Face-down Faith

Jerusalem to face that cross,
to pay the sin for the sin of humanity. And we come to a rather
striking passage indeed. A.W. Tozer some time ago said this. He said, the history of mankind
will probably show that no people has ever risen above its religion. And man’s spiritual history will
positively demonstrate that no religion has ever been greater
than its idea of God. Worship is pure or base as the
worshiper entertains high or low thoughts of God. For this
reason, The gravest question before the church has always
been God Himself. And the most portentous fact
about any man is not what he at any time is given to say or
do, but what he is deep in his heart and what he conceives God
to be like. Essentially, what A.W. Tozer
points to there is the fact that our worship is going to look
just like our view of God. How we worship God is going to
be reflected by what we think of God. Does that make sense? It’s perfectly clear. His point
is simple. And given that, and as you step
back from a society whose worship is so diverse, and in some places
so strange, The question that must be asked is what is our
view of God? We face in this passage a man
who came face to face with none other than the Lord Jesus Christ.
Nine of them. Came face to face as well, and
nine of them had a completely different response. I dare say
in our society, I don’t even think the percentages are that
good, I don’t think it’s 10 percent. 10% who are properly returning
to God the worship that is due His name. I don’t think it’s
10%. I don’t think it’s even close.
I want to look this morning at Luke chapter 17. I want to look
beginning in verse 11. Read along with me if you would.
Luke 17, verse 11. While he was on the way to Jerusalem,
he was passing between Samaria and Galilee. As he entered a
village, ten leprous men who stood at a distance met him.
And they raised their voices, saying, Jesus, Master, have mercy
on us. When he saw them, he said to
them, Go and show yourselves to the priests. And as they were
going, they were cleansed. Now, one of them, when he saw
that he had been healed, turned back, glorifying God with a loud
voice, and he fell on his face at his feet, giving thanks to
him. And he was a Samaritan. Then
Jesus answered and said, Were there not ten cleansed? But the
nine, where are they? Was no one found who returned
to give glory to God except this foreigner? And he said to him,
stand up and go. Your faith has made you well. I don’t think it’s 10 percent
in our society who return to give a proper gratitude to God,
whose worship is reflected by their theology. I don’t believe
it’s 10 percent. I think it’s a lot lower than
that. But I want to take us back through
this passage. And before we look at a good
example of worship, before we look at a man whose theology
is reflected in his worship, I want to go back and I want
to look at how this whole picture unfolds. I want to go back to
verse 11. Where it records that Christ
was on His way to Jerusalem. If you recall, He had already
been ushered out of Samaria. He’s literally having to walk
along the border countries. Galilee didn’t want him. Samaria
didn’t want him. It’s passing between Samaria
and Galilee. And as he entered a village,
10 leprous men who stood at a distance met him. We need to spend a few
moments just in review of what this disease is and what the
nature of it is that would have them standing off at a distance.
There’s much there just in the detail. One pastor noted that of all
the maladies that can affect the body of man, leprosy appears
to be the most severe. This was, if you will, the original
flesh eating virus. It affects every part of the
man’s body at once. It brings sores and decay upon
the skin. corruption in the blood, rottenness
in the bones. One called it living death. Living
death. Leprosy was a frightful disease. Consider the physical aspects.
The skin would be covered by these white sores that would
eat away into the flesh, attacking not only the flesh, but eventually
the muscle and even the bone. It was attended with a great
fever, sleeplessness, nightmares, and there was almost no hope
of any cure. The climate there in the Mideast
was suited to it because the humidity just lent itself to
this decay, this virus taking hold. It would begin with a small
spot or a pock on the skin, and then soon it would take over
the entire body, the end almost Inevitable was death. Very few
cures. It was a serious enough condition
that God’s word even spoke of it. Leviticus 13 said when a
man has on the skin of his body a swelling, a scab or a bright
spot, and it becomes on the skin of his body like a leprosaur,
then he should be brought to Aaron the priest or to one of
the sons of the priest. This was a very serious thing
to which they would invoke the very priests. for their help,
their assistance, their prayer. And there was a lengthy procedure
that was given there for the dealing of a leper. One estimated that the average
course of leprosy was a mere nine years, but it was nine years
of living hell. It was nine years of suffering,
waiting to die. Leprosy might begin with the
loss of a sensation ultimately, and ultimately land a man on
his back, literally laying there in misery. His voice would be
hoarse. His face would resemble coal,
half extinct, burning red and black. The hair would be short
and bristled. The tongue was dry and black.
