Turning Back in Gratitude

The theologian Eric Barreto writes, “If Jesus’ words never strike me as strange, if Jesus’ words never cause me some sense of unrest, if Jesus’ words never trouble me, then I can be sure of one thing: I can be sure that I am missing something important.”

I think that’s a powerful lens through which to read Scripture. We can become so familiar with scripture passages that they lose their edge. We smooth them out, domesticate them, and file them away. However, the Gospels are not meant to be comfortable. They are meant to confront, challenge, and ultimately, to transform us.

Our text today, the healing of the ten lepers, is one of those stories. On the surface, it’s a straightforward miracle story with a simple moral: be thankful. And we see that story play out. But if we sit with the passage, if we let it trouble us, we find it’s about so much more. It’s about distance and inclusion, about the difference between being healed versus being made whole, and about who truly understands the nature of grace.

The scene is set with a sense of finality: Jesus is on his way to Jerusalem. This is not a casual journey. This is the final journey, the road that leads to the cross. Every step is intentional, every encounter laden with meaning. And on this road, between Samaria and Galilee, a cry breaks the silence.

“And Jesus entered a village, he was met by ten lepers, who stood at a distance and lifted up their voices, saying, ‘Jesus, Master, have mercy on us.’”

Distance and space. These are the first themes that confront us. Leprosy in the ancient world wasn’t just a physical disease; it was a sentence of social death. These ten individuals were forced to live on the margins, isolated from family, from worship, from community. They had to stand “at a distance,” their very presence a source of fear and defilement.

From that distance, they cry out. And their cry is not just, “Heal us!” It’s, “Have mercy on us!” Mercy is a plea for compassionate action from someone who has the power to change your situation. It’s the cry of the powerless to the powerful. It is a cry of profound need.

And Jesus sees them.

How often do we not see those who are in need? We live in a world that excels at creating distance from people. We put up walls whether they are social, economic, political, and even religious that keep us from seeing the lepers in our own communities. We keep a safe distance from the messy, the broken, the people who make us uncomfortable. But Jesus hears their cry across the divide. He sees them in their isolation and responds.

Jesus doesn’t perform a dramatic, instantaneous healing. He gives a command: “Go, show yourselves to the priests.” This was the process outlined in the Law for a cleansed leper to be declared ceremonially clean and restored to society. Their healing happens as they go. It requires a step of faith, of obedience in the face of uncertainty.

And a miracle of abundance unfolds. Not one, not two, but all ten are cleansed. As scholar Matthew Thiessen notes, this is more than healing a skin disease. In a world where this condition was seen as a living death, a visible sign of decay, Jesus resists the deadly force itself. This is a battle against the encroachment of death on human life, a powerful preview of the resurrection.

So, we have one healing narrative: ten individuals are physically restored. Their skin is made clean. They are free to return to their homes and their lives. They received exactly what they asked for.

But the story isn’t over. There is a second, deeper healing narrative at play. Because there is a profound difference between being cleansed and being made well.

“Then one of them, when he saw that he was healed, turned back, praising God with a loud voice. He prostrated himself at Jesus’s feet and thanked him. And he was a Samaritan.

The one who returns is the one nobody expected. A Samaritan. In the eyes of the Judean community, he was a heretic, a foreigner, a half-breed. He was an outsider among the outsiders. The nine were Jewish; they were part of the in-group. But the one who truly gets it is the one on the farthest margin.

His healing prompts a complete change in his direction. The word for turned back is the same root often used for repentance or conversion. He was on his way to the priest, to religious validation, but he realizes something more important has happened. He has not just encountered a rule, but a Redeemer. So he turns back to the source of his healing.

His response is pure, uninhibited worship. A loud voice praising God. Falling on his face at Jesus’ feet. This isn’t a polite thank you. This is an act of total surrender and adoration. He recognizes that his healing didn’t come from a magical formula, but from the merciful hand of God embodied in Jesus.

As Eric Barreto writes, the foreigner, the one who knows the sting of exile and oppression, often has a clearer insight into grace. They don’t have the luxury of entitlement. When mercy comes, it is so stunning, so unexpected, that the only possible response is overwhelming gratitude. This passage is a wonderful opportunity for us to be humble and to learn about faith from those on the margins.

Jesus’ response is fascinating. He doesn’t seem to be addressing only the Samaritan. He looks at the crowd, at his disciples, and perhaps across the centuries at us, and asks a question that echoes with sadness:

“Were not ten made clean? So where are the other nine? Did none of them return to give glory to God except this foreigner?”

Where are the other nine? They were on their way to the priest, doing exactly what they were told. They were following the rules. They may have felt a sense of entitlement. After years of suffering, they finally got what they deserved. They got their healing, and now they were going to get on with their lives. They attributed their healing to the process, not the Person.

Their story is a warning. It is entirely possible to receive a blessing from God and walk away unchanged. It is possible to have our prayers answered and feel entitled to the result rather than grateful for the grace.

The Samaritan’s gratitude is the key that unlocks the second healing. It is the outward sign of his inward wellness. It reorients his entire life. To the nine, Jesus was a means to an end. To the Samaritan, Jesus was the end.

This brings us to Jesus’ final words to the man. “Get up and go on your way; your faith has made you well.”

As commentator Chelsey Harmon points out, the Greek verb here is powerful. To be “made well” is the same verb used for being “saved.” All ten had the faith to obey and be cleansed. But the Samaritan’s faith was different. It was a faith that, as Harmon writes, “changed the pattern of his behavior to be first and foremost about gratitude towards his Redeemer.”

His faith didn’t just heal his skin; it saved his soul. It made him whole. He was restored not just to the community of his village, but to a right relationship with God. The ultimate outsider was brought fully inside by a faith that expressed itself in thanksgiving.

This story leaves us with a choice. Will we be like the nine, who receive God’s abundant blessings but never turn back? Who take the healing, the forgiveness, the grace, and simply walk away, focused on ourselves?

Or will we be like the one? Will we allow the mercy of God to stop us in our tracks, to turn us around, and to bring us to our knees in worship? Will we recognize that every good thing, every breath, every moment of healing, every ounce of forgiveness is a gift from God?

God’s desire for you is not just to cleanse your problems. It is to make you whole. And the path to that wholeness, the path to salvation, begins when we, like the Samaritan, turn back to Jesus and give him thanks and praise. Amen.