Episode Transcript
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Just by way of background. We
think about Thanksgiving and supposedly even the the
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secular world recognizes the importance of giving
thanks what do we, as parents,
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or any parents in these days,
say? Oh, the magic words are
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please and thank you. There is
supposed to be a certain courtesy, a
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certain understanding, even for those who
do not purport to be Christians. And
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there is a tremendous amount of things
to be thankful for, because God pours
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out common grace even on those who
do not believe him. He gives rain
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sometimes on the on the just and
the unjust alike. He brings all kinds
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of blessings. But again, we
are very, very confused about what real
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biblical Thanksgiving is all about. And
it's a it is a crucial issue because
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when they look back into Romans,
you may have remembered many months ago when
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pastor Choka started is the Roman study. What is one of the first things
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that Paul brings out in his general
condemnation, but particularly of those who don't
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have the law, gentiles? In
Romans one, beginning of verse eighteen,
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it talks about for the wrath of
God is revealed from Heaven Against All ungodliness
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and unrighteousness of men who buy their
unrighteousness suppress the truth. What is that
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truth? What it can be known
about God as plain to them, because
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God has shown it to them,
for his invisible attributes, namely his eternal
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power and divine name, have been
clearly perceived ever since the creation of the
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world in the things that have been
made. So they are without excuse,
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for although they knew God, they
did not honor him as God or give
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thanks to him, but they became
futile in their thinking and their foolish hearts
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were darkened. Lack of real Thanksgiving
to God is a fundamental characteristic of an
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ungodly person. kind of makes sense. However, if we look around,
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there's a lot of confusion about true
biblical thankfulness, even amongst professing believers.
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That can creep in, particularly in
the kind of culture they were involved in
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the day. So we need to
understand what we are about when we are
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giving thanks and act accordingly. As
a way of kind of working through these
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things, I want to direct your
attention to an incident in Christ's earthly ministry
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found in Luke, chapter seventeen.
So if you had turned back to that,
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going to unpack this fairly short little
episode, but there's a lot to
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it. Actually, I'm going to
be referring to a lot of passages that
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I won't have a time to discuss
in any detail. So I would suggested
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maybe you'd like to make notes about
some of the reason they might be fruitful
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for you to look into in the
week as you approach the Thanksgiving Day.
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So we're looking at luke chapter seventeen, versus eleven through nineteen, and I'll
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give you a moment. I didn't
tell you that before, but so we're
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looking luke seventeen, beginning at verse
eleven. On the way to Jerusalem,
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he was passing along between s Mary
and Galilee and as he entered the village
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he was met by ten leppers who
stood at a distance and lifted up their
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voices saying Jesus Master, have mercy
on us. When he saw them,
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he said to them go and show
yourselves to the priests, and as they
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went they were cleansed. Then one
of them, when he saw that he
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was healed, turned back praising God
with a loud voice and he fell on
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his face at Jesus feet, giving
him thanks. Now he was a Samaritan.
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Then Jesus answered, we're not ten
cleansed. Where are the nine?
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Was No one found. Return and
give praise to God except this foreigner,
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and he said to him, rise
and go your way. Your faith has
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made you well. So let's go
through this text a little bit, verse
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by verse, and kind of unpack
some of the implications. There's a lot
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of historical background that we need to
understand to get to the full meaning of
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it, and then we'll see how
it applies. So he's going through this
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area on his way back to Jerusalem
and it's between Samaria and Galilee, and
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this is historically important and you'll begin
to see already the implications of this area
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leprosy and other things by remembering that
this is the area where the Prophet Elisha
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had his ministry and there's a famous
episode where he healed the Syrian general name
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and from leprosy. So is right
in the same area that leprosy was being
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dealt with. So he's in this
unnamed village, he's met by these ten
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lepers and they stood at a distance. That little phrase has a tremendous weight
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of cultural meaning. Leprosy is a
dreadful disease in itself. We are not
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entirely clear what today we call leprosy, Hanson's disease, whether that is what
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they call leprosy then. But the
symptoms and the results are well known.