The skin was covered with ulcers. As I said a moment ago, it was
almost a foregone conclusion that it was a terminable disease. But Syria’s ruler sent a letter
to Israel’s king one time where he said, when this letter reaches
you, I know that I know that I sent you name in my servant
that you may heal him of leprosy. Here’s how outlandish a thought
that seemed. Israel’s king tore his clothes
and exclaimed, Am I God who can kill or restore life that this
fellow has sent a man to me that it may cure him of leprosy? He
threw his hands up. It’s a hopeless situation. Socially
speaking, these were outcasts and for good reason. This was
a dreadfully contagious and deadly disease. And as such, they were
outcast from the society. And as such, they often would
band together for the only kind of social interaction they could
get, other lepers. This was the procedure laid out
in Scripture. In Leviticus chapter 13, it said
that a leper on whom the sore is, his clothes should be torn,
his head should be bare, he should cover his mustache and cry, unclean,
unclean, everywhere he went. He should be unclean all the
days he has the sore. He should be unclean. He is unclean
and he shall dwell alone. His dwelling shall be outside
the camp. Now, it isn’t there isn’t anything
written in Scripture to say how far some rabbis said four meters,
some said one hundred cubits. A great distance was the understood
distance. They were to keep their distance
from the rest of the general population and for good reason. The social stigma that came with
that, the literal second class citizenship, the total loss of
any religious privileges, had these as less than human. And as such, we meet across as
does Christ with ten. Ten of these lepers, whose disease
had long since been figured out by the religious elite as being
caused by a lack of spirituality, much like our modern day health
and wealth movement. There was something wrong with
these men spiritually, and therefore, they had this disease. And as
Jesus passes by, they call out. They raise their voices saying,
Jesus, Master, have mercy on us. I love their prayer. There’s
nothing wrong with their prayer. In fact, their prayer is right
on. They knew that they didn’t deserve a cure from Christ. They
knew that they didn’t deserve anything from God. What they
pleaded for was mercy. And that’s a prayer we’ve forgotten
in our day and age. We go to God with our demands,
with our lists. We go to God and we bind Him
to some kind of an agreement. These men were at wit’s end. They were at hope’s end. And
when they saw Christ, the only legitimate prayer they could
cry out was mercy. As I indicated, as societal outcasts,
they had banded together. They usually stood outside by
the roadside. And when anybody would come by,
they would clamor for some kind of offering, some kind of change
or handout. Now, even though it’s fascinating
in this passage, even though previously to this, they were
quite different, these nine from the one, quite different socially,
economically, religiously, Here now you find ten, one of which
was a Samaritan. Previously, the Jews would have
nothing to do with the Samaritan, but now in this condition, they
are all as one. They’ve been reduced to the lowest
common denominator, the bare grip to life itself. And they call out as one, with
one voice, have mercy on us. Have mercy on us. I want to go back and I want
you to just be reminded of what it is for nine Jews to be in
some kind of, any kind of, even in this deplorable condition,
fellowship with a Samaritan. The Samaritans were the half
breeds who had bred with the neighboring countries and with
that had adopted idolatry, but not wholesale. What they had
done is incorporate their idolatry into Jewish worship. And therefore,
by the Jews were hated. Here’s how it happened. After
being carried off by the kingdom of the 10 tribes, a large number
of Jews remained behind in Samaria. And they had eventually interbred
with the pagans. The neighboring countries, especially
the Assyrians, And as a result, eventually the Samaritans was
the new race. They retained a lot of their
Jewish religion. But they also incorporated a
lot of idolatry, and as such, there developed and prevailed
this hatred between the Jews and the Samaritans. And so when
you look and you see these nine in league, with this Samaritan. This is how bad a condition they’re
in that they would have fellowship with this man. Jesus, it says in verse 14, when
he saw them, he said to them, go and show yourselves to the
priests. You didn’t give him any details.
