TEN MINUS ONE
Ten lepers. All
ten healed. Only one of all ten lepers bothered to return thanks to the source
of their healing. Oh, how very interesting! Leprosy is a disease you wouldn’t wish
on your worst enemy. It is characterized of bodily deformities and painful
white patches on the skin destroying the nerves. Like every other of life’s
challenges it reduces one to a selfish entity. All you care about is yourself,
your troubles, how you can manage, how you can get by, what you can do to
better your lot, how every single thing in life affects your own prospects. It is
very defeating, this world; bending humanity out of shape. And so ten lepers,
each aware of the other, were miraculously healed by the Great Redeemer, Jesus
Christ. Sadly, this change in circumstance did not change their core. Their limbs
and skin may have revived but their souls were still deformed. The selfishness
had not dissolved from their souls. The fear of the future, the overbearing
need to put themselves first, the drive to compete one with the other; these worldly
traits still consumed the lepers even though they were physically healed. But one
of the ten lepers acted differently. He lived in the same world as did the
other nine lepers and experienced the same challenges as they all did. But this
one raised himself from the sea, he roused himself from sleep, he acted
differently. He made a break with the authoritarian grip of human nature, and
he was unstoppable. He did the right
thing. He sought the One who had bothered with him; the one who cared about
him where everyone looked out for themselves; the one who didn’t do ‘cool stuff’
for social media fame; the One who healed him. The healed leper bothered to
seek Him, to find Him and thank Him for making this difference in his own life
when the simple fact is Jesus didn’t
have to. God made man; man went his own way. It should be man for himself
but Jesus bothers with us for just one reason- love. To the leper this became
clear; it had more weight than anything else; more weight than the leprosy, the
healing, the future, everything. He had to find this embodiment of love and
connect with Him. And he found Him! Yes he did! The scripture says, ‘seek and you will find’. Anyone who
seeks Jesus will find Him. To the seeker Jesus said, ‘Just you? Weren’t there ten of
you I had healed? Only you got the message? Well, now you’re whole’. (See
Luke 17:11-19) What does this mean for the other nine whose physical condition
did not improve their spiritual condition? The nine whose promotion did not
redress their self-centeredness, fear of the future, rivalry. What does this
mean for them? It means they were still ‘lepers’. Their material lots may have
improved but their souls were still out of shape. They were still sick, still
not whole. The one that found Jesus found true wholeness- true healing. David said,
Psalm 103:2
Let all that I am praise the Lord;
may I never forget the good things he
does for me.
The thing is
the goodness of God escapes our notice because we are like the nine lepers. If only
one out of the ten lepers was healed, the miracle would appear more tremendous
than it did when everyone else experienced the same thing. Sleeping and waking,
standing and sitting, eating and drinking, tooth that fell out and re-grow,
cuts that naturally heal up- these are masterpieces of God. Do you only think
of God when there is need for deliverance from kidnappers? Is God to receive
heartfelt thanks only when there is a new house or new car? Is God wonderful
only when the cancer goes away? The cancer and the healing, poverty and new
job, prison and liberation, leprosy and restoration; all these are naught but
signposts pointing to the One who alone is God; the one that loves and care for
you; the one thing that matters most. If your situation, good or bad, does not
bring you nearer to Jesus; yes you are sick and needs to be made whole. It didn’t
matter that the nine lepers were walking about the city happy and fit, living
and enjoying life; they were still sick with a greater sickness and Jesus knew
this. This is why Jesus informed the one with
Him, ‘you are the one made whole. You
are the one no longer sick’. A person’s physical body may waste away but
the soul within that body brims with life because that soul is with Jesus. Be the one minus ten.
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