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Basically, while you're still alive,
your flesh waste away. Often it's the
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nose and other pieces of cartilage.
Often there are terrible running sores. It
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affects the nerves so that often the
sense of touch is lost and you don't
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know that you've been injured. You
can't even take care of yourself, and
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so there's more damage. And so, as a result there's loss of limbs,
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noses, Chins, ears, general
gross deformity. But what's important is
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it in scripture, leprosy is closely
tied to sin, at in fact almost
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a symbol of what it means to
be a sinful person. For example,
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back in numbers twelve, when Miriam
basically sparked a revolt against Moses, was
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questioning his God given authority, God
struck her with a leprosy. And Second
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Chronicles Twenty six, King Ziah,
when he attempted to do what was not
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fit for him as king but rather
to go in and act like a priest
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and offer sacrifice, he was struck
for the rest of his life with little
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leprosy. And so we see that
there is a clear spiritual connection between leprosy
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as a punishment and as a symptom
of sinfulness. And in those days when
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you were a leper, you are
essentially cut off from everyone. You became
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a living dead person, a nonperson. There's a whole lot of details in
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Leviticus, chapter thirteen fourteen about how
pre not go they we're not talking about
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doctors, we're talking priests, are
to detect leprosy and people or even in
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pieces of property. It could be
affected in houses. So they're moral implications
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here, and it's talking about evil
inside and outside. Inside the house,
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outside the house, visible on skin. If it's found, the person who
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is unclean has to go around with
his clothes torn to reveal the disease and
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heads uncovered. These are also typical
Jewish signs of mourning, and they had
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a lot to be mourning about.
They were to cover the mustache or the
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face masked. It's another sign of
mourning, but also they wrapped their dead
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covered up, so they're almost like
again a dead person. So he is
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unclean, she is unclean and must
live totally outside the camp, no longer
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a part of the community. They
have to go around crying, unclean so
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no one will come near and be
contaminated, cannot participate in any religious activity.
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So basically the leper was someone who
is at a distance literally from both
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men and God. No community,
no relationship to God, effectively dead while
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alive. In that numbers twelve episode, after Miriam is stricken with her leprosy,
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Aaron says, do not let her
be like one dead where flesh is
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half eaten away, when he comes
from his mother's womb. So we can
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see that this is a terrible state
to be in and it was recognized as
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being totally incurable by any human means. When the name and sends an inquiry
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to the King of Israel, saying
Hey, I hear you've got this Miracle
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Working Prophet. You know, maybe
you can help me, and the king's
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replies, am I god to kill
and make alive? Is, you know,
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human beings. Leprosy is what it
is. You know, there's nothing
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to be done about it. So
this is the situation that these people find
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themselves in and they come and they
call out to Jesus. Now what they're
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doing when they're calling out to him
is a little bit unclear. Can we
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call them in some sense believers,
some kind of faith? Because, as
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we just looked in Romans it says
that evil men don't honor God or give
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him thanks, and there are some
things about this episode which suggests that there
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is some kind of faith that's there, because they do apply to Jesus for
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what is known to be incurable by
human beings. So there is perhaps something
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to be in for there that,
because it's incurable by God except by God,
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that they recognize him for that and
they also call him master, they
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recognize him as an authority and as
I understand it, to that word in
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Greek epistaties is used only by Luke
in the Gospels and otherwise it's always about
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the disciples who are speaking to him. So there is some hints that perhaps
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they have some kind of a faith, but it's a difficult question because we
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also see that although they come this
way, once they received this word from
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Christ, they turn around and go
their way without actually even thanking him.
