If we were a parish that had a marquee sign with this week’s sermon title listed out in front of the building, I’d call this sermon, “In Defense of the Other Nine.” I don’t like the way this story denigrates the nine who do what they are commanded to do, especially since these verses follow immediately the instructions we heard last week – the ones that Jesus gave about doing what you are commanded to do because it’s your responsibility, not because of any reward you might get.

According to Luke (the only one of the Gospel writers who tells this story), ten lepers yelled out from a distance to Jesus as he was travelling through no-man’s land. Ten scaly men, the text says, called out “eleison” – have mercy on us. Jesus saw them and yelled back, “go and show yourselves to the priests.” He didn’t say “okay, I do have mercy on you.” He didn’t ask what he sometimes asked, “What do you want me to do for you?” He didn’t say “great is your faith.” He didn’t touch them – there’s nothing to suggest that he even got near them. They kept their distance, the story says. On the other hand, he didn’t tell them it wasn’t his job to have mercy on them, but one could interpret that in his lack of explicit consent. “Go and show yourselves to the priests,” he says. “Go on.”

Who knows why they went. Perhaps it took immense courage and trust to set off down that road. But my guess is that maybe they believed that the priests might have mercy on them, and besides, they probably had nothing left to lose. The story goes that, “as they went, they were made clean.” So not while they were talking with Jesus, but after they left Jesus, on their way to show themselves to the priests, they realized that they had been healed, before they’d even reached their destination. All ten of the scaly men were healed. They’d been asking for mercy, hoping for mercy, and they got something so much better! By law, the priests, of course, would still have to declare that they were healed. So presumably, they continued on their way, simply doing what Jesus had told them to do.

Well nine of them did, anyway. One of them didn’t go to the priests. One turned back to thank Jesus and praise God. One did not go with the others. And Jesus asked where the other nine were?? Didn’t he tell them to go and show themselves? That’s what they were doing. And after that I imagine they were getting re-acquainted with their families and friends, re-integrated into the life of the community from which they’d been isolated. I think that it’s reasonable to imagine that the nine didn’t attribute the healing to Jesus – so it might not have even occurred to them to come back and thank him. Therefore, I don’t think we or anyone else should be particularly critical of those nine. In fact, the story even makes the point that it’s a foreigner who turns back to give thanks. It’s not the cultural norm, it’s foreign.

Furthermore, the foreigner was a Samaritan who couldn’t have and wouldn’t have gone to show himself to the priests, because they weren’t his priests. That law didn’t apply to him. In Jesus’ time, Israelites and Samaritans did not worship the same way, and Israelites considered Samaritans ritually unclean (and I’m sure the feeling was mutual). Those nine who went to show themselves to the priests, having been declared clean, would have praised God according to their practice. The one who returned to give thanks to God at Jesus’ feet probably had no-where else to go. So let’s move past Luke’s backhanded slap at the Jesus-obeying, Torah-observing nine former lepers and rest assured that all ten praised God for their healing in one way or another.

For me, this is not a story about faith equaling healing, or about enough faith causing the healing that one wants. The lepers in this story weren’t even asking for healing – they were asking for mercy. They all received healing – one turned back to give thanks, the nine others went forward to give thanks.  If there’s any exchange equation that can be drawn here, it is that for foreigners who do not worship exactly the way Israelite Jews worshipped, thanking Jesus equals giving glory to God. It counts. It also seems to me that this is not a story to use to teach about or encourage tithing, close as it is to annual pledge season in Protestant and Episcopal churches. You know, when I first approached this text, I thought it could be a really handy pledge stewardship text. One out of ten returns to Jesus. Sounds like a tithe of thanksgiving to me, and Emmanuel Church certainly needs our tithes of thanksgiving if we are going to sustain a ministry in this place. But the difference between being a visiting preacher and your rector, is that I have to look you in the eyes after I preach, this week and next week and so on. And so I had to dig deeper.

The part that comes right after this story in Luke says, “once Jesus was asked…when the kingdom of God was coming, and he answered, ’The kingdom of God is not coming with things that can be observed; nor will they say, “Look, here it is!” Or ”There it is!” For…the kingdom of God is among you all. The reign of God is within you all.’” (1) That makes me want to remind myself and you that the Bible is not a book of facts. The Bible is a book of possibilities. And it’s our mission (should we choose to accept it, of course) to engage in discovering the Sacred Story in order to discover and rediscover our own personal and community stories, to help us understand our stories through the story of the Holy One.

So how might we do that with this story? How might we get in touch with the reign of God not coming with things that can be observed but coming among us and within us? Well, I’d say that every one of us has ten healed lepers inside of us (at a minimum). Every single one of us has (at least) ten healed lepers inside of us. That is, we have had at least ten parts of ourselves – physical, emotional, spiritual -- that haven’t been well, that made us (and maybe others) feel disgust, that made us feel shame, and have isolated us from fullness of life in relationship with the community. Each community of faith has at least ten parts – physical, emotional, spiritual, that have experienced unclean physical or spiritual health. And along the way, healings have taken place. (Of course we all have parts that are in need of healing as I speak – but for right now, I’d us like to focus on those experiences of healing that we’ve already had.) Along the way, and maybe even on the way to showing the uncleannesses to the priests, healings have occurred. I bet nearly everyone in this room could list 10 times that we’ve experienced a healing along the way, whether from a disease or a disaster, a broken part of the framework or a broken relationship or a broken heart.

I wonder if you could imagine that every one of those healings was from God. I’m not talking about belief or faith. I’m talking about imagination. Could you imagine that every one of those healings was from the Holy One, longing for fullness of life for each of us, and that giving thanks to God can take different forms? I understand that attributing all healing to God might be a stretch here in this place, but giving thanks to God in a variety of forms surely is not.

I wonder if you could imagine that if we are people who can connect the Sacred Story with our own stories, that we are people not of facts, but of possibilities. What if we entered this season of pledging to Emmanuel Church thinking about all of the healings that have happened along our various ways (Who knows how), and focusing our imagination on possibilities. How might our lives look if we were we to recognize that every part of us, even the foreign ex-leper part of us, is able to give thanks to God and get us going on our way? (2) Imagine the possibilities!