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After making a peanut butter and jelly sandwich, I handed it to our then 4 year old daughter and waited.  When there was no response, I said, “You forgot your thank you”, to which she said thank you.  She stared at her sandwich a bit, then she look up at me a bit more and then said, “You forgot your welcome.”

From our earliest years, we are taught proper manners. In fact, the first rule of etiquette we learn and teach is the most general expression of gratitude, “Thank you.”  These two words help us to see “it is not all about us and our individual needs.” Rather, calling our attention to the efforts and caring of another, they remind us that we are connected to others and that we do not stand alone. The utterance of these two simple words, throughout life, says so much about what we honor and appreciate, what we value. “Gratitude teaches us the truth about our lives.” (J. Thomas)

When we offer gratitude, when we experience the blessing of giving thanks, life becomes rich. When it seems absent, we are often left waiting for an explanation of what just happened.  

Traveling towards Jerusalem to face the reality of the cross, somewhere between Samaria and Galilee, Jesus encountered ten lepers, social outcasts, on the side of the road—calling to him—pleading for him to have compassion on them and to heal them.

According to the rules of their society, the ten, nine who were Jewish and one a Samaritan, all rejected, yet united in their suffering, were forced to live on the edge of town set apart from everyone else. Leprosy, both a medical condition and often understood as a sign of God’s judgment was desired by no one, distance was kept. The ten could scrounge about for food around the town’s borders and in the trash. They could also beg for things they needed as people walked along the road, but they could not go into town, nor could anyone come near to them.

Seeing Jesus walk towards Jerusalem, they call out to him rather than come close to him and unlike other moments when Jesus healed the sick, he does not come close to them and does not touch them.  Instead, Jesus acknowledged their predicament, then sent them to show themselves to their priests, where according to Leviticus law, they could be inspected, declared ritually clean and thus restored to the community and the temple. They went, and along the way, there were healed.

Nine continued the journey to their priest with the hope of returning to their hometowns and to a full life in the community with their family and friends, telling the story of what Jesus had done. One, too full of joy to do otherwise, came back to find Jesus to offer gratitude, and he did so in a big way! He fell on his knees and put his face on Jesus’ feet and said thank you. Thank you, thank you, thank you!

Only one came back! Only one. But why only one? This perplexing reality can cause us to slip into complacency or static wondering what happened to the other nine. Jesus is not necessarily helpful with this as he is the one who raises the question in the first place. He asks, “Were not ten healed, where are the other nine?”

Some suggest when pondering the question Jesus asks, it is helpful to consider the inflection of the words and the impact that inflection has on the meaning of what is being heard. The focus here is not on what is being said, but on what is being heard.  For instance,

“Where are the other nine?” (statement)”

“Where are the other nine?” (harsh disappointment inquisitive)

“The nine, where are they/Where are the other nine?” (judgment)

How we hear the question does indeed have an impact on how we feel about and judge those who did not return to meet Jesus face to face. The inflection can also determine how much we read into their physical absence and what appears to be the absence of their gratitude.

The text does not tell us why the nine did not return, but this we do know, the nine did what Jesus commanded to do. They go to the priest and on their way they are healed from their skin disease. This we can surmise, “Jesus knows where they are and Jesus knows they are grateful… or confused… or preoccupied… or empty or grieving, or doubtful.  Jesus always knows these things about us…”

So if Jesus knows these things about the nine, perhaps, just perhaps, the only reason to raise the question in the first place is to draw our attention to the one who returned to give thanks. There is no need for us to wait for clarity about what just happened, for as we, you and I, listen to the text, we are being drawn to experience the richness gratitude brings to our own lives.

The one leper who returned to Jesus after being healed of the skin disease was a Samaritan, an outsider. As such, when he stood with the other nine, he was twice scorned, twice rejected, twice removed from the community. We can only imagine the depth of his gratitude for physical healing.  It is even more challenging to consider the depth of his gratitude for the encounter with Jesus. In this moment, the doctrinal and spiritual boundary that separated him the other nine became permeable. In gratitude, he fell down before Jesus and touched his feet. The Samaritan touched Jesus.

The Samaritan’s return to Jesus in order to give thanks was not generated by an obligatory response spurred on by early lessons in proper etiquette; rather, his thankful return was inspired by his experience of grace and a yearning for an even more intimate relationship with God.

What do you do with the moments in your life when you have experienced grace and healing, culturally, physically, spiritually or otherwise?  Gratitude is an acknowledgement of grace.

Hearing Jesus’ command that they go and show themselves to the priests, the one begins the walk alongside the nine to the temple. Remember, the priests were the ones who had the authority to pronounce them socially and ritually clean, in essence they had the authority to define the social and religious status of all ten. Either they would become a part of their communities once again, or they would be sent back to the outskirts of town. As they walked, the one experienced a shift in theology. Grounded in the traditions of his faith and community, his encounter with Jesus invites him to experience a broader, more inclusive view of God and of God’s people. With his eyes wide open, and with an openness to what he had experienced, he leaves the nine without the blessing of the priests and returns to Jesus to give thanks. He does not reject his religious and cultural background; it is just that through his experience with Jesus, he sees the world anew.

So, this text invites us to ponder, in what ways have you been invited to acknowledge your roots while broadening your view of all God’s people, of Jesus and the Samaritan, of God’s world? Sometimes it takes someone unexpected, to open our eyes to the blessings and wonders around us. Gratitude is an offering of love inclusion and welcome.

At the end of the story of the ten lepers, Jesus said to the one, “Rise and go, your faith has made you well.”  There are four times in the Gospel of Luke where we hear these words. We hear them when Mary, a woman whose reputation was questioned, washed the feet of Jesus, and when we encounter them in story of the woman who bled for years. We hear these words, “Your faith has made you well” when the blind man is made to see and then again when the Samaritan leper falls at Jesus feet. Each one of these people stopped to thank Jesus for his healing grace and in each instance, after an experience of healing, Jesus tells them that it is their openness and willingness to experience transformation that made them whole.

In what ways have you been invited to open yourself to an experience of transformation? Gratitude is knowing your faith has made you well. “Your faith has made you well” In essence, through these words Jesus is saying’ “Your welcome!”  Unlike the time I needed to be reminded by my 4 year old daughter, Jesus never forgets a Grace-filled, “Your welcome.”

Thanks be to God.

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