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To nine don't. So we remember
the parable of the soils, where there
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is a kind of faith, it
springs up and it's exuberance, but it
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doesn't last. It's not for real, it has no root. But there's
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also, and really there's a difference
between the nine and the one, and
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so that that's going to be significant. So they call out to him,
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they beg for His mercy, and
it's interesting because he doesn't say okay,
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you're well, you're healed, you're
okay now. Instead, he says go
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to the priests, and that's part
of the live dcus fourteen ritual where if
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someone believes that they are cured miraculously
by God of the leprosy, they have
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to go to the priest who found
them Lepros in the first place, and
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priests then certifies it. Yes,
you're okay now, and they're after sacrifices
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are made, then they're the declared
clean and allowed to re enter the community.
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But what we see here in the
text is that it says that as
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they were going they were healed.
So there is a certain trial of faith
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which is going on here. He
could have healed him instantaneously. This is
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a very interesting episode because it's the
only really mass healing the Christ does.
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He does it by ones and twos
and other places, but this is the
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only group of this size, and
so we know from those other episodes you
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could simply said you're clean, receive
your sight and it could have happened instantaneously.
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But he doesn't do that. They
had to, in a sense,
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step out in faith, not knowing
what the result would be, before the
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miracle was worked and they actually received
blessing. So we have these instances of
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instantaneous healings. So they had to
step out in faith. And just kind
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of a side note, what the
shows is it God doesn't work on everybody
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in the same way, particularly when
we look at our sanctification. There are
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some people who have problems, maybe
an addiction or something else, and they
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can come to Christ and be basically
instantly relieved of that. But there are
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other people who don't have that.
It takes a long time for the process
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to occur, if at all.
And so, as talks about in John's
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three the spirit moves like the wind. You don't know where it comes from,
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where he goes, how he's going
to work, and so we have
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to be very careful about applying kind
of cookie cutty, cookie cutter categories to
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people's experiences in coming to Christ.
So Christ gives them this command they go,
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but only one of them, who
realizes that he that he has been
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cleansed, comes back. And what
does he do? He glorifies God.
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He clearly proceeds the source of the
blessing. He doesn't just thank himself for
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being lucky or wow, I'm sure
glad I was part of that clinical trial
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or something like that. No,
he recognizes that this is a miracle,
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a blessing by God, and he
thanks Jesus, effectively acknowledging that Jesus is
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God. It would be totally improper
for him to thank him in this way.
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Unless he did that, and notice
that he does it with a loud
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voice. He's not off muttering in
a corner, but he's shouting so that
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basically the whole world, that everybody
that's within hearing, can know about it.
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And he falls on his face in
complete humble submission to Christ. That's
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the way you showed submission those days. You didn't come up with a hearty
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handshake or anything like that. You
say, Whoa, I am not fit
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to lace up your shoes. I
am bowing down before you in the dust.
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Isaiah hits the dust, you know, when he is confronted with God.
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This is the way we show our
submission. But notice this, and
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Luke particularly points it out. He
was a Samaritan, obviously not the same
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as the others who presumably were Jews, and this is important. Christ calls
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him a foreigner. He is outside
now the covenant community because after the separation
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of the kingdoms, they had thrown
out the worship of Jehovah which was conducted
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in Jerusalem. They installed Golden Calves
and after the conquest there were other,
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even non Smitic, peoples who are
brought in by the Assyrians to mix it
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all up, and so they ended
up with only acknowledging the five books of
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Moses to Pentituch as, carefully edited
to sooth or purposes. So this is
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where this division between Jews and Samaritans
came in. They were considered mongrels,
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no longer faithful to God. Again
an important point. We hear that God
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is no respect your persons. He
can save whoever he wants and he will.
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So we can't say, oh well, he's beyond the Pale, she's
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so bad it can't happen. God
works in mysterious ways and quite often not
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in ways that we would even suspect, and so Jesus notes this strange situation.
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Out of only out of ten,
only one gives any kind of public
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acknowledgement of his healing, and that
the least likely one, one who had
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normally despised Jews, has a poor
knowledge of God, and so he this
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one Samaritans, marked out for special
recognition and there appears to be a special
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blessing to because the language is important, because there are different words here.
