The One Who Came Back

Luke 17:11–19 NIV

Now on his way to Jerusalem, Jesus traveled along the border between Samaria and Galilee. As he was going into a village, ten men who had leprosy met him. They stood at a distance and called out in a loud voice, “Jesus, Master, have pity on us!” When he saw them, he said, “Go, show yourselves to the priests.” And as they went, they were cleansed. One of them, when he saw he was healed, came back, praising God in a loud voice. He threw himself at Jesus’ feet and thanked him—and he was a Samaritan. Jesus asked, “Were not all ten cleansed? Where are the other nine? Has no one returned to give praise to God except this foreigner?” Then he said to him, “Rise and go; your faith has made you well.”

Introduction

Lighthouse we are in this series called the Long Shots. How many of you enjoy a good underdog story? Come on, Disney and Hollywood have made a killing on telling the stories of underdogs.

And we’re not just looking at underdog stories in the Bible, but we’re reading about the lesser known people of the Bible. These aren’t the people who went on to be Kings or Queens, they’re just kind of average everyday people.

Like Emmet.

Let’s see who in the world knows who I am even talking about right now?

Let me give you one more clue… “everything is awesome!”

Ok, now you know that I got young boys. The Lego Movie!

The hero in the Lego Movie is just a regular dude who happens to know everyone, but no one knows him.

Emmet is just so ordinary that he blends in. He’s forgettable.

And in the movie the heroes are master builders who can build ANYTHING. But the only thing Emmet can build is a double decker couch!

That’s our hero! That’s our main guy!

Transition

Now your homework, is to go and watch the Lego Movie. But for the next few minutes I want to talk to you about someone who is a lot like Emmet.

Text

The story of the healing of the 10 lepers is only found in Luke’s gospel. I think the reason for that is because the author, Luke, was a physician. I think he had a keen interest in telling the story to his readers. As a physician, he wanted to make sure that this story is told, and it is told in great detail.

And that’s exactly where we begin to encounter some challenges in this story. The story begins by telling us that Jesus entered into an unknown village.

So Luke, the great detail oriented physician suddenly forgets to enter the GPS location. Luke the meticulous and articulate communicator of the life of Jesus all of a sudden gets some sort of amnesia about where this was happening. It was just some random place. A place with not much to write about. A place that has no significance. A place that is forgettable. A place that isn’t even worth mentioning.

But the story gets real in the next detail, because Luke tells us that these lepers were a great distance from God. Someone say, “far from God.”

And now we have the setting...

These lepers are people who were not only socially isolated and in a nondescript location, but they are far from God.

I can identify with these lepers... I’ve been far from God, in a condition that I didn’t want to be in and in a location that I wondered, how in the world did I get here?

Maybe some of you can sympathize with their situation. Sure, you may not have their exact illness but you know what it feels like to feel alone. You know what it is like to live in a house, but not live in a home. You know what it is like to not have the people who are supposed to love you and be with you be far from you. When you find yourself in this situation, perhaps you too feel far from God.

If God was really for me, then why am I in this condition? If God is really for me, then why am I here? If God is really for me, why do I feel so alone?

These 10 lepers began to cry out to Jesus, and Jesus begins to get to work.

Get to the Priests

You need to understand that this command from Jesus had weight. When a leper was cured from leprosy, before he could reintegrate into the general population he needed to present himself to the priest and be declared well again.

Jesus tells the lepers, get to the temple, and show yourself to the priest.

This sounded crazy to them because they were lepers. They probably looked at their arms, looked at each others, and thought to themselves, “but we’re sick.”

Let me pause right here and preach on this point. Let’s make an application here.

The difference between religion and the gospel is here - when you are in religion, and you make a mistake, you want to hide from God. But when you are in the gospel, and if you’ve made a mistake, you want to run to God.

Bring yourself to the Church

In this moment, Jesus is beginning to let them, and everyone else know that it’s not the healed who need a doctor, but the sick.

And since the Great Physician is in this room, we want people coming who are broken, we want people coming who are hurting, we want people coming who are in great need!

If you are addicted to drugs, get to the church.

If you are an alcoholic, get to the church,

If your marriage is falling apart, get to the church.

If you’ve been abused, get to the church.

If you cheated on your spouse, get to the church.

If you are sick and tired of the life you’ve been living, get to the church!

Lighthouse Church is not a country club for the saints, but a hospital for the hurting.

I want to be the type of church that when people are going through their hardest moments in life they run into our doors and are met with love, compassion, and grace.

Their Healing Was In Their Action

Luke tells us here in verse 14 that as they went, they were cleansed.

Tell your neighbor, “as they went.” Imagine if they had heard the word and made the decision that they would go once their leprosy was healed. No, as they went, their leprosy was healed.

This is why here at Lighthouse you don’t need to have all of your stuff together before you can jump on a team and start making a difference.

Pastor, when I get my stuff together, then I’ll start helping...

Action says my faith is in God, and not in myself.

When I get better... When I feel better... When I think I’m ready...

That’s a whole lot of “I” and not enough “God.” There’s no faith in that way of thinking. Instead, start thinking this way...

If I’m sick, I’m going to serve anyway and believe that God will give me the strength!

Even if I haven’t fixed my budget, I’m going to start giving anyway, and I have faith that God is going to multiply my finances

If my mind is not right, I’m going to stand at the edge of that parking lot, put a smile on my face and start making someone else’s day brighter.