He didn’t really give them any specific hope that their disease
was cured, except to go to the priest meant that very purpose. To go and show yourself to the
priest and have him examine you to see whether or not you are
truly cleansed. As such, as we saw from Luke
chapter five, They were to go and they would go and not only
show themselves to the priest, but they would make an offering,
a thank offering for having been healed from this disease. This
was, if you will, the brief procedure from Leviticus 14.10. This should
be the law of the leper for the day of his cleansing. He shall
be brought to the priest and the priest shall go out of the
camp. The priest shall examine him. And if indeed the leprosy
is healed in the leper, then the priest shall command him
to take for him who is cleansed to living and clean birds, cedarwood,
scarlet and hyssop. And the priest shall command
one of the birds be killed in an earthen vessel over running
water. And for the living bird, he shall
take it, the cedar, the wood, the scarlet and the hyssop and
dip them and the living bird in the blood that is of the bird
that was killed over the running water. This was a very serious
procedure. A very solemn thing had taken
place and a very exacting Procedure was prescribed. And he who is
cleansed shall wash his clothes and shave his hair and wash himself
in water. And note all the religious accoutrements
that God puts down on them for this disease. Jesus just says, go show yourself
to the priests. The priests were the ones appointed
to examine this disease. And as they were going, it says,
they were cleansed. We don’t know how far they got.
They couldn’t have gotten too far because it was just close
enough that this one man was able to catch up to Christ. But
we know they departed. And it says, as they were going,
they were cleansed. They had been ordered to go.
And in a sense, this is a step of faith by all ten of them.
Is it saving faith? I don’t think so. But I think
it is proven to be a step of faith. You say, what kind of
faith is this that in the end falls short? It’s the same kind
of faith that you see every day. Every day among you. It’s the
same faith that enables a man to go plant a seed in the ground.
with some kind of hope that something is going to take place. Some
process that God initiated called germination and some cloud is
going to come and reign. And that this miracle is going
to continue and is going to grow and produce some kind of food,
that kind of faith, not saving faith. It’s the same kind of
faith that has a man get out of bed in the morning, get up
and go about his day seeking to earn a living, thinking that
all the while, presuming upon God that God is going to continue
to provide through him. That God is going to continue
to hold this universe together. It’s the same kind of faith.
The faith that these men had wasn’t some special kind of faith.
It was the, what have I got to lose faith? Jesus says, go show
ourselves to the priest. I’ll go show myself to the priest. There’s a purer and higher faith
to be discovered, though, that we’ll see in a moment. And it says in verse 15 that
one of them, one of them, when he saw that he had been healed,
turned back. glorifying God with a loud voice. And he fell on his face at his
feet, giving thanks to him. And he was a Samaritan. And Jesus
answered and said, were there not nine or were there not ten
cleansed? But the nine, where are they?
Now, Jesus, in his divinity, was not
surprised at this. Didn’t catch Christ off guard.
He didn’t really wonder where they were. He was fully aware
of the nature of their hearts. He was fully aware of their waywardness,
of their shallow faith, such as it was. Where were they? I think one
pastor hit the nail on the head. One Puritan pastor said the nine
others were already healed and hastening to the priests. Why? That they might be restored to
the society of men. And that their life in the world, that’s what they wanted. They
couldn’t wait to get back to their friends. They couldn’t
wait to get back to their parties. They couldn’t wait to get back
to their vices. They couldn’t wait to get back
to making all that money. Couldn’t wait to get back to
the world. We’ll come back to the one in
a moment, but let’s consider for a moment these nine. Where
indeed were they? One pastor asked, what worse
kind of leprosy of superstition, ignorance, eager selfishness,
or more glaring ingratitude kept back the others? Where were they?
