Amy C Walters

Jesus Cleanses Ten Lepers | Luke 17:11-19

As Jesus travels along the border between Samaria and Galilee, he encounters a group of 10 men with leprosy. In desperation, they call out to him for help and Jesus heals all ten of them from a distance, even though only one would come back and thank him for it. This story shows us that Jesus is powerful and gracious.

As Jesus is headed toward Jerusalem, he travels along the border between Samaria and Galilee. This area would have both Jewish people from Galilee and Samaritans from Samaria. These groups don’t really get along, they’re enemies. But in a border area like this, you would come across some mixed groups. And that’s what Jesus encounters as he is entering a village–a group of 10 men who have leprosy.

Leprosy was a general term that covered a wide variety of skin diseases. Old Testament law directly addresses what to do with such a diagnosis. Leviticus 13:45-46 says that someone with leprosy would have torn clothing, they’d let their hair grow long and hang loose. It even says they cover their mouth and cry out to people, “Unclean, unclean,” as a warning. And the person with leprosy has to live alone outside of the town.

Also, because they are unclean, they can’t participate in worship at the temple. And anything that they touch also becomes unclean. 

How do you think it would feel to live like that? It would be very lonely. You couldn’t be around your family and friends. Likely this group of ten came together for their own survival. Your life would be on pause until your disease clears up and you can re-enter society. It would be a rough life out there, outside of the conveniences and comforts of town and home. It might even

even be kind of hopeless, because who knows how long this is going to last.

So these men are in a desperate situation, and when they see Jesus, they call out to him in a loud voice and say, “Jesus, Master, have pity on us.” And when Jesus sees them, he says, “Go show yourself to the priests.” 

Now, what does this mean? When someone’s leprosy had cleared up, they would go and meet with the priest. He would examine them, and if it appeared that they were indeed free of the disease, then a process would start to bring them back into society. So when Jesus says, “go show yourself to the priests,” he’s in essence saying, you are going to be healed.

We have seen Jesus heal a lot of people so far in the Book of Luke. But let’s take a moment and notice some of the unique traits of this miracle. First of all, how many people did Jesus heal at once? Ten. The whole group of ten. We have seen Jesus heal one person at a time before. Sometimes there would be groups of people, but still it seemed to be on an individual basis. But here, Jesus heals all ten men. 

Also, Jesus healed them from a distance. We’re told that they stood at a distance and called out to him. So even though we’ve seen Jesus heal people before, this seems to be a new revelation of his power. Jesus continues to surprise us with what he is able to do. 

There’s one other attribute of Jesus that I think that we get to see here. Ten men were healed, but only one came back to thank him for it. The other nine continued on their way, went to the priest, started that process of being reintegrated into society. They didn’t bother to come back and thank Jesus. 

Now, he healed them at a distance. He could remove that healing from a distance too, if he wanted to. But I think this demonstrates that Jesus is so gracious. Grace is giving someone something they don’t deserve. Jesus gave those men that healing even though they were ungrateful to him for it. Jesus is full of grace, even when we are full of ingratitude. 

If we take these two main points together, we find our key truth for today: Jesus is powerful and gracious.

Now, it can be easy, after all of the miracles that we have seen, to lose our sense of awe at what Jesus is capable of. We have seen him heal so many people. And yet, Jesus just keeps showing us another level, revealing even more and more of his power. There is no limit to what his power can do. 

We can also start to develop an attitude of entitlement, assuming that we’ll get good things because we’re good people. It’s very easy to slip into that mindset and lose sight of just how gracious God is in giving us so much that we don’t deserve. This story reminds us that God’s goodness is in spite of us, not because of us.