A thankful heart is the parent of all virtues.

Cicero

Luke 17: 11 ¶ Now on his way to Jerusalem, Jesus traveled along the border between Samaria and Galilee. 12  As he was going into a village, ten men who had leprosy {The Greek word was used for various diseases affecting the skin--not necessarily leprosy.} met him. They stood at a distance 3  and called out in a loud voice, "Jesus, Master, have pity on us!" 14  When he saw them, he said, "Go, show yourselves to the priests." And as they went, they were cleansed. 15  One of them, when he saw he was healed, came back, praising God in a loud voice. 16  He threw himself at Jesus' feet and thanked him--and he was a Samaritan. 17  Jesus asked, "Were not all ten cleansed? Where are the other nine? 18  Was no-one found to return and give praise to God except this foreigner?" 19  Then he said to him, "Rise and go; your faith has made you well."

A woman leaving the worship service said to the minister, "I enjoyed the sermon."

"Don't thank me. Thank the Lord," said the minister.

"It wasn't that good," the lady replied.

n      Robert S. Smith, Kane, Pennsylvania, Christian Reader, "Lite Fare."

Don’t make the mistake of writing yourself into this story as the central character.  You are most likely one of the extras.  Where are the nine?

One waited to see if the cure was real.

One waited to see if it would last.

One said he would see Jesus later.

One decided that he had never had leprosy.

One said he would have gotten well anyway.

One gave the glory to the priests.

One said, "O well, Jesus didn't really do anything."

One said, "Just any rabbi could have done it."

One said, "I was already much improved."

-- Charles L. Brown, Main Street Monitor

A Sense Of Need

Ø    Tends to unite people

Perhaps we could use a greater sense of need in the church.  There were 10 lepers in the story – most likely 9 Jews and one Samaritan.  Neither liked the other in terms of their race and yet they were comrades in misery and in need.  When people share things in common relationships develop and yet there are so many petty barriers that divide the church today, things that are so small and petty that they would grieve the heart of God.  Probably the greatest evidence that the self-sufficient person or a collection of them parades their sufficiency before God and then with half a heart and tongue-in cheek we tell God that we need Him.  I need thee O I need thee – every hour I need, O Blessed Holy Spirit I come to Thee . . .

A sense of self sufficiency tends to divide people because we start to believe that we no longer need one another.  So we assume that we have the luxury of bidding one another good bye at the slightest hint of disagreement and we walk away from each other saying “Who cares?”

Ø    Tends to bring people to Christ

The ministry of Christ was always focused on people who were needy.  They were those who were overlooked by society in general.  People that others who were self assured and contained had already cast on the scrap heap.  We do the same thing today – we will labor with people to a degree and then we will cast them aside and label them in order to make ourselves feel better.

People who hold high position have a greater responsibility.  I have heard the words “He’ll never amount to anything.” -  too frequently in my life.  The tragedy is that sometimes people will believe that – you might believe that about yourself today because someone in a position of authority made that pronouncement over your life.  Shake it off.  For every Christian person your abilities are not limited in Christ.  In Him you can do all things.

Ø    People expect different things from God

I think that this was the case with the ten lepers.  Perhaps they were more consumed with the consequences of their disease then they were with the disease itself.  A good number of people are sorry for the mess that they are in and mindless to the nature that resides within them that lead them to the mess and will take them there again.  The great thing about a relationship with God is that he deals with both consequences and the nature.  He’ll forgive your debt but he’ll do something to set you free from returning to that state.  These men were most likely consumed with the fact that their disease had made them outcasts from society and to be reunited with friends would be the first evidence of healing.

The one man, a Samaritan

Ø    Most people get what they expect

A Show Of Negligence

It’s amazing how quickly we forget the miracle of answered prayers.  Our need draws us to Christ and brings sincerity and fervency to our prayers.  Even regularity and yet we forget our need quickly even as we receive the answer and fall back quickly to our ungrateful patterns.  We are much better pray-ers than praise-ers.

