Luke 17:11-19 Many Christians keep prayer journals and in these journals they keep
track of the things that they are praying for—the various concerns and
struggles that they have lifted up to God in prayer.
Imagine with me that we have kept a list of all the things that we
have prayed about over this last year: healing
for our loved ones when they were sick; protection on our journeys; material
gifts necessary to support this body and life.
If we kept a journal of all that we have asked the Lord for over this
last year it would be a long list.
People who keep prayer journals also record all the times that God
has answered their prayers and how—and this is something that I can really see
the value in. Much too often we ask God
for things and when he answers our prayers we have already moved on to
something else and forgotten about what we asked for before.
Just imagine what a faith-strengthening exercise it would be if we
kept track of all the times that God has answered our prayers—how a list of
God’s answers would give us courage and confidence in our prayer life.
One category ought to be added to our prayer journal (besides our
petitions and God’s answers) is a column to add up the times we have given
thanks for God’s gracious answers to our prayers because not only does God want
us to ask him for the things that we need-- and not only does he want us trust
that he will answer our prayers—but he also wants us to thank him for those
answers.
That’s what Thanksgiving Day is—an opportunity to thank God for all
of his blessings and tender mercies—to show our gratitude for all of those
times he has answered our prayers-- and to praise him for all of those times he
has provided for us when we weren’t wise enough or faithful enough to even ask
for what we need.
In the familiar story of the thankful Samaritan we have a beautiful picture
of Jesus’ faithfulness in meeting our needs and answering our prayers. We have a mirror that we can hold up to
ourselves and see our lack of gratitude that forgets to acknowledge and thank
God for his provision. And we have a
beautiful example for us to follow in the thankful Samaritan who made it a
point to thank Jesus for the good things he had received. St. Luke writes that:
On the way to Jerusalem Jesus was passing
along between Samaria and Galilee. And as he entered a village, he was
met by ten lepers, who stood at a distance and lifted up their voices, saying,
“Jesus, Master, have mercy on us.”
When
we criticize the unthankful lepers for their lack of gratitude at being healed
we have a tendency to forget everything that they got right.
They
knew to come to Jesus in their need.
They were confident of his power and his mercy. They understood their helplessness. And they acknowledged that he was their
master.
There
are all kinds of valuable spiritual lessons for us in their actions. If we didn’t know anything more about them we
could still safely say that in all these things they are an example of what
Jesus wants from all of us—to come to him in our need and ask for help.
One
of the most humbling verses of the Bible is found in James where he says that we have not because we ask not. We have not because we ask not. How true that is! Our prayer life is not everything it ought to
be.
We
don’t come to Jesus in our need either because we think we can handle life by
ourselves or because we see some challenges and situations as too great for the
Lord to help. Sometimes we are afraid to
pray “thy will be done” because we are afraid of what that will be. Sometimes we are just too proud to humble
ourselves, admit that we are incapable of helping ourselves, and cast ourselves
upon the Lord’s mercy.
But
the lepers who came to Jesus that day suffered from none of these spiritual
problems. They knew their great
need. They knew they could not help
themselves. They knew that Jesus
could. And they came to him in faith
expecting his mercy.
In
all this—so far as it goes—they serve as a model for our own lives of prayer
and they encourage us to pray boldly because they received that for which they
prayed. St. Luke writes that: When Jesus saw them he said to them, “Go and show yourselves to the priests.” And as they went they were
cleansed.
The faith of the lepers was not
misplaced. Jesus answered their prayers
and met their needs and they were healed.
That is the great hope and promise of this story—that no one who comes
to Jesus in their need goes away unfulfilled.
Now
it may seem that way at times when
our prayers are not really prayers asking for help according to God’s will--
but demands telling God what he has to do.
But Jesus meets our needs by giving us what we ask for OR something that
is even better. For example…
How
many times over the course of our life have we asked for healing—either for our
loved ones or for ourselves? And how
many times has God said “yes, be healed.”
Now there is going to come time for all of us (unless the Lord comes
first) when we pray for healing and instead the Lord will say “Allan, I’ve got
something better for you than that” and he will call me home where I never have
to worry about getting sick again. He
always answers our prayers!
Since
Thanksgiving last year you and I have prayed hundreds, and probably thousands
of prayers, and if we were presented with a list of our prayers and Jesus’
answers we would never worry again about whether Jesus has heard our prayer--
or has the power to answer our prayers—we would know it and believe it!
As
valuable as that lesson is, there is still one more thing that we still need to
learn and that is the blessing of gratitude.
Just like with the lepers who were healed, thankfulness is one of the places
in our life of faith where we could all do a better job. St. Luke writes that: One of them, when he saw that he was healed, turned back, praising God
with a loud voice; and he fell on his face at Jesus' feet,
giving him thanks. Now he was a Samaritan.
I want you to notice that the Lord
did not make their healing contingent upon their thankfulness—he healed them
because of who he was not because of how they would respond to his gift. But having said that, God does want us to acknowledge and be
thankful for his gifts.
When little Lutherans cover this in
confirmation classes, we learn that the gifts that God gives us are given out
of ‘fatherly, diving goodness and mercy, without any merit or worthiness in
me.” And then we go on to ask what we
owe to God on account of his grace and we learn that “it is our duty to thank
and praise, serve and obey him.”
These of course are not Luther’s
ideas—they are the teaching of the Bible.
God loves to bless his children and he gives these blessings because
that is who he is. But he also wants us
to be grateful for his gifts—to thank and praise him.
That
is what we see so beautifully portrayed in these verses—the grateful heart of a
person who has asked for God’s help and received God’s help and is filled with
gratitude for God’s help. St. Luke
writes that: Then Jesus answered, “Were not ten cleansed? Where
are the nine? Was no one found to return
and give praise to God except this foreigner?”
Much
too often our list of prayer petitions is much longer than our list of
thanksgivings for the prayers Jesus has answered. Why are we so different from the thankful
leper? At least part of the answer is
found in the fact that the man who returned to give thanks was a Samaritan—in
other words, he was the least likely
to expect anything from God.
But
the very fact that he was the least likely made
him especially aware that he didn’t really deserve anything from the
Lord—that all he had received was by God’s grace alone.
It’s
easy for us to fall into the attitude that when it comes to our life with God
there is a “tit-for-tat” relationship:
God does this for me and I do this for him—that our life with God is
really a transaction.
But
God gives his gifts without ANY merit or worthiness in me and when I
acknowledge that—when I understand that I can demand nothing of God—that I have
no right to expect any good thing from him and yet have received blessings
without number—it totally changes my attitude towards him.
How
can I not be thankful for all his blessings when they really are gifts? How can I grumble about what I have when he
has graciously met my needs? How can I
fail to rejoice in ALL circumstances when I understand that my very life is a
gift from him?
This
is where God wants to bring us all spiritually—to understand and rejoice in the
Good News that our life with him is by grace alone. St. Luke writes that: Jesus said to him, “Rise and go your way; your faith has made you well.”
The thankful Samaritan received healing just like the others. But he also received something more. His faith in Jesus changed him- not just on
the outside- but on the inside. He
understood what kind of gracious God he had in Jesus.
As we give thanks to God for his material gifts on this Thanksgiving
day may the same be true of us—that we are truly thankful for the forgiveness
and new life we have in Jesus. Amen.
No comments:
Post a Comment