: publicly thanking Jesus with the community of Christians (at Church) is not optional. You have been cleansed. How long will you continue to be like the nine?