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Jesus answered and said, we're not
ten cleansed. They got what they asked
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for, they had their physical leprosy
removed, but only to this one does
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he say your faith has made you
well. There's a clear distinction being drawn
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here. There's faith, there is
acknowledgement of Christ, there is real thankfulness,
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and so that's the only one who
is really well. So let's look
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at this and see how it applies
to us and to others today. Basically,
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we were looking at is a picture
of what, by nature, we
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are and how God deals with us
and right and wrong responses to His grace.
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Our natural state is that we are
spiritual lepers. We are born,
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even like in that reference to to
Miriam, as a child that comes out
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deformed and flesh eten and so forth. We're spiritual zombies. I aide Zombie
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movies, but they provide a wonderful
illustration the living dead, eaten up with
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corruption, incapable of doing anything but
shuffling around committing evil. So there's some
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kind of animation there, but it's
not to any good purpose and it's dead.
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They are dead to any spiritual good
and so we have this loathsome disease
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which cuts us off from God and
men. Ever since genesis three, this
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has been our genetic disease, passed
on sin, separated literally to greater lesser
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degrees, from God, certainly,
and even from our fellow men in the
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way we treat one another, and
we are utterly incapable of doing anything about
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it. We to the extent of
were alive. We're alive as slaves of
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sin were. Scripture also tells us
that we are dead in our trespasses and
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sins, or not just kind of
sick, we're not just making mistakes,
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we're dead in it, and dead
people can't do anything for themselves. So
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we are incapable in and of ourselves, in anything human, of dealing with
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our sin problem, this spiritual leprosy. But God can we see it.
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That which is impossible for man,
he does all the time. And so
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God deals with us. He gives
grace, not what we Merrit, because
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we don't merit anything we marry.
Well, we got grace, mercy,
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and he says, but not all. His is an electing grace, a
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distinguishing grace, just as we see
here. They're all these people who got
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the same benefits, should have been
thankful in the same ways, but only
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one really had the right kind of
faith. And actually, earlier I think
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it's Luke, for he talks about
Elijah and the healing of name and and
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he says they're all kinds of lepers, you know, wandering around needing healing.
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But God shows through Elisha to heal
this one man, this again a
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foreigner, and he does it by
the blood of Christ. Once again we
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see this tide in all the way
back. Will of it, because fourteen
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how is the healing recognized and an
effect made effectual to the eyes of the
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community? It's through the blood of
a sacrifice. We have the blood of
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a sacrifice applied to US Jesus Christ, and so we have an effesions to
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I'll let you read that, but
it's very familiar. Paul says. We
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were dead in our trespasses and sins, incapable of helping ourselves, but we
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were made alive passively God acting in
Christ. So how should we respond when
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we see God's grace in our lives, even in what we call the little
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things? How To respond? Well, the first thing we have to do
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is to in fact step out in
faith. Hebrews Eleven says that the faith
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is the assurance of things hoped for, the conviction of things not seen.
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We have to take the promises of
God at face value. I was struck
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by that of verse and at him
that we just saying before we started here,
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about God has said it, so
so it must be. I'm paraphrasing
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a little bit, but that was
the essence of the line. He doesn't
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change his mind, he doesn't lie. When he says it, when he
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promises it, it happens, and
so we need to rely on that,
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even when we aren't seeing results immediately, sometimes even when we know that through
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Christ we are convinced that we have
been justified, we have been saved,
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we've been brought into communion with him. It takes a while for that cleansing
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of our lives to become fully evident. That's the process of sanctification. Facts
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not going to become fully evident until
we're glorified. But it takes time.
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But what is our response? Say, oh well, I'm not seeing sanctification
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happening in my life, so I'll
just sit here and wait for some sanctification
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to come on me. No,
we have to get out and work for
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it. We make our calling and
election sure by obeying God's commandments, which
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include loving him, loving one another
and all it goes with that. So
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we have be diligent and obedient and, Paul says, to press on in
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order that we may lay hold of
that for which, all so we were
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laid hold of by Christ Jesus.
