Scripture: Luke 17:11-19
It was a dark night. Cold and wet after raining for days. The line huddled outside the soup kitchen shivered as they waited their turn, hoping to get inside out of the weather and get a warm meal in their hungry bellies.
The director of the kitchen came outside, with his keys in hand. A great cry of protest went up as he began to lock the door. “I’m sorry,” he responded. “There is no more food. We have none left for you.”
Across the street, the old shopkeeper was also closing up, looking out his window at the scene outside the soup kitchen. Ten remained out in the rain as the doors were locked. Ten that would have to go without. He turned and called out behind him. “Martha, how much do we have in the refrigerator? How much in the pantry?” Without waiting for the answer, he stepped outside into the rain and called out to the ten men across the street. “Come over here. Come inside. We will take care of you.”
Martha and the shopkeeper scrambled together a quick meal. Whatever they could find, leftovers, old cans of soup and Chef Boyardee from the cupboard. They prepared all they had and set it before those ten men who’d been left out in the cold. And the ten ate.
“You can stay inside the shop.” said the shopkeeper as they finished their meal. “No sense you going back out there in the rain.” And so they did. As each marked out their place on the floor to rest and wait, the shopkeeper sat down with them. To each, he asked the same question, “who are you and how did your life come to be this way?”
Most told him roughly the same story. They had been people of some means, middle-class, one was even a rich man at one point, all before some misfortune befell them. One went bankrupt from medical costs. Another lost his job to lay-offs. Still another was injured in a car accident and now could not work. Yet another, a veteran wounded in war. All lamented the lives they’d left behind, lives of success and happiness. Most spoke of families, of having respect in their communities, of memberships in churches and civic clubs. All lost when the economy went south or some other misfortune came upon them. All decent men, down on their luck.
But there was one that was silent. The shopkeeper chose not to push with him and left him in his solitude. As time went on, the rain stopped and the ten went on their way. The next day, the shopkeeper opened his business and life, for him at least, returned to normal.
Some weeks later, on a sunny afternoon, a customer came into the store. He was clean, well-dressed in a fine suit. The shopkeeper came out from behind the counter to ask this gentlemen what he could do for him and was astonished to recognize him as he got closer. It was the silent one from that stormy night.
“I wanted to come back to thank you again for what you did that night.” said the man. “You asked me my name and my story that night, but I said nothing. I said nothing because I knew I wasn’t like the others. I was a thief and a criminal. I was no decent person with a streak of bad luck like those others. But you didn’t care. You fed me just like them. You entrusted your shop to us for those few hours when you didn’t have to get involved. You did that for no other reason than your own kindness. Why?”
“It was the right thing to do.” answered the shopkeeper.
“I thought you might say that.” replied the man. “I wanted to show you that my fortunes have changed and I’ve gotten my life back. But not like it was. I’ve cast off my old ways and I want to make a difference for others like me. I thought you might want to help.”
The shopkeeper nodded and the two began to talk about the future.
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I wrote this paraphrase of the story of the ten lepers as I was sitting in my office looking out over the rain and thinking about those out in it. Those modern day lepers we call the homeless. I remember, when I was in seminary in Philadelphia, how we seminary students would fastidiously avoid them whenever we’d go across the street to the Wawa. I remember my encounters with them outside Port Authority in NYC and the Metro stations in DC, where I, like most everyone else, pretended they weren’t there.
Human beings don’t change much. There’s always some group of people in society that we just wish weren’t there. As twisted as our society has become over these past dozen years or so, our list has become almost endless: gays, Muslims, liberals, and immigrants have joined with perennial favorites like the homeless, people of color, Jews, sex workers, you name it. It wasn’t so different in Jesus’ day: Gentiles, lepers, prostitutes, tax collectors, and Samaritans were all on that short list of people the good folk of the day wanted to just wish out of existence.
I talked last week rather stridently about how all those labels which are so important to us DO NOT matter to Jesus at all. Ten people in need come before him. Ten receive healing from their disease. Yes, only this one Samaritan comes back in gratitude, but the gift that Christ gives he gives to all of them.
That simple fact in this story cannot be overstated. Jesus does not take away from the others for their failure to come back to him. He gives as much to them as to this one. He is not in the business of punishing those who do not show some standard of proper gratitude or devotion. Grace is meant for everyone, no exceptions.
This may be a bit presumptions of me, but I look out over this congregation and see in each of us here that one who came back. Like him, we’ve been given a great gift from Jesus through our baptism. We have been claimed as one of Christ’s own, nurtured at his table, educated from his Word. We’ve heard the story time and again of how we went to the cross for us and for all. And we are here each week (and hopefully also in the rest of our lives) to show our gratitude in some small way to the one who has done so much for us.
That is all great and good, but our presence here does not make us better than those who are not. What we’ve been given, so have they. Maybe they haven’t realized it. Maybe they have and it just hasn’t taken hold yet. But no matter. The nine were given healing just as the one was. That’s who Jesus is, constantly showering this whole world with his love and mercy, giving with no expectation of return.
He gives because it’s the right thing to do. Perhaps we can do the same. Amen.
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