Luke 17:11-19
Thanksgiving - Years A, B, C
Two notices here.
First, Lepers are an excluded people. It matters not what other identity they could also carry, their exclusion is an identity that supersedes any other. A nation of excluded folks within a nation is a crack in the foundation of that nation. This excluded nation does continually raise a cry from the margin. A prophet/priest does periodically come to release.
As a prophet, Jesus announces freedom. It is as though he said more fully, “Go show yourselves to exclusionary priests who are the gatekeepers of privileged inclusion.” This points toward “outing” one’s self—claiming a place at the table.
While still categorically excluded it is difficult to reveal one’s claim on community. Before an exclusion is excluded it is surprising that even one in ten claimed their belovedness, their basic wholeness, their inherent belonging in the face of categorical discrimination. Being a pioneer in claiming one’s self in the face of exclusion is difficult, difficult work.
Second, once one knows they are whole, not just a person in form but through-and-through, Joy is released. This is shown here with nine out of ten still needing an external validation and obviously not getting such from a discriminating priest. They are not heard of again. Here one comes to a prophet/priest claiming their own with thanksgiving. Indeed, trust is their password—I trust I am whole. [Note: From the discriminating side, Welcome is a sign of a healthy priest.]
Another synonym for faith is following one’s bliss. For an expression of a Leper returning you might get your own T-shirt by one who is still a Leper in The United Methodist Church that categorically excludes gifted and called lesbian women and gay men from ordained ministry simply on the basis of their sexual orientation. Rev. Amy DeLong was tried by the exclusionary priests of her denomination and is still present because of enough prophet/priest on the trial court. You can still support inclusion by purchasing one of her T-shirts
http://www.loveontrial.org/pics/a-logo-2.jpg
If you are preaching on this text, what would you think about wearing this T-shirt instead of a robe or other professional attire? Would you use this as bulletin cover or video image to preach on?
http://kcmlection.blogspot.com/2013/10/luke-1711-19.html
The following comment by Susan Ivany on the free-for-email-registration lectionary conversation Midrash found on joinhands.com under Wood Lake Books and their Resource section, was helpful to me regarding the need for thankfulness to our being, not in response to the situations we encounter.
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Let me guess. Each of your pastoral encounters has a clear starting point and ends with an embossed thank you card extolling your many gifts for ministry. I didn't think so. When it does happen this way, it is a rare and wonderful thing, but for the most part pastoral ministry is not that tidy. More often than not, pastoral care evolves out of need and dissolves out of circumstance. People move on, lives change for the better, and situations require less of your presence.
If we were in ministry for the accolades and gratitude, we wouldn't have made it past our first internships. The truth is we get up every morning entrusting our lives and ministries to the grace of God. We do the best we can, often unaware of the effect we might have on the people we meet.
Jesus didn't really need the ten people to thank him. He knew who he was and did not define himself on the basis of other people's approval. He wanted them to be thankful, not for his sake, but for their own.
http://www.kairoscomotion.org/lectionary/2004/october2004.html
We find ourselves in borderlands, between related but different perspectives. The issue is not whether one belongs to this group or that group, this tradition or that. The question is related to the relationship issues of healing and mercy. How do we move toward personal wholeness as well as social holiness?
Certainly there is a place for the traditions to come to bear - going to see the priests for certification. There is also a place for breaking such - turning back from going to see the priests in order to express thanksgiving.
Sometimes, though we get all caught up with the one who returned thanks to Jesus. We equate this with faith. All ten had the faith to go for certification of a healing that was not visible. All ten had a healing. All ten gave thanks (my projection), but in different directions. One might argue that Jesus sent this one who came back off in a similar direction as his nine companions - "Get up and go on your way."
Our way is wholeness and health; our way is sharing that story and encouraging others and pointing a way for individuals and communities and even enemies to be more whole and holy.
Let's not limit thanksgiving as a way of being before Jesus, but a way of life, no matter where or when we are or what circumstance we are facing.
http://www.kairoscomotion.org/lectionary/2004/october2004.html
Jesus asks, "Was none of them found to return and give praise to God except this foreigner?"