That's Philippian three and twelve. So we
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can't be complacent, we can't just
lie back and say, Oh well,
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I'm waiting for it to happen.
It'll all know when it gets here.
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It's getting here when we start getting
to it. So we have to step
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out in faith and then we have
to examine ourselves. It mentions that the
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lepers saw that they had been healed, and particularly this one, there has
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to be an awareness of our spiritual
condition. It. We can't say,
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Oh wow, he just happened,
that's cool, without again realizing the spiritual
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consequences. But most of all,
we must think and glorify God, and
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this really should be the natural response. How do I say that? Well,
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giving thanks. In Verse Sixteen.
That the Greek word used as Eucharisteo.
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That that that sound a little bit
familiar. That's where we get the
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term Eucharist for the Lord's Supper,
which means basically Jesus giving thanks, and
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the rude word in the Greek,
which is Charus or grace, is the
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stem for both the blessing or the
gift and for the term for giving thanks
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for it. It ought to be
automatic. You get a gift, you
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thanks that. That's what we're supposed
to do. So this, this blessing,
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should naturally call forth to thanks.
But we're not again totally sanctified,
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and so there is still that weight
of sin, that that ongoing propensity of
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sin that dwells in this even when
we have been justified and drawn to Christ.
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But it should work this way.
Psalm fifty, and I would recommend
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that as one of your readings.
God says, Call Upon me in the
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day of trouble. Okay, I
shall rescue you and you shall honor me.
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That ought to be the automatic sequence. You ask, he allows us
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to ask, he encourages us to
ask, he says ask of me.
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You know your your earthly parents know
how two good gifts give you good gifts.
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You know, think about me,
as your heavenly father, what kind
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of gifts I can give you.
But you've got to ask, call upon
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me. I rescue you and you
shall honor me. Now what should we
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how should we be doing this,
thanking and glorifying God? Well, it
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ought to be public as well as
private. Obviously we're going to be thanking
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God in our hearts, but he
also spoke it out. There is a
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real confession, a real witness as
going on here. He glorified God in
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a loud voice, prostrate to himself
before Christ. What is effusions to say?
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We are created for good works.
So we have word. Indeed,
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thank you God. I'm going to
do whatever I can to acknowledge that and
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go forward with it. That's a
proper response. How should we not respond?
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Well, we can respond by not
doing what we're supposed to do,
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by not by withholding our praise,
with holding thanksgiving. This is an integral
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part of the Christian life. Some
quick notes. In the Psalms Thanksgiving is
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referred to more than sixty times.
It's as very frequently appears, Christ himself
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gives thanks to God, his father, when he prays to him. Thanksgiving
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his commanded or commended in most of
Paul's epistles. Just get at your book
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and start tracing it through. Giving
of thanks in all circumstances is said to
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be the will of God in Christ
Jesus for You as first Tessalonians eighteen and
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revelation shows that the giving of thanks
as part of the worship that goes on
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in heavens. You Got Angels,
you got elders, you got living creatures.
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Everybody's giving thanks. So it's seemed
like it's pretty important. This ought
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to be the automatic response of a
truly saved person, and so if you're
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not, then you've got some questions, some self examination to do. Being
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given thanks pleases God. Another good
reading is psalm sixty nine, basically thirty
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three, thirty two. It pleases
him. That same psalm says it encourages
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others. It is basically obedient.
Just the things that I've talked about and
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if we don't, we lose a
benefit ourselves. Dr Lloyd Jones wrote a
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very insightful book on spiritual depression and
he said that there are many miserable question
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Christians who are that way because of
things they don't understand or don't do,
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and so that's something that we need
to bear in mind. Why are we
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miserable? Are we not understanding something
or are we not doing something that we
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understand that we should be doing?