Have they received any less blessing, any less healing than this one
man? No. They all received the same
mercy of God. Thanklessness is one of the most
common and deeply seated of all human sins, isn’t it? I mean,
no wonder we need a national day to remind us to be thankful.
Even we as Christians, we would have to admit, wouldn’t we? Is
thankfulness really, does it really occupy the central core
area of our prayer lives that it should? Can we really say
that we are as thankful as we ought to be before God for all
the blessings that he’s poured out on us? But we turn our attention to
the one. Let’s look at the conclusion
first in verse 19. Pardon me, verse 18 at the close.
Was no one found who returned to give glory to God except this
foreigner? Indeed, it was the foreigner
alone, the Samaritan who Christ knew. Christ knew instantly he
was a Samaritan. And he alone returned. And in
verse 19, look at the glorious turn. He said to him, stand up
and go. Your faith has made you well.
And I believe he’s not just talking about physical healing there.
It wasn’t his faith that attributed or contributed to his physical
healing. And it certainly wasn’t his faith
that contributed to his salvation. But it received it as such. His
faith received that physical healing. His faith received that
salvation. And I believe the wellness that
Christ speaks of is a spiritual salvation. It’s a new blessing. The faith that Jesus spoke of
is not merely that which brought Him to Christ in the first place.
It took faith of a sort to cry out to one walking down the road,
have mercy on us. It took faith of a sort But he
recognizes Jesus’ Word, His mere Word, as the instrument of that
miracle. And now, all he wants to do,
all he wants to do is to draw near to that One. To draw near
to the One who had saved him and healed him. People, what
I present to you is a man who is touched by Almighty God. A man who has been saved by Almighty
God. And what I want to tell you is
his theology is reflected in his worship. And I want to take
you just to five quick points as we prepare for the Lord’s
table. And as we consider them, I want
you to examine your own heart. Do you worship likewise? Is your theology reflected in
the same manner as this man in the same way? What I called it was face down
faith. It’s a different kind of faith
than the other men had. They had the faith to receive
God’s blessings and go on about their way, if you call that faith.
Put it in quotes. But this is a faith of a very
different kind. This is a face down faith, a
faith that receives God’s blessings, not as our just desserts, but
as the very mercy of God that it is. This is the worship of a person
touched by God. First of all, the worship of
a person truly touched by God recognizes the blessings of God. He recognizes the blessings of
God. Look at verse 15. Now, one of
them, when he saw that he had been healed, does that mean that
only one of them noticed? No. They all know. I mean, as soon as they saw the
pinkness of their flesh come back and the sores disappear,
they all knew. But one of them, when he saw
that. When he saw that he had been
healed and people, the first. And primary thing, if we are
going to give blessing and honor to God and we are going to worship
him properly, if our theology is going to be reflected, we
have to recognize the blessings that God’s poured out on us,
don’t we? I mean, when we think about the
nature of God. When we consider the nature of
God, doesn’t that cause us To worship when we think of Christ
and all that Christ has done, the suffering that he endured
for us. Have we forgotten that? Have
we forgotten about the terrible nature of sin? The sin that we
were steeped in, embroiled in, the sin that we lived in encompassed
every part of our being. And now, by God’s grace and His
grace alone, we’ve been saved from that. Have we forgotten
that? What about the process of sanctification,
that about which we prayed a few moments ago? Have we forgotten
that God has eradicated from our lives worse things than now,
which we struggle against? Is God powerless against that? Have we forgotten? Have we forgotten
God’s gifts of grace to us? Look around you and you see your
family and you see your friends and you see your fellow believers
in Christ. Have we forgotten those blessings? What about his giftedness, the
giftedness that he’s put in you? You didn’t deserve it. Have you
forgotten that? Have you forgotten or have you
failed to recognize that God has put in you a means of making
you useful for the sake of his eternal kingdom? I think many of us have. Have we
forgotten about his guidance, his word and his spirit, his
blessings that he pours out on us, the food that we eat, the
freedoms that we enjoy, the air that we breathe? Have we forgotten
that? T.J. had the privilege to pitch
in a baseball game the other day and he came off quite confident.
