Luke 17:15Then one of them, when he saw that he was healed, turned back, praising God with a loud voice; 16and he fell on his face at Jesus’ feet, giving him thanks. Now he was a Samaritan. 17Then Jesus answered, “Were not ten cleansed? Where are the nine? 18Was no one found to return and give praise to God except this foreigner?” 19And he said to him, “Rise and go your way; your faith has made you well.”
Thank you.
St. Paul begin 7 of his epistles with a thanksgiving to God for the church’s or the individual that he is writing to and it shames to realize that I have yet to begin single sermon in the same manner.
So here it is again in a more complete way.
I thank my God for you – as a church and as individuals.
I thank my God for you that you receive God’s Word in repentance and faith and thanksgiving and joy and that you receive me as God’s Word with thanksgiving and prayer and generosity and love and support.
Kelly and I often thank God for you ask why you are so nice to us and the only satisfying answer we have come up with is this:
Because you love Jesus.
I thank my God for all of you.
And I wonder if you hear this very often.
Jesus in our text cleanses 10 men with leprosy. 10 men cleansed and healed from this painful, isolating, debilitating disease.
10 men who begged Jesus for mercy from a distance and 10 men who received mercy to once be close and near to Jesus and others.
And only one turned back, praising God, fell at the feet of Jesus and gave him thanks.
Were not ten cleansed? Where are the nine?
And I know you know somewhat what that’s like.
I know you do much good. You sacrifice much. You are generous and forgiving and wise and honest and kind and hard working.
You have received much from Jesus and you still are and you begin to recognize that and return to Him to give Him thanks.
Your faith has saved you and the Holy Spirit has and is bearing His fruit of love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, 23gentleness, self-control;
And you do this in your church, family, work and everywhere you go.
And as people receive you and the things you, a “thank you,” or an “I thank God for you,” can go a long way.
And lack of thankfulness can make you feel very weary.
Sometimes the good you do is repaid with little recognition, quick forgetfulness or worse.
Sometimes, you hear or feel a great dissatisfaction and complaining of who you are what you do.
Sometimes, people in your life feel entitled to the things you do for them.
A story goes of a beggar who received $20 from a man on Monday and $20 from the same man one Tuesday and $20 from the same man on Wednesday and on Thursday when that same man just smiled and started to pass by, asked, “Hey, where’s my $20?”
We don’t do it for the recognition or the praise or the thanks.
We do it out of recognition and praise and thanks for God.
One of our marks is we:
Love our enemies and pray for those who persecute us, 45 so that we may be sons of our Father who is in heaven. For he makes his sun rise on the evil and on the good, and sends rain on the just and on the unjust.
We don’t just love those who love us and do good to those who or when they recognize it and give thanks, nearly everyone does that.
We are children of the Father who does much good in creating and preserving all and in even sending His Son to die for all and in even sending His Christian out to preach and teach and baptize all – whether there is reception and thanksgiving or abuse, entitlement and rejection.
But let’s recognize the hurt we’ve received or are receiving, lest being sinned, work in our sinful flesh enmity, strife, fits of anger, rivalries, dissensions and divisions and things like these.
The 10 Commandments help us see our sin and they also help us see where we have been sinned against.
Dissatisfaction and discontentment and unthankfulness dwell not only in our hearts, but in the hearts of others, too and this often hurts and wearies our hearts.
It can often quench our generosity and goodness,
begin to smolder our love and gentleness,
and begin to harden our kindness and patience and joy and self control.
We are children of our Heavenly Father, but we are not yet perfect as He is perfect.
We weary and want to stop sometimes and sometimes let others receive what they deserve and not show mercy.
We prayed today that because of our frailty, we cannot but fall, but Lord keep us from all things hurtful and lead us to all things profitable to our salvation.
Were not ten cleansed? Where are the nine?
If they did and do it to us, they did and do it to Jesus first and second and a million time more.
But we have something here today that the leper who was cleansed and healed and thankful had, we have the gift or returning back to the source of all gifts and healing and cleansing in Jesus.
We can return to Him again today to receive healing again for the hurt we have received and forgiveness and wisdom for the hurt that we have caused
Not being thanked has a way of contaminating us and spreading, kind of like leprosy. It sometimes harms not only our goodness, but our own thankfulness to God and to others.
Today, Jesus does something amazing. He gives us the gift of thanking Him for all of His goodness.
We don’t have to wait to be sick to thank Him for the health we do have.
We don’t have to wait to see the fire or the storm to thank Him for the house and possessions we do have
or to see the war to thank Him for relative,
or the famine to thank Him for food and drink,
or to wait to feel alone and unloved to thank Him for friends and Christians we do have.
And we don’t have to wait to feel hurt by others sin, to receive healing or wait to feel guilty to receive His forgiveness.
We get to thank God, Father, Son and Holy Spirit today because God Himself is present.
We get to say “thank You,” because the You of all of these good gifts and more is present now.
Our liturgy of the Lord’s Supper says that we should at all times and in all places give thanks to You, holy Lord, Almighty Father, Everlasting God.
The Lord’s Supper is an amazingly unique gift.
Jesus brings healing with His body and blood – He strengthens us.
Jesus brings forgiveness with His body and blood – He gives us peace.
And Jesus is here to give us opportunity and increase our thanksgiving for Him.
We get to return again to God and do and say such words as thank, praise, bless, worship, glorify and alleluia.
If we have received good, it came first from His hands.
If we have done good, we were only borrowing that which He first gave us.
Your Father sees in secret.
He sees what your right hand is doing even if the left hand doesn’t.
And He knows how to reward.
I can’t say it’s okay to not be thanked as you should – but I can say do not weary in doing good.
It’s the fruit of the Spirit that is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, self-control, not the fruit of being thanked.
You are son and daughter of the Heavenly Father who does make the sun shine and rain fall on both those who recognize Him and those who don’t.
More than that, our Heavenly Father sent His Son to heal and feed and cleanse the thankful and the unthankful.
And even more than that, Jesus, the Son of God, died while the sun refused to shine, to pray for those who were crucifying Him, and to forgive all who did not fully know what they were doing.
That’s our Jesus who is here.
That’s our Jesus who we thank.
That’s our Jesus who I thank because you love Him and because of that, you love me as His pastor, too.