October 13, 2013
[Luke 17:11-19]
Jefferson United Methodist Church, Jefferson NC
It was
Frederick Buechner in his book Secrets in
the Dark who said, “I will ask
you a terrible question, and God knows I ask it also of myself. Is the truth
beyond all truths, beyond the stars, just this: that to live without him is the
real death, that to die with him is the only life?” Will you pray with me?
God who
inspires thankfulness and gratefulness,
May the words of my mouth and the
meditations of all our hearts be pleasing in your sight oh God our strength and
our redeemer. Amen.
A year and a half ago, I went to the
Avery County Humane Society. You see I had wanted to adopt a dog for some time,
but the right one hadn’t come along. As I walked the long hall of the kennel no
dog stuck out to me, there wasn’t any one in particular that had that eternal
connection that pets create when you meet them and spend any amount of time
with them. We came to the end of my tour without any dog to bring home. As I
was walking out I heard a whimper behind a metal door, a dog obviously in pain
and lonely. Rusty had seen about as hard a life as any dog could see. He was
abused, badly injured and in need of surgery. We made the necessary
arrangements and got him well. After the first month of living with me it came
time to go visit the vet.
Now I left out one particular detail
of importance to this story. Remember I had said Rusty was in need of surgery,
after his abuse and neglect he had to have his eye removed. So this one-eyed
mut got in my car and we went to the vet. When the vet saw us, she saw the joy
that Rusty (who had affectionately become known as little man) had found in his
new life. I asked her how she knew he was happy and if it had made a difference.
Her response was simple yet something I will remember forever, “He has
thankfulness in his eye, but I’m confident in time you’ll see he saved you as
much as you saved him.”
Part of me wonders what Jesus’
expression was when he realized that one leper, a Samaritan at that had come
back to thank him for what he had done. I honestly wonder if this man had
restored Jesus’ hope in humanity as Jesus declared, “Your faith has made you
well.” This leper was the polar opposite of Jesus. On one end you had this 1st
Century Jewish Rabbi, Messiah, and Savior of the Nations and on the other you
had a half dead leper from Samaria, that bad part of town across the tracks
that no one really liked to go to. But herein lies the hope of this leper. He noticed
the holiness in the divine, they saw the messianic promise of Jesus. As Barbara
Brown Taylor says, “Whoever you are, you are human. Wherever you are, you live in
the world, which is just waiting for you to notice the holiness in it.”
Friends we
live in a world where thankfulness and gratefulness are things that we talk
about in church on Sunday but don’t live out on Monday. We find it odd when
people thank us, almost awkward as we go about our lives. Even for Jesus it was
odd at best when he says, “Were not ten made clean? But the other nine, where are they? Was none of them found to return and give praise to God
except this foreigner?” Perhaps we need to remember what a famous UN Secretary
General said, “For all that has been, thanks, for all that will be, yes.”
We’re finding more and more that
thankfulness, turning that thanks to yes leads to happiness. A recent study
showed that the more thankful you are, the happier you are. You find this in so
many ways, have you not just beamed with thankfulness and experienced the warm
glow of happiness? You see, that stuff is Biblical.
However, we need to move into a
lifestyle and reality that takes our thanks, our praise, our joys and turn them
into action. How are you taking your thankfulness and living with it shining
not only in your eyes but also in your actions? How are you accomplishing a
saving work in the lives of others simply because someone has initiated that in
your own life as well? How has God turned your thanks into yes?
Perhaps it’s through a ministry here
in this church or in the greater community, maybe it’s in a conversation with a
friend who is experiencing close to what you have experienced. For it is in
these ways that God declares healing grace and love in the lives of all of
God’s children.
If you’re like me, you were taught
as a child to be thankful for what you received. When guests would begin to
leave as a child I would be remiss with my parents if I did not thank them for
being in our home. I was taught to say, “Thank you for coming, I’ve hope you
had a wonderful time.” I knew how to rattle that off quickly and as quietly as
humanly possible as not to actually mean what I said. I just didn’t get it. But
then life changes doesn’t it? You start to grow up and meet someone who you
could actually be compatible with in the long run as a friend or spouse and
they stand to leave and you say with all your heart, “Thank you for coming,
I’ve had a wonderful time!” Or you find yourself visiting a relative who
doesn’t have much time left and they say to you, “Thank you for coming, I’ve
had a wonderful time.” These moments, this same vocabulary but different
context is exactly what Jesus was talking about and what Jesus wants from us.