There are several barriers to gratitude:

Ø    Entitlement –

I deserve it

Ø    Grievance –

I’ve been victimized and it’s about time that I am compensated

Ø    Self-centredness –

Let me get on with my own agenda.  This is a setback to me related to my own interests and pursuits

Ø    Over-sensitivity –

There are those who for whom the slightest offense will obliterate the wonderful experience of a lifetime.

A Samaritan’s Nature

Ø    He noticed the miracle

He was no stranger to rejection and so the social consequences of his disease held it’s advantages.  He was now welcomed into the company of his Jewish brothers on equal footing.

Ø    He came back to Christ

More and more in my life I find myself looking back to thank the people who yesterday invested in today’s victories.  Our church is a good example.  5th in average attendance and 2nd in giving.  This is an incredible standard that we have set before us.  There is so much to be thankful for in this and at the same time an unbelievable challenge for the up and coming generation of leaders.  There is only one evidence that would be a stronger indicator of a person’s love for Christ than the way they give of their material resources – that is the kind of love that would call one to lay down his/her life for another.

Ø    He expressed his gratitude

We are much better at praying than we are at praising.  It is amazing how quickly we forget the depth of our cry and the relief when God meets us at our point of need.

The chances are that we are among the ranks of the thankless.

There are many times in life when we are wiser to go back before we go on.  For many of us and much more than we realize there is someone behind us who has given us some valuable direction, the worth of which we never realized until we began to act upon it.

There was really no promise of healing as Jesus sent them to the priest.  Perhaps they thought that their healing might come from him.

It only occurred to one that he should return to give thanks.  The others returned to the source of their healing as the others went to have themselves declared clean.  He knew he was clean – as clean as he could get – he didn’t require the proclamation of the priest.

The others were more concerned with their official proclamation than they were with the fact that they had met the healer.

The glory tends to fade as time passes.  I guess that’s normal. 

.

See:  Luke 17:12-19

Ironically, the best way to develop an attitude of responsibility toward the future is to cultivate a sense of responsibility toward the past. ... We are born into a world that we didn't make, and it is only fair that we should be grateful to those who did make it. Such gratitude carries with it the imperative that we preserve and at least slightly improve the world that has been given us before passing it on to subsequent generations. We stand in the midst of many generations. If we are indifferent to those who went before us and actually existed, how can we expect to be concerned for the well-being of those who come after us and only potentially exist?

n      David R. Carlin, Jr., Christian History, no. 25.

John Henry Jowett, a British preacher of an earlier generation, said this about gratitude: "Gratitude is a vaccine, an antitoxin, and an antiseptic." What did he mean? He meant that gratitude, like a vaccine, can prevent the invasion of a disgruntled, discouraged spirit. Like an antitoxin, gratitude can prevent the affects of the poisons of cynicism, criticalness, and grumbling. Like an antiseptic, a spirit of gratitude can soothe and heal the most troubled spirit.

n      John Yates, "An Attitude of Gratitude,"  Preaching Today, Tape No. 110.

I must be poor and want, before I can exercise the virtue of gratitude; miserable and in torment, before I can exercise the virtue of patience.

n      John Donne,  Leadership, Vol. 10, no. 2.

Back in the very early thirties, William Stidger was seated one day with a group of friends in a restaurant. Everyone was talking about the depression: how terrible it was, the suffering people, rich people committing suicide, the jobless, the whole thing. The conversation got more and more miserable as it went on. There was a minister in the group, and he suddenly broke in and said, "I don't know what I'm going to do, because in two or three weeks I have to preach a sermon on Thanksgiving Day. I want to say something affirmative. What can I say that's affirmative in a period of world depression like this?" And as the minister spoke, Stidger said it was like the Spirit of God spoke to him: "Why don't you give thanks to those people who have been a blessing in your life and affirm them during this terrible time?"

