The Fourteenth Sunday after Trinity

The Fourteenth Sunday after Trinity – September 1, 2024

Psalm 84; Proverbs 4:10-23; Galatians 5:16-24

St. Luke 17:11-19

In the Name of the Father, and of the + Son, and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.

In the collect for today, we asked that God would keep His Church with His perpetual mercy.[1] This wording connects us with the lepers who cry out to Jesus for His mercy. However, the original wording of this collect would have us ask God to keep His Church with His perpetual propitiation. Propitiation is the act of Jesus to appease, or satisfy, or resolve, the anger of the Father.[2] It is the aspect of the atonement that is directed toward God. Jesus’ death on the cross satisfied the punishment for sin. It satisfied God’s wrath toward sinful man.

A prayer for God to keep His Church through or by His perpetual propitiation is asking for God to continue to smile upon His people; that the propitiation of the wrath of God would last forever. How can God continue to smile upon His people? Only through the Body given and Blood shed of Jesus Christ. It doesn’t mean that Jesus’ Body and Blood are constantly re-sacrificed or constantly in a state of being sacrificed. Rather, that the Body and Blood of Jesus that were once crucified for the forgiveness of sins endures forever.[3] The crucifixion happened once. The effects of this sacrifice are perpetual, that is, they last forever.[4] They endure. The satisfaction of God’s anger toward sin is an everlasting state because Jesus is forever the Crucified One; crucified as adjective not verb.[5]

How might a return to this earlier collect be appropriate for this Gospel reading? The ten lepers cry out to Jesus to have mercy on them. They do not announce their leprosy, as commanded in the law. They do not beg for healing. They ask Jesus for mercy. They lift up their voices, a phrase commonly used for prayer. Jesus has mercy on them. All ten are cleansed. All ten are healed. But only one returns. Only the Samaritan returns to glorify God, that is, to give thanks to Jesus.

Did you catch that? What you might think of as two distinct actions are in fact one. The Samaritan leper glorifies God with a loud voice, that is, he falls on his face before Jesus’ feet and give Him thanks. The falling on his face is an act of worship. It is the word for worship. He bows before Jesus because he has realized that Jesus is the God of all creation. He is the Alpha and the Omega. The courts of the Lord, the Holy Habitation of the Almighty is the presence of Jesus.[6] The Samaritan knows this by faith and his faith guides his actions. Better to be in the presence of the Body and Blood of Jesus than to spend a thousand days anywhere else.

Last Sunday, Jesus identified Himself as a Samaritan, as the Good Samaritan. The Samaritans and the Israelites were once the same people. But 700 or so years before the birth of Jesus, the Assyrians invaded Israel and cast many of the northern tribes into exile.[7] The Assyrians then imported hundreds of foreigners into the region and these intermarried with the native Israelites. Soon, the importation of foreigners led to a mixing not only of peoples but of religion. It began as continued worship of their foreign, pagan gods but soon this worship was placed on top of the worship of the true God. The Samaritans are the result of this mixing. They accepted the first five books of the bible but rejected all others. They centered their worship on Mount Gerizim rather than Jerusalem.

Once the Kingdom of Judah returned from exile in Babylon, the tide turned, and the Judeans began to persecute the Samaritans. In 172 BC, the Judeans destroyed the Samaritan temple on Mount Gerizim. There are hundreds of years of bad blood between the Jews and the Samaritans. The Samaritans are mixed blood heretics in the eyes of the Judeans. By the time of our text, the Samaritans are a tiny community, barely hanging on to existence.

And yet it is a Samaritan who can recognize the Messiah. It is a Samaritan who sees the True God in the flesh and knows to worship Him. It is a Samaritan to whom our Lord compares Himself in the parable of last week.

The Pharisees, and by consequence the most people living in the Near East, considered leprosy to be the consequence of sin. Since leprosy can refer to several different diseases in the Bible, it is entirely possible that in some cases it is the result of sin. There are actions and behaviors that lead directly to life altering diseases. At the same time, there are some who contract these diseases by chance. They have done nothing wrong. As they ask Jesus regarding the blind man, “Whose sin caused this disease, this man’s or his parents?’”