I would rather wait, but faith says start now.

I would rather have everything together, but faith says it’s time to get going.

Oh but Pastor, that’s very illogical. Let me tell you that faith is illogical.

Faith made Noah build an Arc even when there was no rain.

Faith made Abraham believe God for a son when he was almost 100 years old. Faith made Moses go to Pharaoh and say, “Let my people go.”

Faith made Joshua tell Israel let’s walk around the walls of Jericho.

Faith made Gideon lead an army of hundreds against an army of tens of thousands.

To the world faith doesn’t make sense, that’s why it’s faith.

But to us, we have faith in God who is above all, in you all and is working through you all. I’ve got confidence in the creator of the universe. I’ve got confidence in the God who commanded the winds and the seas to stop and they obeyed him. I’ve got confidence in the one who walked into the tomb of a dead man and said, “Lazarus, come forth.” I’ve got confidence in the one who went to a cross, died as me, he was buried in the tomb, and after he took a 3 day nap rose up from the grave and defeated death, hell and the grave!

I don’t know what your faith is in, but my faith is in him!

The One Who Came Back

So the 10 Lepers go to priests, he says to them I see no reason for you to live in isolation any longer. You are healed and you are free to return to society.

9 lepers took off so fast, and who can blame them? They wanted to see their family. They wanted to return to their children. They wanted to make up for lost time.

But there was one... The one who came back.

We get to the story where this one falls at the feet of Jesus, and now all of a sudden Luke wants to get very detailed once again. Luke says, “and he was a Samaritan!”

This kind of feels like the old Scooby Doo cartoons when they pull off the mask from the villain and they are all surprised by who it is.

But, you need to know why this matters... you need to know the context.

Earlier in Luke, we get this interesting passage of scripture.

Luke 9:51–56 NIV

As the time approached for him to be taken up to heaven, Jesus resolutely set out for Jerusalem. And he sent messengers on ahead, who went into a Samaritan village to get things ready for him; but the people there did not welcome him, because he was heading for Jerusalem. When the disciples James and John saw this, they asked, “Lord, do you want us to call fire down from heaven to destroy them?” But Jesus turned and rebuked them. Then he and his disciples went to another village.

Did you catch that? Jesus wanted to go through Samaria in order to enter Jerusalem, and the Samaritans were like, “you can’t come through here...”

Why does that matter?

Well let’s go to John 4 to see why that matters.

Jesus passed through Samaria, against his disciples wishes, and he completely turned the city upside down in an awesome way!

John 4:39–42 NIV

Many of the Samaritans from that town believed in him because of the woman’s testimony, “He told me everything I ever did.” So when the Samaritans came to him, they urged him to stay with them, and he stayed two days. And because of his words many more became believers. They said to the woman, “We no longer believe just because of what you said; now we have heard for ourselves, and we know that this man really is the Savior of the world.”

So, the last time they were in Samaria, Jesus was received. He was loved. He was welcomed.

Fast forward a few years, and they want nothing to do with him.

That’s why James and John were so upset that they said, “can we please call down fire from heaven to burn the entire village?”

They were those crazy cousins who were looking for a fight. They were saved, but they were still gangster. Jesus took the boys out of the hood, but apparently the hood was still in the boys.

Jesus tells them, no we’re not going to set this place on fire.

Stay with me just a bit more... this incident was in Luke 9... In Luke 10, a lawyer asks Jesus the question of “Who is my neighbor?” and Jesus then tells him the story of the Good Samaritan. Jesus was talking to the lawyer, but he was also telling the story for his disciples.

This is why there is no one like Jesus.

The disciples didn’t want to go to Samaria, Jesus went anyway.

The Samaritans turn their back on Jesus, and the disciples get crazy, “I told you they were busters Jesus! I told you they couldn’t be trusted, Jesus!”

And now here, Jesus is telling the story of the good samaritan! The disciples know that Jesus is challenging them.

And now, here we are in Luke 17, and the disciples are still feeling a certain way about the Samaritans, and Luke tells us the one who fell down at Jesus’ feet was a Samaritan. This is not a fictitious story like the one Jesus told the lawyer, but this is flesh and blood, this is real life... and the disciples are watching Jesus not only heal this Samaritan, but he makes him whole.

But Pastor Josh, what’s the difference?

The 9 lepers were healed from their leprosy, but only this man, who came back to Jesus, was made whole again.

God doesn’t just want you to be healed, but he wants you to be whole.

He was healed from the pain of being cast away from his family.

He was healed from the shame he endured for being an outcast.

His heart that was broken was mended, and his mind that had been so traumatized had been renewed in that very moment.

This ordinary man received an extraordinary healing, here at the feet of Jesus.

And it wasn’t just that he was healed, but he not acts as an intermediary from the Samaritans, to Jesus. He’s the bridge between a village that turned its back on Jesus, and now reconciling a relationship with Jesus. This is the man who didn’t just restore himself, but he restored the Samaritans in the eyes of Jesus’ disciples.

Conclusion

Friend, I don’t know what you’ve had to go through in life. I don’t know what things you are currently going through. The healing and the wholeness that you need can only be found at the feet of Jesus.

He sees you, exactly as you are. You might feel lost, but he doesn’t need a map to reach you. You might feel alone, but he’s never left your side. You might feel unloved, but he has never stopped loving you.

He can get to you just as soon as you take that first step.