God himself spoke to Kane. Kane was
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mad, he was upset. Is
Sacrifice had been rejected as improper, and
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God said the Kane, if you
do well, will not your countenance be
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lifted up? I forget which translation
that's in. It's not in the SV,
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but that's a valid translation. If
you do well, if you're doing
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the things that you're supposed to be, your attitude is going to be affected.
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So here all ten were healed,
but only one was made well.
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The others may well have been true, but of the miserable Christian variety save
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but not having the joy that the
otherwise could have. Again there's there are
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things that way either way about whether
they were really Christians or not, really
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believers. So why didn't the others
nine respond? When you don't know that
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we're not specifically told, it may
be significant that they were Jews. There
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are lots of instances in the gospels
where Jews, even the most religious ones,
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are condemned. Were thinking that just
being Jewish is all that it took.
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Oh, we've got we're Jews where
des Center from Abraham, we got
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the laws, we follow the laws
as we interpret them, and so you
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know, of course God will bless
us. So they may have almost felt
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a sense of entitlement. Well,
here's this person, he's obviously at least
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a prophet, he does miracles,
he's Jewish, where Jewish? So the
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buddy system works. He certainly has
a responsibility to help us. So it
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may not in the sense of been
as joyful or an unexpected occasion as it
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was for the Samaritan, but this
is also an important lesson because sometimes those
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who are who have been raised in
Christian homes or have been long time believers,
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even if not raised as Christians,
we can become complacent, we can
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become assuming, we can expect God
to do the things that we want him
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to do, and he doesn't work
that way. He's not a cosmic vending
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machine where you just plop in the
prayer quarter and out POPs to the gift.
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So are we really responding to him
with that sense of humility and faith
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that we saw and Mr Number ten? And if we're not giving thanks,
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maybe we're not saved at all.
That really is what we glean from Romans
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one. If there is a real
absence of thankfulness, there may be no
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faith at all. fact, it's
a good sign that there isn't. And
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so that's time for some real honest
self examination. Where am I in my
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relationship to God? Am I really
giving him the thanks, the honor that
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he is due or not? If
I'm not, I'm in trouble. So
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I don't know everyone's hearts here.
You know, we don't judge one another.
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There may be those who are not
Christians at all and know it,
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or you may and be in doubt. So this is just something to take
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heat of, because it's possible to
appear smooth and clean on the outside,
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like maybe those nine did after they
were healed, but it's God who sees
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the heart as that part been made. Well, is it well with your
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soul? Some of you probably maybe
high school literature something read a book or
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a short story called the picture of
Dorrian Gray, is about a man who
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wanted to retain his youth and not
age and get to be what he thought
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was old and nasty ugly, and
so he basically sold his soul to the
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devil. And so what happened was
that there was a portrait of him that
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he stuck away in the closet because
all the things would naturally happen to him,
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especially because he was leading a filthy
into general life, didn't show on
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him on the outside, but they're
showing up on that portrait that was showing
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the Real Hymn God looks on the
inside. He knows this as we are,
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do we know us as we are? We need to think carefully.
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If you are a Christian, if
you are giving thanks, keep it up
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that that's a good way to be. But what about the situation where it's
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so unclear about the other nine?
When it again, the scriptures are not
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definitive. Were they saved in a
spiritual sense or not? Not altogether clear.
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Can argue both ways. I hope
that the proportion of professing Christians who
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are not giving proper thanks isn't ninety
percent, like it is a my story.
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And so what we need to do
now, to the extent we're not
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giving thanks, and none of us
do it very well, is to begin
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without looking back. After Peter was
restored, after his denials of Christ,
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he basically was pointed forward to the
ministry that God would give him to do
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in the future and a benefit that
he could be to others, because we
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can't get stuck in the past.
But we all need to take the lesson.
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Where are the nine? What is
their condition? Are we them or
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are we met? Mr Number Ten, time for some prayer and self examination
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and giving of real thanks for real
gifts which are spiritual healings, not just,
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you know, two days of black
Friday shopping before Thanksgiving or anything like
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that. It's has God made us
alive in Jesus Christ. So let's pray