In either case, whether one’s behavior causes the disease or one is simply a victim of the disease, the Christian response is (in the first place) the same: repentance. In falling on is face before the feet of Jesus, the Samaritan is doing exactly that. He is glorifying God by recognizing his own unworthiness. “Lord, Jesus Christ, thank you for having had mercy upon me, a sinner!”

This is how we know that the Samaritan gave thanks to God for His perpetual propitiation. The Samaritan recognizes his sorry state. It was plainly obvious in his condition! The wrath of God was seen in the oozing sores of his flesh, a constant and painful reminder of his sin. This man, as all men, was in need of the mercy of God, something that could only be achieved through reconciliation with the Father.

And how might the wrath of God be satisfied? How might the anger of God be turned away from the Samaritan? The breaking of the Body and shedding of the Blood of Jesus. The very same Body and Blood which still effects your salvation. You are in every bit as much need of salvation as the Samaritan with oozing sores. Your sins are more hidden; the effects of your sins are likely more secret. But they are just as deadly as the Samaritan’s disease. The remedy is repentance, acknowledgment of your sins and an appeal to God for His mercy, which He has promised to all who believe, all who are baptized, all who trust in the saving Blood of Jesus.

Now, when I said that repentance was the Christian response to sin, whether sin suffered or sin outwardly committed, I said this response was the same in the first place. That is because a sin which is suffered must be responded to with repentance and faith. However, a sin that is outwardly committed must likewise be met with repentance and faith but also the fruits of repentance, namely, the putting away of that sin. After being healed and falling at the feet of Jesus, the Samaritan is not free to return to worshiping on Mount Gerizim. He is not free to return to rejecting all but the first five books of Moses. His freedom is now found in Jesus Christ. His freedom is from the sins which burdened him. He is now free to live as a child of the Heavenly Father, a child according to promise.

The Samaritan was a heretic by birth. He did not worship the True God from his youth. He worshiped a false god who went by the same name. He did not worship in truth and sincerity. But the presence of the Body and Blood of Jesus, the healing of this man’s body and soul, turns his worship toward that True God. He is turned by the words of Jesus to worship in truth and sincerity. He knows where salvation is to be found. If someone asked him the meaning of Isaiah 53, “But He was wounded for our transgressions, He was bruised for our iniquities…”[8] the Samaritan is unlikely to have an answer. But he gets it. He knows where salvation is to be found. He knows Jesus is the great high priest and salvation is found in His body alone.

Keep, we beseech Thee, O Lord, Thy Church with Thy perpetual propitiation; and because the frailty of man without Thee cannot but fall, keep us ever by Thy help from all things hurtful and lead us to all things profitable for our salvation; through the Holy Body and Precious Blood of Jesus Christ, Thy Son, our Lord, who livest and reignest with Thee and the Holy Ghost, ever one God, world without end.

In + Jesus’ name. Amen.

---

[1] The change in this collect was brought to my attention via Rev. William Weedon’s blog post at https://www.gottesdienst.org/gottesblog/2020/9/13/thoughts-on-the-collect-trinity-xiv?rq=Trinity%20XIV.

[2] Hebrews 2:17.

[3] Psalm 118.

[4] Hebrews 7:24-25; 9:11-15.

[5] St. Matthew 28:5.

[6] Psalm 84:10.

[7] 2 Kings 17.

[8] Isaiah 53:5.

The Fourteenth Sunday after Trinity

 The Fourteenth Sunday after Trinity – September 18, 2022

Psalm 84; Proverbs 4:10-23; Psalm 92; Galatians 5:16-24

St. Luke 17:11-19

In the name of the Father, and of the + Son, and of the Holy Spirit.  Amen.

 There is a distinction between being grateful and giving thanks. Both concern your reaction to receiving a gift but being grateful is oriented toward the gift itself. You are grateful to have received this specific thing. Giving thanks is directed toward the one who gave you the gift. Giving thanks recognizes the value of the gift in the person who loved you such that they gave you this gift.

An example might help clarify. If my wife gives me a tenon saw for Christmas, I am grateful to have received a saw that will help me make more precise cuts. I give thanks to my wife because she has listened to me talk about tenon saws and went through the effort of finding one and buying it for me.

In much the same way, there is a difference between praise and worship. We give praise to God by recounting what He has done for us. The Psalter is full of psalms of praise that tell the story of salvation. Worship is oriented toward the Person of God. In worship, we not only receive the things God gives us, but we recognize the origin of these gifts as being in the Person and attributes of God.

