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“Gratitude”
a sermon by
Thomas L. Jenkins
Text: Luke 17:11-19
“He prostrated himself at Jesus’ feet and thanked him.”
DEAR SISTERS AND BROTHERS, last Sunday, which was the World Communion
Sunday, before the breaking of the bread and the pouring of the wine, I
shared with you that the opening prayer of communion is titled “Great
Thanksgiving.” It has
been labeled in the church as the greatest prayer of thanksgiving that
we share together; because we are grateful to God for showing us the
real presence of Christ in the Lord’s Supper, through the prophets of
the Hebrew Bible and the Apostles of the New Testament, and 2000 years
of the Christian church.
One major part of the Reformation that began in the 1500s, that we are
part of, was discerning Christ’s real presence in the hearing and
preaching the Word of God. Christ
is real and present in the time of the Word and in the time of the
Lord’s Supper. One aspect
of revival, that is growing in our denomination, that I support, is
having the Word and the Lord’s Supper during every worship service,
the real presence of Christ.
Experiencing, and knowing the real presence of God in the human being of
Jesus of Nazareth, and returning to Jesus in the great Spirit of
gratitude is the uniqueness of this Samaritan.
One of the greatest gifts that God will give to us, in our lives,
is to come to know and see Christ’s ministry to us, even outside of
what we might commonly think of as religion.
This is no way of saying that church is not important.
Our church relationships--the love that we experience with others
in Christ—is the greatest flock that we are sheep in.
One of the truths that the church needs to learn and share with
others is that when they are passionately and wonderfully living out
their human gifts, they are participating with Jesus Christ.
When Tiger Woods is birdying almost every hole, in a golf tournament,
many people say “he is in the zone.”
Actually, he is deeper that in the zone.
He is in the Holy Spirit. He
is playing golf with Jesus Christ.
A colleague’s father retired recently from a job for almost 40 years
where he delivered bread to grocery stores.
He is a wonderful Christian, attending church twice on Sunday and
each Wednesday night. Another
friend of mine, a minister, asked the dad, one night when they were out
fishing, “where was Christ in your life all these years?”
And the man said, “That’s a good question.
I’m not sure.” Christ was with and in that man every day that
he was delivering bread. No
one wants another human being feed more than Christ.
These two friends of mine, and I, were out fishing one day; we were
talking theology, having fun, praising God in a fishing kind of way.
And, my friend Baxter said, “You may not know this, but we were
just in church.”
Jesus said: “Where two or three
are gathered in my name, there I will be with you.”
You get together with Christian friends; go out and have good human fun,
talk about your faith and love for Christ, what you are experiencing,
what you are gratified to God about, and you will be in church, even if
it is on the beach.
These lepers, apparently, had heard that Jesus of Nazareth was walking
into their village. Nine
were Jewish; one was Samaritan. There
were racial and political disorders between the Jews and Samaritans.
But, when a common misfortune comes upon people, racism breaks
down. The Jews allowed the
Samaritan to be with them. And
when Jesus was walking in their direction, they kept distance from him.
This was a rule from Jewish religion.
The Samaritan obeyed that with them.
They called out to the Lord, “Jesus,
Master, have mercy on us!” Then,
when Jesus saw them, he said, “Go
and show yourselves to the priests.”
Telling them to go and show themselves to the priests, was a sign to the
Jews that they were going to be healed.
In the Old Testament book of Leviticus, whenever someone has a
situation of uncleanness, like leprosy, they were to go to the priests
and follow a complete purification ritual that consisted of three
elements: (1) a waiting period, (2) a cleansing time, and (3) sacrifices
offered to God. If a person
was healed through this ritual, then only the priest could proclaim them
as clean.
So, when Jesus told all ten of these lepers to go to the priests, the
Jewish ones had their religious rituals on their minds.
The Samaritan probably did not know about it.
Maybe he did. However,
when he saw himself made clean, he turned around, was praising God with
a loud voice, and when he reached Jesus, he fell at his feet, thanking
him.
Even though Jesus asked, “where are the other nine?”
He knew what they were doing.
They were committed to filling out the three rituals with the
priests from the book of Leviticus.
Had they turned around and come back to Jesus (which is a picture of
repentance), Jesus would have probably said the same thing to them: “Get
up and go your way; your faith has made you well.”
This does not mean that the other nine were not healed.
They probably were, just like this Samaritan.
And maybe they did go to the priests, involved themselves in the
rituals, and believed that God healed them.
That could have happened, and it very well might have.
This is not about knocking down the Jews. This is about the
wonderful gift of seeing where we are participating with Jesus Christ in
our human lives.
And as we turn and run to Jesus, in our humanity, what we love as
humans, and fall down at the feet of Jesus, he will tell us too, “Get
up and go on your way; your faith has made you well.”
Get into what you love as a human being.
Now, you do need to love good human characteristics, not some
part of sinful human flesh. Go
at it; give it your best. Love
it. Know that you are
joining with Christ. As we
hear this, believe in this, apply this in our lives, Christ is going to
show us that this very kind of faith, that sees God in our humanity,
makes us well in being human with God.
One of my favorite movies in the 80s was the Chariots
of Fire. It was based
the true situation of the summer Olympics in the early 1900s.
It showed the story of about three runners who were competing
with each other; two were Christian and one was Jewish.
There were different beliefs about weather they would race if the
Olympics were on a Sunday.
There was a scene, in the early part of the movie, where Eric Liddell
was contemplating the whole notion of racing in the Olympics.
He was involved in ministry in the Church of Scotland. His sister was trying to communicate to him that he needed to
get his mind off this whole notion of being in the Olympics, because of
his ministry in the church.
After some time, thinking deep within his heart, his response was,
“God loves me when I am racing. I
feel closest to God when I am running.”
He went ahead, won the Olympics.
And later in his life, he became a Christian missionary in Chine.
Wouldn’t it be a wonderful aspect within the church, if we found ways
to express the gratitude that we have for seeing Christ in our humanity,
with us?
Let us pray…
Amen |