He did well. And my admonition to him is thank
God for your hands. Thank God for your eyes. It has
nothing to do with us, does it? And you see how prone we are
to forget about all that God has poured out on us. And we’re no better than the
thankless nine. No better. The first mark of someone who’s
truly been touched by God recognizes he recognizes the blessings of
God. Secondly, he is responsive to
the blessings of God. When he saw he turned. And you get a lot of people that
see A lot of people can list you a beautiful list of things
that God has done in their life, but they never turn. They never
pause, they never stop, they never worship, they never commune
with God, they never go to church, they never turn and thank God
for what they’ve been given. But he stopped. I believe that
as he was walking, he became so convicted, he halted dead
in his tracks. He couldn’t take another step
away from Christ. And I believe that as he turned,
he picked up his pace. He must have, as he considered
the Savior that he was going to embrace, the Savior that had
given him this physical healing that he had suffered with for
so long. And now he was returning. He turned. It’s an active turning
that marks a child of God, not only the initial repentance,
right? But our whole life is a turning to God. Remember the
Thessalonians for which Paul was so thankful? Paul was so
thankful for them because he said, I watched you, how you
turned to God from idols. There was that initial turning.
An initial turning for the purpose of acknowledging Him. But it
was a lifetime of turning because it can never be any different.
Because as soon as you take your eyes off of God, you turn back,
don’t you? You turn back. So it’s a life
of turning. Not only in initial repentance,
but what about in our quiet times, our time of attending worship,
our time of fellowship with fellow believers? All of our life is
to be a memorial to God, a thanksgiving, a life of turning to Him. Just
a moment. Not just a static hour of repentance. I loved what my brother challenged
us with last week, didn’t you? How would your worship look if
Christ were standing in front of you? And you know what I did,
I immediately started jotting myself notes. If Christ were standing in front
of me, If Christ were here in our worship service, would I
listen more attentively? Would I listen more purposefully?
If Christ were standing in our midst, would I sing more heartily?
If Christ were here in our worship service, would I prepare more
mindfully? Would I be more ready for worship
knowing that Christ were going to be here today? Would I arrive more promptly?
Would I be more effective in greeting others? Would I give
more liberally? All of those things come into
play. It’s a life of turning. My friends, and you know what
the greatest reminder that He gave us? He is here. He is here. So I drove back to Denver. I said, so, you know, brother,
I do this with every guy who comes through here and ever preaches
of any ilk. I say, so what do you see? He
said, I saw what I see across this country, and that is just
this casualness in worship. You see, people look back again.
It’s not just a mere recognition. It’s not a mere turning back
to God, but there’s a third point there. The worship of a person touched
by God is not only one who recognizes the blessings of God and is responsive
to those blessings, but rejoices in them, actively rejoices. Look at what happened with the
one. One of them, when he turned back and saw that he had been
healed, turned back, glorifying God with a loud voice. Oh, there’s
an interesting one for us. We white people are way too quiet
in our worship. Steve and Emily would probably
say amen to that because they go to a black church down in
Florida and we’ve worshipped in a black church. And I’m telling
you, when you come out of there, you know, you have worshipped.
