Imagination is an important tool when it comes to growing in faith.
Every time Jesus told a parable, he used imagination in his storytelling.
And our stewardship theme—”Dreaming God’s Dream”—invites us to imagine what this world could be like when we let God’s dream for this world become our dream.
In today’s Bible story, Jesus invites us to use our imagination when he asks the question: “Where are the other nine?” Ten people are healed; only one returns to give thanks. Where are the other nine?
No answer is given to this question…
I think it’s an invitation for us to use our imagination, and imagine what happened to those other nine…
So…
Person #1: When he saw that he had been made clean, his first thought was his family, which he hadn’t seen in many years. People with skin disease were forced to live separate, away from everyone else, so he hadn’t seen them in years...
He ran home, anxious to embrace his wife for the first time in many years. But upon arriving, he discovered that she was now living with another man. He asked her to return to him, but she only cried, “I can’t. I thought you were dead.” And she shut the door.
So he ended up cursing the healing that he had received. Just being healed wasn’t enough. He wanted his life back.
Person #2, when he saw, as he walked toward the temple, that he had been healed, he started walking faster, running even, eager to return to the city and get on with his life. On his way, he passed by some beggars, some men who themselves had that same skin disease. They kept their distance, but of course he could not avoid the sound of their cries.
Nevertheless, he kept on the path, ignoring the cries that he heard. He had no mercy. Having been healed himself, he wanted absolutely no reminders of his former life. Thus, his life became a life of denial and avoiding realities.
Person #3 believed that he was someone special, since he had been healed by Jesus. After all, there were a lot of people afflicted with skin disease who were not healed. Why did Jesus pick him? Surely, he said to himself, it was because he was more important or more righteous than the others.
He became arrogant. He expected people to bow before him. He expected to have a high-paying job just handed to him; and he actually got such a job, but it only lasted one day. As soon as the boss noticed his overblown sense of entitlement, he fired him.
Unable to find a job after that, person #3 was forced to resort to begging. Thus, he lived as an outcast, unclean, his life after the healing being not all that different from his life before.
Person #4, having been afflicted with skin disease for so long, didn’t know how to transition to a new life. Rejoining society proved very difficult for him, and soon he was plagued by doubts: doubts about whether he really deserved to be cleansed; doubts about whether he really belonged within the city walls with everyone else.
Maybe Jesus had made a mistake? Life in the city was so new, so different, so bewildering and confusing.
Eventually, he went back to living outside the city, where he had lived previously, among the outcasts. “Why are you here?” they asked him; and he said, “Because I don’t know how else to live.”
Person #5 did a little better at adjusting to society and fitting in. He managed to get a job, become a manager, and eventually become quite rich. He built a large house, and had a large wall built around his house to protect his wealth.
Having gone from the bottom of society to the top, he was always afraid of losing everything and falling back down to the bottom. So he hid himself within the walls he built, along with his money, never going outside, always fearful, and living every bit as much an outcast as he was before, the only difference being that now his exile was self-imposed.
Person #6 felt that, because he was cleansed, he should devote his life to easing the suffering of others. This, he felt, was his life’s new purpose. He promised himself that as soon as he got himself together, as soon as he got his own life back on track, as soon as things were going smoothly for him, then he would begin the work that he felt called to do.
However, things never did go quite as smoothly as he wanted them to. He felt that his life was always almost—but not quite—on track, and he never did get around to fulfilling his life’s purpose.
As soon as person #7 saw that he had been healed, his first thought was actually to return to Jesus and give thanks. But then he started to doubt. “He said to himself, “What do I have that is of any worth to give in return as an expression of my thanks? What can I do with my life that would honor the God who healed me? I have no money. I’m not a good speaker. I’m not particularly wise when it comes to religion. I’m really not very useful at all.” And he fell into a deep depression.
Person #8 was excited and happy that, having been healed, he could now rejoin society. He eagerly sought to prove himself and find the acceptance he always longed for.
However, he soon discovered that some people will always find a reason to judge and criticize. He sought their approval and acceptance, but they said, “So what if your skin disease is gone? You’re still not one of us. You’ll never be one of us…”
Seeing himself only through the eyes of his tormentors, his bullies, unable to see himself through the eyes of the God who had cleansed him and healed him, he went out and hung himself.
