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I grew up without Thanksgiving Day on my calendar. For me the fourth Thursday of November was just another cloudy, damp, and cold school day, like most other days in November. Nothing to celebrate, no cause for a song and dance, and definitely no reason for giving thanks.

I was familiar with what Jesus thought about giving thanks, however. At elementary school, I’d sit cross-legged on the floor, while a teacher told us the story from Luke 17:11-19 about Jesus healing ten patients with leprosy, but only one coming back to thank him. She instructed us that we were to be grateful children. She exhorted us, cajoled us, and threatened us with terrible consequences, to be the tenth leper. I tried to imagine being one of the other nine and what led them to be so ungrateful After being healed of a fatal and incurable disease, how could they not return to their healer and say “Thanks!”? I didn’t get it. But the boy grew up and now I do get it. That’s because I’ve stood in the sandals of the ungrateful nine, thought with their minds, felt
with their hearts, and acted on their impulses. So, here’s what I’ve learned.

Patient Number 1 didn’t want to jump to conclusions. He waited to see if the healing was real. Maybe give it a few days and see if it returned. Patient Number One was cautious, he kept his feet on the ground, and reserved judgment until all the evidence was in. Some people might call him a cynic, he preferred to think of himself as sensible.

Patient number 2 knew about medicine. She knew that leprosy was incurable and was fatal. She knew that it didn't just go away. So, she concluded what any reasonable person would conclude. That she had never actually had leprosy in the first place. She'd been misdiagnosed. And so, there was no reason to thank Jesus.

Patient Number 3 was a very busy woman. She had a life to get on with. Living in the leper colony meant it had been years since she'd spent time with her husband or embraced her kids. She was now free. She needed to get home and run through the street and shout out that she was healed. She wanted to thank Jesus, and so she would when she saw him next. He was bound to come back this way soon.

Patient Number 4 was a religious man. All these years of his confinement in the quarantine village he had been prevented from following God’s call. Now he was cured he could get back to the city, go back to serving the poor and doing God's will. There was no time to lose. So much work to do. Jesus would understand.

Patient Number 5 was full of thanks – to the priests. It was they who had healed him, he concluded. He did as he was told by Jesus. He went to the priests to show them his healed body and received their clearance to return to normal life, and he was healed. So, he thanked them and fell on his knees and lavished kisses on their feet and pledged his love to them.

Patient Number 6 believed she had the power to control her own destiny. She had come to believe that with a positive attitude and a solid belief in her own power there was nothing she could not achieve. As long as she kept believing in herself she could do anything. And now because of her self-belief she had healed herself of leprosy.

Patient Number 7 went back excitedly to her life. She would return home to greet her parents and then she would come right back out to find Jesus and thank him. Except that when she got home her family was not there. The neighbor said that her parents had died. Number 7 was grief-stricken. She was so distraught that she never did go back and find Jesus. Instead she shook her fist at God and wished she'd never been healed of leprosy.

Patient Number 8 would have gone back to thank Jesus, but things were tricky. Her family had never liked organized religion, which they thought was all about money and power. Number 8 was grateful to God for her healing but if she were to go and find Jesus and thank him it might cause a bit of trouble in the family.

And then there was Patient Number 9. He wanted to return and look Jesus in the eye, and kneel at his feet and worship. He really did, but inside him there was a deep suspicion that he wasn’t good enough for Jesus. Number 9 knew he was a sinner. He feared that Christ would judge him, cast him away, or rebuke him for his moral failures.

So, let us in this week of celebration, be a 10. Be the Samaritan who returns to Jesus, heart full of gratitude, mind full of wonder at the miraculous rescue that God has performed in our lives.