The Tenth Leper and How God is Already at Work in the World

Luke 17:11-19

I find myself thinking of the 'faith of the outsider' this week as we pause in the familiar story of Jesus' healing of the ten lepers now. For while are surely called to focus on the powerful gift of Jesus' healing as demonstrated in this story, what stands out is the grateful response of the one. The Samaritan. Here is how my perspective is developing:

I was privileged to assist in leading a Dwelling in the World workshop this last Saturday. "Dwelling in the World" is one of the six missional practices which are taught through Church Innovations Institute. (If you are interested, you can find more information here.)

Simply put, the experience equips us to be 'detectives of divinity' in the world. Rooted in the sending imagery of Luke 10:1-12, it gives us some tools for encountering the stranger --- and in doing so receiving the gift of witnessing what God is already up to in their lives and in the world. It is, in fact, a way of being people of peace and looking for people of peace in the world. (Again, see Luke 10.)

• It is not necessarily meant to be a way of gaining new members -- although it may lead to that.
•  It is not necessarily even meant to be a means of offering an overt verbal witness to one's faith, although it may lead to that as well.
• It is not even supposed to be a way of actually meeting the needs of another --- although similar conversations repeated and shared may well result in a congregational effort to address a particular need experienced by many in a community.
•  It is simply a practice which has us intentionally speaking to strangers, expressing genuine interest in their lives. It can look like a brief exchange with the teller at the bank. It may mean hearing the life hurts and hopes of the cashier at the grocery store. One has no way of knowing, of course, what these brief encounters may result in. But what fun to be there and to wonder at what may come of it. And no matter what happens next, the world is already a better, safer place because of the effort to engage the stranger.

And so it was that late on Saturday morning the thirty gathered were sent out into the community to seek out a stranger and to try to engage them. They came back in time for lunch laden with stories --- some poignant and some marked by hilarity.

• There was, for instance, the one who found himself disappointed by the terse exchange with his bank teller, but who encountered two young men in the parking lot who were new to the community. And who returned with a lively story to tell about what he learned.
• There was another who carefully observed the young man in charge of hospitality at McDonald's and when he came near, commented at how hard his job was. He paused to say, 'Yes, it is hard to stay positive when so many refuse to acknowledge his efforts at kindness.'
• And there was one who engaged the owner of a small downtown store --- and who heard her whole life story. Apparently at some point she offered that she had been sent to do this from our workshop. She left and another of our folks wandered in and sought to engage her. And the woman said, "Oh, are you from that Lutheran Church?" We laughed to hear this and then wondered what it might mean if Lutherans actually got a reputation for engaging the world in our community!
• Still another had forgotten to take off her name-tag and was called by name by the owner of the gas station in her neighborhood, completely throwing her off in her effort to reach out to him!
• And the stories went on and on

Perhaps by now you are wondering what any of this has to do with the Gospel story which is ours to share this week. Just this:

• Without a doubt, God was already at work in the life of the Samaritan so that unlike the rest, he offered a grateful response to the unexpected gift of life restored that he received at the hands of Jesus. And I wonder how God might already be at work in the lives of strangers we encounter every day. Indeed, I do wonder how we might become more aware of that wondrous work. Even as thirty Lutherans did last Saturday morning.
• And this: I wonder about how God already be at work in the life of someone we least expect who we might just encounter. Who would be a Samaritan --- an outsider --- in your community, neighborhood, congregation? And how might you engage them enough to hear how God may be at work? 
• And also this: Jesus offered a gift of profound healing to the ten who approached him that day. I wonder how you and I might be agents of such healing in our world today. Indeed, in a world too often marked by fear and division, might healing just be ours to offer (and in turn, receive) if we simply reached out with a word of kindness, curiosity, or affirmation even to someone we have never seen before who we may never see again? Or to one who we have passed by a thousand times (as those ten lepers must have been passed by a thousand, thousand times) without even noticing before?
• And finally this: More than just receiving physical healing, the ten lepers were actually restored to community by the healing they received. How might we be called to restore others to community by simply engaging them? Even in casual conversation. Even now.

Indeed, perhaps one of the best gifts of a practice like Dwelling in the World is that it invites us to look outside of ourselves to see where God might just be at work in the world. Even as God was at work in the Samaritan who returned giving thanks so long ago. Can you just imagine how we might all be changed by more intentionally Dwelling in the World God made and God so loves? Wouldn't that be something to see? Isn't that something you want to be a part of, too?

