The Twenty-first Sunday after Pentecost - October 13

Healed, Cleansed and Whole
Luke 17:11-19

I should begin by saying I am not a Greek scholar. I took one year of Greek in seminary, but it didn’t really stick. I retained just enough, though, to be able to use some resource books on Greek. I’m going to talk a little bit about some of the words in today’s Gospel, which was originally written in Greek.

It’s the story of the ten lepers. Jesus is entering a town and on the outskirts of the town ten lepers cry out to him for compassion. He responds compassionately, telling them to go show themselves to the priests. As they obey, they are cured. One of the ten, a Samaritan, returns to Jesus giving thanks and praising God.

Three different Greek words describe what happened to the lepers. In our translation those words occur as “made clean,” “healed,” and the leper who returns to give thanks is “made well.”

As they obediently responded to Jesus’ instructions, all ten lepers were “healed.” The word is used in a medical sense. Certainly in Jesus’ day disease and healing and medicine were understood very differently than they are today. Nonetheless, this word indicates relief from the symptoms of a disease.

Because that disease was leprosy, to be healed also meant to be made clean. Interestingly, the Greek word translated “made clean” is the root of our words cathartic or catharsis, but in this context it refers specifically to ritual or cultic cleansing.

As you may know, in Jesus’ day to have leprosy meant you were labeled as “unclean” by the religious laws and authorities. Mistakenly, people at that time thought of leprosy as highly contagious. Lepers were forced to stay away from others and if anyone approached them, they were required to call out “unclean, unclean.” This meant, of course, that they were excluded from general society, excluded even from the lives of their families, and excluded from the meaning and comfort of all corporate worship. Excluded from family, societal and religious life.

To be made clean was to have a life lived with the company of others restored.

All ten lepers were healed and cleansed. One, seeing that he had been healed and cleansed, stopped, and returned to Jesus, doing two things. He offered himself, prostrating himself in thanksgiving and he gave praise to God. Praise and thanksgiving. Our words doxology and eucharist. Giving voice to praise and offering oneself in thanksgiving.

And the leper who spoke his praise and offered thanksgiving was made “well.” The Greek word translated “well” in this passage is a word that is sometimes translated “saved” or “made whole.” In the Gospels it is most frequently used to describe a result of Jesus’ healings and it clearly means more than a medical cure… it means wholeness of person. Being found or put right. Sometimes it refers to what will happen in the Kingdom of God. But most of the time, it refers to something that happens in the present tense to those who are healed by Jesus.

For me wholeness seems to be maybe the best translation.

As I was reading about this passage I came across a wonderful definition of wholeness. A little different from what I might have said before. In this definition wholeness is not so much a matter of restoration or repair or even healing. It is a state of being where everything unholy is pushed out. A state of total holiness. All else is shut out of our person except the holy context. We are at one with God and one another, in a sublime moment of grace. I can almost visualize it physically. Holiness within us expanding until we are wholly holy.

By God’s grace, this transformation to wholeness to holiness happens when we are actively engaged in singing praise to God and in offering ourselves to God in thanksgiving. These are the transformative acts that bring about wholeness. When we give ourselves to praise of God and thanksgiving for God’s grace and blessing and presence with us in Christ we become holy and whole.

And we have cause and opportunity to praise God and offer ourselves in thanksgiving. It is right to give God thanks and praise. Always and Everywhere. No matter what is going on in our lives or in the world around us. Sing praise. If you need words, whether you sing them or say them, check out the praise section of the Hymnal. And come to the Eucharist, offering ourselves, our souls and bodies, all that we are in this action of thanksgiving for Christ’s living presence with us.

The leper who gave voice to praise of God and offered himself in thanksgiving was made whole.

As we praise God and offer ourselves in thanksgiving, by God’s grace we, too, will be made whole.