Too often we take this literally, as though praise to GOD can only be done in a particular acceptable format. I wonder if Jesus isn't still hoping that we will think and feel about life in such a way that we won't have knee-jerk reactions to questions, pre-planned responses to town-hall queries.
And if those gathered around responded to Jesus' question with, "Yes, they were all found to give praise to GOD and they did so by going forth to share the gospel they experienced. You will find them returning to you in other times and places with not only their own thanks, but that of others. In some sense this one has come to bury his talent, rather than invest it. It would be good if you sent him on to emulate the others."
Might then we see Jesus again learning and finally saying, "Get up and go on your way...."
What part do you and I have to play in the salvation of the world, the extension of thanksgiving for life, for life renewed, for life eternal? Might we go beyond simple acquiescence to literally taken questions and sense a movement of life, not a reduction to the lowest common meaning of words?
http://www.kairoscomotion.org/lectionary/2004/october2004.html
A part of enlarging one's gratitude (in general or in praise of G*D) is awareness of its availability as a choice.
Suppose we came up with a Gratitude Quotient that would take our expression of thanks during a particular time frame (morning, afternoon, evening) and divided them by the number of opportunities we had to be thankful (then turning it into a percentage by multiplying it by 100).
GQ = # Thanks / # Opportunities x 100
Then we could devise a refrigerator chart divided into those time frames per day and chart our Gratitude Quotient. Hopefully we would see a rise in our percentage of thankfulness over time as well as seeing a connection between our biorhythms and ease of thanksgiving.
Just raising gratitude to our awareness in this or some other gimmicky way, brings a benefit. We will begin to recognize more and more opportunities for giving thanks, rather than simply proceeding to life as usual. Try it, you may like it.
- - -
sometimes we call out
have mercy on me
sometimes our call becomes
have mercy on us
both are powerful
incantations
to ease troubles
to firm resolve
then our stuck point
becomes the doing
or the not doing
of what we hear
we can wait for confirmation
right where we are
and trust nothing less
than immediate healing
we can wander about
following this instruction
and that instruction
and be further lost
may we have the wisdom
to know when to what
and what to when
to plow ahead or return
http://kcmlection.blogspot.com/2007_10_01_archive.html
The space between wake and sleep where drowsing, active-dreaming, springs to life is a critical creative space. Here the interface between Samaria and Galilee is just as creative. You might want to consider where a creative interface is for you - it may be geographical or relational, perhaps it is is an art form or a time of day - and intentionally and regularly engage it.
Here, in the in-between, the least likely avenue to spiritual growth shows up. In this case, outcast lepers come out of nowhere [where in real life would lepers be waiting just inside the boundaries of a village - wouldn't you expect them to be at some remove?]. Lepers become judges at the gate and might bring an appeal for healing from any number of perspectives. Here the healing rubric is, "mercy" and raises a question of whether the dreamer will be mercy-full - full enough to have it overflow.
In this dreamtime, a community of lepers could be made up of Jews and Samaritans. Their common exile binds them together in much the same way that folks from differing religious groups have more in common with those with similar experiences in a different religious group and be in closer accord with them than with someone else from their religious group who hasn't arrived at a similar values package.
Whether the lepers were all Jews except for one Samaritan or all Samaritans, sending Samaritans to Jewish priests would have no meaning to the Samaritan. It takes an especially active dream to have a/the Samaritan return to Jesus, as though to a priest, to say "Thank you", to offer "Praise/Sacrifice" for completed healing.
And so, in a daze, Jesus reflects that a faithful, trusting, relationship - regardless of its religious orientation - is a source of healing. Quite a dream - healing goes beyond ritual, expectation, or privileged religious affiliation. The faith of a faithless person is a wonder to behold.
May you dream strong dreams of new ways of being together. This sort of dreaming will lead you to situations as equally strange as Jesus and the lepers - all healed, mysteriously on a hidden journey, even if through ways passing strange and beyond our usual sense of reality's limits. As you enact your new, strong dream, may you hear, "Go, on your way; your dream has made you well.
http://kcmlection.blogspot.com/2010/10/luke-171-19.html