Thoughts on the 14th Sunday after Trinity. St. Luke xvii.11 To members of Anglican Prayer Network

David Valentini 09 September at 06:47

Of all the Gospel writers, Luke stands out. He is the physician. Luke’s account of our Lord’s birth is the most detailed account in the New Testament. In today’s Gospel passage, our Lord is heading towards Jerusalem. Jesus passes through Samaria and Galilee. He encounters ten lepers. The lepers ask our Lord to have mercy on them.
Jesus cleanses them and tells them to show themselves to the local priests. Nine of lepers after they were cleansed continued on their way. One leper, a Samaritan, fell down at the feet of Christ and glorified God the Father. The passage concludes with Jesus telling the leper to arise, and to go his way. Our Lord tells the man that his faith has made him whole.

This passage is very rich with information. The ten men were affected with leprosy.The disease was recorded for the first time nine thousand years go. Leprosy afflicted people in Southeast Asia and the Middle East. Many individuals were disfigured and disabled. In time of our Lord’s life, there was no known cure for leprosy. Of the ten lepers, nine were Jews, and one was a Samaritan. Samaritans and Jews did not get along.
Jews ascribed to the whole Torah. Samaritans to the first five books commonly called the Book of Moses They also had a series of books known as the Tolidah. The central place of worship for Jews was Mount of Olives. The central place of worship for the Samaritans was Mount Gerizim, near Shechem, the first capital of the kingdom of Israel. The Jews told the Samaritans that they were incomplete of their worship of God, as they did not hold to the entire Torah. The Samaritans told the Jews their worship of God was corrupted by their exile in Babylon that began in 586 BC and ended in 538 BC. The Samaritan Chronicles hint that it was the sinfulness of the people of Israel that led to the Babylonian exile. Thus in a nutshell, the Jews viewed the Samaritans as a sect of the Jewish faith, and The Samaritans saw the Jews as having corrupted the faith of Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, and David.

Unfortunately, this schism between the Jews and the Samaritans has influenced Christianity. In the New Testament, Paul writes to a divided Church in Corinth of which Fr. Carder spoke about two weeks ago; each side following a leader and dividing the body of Christ. In the fifth century, the Coptic Christians split from the Undivided church. In 1054, the Latin Rites Catholics of the west split from the Greek and Middle Eastern Catholics in the east. In 1378, in the west, Catholicism was split into two factions: one in Rome and another in Avignon, France. The Protestant Reformation led to the further divisions in the body of Christ. Today, all one has to do is go on the internet and see a new church split.

In each every split mentioned in the sermon, both sides in each successive faction believed they had the true faith, the right leaders, the correct readings, the correct places to worship, and the genuine doctrine. In certain cases, one side did have a clearer understanding of faith and doctrine. But if we go back to the Samaritan he had the faith of child and the wisdom of an adult. He like a child simply asked for the Lord to have mercy on him and to cleanse him. One almost gets the idea that he had an expectation he would be cleansed. Perhaps he had the wisdom of an adult, and may have examined the sins that may have contributed to his disease. Then like a child with that simple faith, he glorified God the Father.

What is always also astonishing was that Samaritan was with nine Jews. There was no evidence that he criticized them at all, or fought with them. His focus throughout the passage was God. He asked for mercy, and may have examined his sin. He asked to be cleansed and he was. The Samaritan glorified God when he was cleansed of his disease.
He was not focused on whether or not the Jews or the Samaritans had the true faith. He was focused on coming before God in humility, having a child-like faith, and communing with Him. The Latin commune is to come together.

All too often Christians, become concerned with the latest dispute in the church at a congregational or regional level. Some often become hardened by it, and have a “crises of faith.” They often react with weariness about the poor relations with another denomination. During those times, we have to ask ourselves do we have the childlike of faith of the Samaritan? Do we have such a faith that no matter what we occurs, that we know that we have to do is examine our lives, as Saint Augustine and Paul urge us to do,ask for His mercy and have the expectation that God will assist. Are we prepared after that to give glory to God? If we answer yes to all those questions, will be able to simply interact with and be healed by the loving God: the Father that created the world, the Son that redeemed it, and the Holy Ghost that sanctified it.