To be fair, these distinctions are not perfect. These words can be used in different ways. But to distinguish the concepts is very helpful. It is helpful because it places our focus not on what we are doing—being grateful, giving thanks, praising, worshiping—but on the object of these actions. On whom or toward what are we grateful, giving thanks, and offering worship or praise?

All ten lepers cried out to Jesus to have mercy on them. All ten lepers were grateful for the cleansing. They rejoiced to have received a life-altering miracle. Leprosy caused them to be separated from their families, their communities, and the life of the Temple, where God dwelt with man. The gift of healing meant these lepers would be reunited with mothers, fathers, sisters, brothers, and children. It meant they could go to church again, to receive the blessings of God. All ten lepers undoubtedly recognized the goodness in the gift of healing and were abundantly grateful.

It is possible, and quite likely, that all ten lepers praised God for what He had done. When they went to the priests, the lepers probably told the story of how they were healed. They proclaimed the works of God. This is the essence of praise—to recount what God has done for us.

Although all ten were grateful and possibly praised God for this miracle, only one gave thanks to God and worshiped Him. Only the Samaritan leper recognized the value of healing in the person of Christ and directed his worship toward God in the flesh. Only the Samaritan realized the true nature of the Man standing before him.

When Jesus commanded the lepers to show themselves to the priests, it was the Samaritan who realized that the true High Priest was standing before him. With a loud voice, he glorified God, fell on his face, and gave thanks to Jesus. This is an act of worship.

Our worship is oriented toward the Triune God: One God in Three Persons. We worship the Trinity in Unity and Unity in Trinity. This means we see that the forgiveness of sins, life, and salvation are meaningless if they do not originate in the Person of God. If God is not a Person, that is, someone with whom you have a relationship, then He is not worthy of worship or thanks.

Our world is content with an ambiguous god. Quite often, we are content with an ambiguous god. Perhaps it is because we don’t like something the True God has said. Perhaps it is because we are afraid that we will say too much and so we purposely remain ignorant of who God is. Perhaps we know exactly who the True God is and yet we prefer a god of our own choosing.

Whatever the reason, an ambiguous god cannot save you. The abstract concept of a divine being who loves you just because will not save you. Even the idea that god loves you, if not given the flesh of meaning, is not enough to save you. The only god who saves is the God who took on your flesh, then died for your sins. The only god who saves is the God who calls you to repentance for your sins. It is this God alone who loves you such that He would die for you, rise from the grave, and call you out of the darkness of your sin and into His marvelous light. An ambiguous god can do no such thing because it is not a person.

God is love and this means He acts on your behalf. Leprosy kept these ten people from going to the Temple to be with God so God came to them wrapped in flesh. Your sin, both the sin from your birth and the sins you commit in thought, word, and deed, prevents you from drawing near to God. Your sin prevents God from smiling upon you for it is evil in His sight.

God is love and this means that He cannot abide His beloved children dwelling in evil. He comes to you, wrapped in flesh, that you might come to Him. He comes to you in water, where you are drowned in the first death. In Holy Baptism, you died. But if you died a death like His, you shall certainly rise in a resurrection like His. You rose from the waters of Holy Baptism a New Creation, breathing new life in Christ. Therefore, the faithful Christian has nothing to fear in temporal death. You have already died in Christ. Now, the sleep of death is a portal to eternity.

Between your death in the waters of Holy Baptism and your rest in the grave, God comes to you wrapped in bread and wine. He comes to you not as a performance, not as an act, but as your loving bridegroom. He comes to you just as certainly as He came to that village where ten lepers came out to meet Him. Your eyes of flesh do not see it, but the eyes of faith see the face of Christ in the Eucharist.

Our worship is oriented toward Christ. Physically, we orient ourselves toward the altar as the primary symbol of that which is truly happening. Jesus Christ comes to you today and every day. He comes to you today in Word and Sacrament. He comes to you every day as you pray, sing, read the Scriptures, and obey His commandments while serving your neighbor.

There is nothing fake about what happens when we worship. There is nothing theatrical about giving thanks to God. Thanksgiving and worship of the Triune God cannot be done without sincerity because to do anything else would be to deny that God is a Person.