I mean, I’ve never I’ve never been a part of such heartfelt,
enthusiastic singing. You know what? It isn’t just
black churches that have the corner on that kind of that fervency
of worship. When was the last time you turned
on the nightly news to see a Muslim rally? You talk about exuberance. You talk about power and passion,
about what it is they believe. Where is it with us? I’m not just talking about singing
loud. But where is the heart? Where
is the passion? Where is the recollection that
we were dead and bound for hell and God, by His mercy, has saved
us and rescued us? And if it not for that, we’re
doomed forever. Where is the response to that? Forgetting about all the priests,
said one. Unable to proceed any further,
discovering the change in him, he returns to his great benefactor,
his emotions finding expression in loud bursts of praise. I understand
John’s frustration sometimes in getting us to sing heartily.
He’s trying. He’s trying. I let it for six years. This man, on the first occasion
he has, he can’t even contain it. How ashamed we should be that
we’ve somehow learned how. We somehow learned how to contain.
We will go to a football game and we will scream and make ourselves
look like morons. But to break out into a hearty
amen or praise God would simply, in our understanding of spiritual
things in our culture, be uncivilized. Sad. Remember, it was the lack of
this willingness to rejoice that drew a rebuke of the elder of
the prodigal sons. J.C. Ryle said there, nothing
ought to give us so much true pleasure as the conversion of
souls. Let the worldly mock and sneer at such conversions. Let
the self-righteous, if they will, murmur and find fault and deny
the reality of all great and sudden changes. But let the Christian
who reads the words of Christ, Remember and act upon them. Let
them thank God and be merry. Let them praise God that one
more soul was saved. Let him say that this my brother
was dead and is alive again, was lost and is found. And you
know what you say here? What about me? Shouldn’t we be
rejoicing for our own salvation as exuberantly as we rejoice
in someone else’s? I say yes. It’s a regular feature. of the
Gospels. They return to this theme over
and over again of glorifying God, giving Him the glory, having
seen God’s mighty works. Matthew 9, when the crowd saw
this miracle, they were awestruck and glorified God. We get so stuck in our approach
to worship. We never even sometimes consider
the words that we’re singing. We never invent any praises of
our own. There’s a fourth. There’s a fourth mark of a person
touched by God. Not only does he recognize the
blessings of God, responsive to those blessings, rejoicing
in those blessings, but he is reverent. He is reverent in the
blessings of God. Look at verse 16. And this is
something that the modern day church, this is why we’re so
stilted in our worship, isn’t it? We’re afraid that if we’re
excited, if we come in singing and praising and joyful, somebody
is going to call us a charismatic. How sad. Somebody is going to accuse us
of being part of the church growth movement. How sad. Not this man. He wasn’t worried about the Pharisees.
He wasn’t worried about Christ’s apostles. He wasn’t worried about
the crowds looking on. He wasn’t worried about what
anybody might think. He wasn’t worried about the church
growth movement. He wasn’t worried about any of
that. Look at verse 16. Turned back, glorifying God with
a loud voice, and he fell on his face at his feet. When was
the last time you had a worship service like that? You know,
many of us, I’ve heard many of us had those moments when we
first came to Christ, how we cowered in our rooms on our knees
with our face on the ground and we thanked God for the salvation
that He gave us. Is it over? Do we get up and
just go about the rest of our life? Thanks, Jesus. Show me
how I can help you out sometime. as if He gave us a lift to the
corner store. There’s to be a life of this
kind of worship. And our society is lost when it comes to considering
the worship of God. It’s completely confused. That’s why when I said, I quoted
A.W. Tozer as saying that worship
is going to reflect what we think of God. John Murray said it this way,
God alone is to be worshiped. It is with this word that our
Lord resisted one of Satan’s temptations. When we come together,
it is to worship God and God alone, every reality rests upon
this. Whatever else we may do in worship, it must be focused
upon Almighty God. But I love the way this one obscure
Puritan said it. God is clothed with unspeakable
majesty. The glory of His face shines
brighter than the lights of heaven in their beauty. Before Him,
the angels tremble and the heavens melt. We ought not, therefore,
come before Him with a sacrifice of fools, nor tender a duty to
Him without falling low upon our faces and bowing the knees
of our hearts in a token of reverence.” Now, there’s a man who knows
God. And I tell you, in common circles
in our country today, you look at the worship and you say, that’s
not the God that I worship. You know what Abraham did when he
first discovered God, he fell on his face. You know what? This wasn’t just a leper having
been cleansed, trying to find some creative way of worship
in Christ. This is a pattern of God’s people. that when they
really come to know the God of gods, when they come to know
the Lord God Almighty, they fall on their faces. Leviticus, it happened to the
whole crowd of people. Fire came out from before the
Lord, consumed the burnt offering, the portions of fat on the altar.