Between Samaria and Galilee

Luke 17:11-19

That land between Samaria and Galilee is where we find Jesus today. 

I can't count the number of times I have preached the story of the healing of the lepers and always I have gone to the experience of the lepers --- wondering at the one who was given eyes of faith and understanding enough so that he returned to give thanks.

I am not there today, though, although I may get there yet. 

For now I find myself reflecting on where Jesus and his disciples travel now --- through that in-between land.  I wonder if the writer of Luke offers this detail as a mere literary device to 'get Jesus from one place or another.'  Or I wonder if perhaps it is something more.  I wonder if we meet up with Jesus in that particular place for a reason.

For the land between Samaria and Galilee is neither one or the other.  By its very existence, it is a place where it is impossible to forget that the two had once been one.  It is a location which causes one to remember how things were before long before the experience of exile left its mark on both kingdoms.  It is a place where one might find oneself unsure of who belonged and who didn't, where one might be uncertain, un-trusting, even a little fearful.  It is a place where the accustomed rules might not apply --- where one would not fully know one's place.  It is the place where Jesus travels today.  It is a place where, it seems to me, if we are where we are called to be, you and I are traveling every day.

At least this is what I have found to be so for me of late.   I suppose it should come as no surprise, thought, that in some ways I'd rather not.  And it occurs to me, too, that while I find myself there as a pastor, most others find yourselves even more fully there. Whether your daily lives take you to schools or construction sites, office buildings or hospitals, you know what it is to walk that line between what you know and what you wonder about as you encounter this uncertain, often frightening in-between-ness in the lives of others --- or in your own.

I was struck by this two days ago, this awareness that lately I am more and more in that strange land where Jesus traveled so long ago.  I had just climbed into my car, having ended a conversation with two young men who, under other circumstances I might just cross the street to avoid.   They were leaning against a car in the funeral home parking lot smoking.  I had arrived early to pray with the family and was leaving as many of their friends were just arriving.  I almost nodded and walked by.  Instead, I paused to ask them how they were.  They told me that they were the friends who had been asked to speak at the funeral of their lifelong friend the next day.  Their friend, whose body lay inside, had died of a heroin overdose earlier in the week.  If you paused long enough to look beyond their nonchalant stance, you could see their grief and fear.

What hit me two days ago was this was not a world I knew well.  I grew up safe and protected and in a world entirely foreign to the anger and despair that really took the life of their  young friend.  Much of my life  I have believed that if one just did the right thing one's efforts would be rewarded --- unlike the heartbroken mother whom I had just left who had done all that she knew to do and still today suffers an unspeakable loss.

And I have to say this.  I don't much like traveling in this land in between where words are hard to come by and healing seems so awfully elusive.  Where the rules I've come to count on don't quite seem to apply.  And yet this is where God keeps calling me of late --- to this same place where Jesus traveled when those desperate, hopeful lepers cried out for mercy.

It was just before we were to start the funeral on Friday morning that I bent down to speak to his grieving mother where she was seated in the front row.  She had been thanking people for coming until a few moments before.   I can't remember what else I said to her, but I do remember telling her the room was full.  And with tears flowing down her cheeks, she spoke her gratitude that they were there.  That they had not left her alone in this in-between place of grief and confusion, anger and despairing hope.

I do not have Jesus' power to cleanse and make whole as we hear in the remarkable, familiar story before us now.  But I do have the power to step into those in-between places in people's lives where one can no longer deny that once was whole is now broken and where the pain of their experience may be simply heartbreaking.  Those places where the lepers in today's Gospel once lived --- cut off from all they knew and loved and took for granted.  You and I can walk into those places and maybe, just maybe that is the beginning of cleansing, of healing, of restoration.  And somehow even just that alone sometimes evokes the kind of gratitude we witness in today's lesson.

It's where I'm called more and more, it seems to me.  I expect there was a time when fear alone would have kept me from choosing to walk into these in-between places: this land between Samaria and Galilee where the rules don't apply and the words are hard to find and healing is elusive.  I'm not entirely certain what has changed except most days I see no other choice.  And yes, many days I still find myself surprised to be here. And yet, it is where Jesus traveled.  So don 't you suppose that's exactly where God's people are called to travel, too?

• Does it make sense to you that we are called to travel "between Samaria and Galilee" as Jesus did? Why or why not?
• How would you describe that in-between place?
• How do you feel when you find yourself there?  What has been your experience?
• How have you encountered Jesus in that place?  In your life?  In the lives of others?