In + Jesus’ name.  Amen.

The Fourteenth Sunday after Trinity

Proverbs 4:10-23; Psalm 84; Galatians 5:16-24

Luke 17:11-19

            In the name of the Father, and of the + Son, and of the Holy Spirit.  Amen.

The direct result of leprosy is separation, particularly separation of three kinds. First, leprosy separates the afflicted from his own body. The disease can infect the nervous system, effectively shutting down communication between the affected areas and the brain. This leads sores and wounds to go unnoticed, resulting in serious infection or loss of members.

While many of us do not have experience with leprosy, we do have experience with this type of separation. Dementia and Alzheimer’s erode a person’s mind, turning their own ability to think against them. ALS and Multiple Sclerosis sever the connection between mind and body. The mind is fully aware as the body slowly decays. Autoimmune disorders like Rheumatoid Arthritis, Hashimoto’s Disease, and even psoriasis turn the defense system of the body into a savage opponent. In each of these cases, there is a sense of losing control over oneself. The mind and body are separated, an indication and constant reminder of the separation of body and soul, the very definition of death.

The second kind of separation resulting from leprosy is a separation from community. Lepers were cast out from the community to prevent the spread of the disease. This was commanded by God in Leviticus 13. After extensive measures taken to ensure the cause of disease was Leprosy – measures also commanded by God – the Leper would be cast out.

Eventually, these outcasts would gather into colonies outside of town. They sought community together and while this helped, it did not replace getting to see their grandchildren on their birthday, watching their daughter’s wedding, or embracing their beloved. The lepers relied on the charity of others for food, but when anyone without leprosy approached, they were forced to cry out, “Leper!” so that the one approaching would know to keep their distance.

The third, and worst of the separations, was separation from the Temple. The Lepers were forbidden from entering the Temple, that place where God promised to dwell with his people. They could not offer sacrifices nor hear the Word of God preached. The Leper must stand afar off and cry, “Lord, have mercy!” He is not free to approach the Table of the Lord and receive the gifts offered there. Salvation is possible for the Leper, but it is difficult to maintain faith when you are not fed on the Words and Gifts of God.

Leprosy is not a creation of God – it is a corruption of his good creation. God uses corrupted diseases, especially leprosy, to instruct and chastise His creation. Leprosy causes separation from self, community, and the presence of God because Sin causes separation from self, community, and God. Original Sin places a barrier between man and God, causing man to be born at war against God. Sins against your neighbor separate you from the community in which God has placed you. The summary of the Law, the summary of God’s will for creation is to love God and love your neighbor. To transgress the Law is to separate yourself from God and neighbor.

Then there is sin against yourself, sin against your conscience. This is perhaps the most insidious form of sin for Satan uses it to convince you that you are not worthy of forgiveness. You sin against yourself when you know what you are doing is sin, but you do it anyway. You sin against yourself when you hear your conscience say ‘no’ but your flesh says ‘yes.’ You sin against yourself when you know that you should repent but are too ashamed. These sins separate you from your own humanity, for you are actively choosing to be less than God has made you. You are choosing to be an animal, not a man.

This separation is the natural state of man. We are born citizens of the kingdom of Satan, pledging allegiance to the Prince of Lies. We are separated from God by virtue of our flesh, inherited from Adam. For this reason, the Rite of Holy Baptism begins with the words, “Depart unclean spirit, make way for the Holy Spirit.” This exorcism declares that Satan has no more claim over Charles or any of the Baptized children of God. Charles has been set apart to be the dwelling place of the Holy Spirit, as have you, beloved children of the Father.

There are three different words for the healing miracle in today’s text. First, as the lepers turn to go, they realize they have been “cleansed,” that is, they have been made clean. Their leprous spots have disappeared, and their skin is fresh. This cleansing is not only a miracle of healing but a display of the effects of Holy Baptism. In Holy Baptism, the leprosy filling your soul is cleansed. You are made clean in the Waters of Holy Baptism. How? God’s Word, in and with the water, washes your soul clean and transfers the stains of leprosy onto Christ Himself. Afterall, Holy Baptism would be nothing if Christ had not born the sin of the world to the Cross.  He was anointed in his own Baptism to be the sacrificial lamb who died to atone for your sin. The waters of Holy Baptism are made clean only because Christ has taken your filth upon himself on Calvary.

