What do You See?

How good is your imagination? Can you picture where we are in the gospel account? We’re still on the move with Jesus, still heading for Jerusalem and everything that will happen there. Luke was a gentile, and his geography of Israel is a little sketchy, but we seem to be in some place inhabited by both Jews and Samaritans. Jews and Samaritans hated each other, so most probably they lived in separate villages. Jesus is approaching one of those villages, most probably a Jewish village.

So imagine yourself back in ancient times and put yourself on the outskirts of some dusty village. What do we see? I see a band of shunned people, united perhaps only by their shared disability. Are there only ten of them? They seem to be both men and women. Are they Jews or Samaritans? We’ll find out that at least one of them is a despised Samaritan. Actually, you can smell them before you can see them. Their clothes are so ragged it’s a wonder they can cover themselves. They are gaunt and scrawny, since all they have to eat are the scraps that kindhearted people give them.

What have they done to bring this misfortune on themselves? Absolutely nothing! They must have some kind of skin disease. If they have true leprosy, what we today call Hansen’s disease, they’ve probably lost fingers or toes, maybe even noses. Hansen’s is a disabling and disfiguring disease for which, in the ancient world, there was no cure. Unfortunately, the Law of Moses lumped many different skin diseases under the word “leprosy,” and declared those afflicted by these diseases to be unclean and unfit for normal society. So what do we see? We see a band of broken, starving, diseased people doomed to a life of exile and expected to stay as far away from the “clean” people as possible.

What did these doomed people see? They saw a holy man. Who knows how they knew who he was? They were desperate for help, and so they cried out to him.

What did Jesus see? Jesus saw them. He saw living, breathing, real people – not people defined by their disease – but real people needing help. He saw wives without husbands, he saw homes without fathers or mothers, he saw fields lying fallow with no one to work them, and he saw hopelessness and despair. And when Jesus saw them, he stopped. He allowed himself to be interrupted. And then he did something startling. He told them to go to the priests and begin the elaborate process of rituals and sacrifices through which they would again be declared clean.

What did the now former lepers do? All but one of them presumably did exactly what Jesus told them to do. They went and found the nearest priest and asked to be declared free of disease. One of them took a good look at himself. He saw what had happened. Samaritans didn’t follow Mosaic Law, so he knew he had little to gain from going off to see a Jewish priest. So he turned back to find that holy man through whom he had been cured. He shouted out his praises to God and then threw himself at Jesus’ feet in thanksgiving.

My friends, this is a story about seeing, and our response to what we see. It is not a healing story like others in Scripture, in which healing occurs when Jesus touches someone or someone touches him. Here, the healing occurs offstage so to speak. Remember that we’re in the part of this gospel account where Jesus is teaching his disciples about how a faithful community lives out its commitment to him. So here, we have a story that asks us consider what we see, and what we do when we see. And, not surprisingly, the story also challenges us in several different ways.

What do you see? The first challenge is to see the need of others. Can we see when someone is in need? Can we see when a friend or coworker is facing a health problem or difficult situation at home? Can we see when an international student is far from family and alone on university holidays? Can we see when someone who comes to Loaves and Fishes needs help? Can we see a homeless person as a child of God, and not just some dirty tramp? Perhaps further away, can we see the people in Haiti who again need help in recovering from a natural disaster? Can we see the need in the non-human world? Can we see the elephants whose numbers are plummeting because of our insatiable desire for ivory? Can we see our wonderful national and state parks as places that need our protection, so that our children and grandchildren will also be able to enjoy them?

And if we see, what do we do? Jesus saw the need of the people who called out to him. He stopped. He took action. He did something very concrete for them. What do we do when we finally see need? Do we ignore it, pass by, or hope that the people, the need, the cause, will all go away? Or, like Jesus, are we moved to take some kind of concrete action? Do we find the time to visit those who are lonely or grieving? Do we find ways to provide food for those who are hungry? Do we work for justice for those who are falsely accused? Do we reach out to those who have lost their homes in disasters? Do we support those who are working to make sure that wild animals and wild landscapes don’t disappear from the earth? I invite you to look around you, see a need that breaks your heart, and then follow the master in addressing it.

And finally, do we see God at work in the world? Do we see God as active in our own lives? The leper saw that he had been transformed by his encounter with Jesus, that something awe-inspiring and holy had happened to him. He didn’t break out a bottle of champagne and pat himself on the back for his cleverness. He didn’t return home to his village. He didn’t stick with the other lepers. He returned to Jesus to praise God and fall on his face, filled with gratitude for what had happened to him.

And here’s the challenge to us: to see what God has done for us and, more important, to be truly thankful for all the many ways in which God has blessed us. The truth is that gratitude may be the real measure of our spiritual health. Do we think we are self-made people? Do we think we deserve everything we have – and more? Or do we take the time to examine our lives, to really look at our lives? Do we take the time to look at our day or week and see where we have met Jesus in that day or week?

Anne Lamott has a wonderful little primer on prayer entitled Help, Thanks, Wow. It’s a book about basic forms of prayer. We know about “help.” All our intercessory prayers, for ourselves, for others, for the world, our prayers of the people in the Eucharist, are all forms of “help.” For most of us, if we pray at all, our prayer is usually a form of “help.” “Wow” is our praise of God. It’s a way of expressing our awe for who God is, for the great mysterious yet loving creator, for the God we see in the face of Jesus, for the spark of God that lodges within us. “Wow” is mostly what we do in liturgy and worship.

“Thanks” is something else. Yes, the Eucharist – the very word means thanksgiving – is a way of offering sacramental thanks for the life, death, and resurrection of Jesus. But “thanks” should also be part of our daily walk with God. I invite you to take the time – lots of people do it at the end of the day – to look over your day and see if you have met Jesus anywhere in that day. If you come to the quiet day on October 22nd, you’ll even learn a simple form for looking over your day in order to discern God’s presence in it. And when you discern God’s presence in your day, when you can see how God has blessed you – and continues to bless you – then fall down on your knees, or raise your hands, or open your mouth in thanksgiving.

What do you see, and what do you do when you do see? Does it matter that you have committed yourself to following Jesus? Do you see as he sees? Do you see the need of others and respond to it? Do you see God at work in your own life, and do you say to God, “Thanks?” In a short while, we will leave this place after singing, “Now thank we all our God, with hearts and hands and voices, who wondrous things hath done, in whom this world rejoices.” It’s a hymn that sends you out into the world. So get up, go your way. Spend your life helping others, praising God, and thanking God for all of God’s gifts.