   He began to think about that. The thought came to his mind of a schoolteacher very dear to him, a wonderful teacher of poetry and English literature from years ago who had gone out of her way to put a great love of literature and verse in him. It affected all his writings and his preaching. So he sat down and wrote a letter to this woman, now up in years. It was only a matter of days until he got a reply in the feeble scrawl of the aged. "My Dear Willy"--Stidger says at that time he was about 50 years of age and was bald, and no one had called him Willy for a long time, so just the opening sentence warmed his heart. Here's the letter:

   "My Dear Willy: I can't tell you how much your note meant to me. I am in my eighties, living alone in a small room, cooking my own meals, lonely, and like the last leaf of autumn lingering behind." Listen to this sentence, will you? "You'll be interested to know that I taught in school for more than fifty years, and yours is the first note of appreciation I ever received. It came on a blue, cold morning, and it cheered me as nothing has done in many years."

   Stidger says, "I'm not sentimental, but I found myself weeping over that note." Then he thought of a kindly bishop, now retired, an old man who had recently faced the death of his wife and was all alone. This bishop had taken a lot of time, given him advice and counsel and love when he first began his ministry. So he sat down and wrote the old bishop. In two days a reply came back.

   "My Dear Will: Your letter was so beautiful, so real, that as I sat reading it in my study, tears fell from my eyes, tears of gratitude. Before I realized what I was doing, I rose from my chair and I called her name to share it with her, forgetting she was gone. You'll never know how much your letter has warmed my spirit. I have been walking around in the glow of your letter all day long."

n      David A. Seamands, "Instruction for Thanksgiving," Preaching Today, Tape No. 62.

Mother Theresa told this story in an address to the National Prayer Breakfast in 1994:  One evening we went out, and we picked up four people from the street. And one of them was in a most terrible condition. I told the sisters, "You take care of the other three; I will take care of the one who looks worst."

   So I did for her all that my love could do. I put her in bed, and there was such a beautiful smile on her face. She took hold of my hand as she said two words only: "Thank you." Then she died.  I could not help but examine my conscience before her. And I asked: What would I say if I were in her place? And my answer was very simple. I would have tried to draw a little attention to myself. I would have said, "I am hungry, I am dying, I am in pain," or something. But she gave me much more; she gave me her grateful love. And she died with a smile on her face.  Gratitude brings a smile and becomes a gift.

n      Leadership, Vol. 16, no. 2.

For three things I thank God every day of my life: thanks that he has vouchsafed me knowledge of his works; deep thanks that he has set in my darkness the lamp of faith; deep, deepest thanks that I have another life to look forward to-a life joyous with light and flowers and heavenly song.

   Helen Adams Keller (1880-1968)

It's only when we choose to give praise for the rough spots in life that we will begin to see them from God's perspective. If we don't give thanks in all things, we are living in unbelief, for we are assuming that our circumstances are not controlled by a God who loves us! I'm not saying that you should give thanks for sin, but you can thank God for how he will use that sin to teach, to rebuke, or to challenge you.

   Erwin W. Lutzer (1941- )

Life without thankfulness is devoid of love and passion. Hope without thankfulness is lacking in fine perception. Faith without thankfulness lacks strength and fortitude. Every virtue divorced from thankfulness is maimed and limps along the spiritual road.

   John Henry Jowett (1864-1923)

A man was watching his eighty-year-old neighbor planting a small peach tree. He inquired of him as follows: "You don't expect to eat peaches from that tree, do you?" The old man rested on his spade. He said, "No, at my age I know I won't. But all my life I've enjoyed peaches--never from a tree I planted myself. I'm just trying to pay the other fellows who planted the trees for me."

   --James S. Hewett, Illustrations Unlimited (Wheaton: Tyndale House Publishers, Inc, 1988) p. 259.

Would you know who is the greatest saint in the world? It is not he who prays most or fasts most; it is not he who gives most alms, or is more eminent for temperance, chastity, or justice; but it is he who is always thankful to God who wills everything that God willeth, who receives everything as an instance of God's goodness, and has a heart always ready to praise God for it.

   William Law, A Serious Call to a Devout and Holy Life

I once heard a touching story about a poor woman with two children who had no bed for them to sleep in and scarcely any clothes to cover them. In the depth of winter they were nearly frozen, and the mother took the door of a cellar off the hinges, and set it up before the corner where they crouched to sleep, that some of the draft and cold might be kept from them. One of the children whispered to her, when she complained, "Mother, what do those dear little children do who have no cellar door to put up in front of them?" Even there, you see, the little heart found cause for thankfulness.

n      Charles Haddon Spurgeon, The Quotable Spurgeon, (Wheaton: Harold Shaw Publishers, Inc, 1990)

Instead of asking why me, this could be a better question . . .