Jesus wants to change our empty hope to present reality. He wants to change our
thanks to yes, he wants to heal and restore and redeem. For that is the Christ
that we know, resurrected and triumphant over death and pain and darkness.
Perhaps you like me look to this
time of fall as the first hint that we have reached the holiday that our stomachs
enjoy most, Thanksgiving. If you enjoy the holiday like I do, I’m sure you’ve
heard the hymn Now Thank We All Our God.
This hymn has words such as these, “Now thank we all our God, with heart and hands and voices,
who
wondrous things has done, in Whom this world rejoices;
who from our mothers’ arms
has blessed us on our way
with countless gifts of love, and still is ours
today.
” Beautiful words, but have you ever heard about the man who penned
those words all the way back around
1637?
Martin
Rinkart the author of this hymn was a Lutheran minister who came to Saxony at the beginning of the Thirty Years War. The walled city that Rinkart lived in
became the refuge for political and military figures, but the result was
overcrowding, and deadly plague and famine. Armies overran it three times. The
Rinkart home was a refuge for the victims, even though he was often
hard-pressed to provide for his own family. During the height of a severe
plague in 1637, Rinkart was the only surviving pastor in Eilenburg, conducting
as many as 50 funerals in a day. He performed more than 4000 funerals in that
year, including that of his wife.
Friends
we come to this place with the lavish thanksgiving of the ages. Countless sung
and unsung heroes of the faith just like Martin Rinkart show us that
thankfulness is a part of the economy of God. God is just in the business of
bestowing incredible grace and love upon us and all we can do in response is be thankful. However our thankfulness, if
done right, turns to action, our gratefulness becomes the incarnation of God to
those around us. We are lost in wonder, love and praise as Charles Wesley would
say and that is beautiful.
You see our saying thanks does not
ground us to the past Christ has restored for us, but it binds us to a future
God has planned for us. Saying thank you, showing gratitude is a deeply
vulnerable action in which we set ourselves up to be embraced and welcomed by
another. The vulnerability we share brings us close to the heart of God, and
that is a good thing.
Let me point out another thing about
this text. Notice that unlike other places in the Gospel of Luke as Jesus was
heading towards Jerusalem the text says he ‘was going through the region
between Samaria and Galilee.’ It doesn’t give the exact location as in previous
chapters, it simply states a region, if I may ponder if but for this sermon if
that was intentional. Perhaps this lack of geographical certainty allows you to
cover this text with your own story. We’ve all been in that region between
Samaria and Galilee, we’ve all been a part of a leper colony, or a no-good
Samaritan, but we’ve also been so lost in our thankfulness we’ve forgotten to
thank the one who matters. But maybe, just maybe, we could turn around for a
moment and look God in the eyes and thank God for what God has completed in our
lives.
Back to what I first told you about
my dog, Rusty. Rusty likes to run in the yard. He’s one of those dogs that
almost gallop to show his joy and happiness, but every time he runs he’ll stop
to turn around and see where I am. As I pondered what he might be thinking, it
could be just seeing if he can get away with running, I often look at him and
see the thankfulness in his eye. I see the joy that he has been given new life
and the love and attention he deserves. The same could be said for you with
God. The next time you are lost in the beauty of this world or the reality of
your existence, you could turn around as you are running through this life and
have thankfulness in your eyes. You can have thankfulness in your eyes and be
unbridled by the fear of death and the grave. You could celebrate the reality
that you are beloved. You can be thankful that God has made you to be who you
are. With thankfulness in our hearts, we turn to look back for we know our
pasts have been restored and that God is looking to a future full of hope.
Friends be thankful, know that you
are the product of love and life and joy. Most importantly, remember that for
all that has been, thanks, and for all that will be, yes.
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