Then one of the lepers, seeing that he was healed, returned, glorified God, and worshiped and gave thanks to Christ. This Samaritan saw that he was not only cleansed, but that he was healed. This is he who recognizes the power of Holy Baptism. He sees that it is not an empty rite, nor a fragile ceremony easily lost. He knows Holy Baptism to be the washing of regeneration. He has been made new, made whole, reborn for a new life. The Samaritan sees that Christ has forgiven his sin, the source of leprosy, not just washed his skin to be clean. To put it bluntly, the Samaritan receives the healing in faith.

What then of the nine? Were not ten cleansed and yet only one returned to give glory to God? The Samaritan received the healing in faith, the nine did not. They saw the cleanliness of their skin but did not receive the healing. Perhaps they were disappointed Jesus didn’t give them money. Perhaps they believed the vitamins they took the day before finally kicked in. Perhaps the experimental drug is actually the elixir of life.

Whatever they thought, the last thing on their mind was, ‘God, the Lord, Creator of Heaven and Earth, has spared my life. He has cleansed my body and soul, forgiven my sins, and made me an heir of eternal life.’ They failed to glorify God.

What does it mean to glorify God? It is not simply to say good things about God or honor God. That would have to do with your opinion of God. To glorify God is to recognize God for who he is according to his majesty and power. This can only be done by the revelation of God’s Word. We must be filled with the Holy Spirit, baptized into Christ’s death and resurrection, so that we would have the faith to glorify God, seeing him for who he is.

We cannot see the Samaritan’s heart. We cannot look into his heart and see his faith, only God can do that. But we know the Samaritan has faith because we can see his actions and hear his confession. He glorifies God and worships Jesus. He bows himself to the ground at Jesus’ feet, showing his unworthiness to stand before the Incarnate God and humbling himself before Jesus’ majesty. We can see his faith and hear him boldly confess the One True God.

There is another side to this. What of the nine? Were not ten cleansed? The nine received the same cleansing as the Samaritan but they did not receive it in faith. Because they did not receive it in faith, they did not return to glorify God nor worship Jesus. Their actions and words make it clear they are without faith. These are the one who have rejected their Baptism. Not everyone who is Baptized will be saved. Baptism is not a magical rite in which salvation is bestowed upon all who have the magic water poured on their heads. The salvation of Holy Baptism must be received in faith and the nine have given clear evidence to the contrary.

Just as the Samaritan was both cleansed and healed in the same moment, so too with Holy Baptism. Faith is created and strengthen in this Sacrament. Faith also receives this Sacrament. It makes logical sense that faith must first be created in order to receive the Sacrament, but the mysteries of God do not operate according to human logic. God has promised that Baptism bestows faith. He has also stated the Sacraments must be received in faith. Both are true and we confess it because God says so.

Therefore, we do not baptize anyone who walks through the door. Nor do we baptize the children of unbelievers, who will never be brought back into the church. We instruct the family and the sponsors of their solemn duty to raise this child in the faith into which they have been baptized.

We could say the cleansing of the lepers reunited themselves with their bodies. The cleansing also reunited them with their community. But the nine were not reunited with God because they rejected the One who brought them cleansing. The healing of the Samaritan reunited him with God and the faith given to him by Christ has saved him. The final words of the reading should be, “Your faith has saved you.” The faith of the Samaritan to receive the gifts of God for who God is has saved him.

This faith is not a work anymore than Charlie could walk down that aisle and baptize himself. This faith is a work of God, a gift of the Holy Spirit, and a union with Christ himself, whose death and resurrection has sealed this faith with the promise of eternal life. It is a blessed thing to be helpless. As you age and become incapable of helping yourself, remember that you are simply returning to the state of a child. Unless you become like one of these little ones, unless you are as helpless as Charles, you will by no means inherit eternal life.

Being helpless is a confession of your inability to save yourself. We are too worried that we have nothing left to contribute because we define ourselves by what we have to offer. Christ defines us by what he has to offer. Why would you think you can do better? Arise and come to the Great High Priest. Follow Christ on the journey to the Cross and there receive the cleansing flood of Holy Baptism and the food of His own Body and Blood.

In + Jesus’ name.  Amen.