Someone writing in Christianity Today several years ago said, "Shall I thank God at this Thanksgiving? Why was I born at this particular time in the history of the world? Why was I born in a spotless delivery room in an American hospital instead of a steaming shelter in the dank jungle of the Amazon or a mud hut in Africa? Why did I have the privilege of going to school with capable instructors while millions around the world, without a school book, sit or squat on a dirt floor listening to a missionary?

   "How does it happen that my children are tucked into warm beds at night with clean white sheets while millions of babies in the world will lie in cold rooms, many in their own filth and vomit? Why can I sit down to a warm meal whenever I want to and eat too much when millions will know all of their lives the gnawing pangs of hunger? Do I deserve to share in such wealth? Why me and not other millions? Why was I born in a land I didn't build, in a prosperity that I didn't create and enjoy a freedom that I didn't establish? Why an American sitting comfortably in my own living room this Thanksgiving rather than an Indian squatting in the dark corner of some infested alley in Calcutta, shivering in the cold, or a Cambodian in the rubble of what used to he my home, or a terrified, running Nicaraguan in the jungle? Do I deserve it? By what right do I have it?"

n      Joel Gregory, "The Unlikely Thanker," Preaching Today, Tape No. 110.

If one should give me a dish of sand and tell me there were particles of iron in it, I might look for them with my eyes and search for them with my clumsy fingers and be unable to detect them; but let me take a magnet and sweep through it and now would it draw to itself the almost invisible particles by the mere power of attraction.

   The unthankful heart, like my finger in the sand, discovers no mercies; but let the thankful heart sweep through the day and as the magnet finds the iron, so it will find, in every hour, some heavenly blessings, only the iron in God's sand is gold!

   Henry Ward Beecher

You say grace before meals.  All right.  But I say grace before the concert and the opera, and grace before the play and pantomime, and grace before I open a book, and grace before sketching, painting, swimming, fencing, boxing, walking, playing, dancing, and grace before I dip the pen in the ink. 

n      G.K. Chesterton, quoted in Christian Ministry (July 1983).  Christianity Today, Vol. 34, no. 17.

Our biggest problem in the church today is this vast majority of Sunday morning Christians who claim to have known the Master's cure and who return not [at other times] to thank Him by presence, prayer, testimony and support of His church.  In fact, the whole Christian life is one big "Thank You," the living expression of our gratitude to God for His goodness.  But we take Him for granted and what we take for granted we never take seriously.

n      Vance Havner in The Vance Havner Quote Book.  Christianity Today, Vol. 31,  no. 17.

I do not thank thee, Lord, That I have bread to eat while others starve; Nor yet for work to do While empty hands solicit heaven; Nor for a body strong While other bodies flatten beds of pain. No, not for these do I give thanks; But I am grateful, Lord, Because my meager loaf I may divide; For that my busy hands May move to meet another's need; Because my doubled strength I may expend to steady one who faints. Yes, for all these do I give thanks! For heart to share, desire to bear, And will to live, Flamed into one by deathless Love-- Thanks be to God for this! Unspeakable! His Gift!

n      Unknown, Leadership, Vol. 4, no. 4.

It is probable that in most of us the spiritual life is impoverished and stunted because we give so little place to gratitude. It is more important to thank God for blessings received than to pray for them beforehand. For that forward-looking prayer, though right as an expression of dependence upon God, is still self-centered in part, at least, of its interest; there is something we hope to gain by our prayer. But the backward-looking act of thanksgiving is quite free from this. In itself it is quite selfless. Thus it is akin to love. All our love to God is in response to his love for us; it never starts on our side. "We love, because he first loved us" (1 John 4:19).

n      William Temple, from 3000 Quotations on Christian Themes. Christianity Today, Vol. 32, no. 17.