Upside-Down Christmas: Luke 17

Luke 17

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There’s lots of stories in the gospels about Jesus healing people, and some of the most prominent people who needed healing were lepers.

Welcome back to our Upside-Down Christmas podcast, where we’re looking at Jesus and how he takes all the things we think we know and turns them on their heads. And we’re doing that by working our way through the gospel of Luke, just one chapter at a time.

And listen, we can’t cover everything, so you should go and read the chapter for yourselves. By the time we get to Christmas, you’ll be nearly through the whole thing.

Today we’re looking at chapter 17, and in this chapter, it’s not just one leper that’s healed, but ten!

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 he saw them he said to them, “Go and show yourselves to the priests.” And as they went they were cleansed. (Luke 17:11-14)

Now, there are a couple of things it’s helpful to know about leprosy. First of all, it’s a kind of a catch-all term for various skin conditions and ailments. Second, if you had leprosy, you couldn’t be around anyone else because many of these ailments (real leprosy, especially) were highly contagious, and you were considered unclean besides. Third, in order to be reintroduced into society, you had to be examined by a priest and pronounced clean when you had no more signs of sores or anything like that.

And so Jesus tells these men to go show themselves to the priests, and along the way as they were going, their skin is made well. They’re healed!

But then something else interesting happens. Then 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. 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?” And he said to him, “Rise and go your way; your faith has made you well.” (Luke 17:15-19)

Now, the reason why this is so significant is because you would expect that it would be the Jews, not the Samaritans, who would have demonstrated a righteous faith. You would have expected that it would be the Jews that would have come back praising God.

Because here’s the thing: the Jews, they were the ones with the covenants, they were the ones with the prophets, they were the ones with the temple and the priests, they were the ones who had all the scriptures and all of that.

But Samaritans—they didn’t have any of that. Not only were they not pure, having intermarried with foreigners centuries ago, but they also had messed up ideas about who God was and how they were supposed to worship him. They rejected the prophets and the psalms and thought God was to be worship on their mountain in Samaria.

And because of all of this, the Jews hated them. They saw them as traitors, as fools, as impure, as defiled.

But look at what happens. It’s the Samaritan that comes back and praises God. It’s the Samaritan that demonstrates a true faith. It isn’t who you’d expect to be close to God that proves to be.

But this is the upside down way of God, isn’t it? This is the upside down kingdom, where the first shall be last and the last shall be first, where the insider becomes the outsider and the outcast is brought in.

As it turns out, things don’t turn out like we’d expect.

Lord, your kingdom is marvelous, and we are in awe of what you do. Amen.

Family Devotional:

Read Luke 17:11-19 together.

How many men remembered to come back and say "thank you" to Jesus? (Only one.)

Why is it important to say "thank you" to someone who gives you a gift or helps you?

Leprosy was a serious skin disease with no cure, which forced people to live away from their families and communities. Jesus had compassion on the ten lepers who called out to him and told them to go show themselves to the priests (the required step for being declared clean). They were healed as they went.

The One Who Returned: Only one of the men, who was a Samaritan (an "outsider" to the Jewish people), returned to Jesus, praising God and thanking him. The core lesson is that we should always remember to thank God for all our blessings, big and small, instead of forgetting like the other nine men. 

What are three things you can thank God for today?