Gospel for October 14, 2007 (Proper 23): Luke 17:11-19
This year the calendar plays a neat trick on us. Thanksgiving Sunday is the first Sunday of October because the second Monday is the eighth. Canadian Thanksgiving and worldwide Communion come together, providing an opportunity to teach Presbyterians to say “Eucharist” without fear of incipient anglicanism. This combination of dates also rescues the Gospel for October 14 from surface-reading sermons on thankfulness. The tale of the “10 unclean with nowhere to go” isn't just about gratitude. Yes, leper 10 turns around and thanks Jesus. The other nine go to show themselves to the priests, in the prescribed ritual of recognition and thankoffering. We can't say they aren't grateful. We only know what's in the Samaritan's heart. And he probably knows he can't go with the others to give thanks their way.
In our readings for October Luke wants us to see Jesus running, hear him running out of breath, feel him running out of time. The momentum toward the cross is gathering speed. That's at the level of the story itself. Now remember Luke is just the first of a two-volume work. On the Luke-Acts level, Jesus pushes his disciples toward the day when he'll commission them as his witnesses to Jerusalem, Judea, Samaria and the entire world. On this level, the urgency doesn't come from the imminence of the cross. It comes from the need to prepare for the mission of the church.
On his way to Jerusalem, Jesus meets 10 lepers. They're excluded from the community because of the condition of their skin and extremities — could be from melanoma, or acne, or plantar warts, or actual leprosy. No one in town wants to look at them, let alone risk catching anything from them. As Jesus rushes southward it takes just a moment to answer their cry for help and send them back to religion and community. Nine of them, anyway. what's this Samaritan doing there? On the level of the narrative, he's an excellent plot device. Jesus is on his way toward conflict and rejection. The only one who sees who he really is and what he's about is a man who shouldn't know. At least not yet. Luke loves to show us Jesus as the Outsider on the inside, who brings outsiders in. Desperate days call for drastic action and the Samaritan understands, with his loud praise and extravagant devotion. we can see the 12 looking on, slack-jawed.
On the Luke-Acts level, Leper 10 is what's in store for disciples of Jesus—the kind of person the Spirit will take them to meet. The disciples will also follow Lepers One through Nine to their date with the priests. when they doubt their call to go beyond their own people, the Spirit will inspire someone to say, “One day Jesus was on the way to Jerusalem, walking the border between Samaria and Galilee…”
What happens when disciples walk the border today? Presbyterians prefer to stay inside the limits of the familiar, predictable, and safe. We're so good at looking out for one another, looking after our own kind! What do we do when we hear God's praise coming from unknown territory, in an unfamiliar voice? That voice from outside might just be the voice of Jesus calling us out of our sanctuaries to walk the border with him.
These are desperate days for both the church and the world. Desperate days call for drastic action. People who aren't afraid to walk the border between the known and the unknown, safety and danger, despair and hope, understand this, and find the courage to do what they must do.
