On the way to Jerusalem he was passing along between Samaria and Galilee. And as he entered a village, he was met by ten lepers, who stood at a distance and lifted up their voices and said, "Jesus, Master, have mercy on us."
- St. Luke 17:11-13
Our Lord was progressing through Galilee and Samaria, with His final destination being the holy city of Jerusalem, and He comes to a village. Just before He entered, there were ten men with the dreaded disease of leprosy standing off at a distance.
They were separate because it was the law, which was very clear: “He that is unclean, he shall dwell alone.” A legal distance had been established for these social outcasts. They were to keep the distance of a hundred paces between themselves and anyone who was passing by. So there they were, gathered together as a little society of their own. The law didn’t care if they stuck together. They were all unclean, so it was of little importance whether they banded together.
As Jesus and His disciples got closer, the law would have required the lepers to cry out “Unclean, unclean” to warn them to stay away. But these afflicted men must have heard somehow that Jesus had healed others of this horrible disease, so this time they attracted Christ’s attention by calling out, “Jesus, Master, have mercy on us.”
In their misery and in their desperation, they wanted Jesus to show His mastery over this curse which was on them – and so He does. He tells them to go to the temple priests, in obedience to the law of Moses. They were to go as though they were already cleansed. This was the act of faith they were required to make. Still bearing the ravages of the disease, they were to go on their way as though they were cured. And their obedience to Him completed their cleansing.
Can we even begin to imagine what that cure must have meant to them? All the poison passed from their decaying bodies; all the corrupt flesh was restored like the flesh of a little child; all that had been mutilated and distorted was renewed to complete health. It was scarcely short of an actual resurrection for these men who had been enduring a “living death.”
But one of the ten – hurrying off with the others to get his certificate of health – when he felt that healing going through his body, was moved by an intense and adoring gratitude. He at once turned back to give his thanks to the One who had cured him.
Our Lord Jesus Christ seems to be especially moved by this act of gratitude by the one man who returned. He had cured all ten of them, but it was only to this one that he said, “Your faith has made you well…” or, perhaps more accurately, “Your faith has made you whole.” This was a gift far beyond that of simple physical healing. Now, a new way of life belonged to this man. The other nine had faith enough to believe in Christ’s power, and they received health and strength, and so were able to go back to life as it was. But this one was struck by the love of Jesus Christ, and he received not only health and strength, but he was drawn into a new and close relationship with God. He knew that, in Christ, he had met God face to face. And that knowledge made him a whole person, a complete person. No longer would he settle, like the other nine, for life as it had been. Now he would be able to grow closer to God through his relationship with Jesus Christ.
As the Gospel describes this event – something that happened to real people in an actual place at a particular time – a picture of the Church itself is painted. We started out by seeing the lepers, standing in dire need outside the village, reminding us that every one of us has stood outside God’s Kingdom. We were conceived and born in sin, created by God but separated from Him. We heard the lepers cry out, “Jesus, Master, have mercy on us,” – and so did our parents and godparents at the time of our baptism. They cried out to God, asking for His mercy upon us, that we might receive a new birth in baptism, making us children of God through water and the Holy Ghost. And as Jesus cleansed the lepers when they asked in faith, so He has cleansed each one of us with the waters of baptism. Our original sin – the sin of Adam which stained each one of us – it was washed away, and we were made new and living members of God’s Kingdom. And as the nine of those lepers ran off to the priests to receive their certificates of health so they could rejoin society and pick up their lives where they had left off, so we need to take care that we don’t treat our baptism in the same way – making our certificate of baptism into a kind of “certificate of health” – costing nothing, making no demands on us. It is a sad fact that there are some who try to make sure that their baptism into the death and resurrection of Jesus Christ doesn’t unduly interrupt their everyday lives!
What takes place at baptism is no less astonishing than what took place outside that village. And yet, how often we are more like the nine than the one. How infrequently, it seems, do we remember the marvelous fact of what happened when the water was poured over us, and God drew us to Himself as a father embraces his children. How little gratitude we seem to show when we’re grudging in the way we take part in the work of the Church, in our prayers, in the time we actually give to God.
But just as the tenth leper was made whole through the thanks he returned to Christ, so our wholeness and our holiness come from returning proper thanks to Almighty God – thanks for the miracle of life, thanks for the gift of new birth in baptism, thanks for the forgiveness of our sins, thanks for the sacrifice of Jesus on the cross, thanks for the gift of the Body and Blood of our Lord in Holy Communion, thanks for the gifts of the Holy Spirit, thanks for the promise of eternal life with God in heaven.
It is right, and it is our bounden duty, that we should give thanks to God with all that makes up our lives: our time, our gifts, our energy, our devotion. And as we receive the Most Holy Sacrament of the Altar, may it be our promise that each one of us will be like the leper who turned back and thanked Jesus. May we thank Him with a faith and a gratitude which will, in turn, make us both whole and holy, and so better able to help heal this broken world.
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Image: Detail from "The Cleansing of the Lepers"
The Codex Aureus of Echternach, 11th c.