Person #9 noticed that all of those who were healed were, like him, Jews; all except one. One was a Samaritan.
He wondered why Jesus would bother healing a Samaritan. The more he thought about it, the more offended he became…. and the more he decided to prove, through his own life, that only Jews were worthy of such attention.
He devoted himself to being the best Jew possible, as if to prove that Jews were better than anyone else, especially Samaritans. He became known as an arrogant, judgmental man, full of bitterness, a person who no one wanted to be around. This just made him try even harder, which in turn just made him even more bitter. And along with the bitterness, hidden within him, was a deep sense of loneliness.
When we hear Jesus ask, “Where are the other nine?” maybe we hear it with a tone of judgment and criticism; but I think it was with a deep sense of compassion that Jesus asked that question. “Where are the other nine? I wanted their healing to lead to a life of wholeness, but I fear that it has not.”
The tenth person – the Samaritan – he alone returned to give thanks. He alone returned to praise God, even before he went to the priests to be examined. And he alone heard Jesus say to him, “Go on your way; your faith has made you well. Your faith has made you whole.”
All ten were healed; but only this one was made well. Only this one was completely restored to wholeness. Only this one truly got his life back.
Being made well, being made whole – receiving what in Greek is called sozo, healing, wholeness, salvation – comes after this tenth person returns to give thanks. He returns to offer up his gratitude… and that is what makes him well.
Perhaps you’ve heard that the happiest people are not those who have all they want; the happiest people are those who are grateful for all they have. The other nine who were healed… they still found a reason to be unhappy. They still longed for things they didn’t have. Being healed didn’t fix their unhappiness.
But the tenth person… his gratitude made the difference. In fact, I’d bet that even before he was healed, he was better off than the other nine, because this tenth person, I suspect, could always find something to be grateful for, no matter what his circumstance. And that gratitude led to greater joy for him in his life.
So even though ten were healed, only one out of those ten found happiness.
Now. Why were there ten in this story? Why not 8, or 20, or 100?
The fact that only one out of ten returned to give thanks reminds me of scriptures that teach that we should return one-tenth of what we have to God.
It’s called a tithe; a tithe is the one-tenth that we return to God, in gratitude for what God has done for us.
Originally, the tithe that scripture talks about was in the form of one-tenth of a person’s crops and their livestock, but as society shifted to one that used money, the tithe came to mean one tenth of one’s income. Basically, out of everything you receive, scripture teaches that one-tenth of it be returned to God.
The book of Malachi is, to a large extent, a chastisement of people who have failed to tithe. Through Malachi, God accuses the people of robbing him. The people ask how are they robbing God, and God replies, “In your tithes and offerings! You are robbing me, the whole nation of you! Bring the full tithe into the storehouse.”
And then God does something unusual. God invites the people to put him to the test. Elsewhere in scripture, the people are told to not put God to the test, but here, when it comes to the tithe, that doesn’t apply. God says, “Bring the full tithe into the storehouse, so that there may be food in my house, and thus put me to the test; see if I will not open the windows of heaven for you and pour down for you an overflowing blessing.”
One tenth of those who were healed returned to Jesus. A tithe of lepers returned to praise God. Jesus gave out ten blessings, and one of the ten was returned to him. And the blessings flowed. They flowed out, back, and then back out again…
That one leper found wholeness. That one leper was made well, because of his faith. Because of his gratitude.
The healing and wholeness God offers to us is given freely. Like those who were healed of their skin disease, we don’t need to do anything to receive God’s grace.
And we try to follow this model in the ministry of the church. You don’t need to do anything, you don’t need to give any certain amount, to receive all the benefits that come from being a part of First Christian Church.
As you know, Ginger and I recently joined the Y. How did we become members of the Y? By paying our membership fee.
Other organizations work the same way. You want to be a member? Pay the membership fee, and you’re a member.
The church doesn’t work that way. You can be a member, and receive all the benefits of being a member, regardless of whether you contribute financially or not.
But gratitude expressed through giving has its own power to heal and restore. There is true joy in giving back, as the Samaritan in today’s story found out. Our offering is our thanks to God. And our path to wholeness is complete when we offer this thanks to God.
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