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This Week's Sermon THE TWENTIETH SUNDAY after PENTECOST 14 October 2007 "Your Faith Has Made You Well" Luke 17:11-19 LSB Series C Vicar Heath A. Trampe Soli Deo Gloria!

How do we determine if something is clean or not? That's hard to say, because we all have our own definitions of clean. Children are likely to see clean as a different phenomenon than their parents. If you've seen the recent advertisements on television for hand sanitizers and spray-on disinfectants, you can clearly see, in a comical setting, that children don't have strict boundaries about cleanliness. One child admits to another that they don't wash their hands, while another brags about playing with his toys in the toilet. Now this almost turns our delicate and sophisticated adult stomachs, but really how clean are we? The latest discovery about antibacterial soap that we use in our homes is that it really doesn't do anything special because of its small concentration of active ingredient. So is it important to really be clean, or simply to imagine that we are? Isn't ignorance bliss? Perhaps with basic hygiene this is true, but what about spiritual cleansing? Is this something that we can just fake our way through? And if it isn't, how do we become clean? Is it by our works that we do for others, or is it outside of ourselves? We as Christians speak about being cleansed by the blood of the Lamb, namely Jesus Christ. In today's Gospel Jesus does some major cleansing, both spiritual and physical, but He doesn't use soap. In fact, when one of the healed lepers returns to worship Him, he declares to the man that

I. Your faith has made you well, but this faith is not of yourself. (vv. 11-14)
II. Your faith has made you well, and this faith is found only in Christ. (vv. 15-19)

The Gospel for today starts with a group of lepers who sort of intercepted Jesus as He was entering a village. The text tells us that they kept their distance. You see, leprosy was a severe skin disease that caused the flesh to rot and disfigure. Since others could contract this disease by contact with the sick, lepers were usually ousted from their communities and had to live by themselves until they healed or died. It wasn't a good lifestyle and we can see why these individuals would come to Jesus.

Jesus wasn't a doctor, and these guys weren't looking for a diagnosis or slow remedy, they asked for something completely different. What were their exact words? The text tells us that they came to Jesus saying "Jesus, Master, have mercy on us!" If these guys really wanted to be healed of their disease, why didn't they ask Jesus for a cure? How often do we get on our knees when things seem awful in our lives, begging God to cure us of our malady? We even throw in a promise to do better if He will only do this for us. This example is anything but far fetched. You all, at some point or another in your lives, let grief overtake you and you forget the formality of your prayer. Even king David was forced to cry out to God, saying (Psalm 6) "Have mercy on me, O LORD, for I am weak; O LORD, heal me, for my bones are troubled". But these Lepers did not ask for a cure, they asked for mercy.

What is the condition that afflicts us all, causing such troubles in our lives as cancer and injury? Sin is the culprit, and we are all sinful from birth, from the time our mothers conceived us. When the paralyzed man was brought to Jesus in the second chapter of Mark, what did Jesus say to him? Did He say rise up and go? No, He said "your sins are forgiven you". And that paralyzed man was healed from that very moment. So also the lepers come to Jesus, asking for His mercy. They know that they are sinful, and they know that sin is the cause of their sorrow. This is faith.

Faith is understanding that Christ is the only one who can truly cure us of our sin. The difficulty we wrestle with is whether the men came to have this faith on their own or if it was given to them. That shall be covered later. For the moment, let's look at what happens in the text. Jesus tells them to "'Go and show yourselves to the priests.' And as they went they were cleansed". There you have it, a genuine miracle. They probably didn't even have to go to the priests, but Jesus instructed them to do so. This was in accordance with the Levitical law so that they could be incorporated back into regular society. Jesus was telling them to go home and resume their lives. But what happens next? What does faith have to do with all of this?

When we last heard from the leprous individuals, they were on their way to the temple to get a clean bill of health and to resume their normal lives. This would have been a great day for all involved! Families would once more be united, and beloved friends would be back in the fold of society. But not all the lepers make it to the temple, do they? We read that "one of them, when he saw that he was healed, turned back, praising God with a loud voice; and he fell on his face at Jesus' feet, giving him thanks. Now he was a Samaritan". This guy is so happy to discover that he's really healed that he just has to go back and show his gratitude, but is that all that's happening here?

Jesus often referred to Himself as the kingdom of God. At His birth, the most holy place was no longer found in the temple, but within the person of Jesus Christ. For these lepers to go back to the temple, they were just doing what Christ told them they could, and they would be getting back to their lives, but one of them knew better. Instead of going to the temple, he worshipped where God really was, in the person of Jesus Christ. While faith led each of the lepers to ask for healing and forgiveness, only one possessed true faith, the faith that seeks Christ out. The only way Christians can see their sin and know that they are worthy of death and condemnation is the power of the Holy Spirit. This is the only reason that we don't curse God each and every time something goes wrong with us. Praying to the Lord in times of affliction is contrary to our human nature, a nature that has put us at enmity with God. We pray because the Holy Spirit has led us to do so. And prayer is powerful.

Why did we mention that this leper was a Samaritan? Samaritans weren't exactly friendly with the Jews. As such, they seldom interacted with each other. The common plight of these lepers probably caused the racial boundaries to fall during their illness, but now he'd most likely go home to his own people. The Jews, supposedly God's chosen people, ignored the reality of Christ and went about their lives. This Samaritan, who was unclean by Jewish standards, was the one who displayed faith, and he was rewarded for this. What is the result of this faithful ex-leper's prayer? Jesus tells him "Rise and go your way; your faith has made you well".

This is potentially confusing. On the surface, it appears as though all of the men are equally well. Likewise, Christians can come to be confused when great things happen to unbelievers. We must remember that God is the author of all good things, and that He showers His blessings on all people, not just Christians. But we are given the gift of faith and, ultimately, eternal life. The Samaritan was praised for his faith. He's made well by Christ, meaning that his life will blessed as a child of God. The other lepers are healed and made socially clean, but what is the condition of their spiritual disease? By not recognizing Christ in the flesh, they're missing the point. All were healed of leprosy, but one of them will surely see life everlasting.

As Christians, we concern ourselves with cleanliness. We not only keep our appearances up with hygiene, but we're also aware of our spiritual cleanliness. The more we try to "clean up" our spiritual condition with our own works, the dirtier it gets. It's like wiping a countertop with a piece of raw chicken. It may appear clean at times, but ultimately you're making things worse. What comfort we have as baptized children of God that we have one who cleans everything for us! As I mentioned before, we're cleansed in the blood of the Lamb. Our flesh is now whiter than snow. To our heavenly Father, we are now more pure and precious than anything this world contains, we are truly clean.