When all the people saw it, they shouted and fell on their faces. Moses and Aaron fell on their
faces. Joshua fell on his face. Manoah
and his wife fell on his face. Jehoshaphat fell on his face.
Ezekiel fell on his face. The disciples fell on their faces. The man covered with leprosy
in Luke 5.12 fell on his face. All the angels in the book of
Revelation fall on their face. Yet we come waltzing into God
as if we own the place. Whenever, wherever and however
we want. And I say, what happened to reverence?
What happened to reverence? There’s a fifth and final point
that I would have you just to consider before we go to the
Lord’s table. The fifth mark of a person touched,
truly touched by God is that he is remindful of the blessings
of God. I almost thought here I was going to have to make up
a word. But this is a real word. Remindful
means one who is constantly putting to mind, bringing to mind those
things. It’s a good word. He fell on
his face at his feet, giving thanks to him. And I tell you, there is an all
too common tendency to receive from God and to even acknowledge
that you’ve received it. And to even turn and to follow
God. And even rejoice in that in a
general sense. And even be reverent in that
worship. And to never actually verbalize gratitude for that
very specific thing that He’s given you. This man did it all. He did it all. When he saw it,
he recognized the blessings of God. He knew exactly and immediately
what God had done. And he was responsive to that. He turned and his whole life
now was going to be one of pursuit of Christ. And he rejoiced in
that. Much like the shepherds did with
exceeding great joy. His worship was reverent. But in those quiet moments, he
paused and he thanked God specifically for what he had done. And I say
too often, too often the blessings of God come, we take them as
to be expected, and we move on in our life without ever turning
and formally thanking for that. J.C. Ryle said it this way, He
who has received only blessings from his hand and does not come
close to him in humble and heartfelt gratitude will always forego
what is the highest and most glorious in life. But he who
on receiving gifts out of his hand turns to the giver himself
in real gratitude will partake of the fullness of life and happiness.
This is what set the one apart from the ten of the other nine. One Puritan challenged us in
these terms. He said, the very best of us
are far too like these nine. We are more ready to pray than
to praise. We are more disposed to ask God
for what we have not than to thank him for what we have. Isn’t
that true? murmurings, complainings, discontent
abound on every side of us. Few indeed are found who are
not continually hiding their mercies under a bushel and setting
their wants and trials on a hill. These things ought not to be
the widespread thanklessness of Christians is the disgrace
of our day. It is a plain proof of our little
humility. Now, if that applies to the rest
of you, We have a good God who is ready to hear our thanks.
Let’s be a thankful people. Let’s be a people proving in
how we live our theology, proving that we’ve been touched by God.
Let’s pray. Our merciful God, we bow in humble adoration because we received a mercy far
greater than did those ten. They were cured of some physical
sickness, no matter how great. Can’t even compare to the forgiveness
that we received, to the healing that we received in Christ. Lord
God, we humble ourselves and we pray that you would enliven
our worship Lord, we’ve recognized what You’ve done. We’ve turned to follow You. But
our hearts are cold. Our worship is lifeless. And
seldom do we ever take the time to pause and thank You specifically. Change our lives, Father, for
Your glory. It’s in Jesus’ name that we pray. Amen. I was saying it might have been
too fast.