18th Sunday after Pentecost

Grace be to you and peace from God our Father and the Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. Amen.

 As I was reading and pondering today’s Bible texts, my attention was caught by a couple of different aspects.

The first one is the call of the ten lepers, “Lord, have mercy.” Such a simple cry. And yet, so full of desperation and pain, faith and hope. These lepers suffer from a disease that makes them outcasts of their society. At the edge of the village, they see Jesus coming towards them on the road. The laws require what we now call social distancing. Across that distance, they plead for Jesus to have mercy on them.

These lepers know they need mercy. They admit their need for mercy. Their situation makes it abundantly clear that they need mercy. On their own, they will not get out of the predicament they are in, will not be able to get well and rejoin society and return to their loved ones and their jobs and a normal life. They need Jesus’ mercy to be well and whole again.

At times, we find ourselves in a desperate spot like that. By our own strength we will not be able to get out of it. We are helpless and overwhelmed. All there is left for us to do it cry out, “Lord, have mercy!”

During COVID, many of us reached that spot, and nut just once, either. When the shut-down dragged on and we missed our family members and friends; and we didn’t know yet how the virus behaved and how we could protect ourselves; and our jobs either stopped or changed completely; and we had to learn so much technology so quickly; and we had to adjust all our routines at home and at work and at school and at church; and there was no end in sight for months on end; and we worried about our finances and our mental health – yes, we, too, cried out, “Lord, have mercy.” We needed Jesus’ mercy to make it through, and we knew it.

And then there is Naaman. He, too, needs mercy, but he doesn’t know it at first. He is a general whom the king favors; he doesn’t need any help from anyone. Yet he has leprosy. No matter how strong and capable he is, no matter how much the king has his back, there is nothing Naaman can do to get well. He needs mercy. It’s really hard for him to admit it. It takes some cajoling from other people. Yet in the end, Naaman realizes that his health and wholeness depend on the mercy of God.

The traditional worship service begins with us joining the call of the lepers, “Lord, have mercy.” Sometimes, we are like them and are fully aware of our need for mercy. We join their outcry from the bottom of our heart. Sometimes, we come to church feeling strong and capable, thinking we can pull ourselves out by our bootstraps. Then the cry reminds us that our wholeness, our whole life, is a gift we receive out of God’s mercy.

Both lepers and Naaman, both desperate outcasts and strong leaders, need God’s mercy. Both when we are weak and when we are strong, both when our lives are falling apart and when everything is going well, we need God’s mercy. When we admit that need by praying, “Lord, have mercy”, then we open ourselves up to receiving the mercy that our Savior is always willing to give.

The second aspect I noticed in our Bible texts is the importance of community. The lepers had banded together to support one another. Having to stay away from other people, they build their own community. They are a bit like the COVID pods we formed so that our quarantine isolation was bearable.

Naaman is surrounded by people who love him and want the best for him. His wife, his wife’s servant girl, his king, his own servants – they all want him to get well. So they point him to the path towards healing. Every time Naaman hesitates or gets stubborn, they gently prod him forward. Without this community of support, Naaman would not have followed through on the advice that led to his wholeness. The community around him guided, supported, loved him into well-being.

Calvary’s mission statement is: As followers of Jesus, we are called to be an inclusive and compassionate community where everyone is connected in relationship with God and each other to foster wholeness of mind and soul. Bible texts like today stress how important community is for our well-being. COVID reminded us just how true that is.

Week before last, Calvary held the funeral service for a young man who had died by suicide. It was a very sad time for many of us. I am not sure I would have made it through that week without the supportive community of many members of this congregation. They checked in with me to see how I was doing; they brought me chocolate; they gave me a hug; they prayed for me. With their love and hands-on care, they fostered my well-being, and I am so very grateful for that.

That’s why participating in the life of the congregation is so important. We don’t encourage it to make our statistics look good or so we can boast with our attendance numbers. We urge you to come so we can all be in community with one another. So we can do for each other what the lepers did, what Naaman’s family and servants did, what Calvary members did for me. By being in community, we help one another be well.

The third aspect I noticed was the importance of praise and thanksgiving. One leper returns, bows before Jesus and thanks him. It is to that leper that Jesus says, “Your faith has made you well.” This leper noticed what Jesus’ mercy had done for him, he acknowledged it in praise and thanksgiving, and that brought him into a relationship with Jesus that changed his life for the better.

Naaman responds to being healed by praising God. When he returns to his native Syria, he takes a bit of soil from Israel with him so that he can continue to worship the God of Israel. Recognizing how his life has been touched by God’s mercy creates an ongoing relationship of faith.

An attitude of thanksgiving and praise makes us look at the blessings we receive. Even in our most trying days, there are still good things happening. For some reason, we are always more likely to focus on what is amiss. Spotting blessings, however, is something we can practice.

Last Sunday, the synod gathered to celebrate the beginning of the second term of our bishop, William Gohl. The preacher was Bishop Viviane Thomas-Breitfeld. In her sermon, she told how she used to take her catechism students to the mall. She sent them out with the challenge to see where they saw Jesus at the mall, other than in the form of jewelry.

At first, they always looked a bit lost. But then they came back with stories, such as, “I saw a mother with a child struggling with her bags, and a man offered to carry them for to her car.” These middle school students learned to see Jesus’ mercy touching lives. They learned to focus on the blessings. And they saw plenty. And it deepened their faith in a merciful God.

When our three children were young and we did our bedtime prayers, we always asked them to thank God for at least three things. They always came up with them. Even in middle school, when live can be brutal, they always found at least three things to be grateful for and thank God for them.

Praise and thanksgiving are a huge part of what we do here in worship. It is most pronounced in the long prayer we say when we bless the bread and wine for communion. That prayer is called “The Great Thanksgiving”. It praises God for the way God has blessed the world, from the time of creation onwards and especially through the ministry, death, and resurrection of Jesus Christ.

Acknowledging the countless ways in which God has blessed us, is blessing us now, and gives us hope by promising blessings in the future, draws us into a joyful relationship with Jesus Christ that restores our soul.

There’s one more aspect in the texts I want to point out: The mercy of God touches and heals and changes lives in what are chance encounters.

Naaman is a general of Aram, an enemy nation of Israel. His captured servant girl (slave would be a more accurate term) tells him where he could find healing in her home country. What a coincidence for these people to happen to share a household so the information about a source of healing could be passed on.

In the gospel story, the ten lepers are moping around the edge of a village, not really doing anything except trying to survive. Jesus and his disciples, on the other hand, are on the road with a definite goal in mind: they are on the way to Jerusalem where Jesus will accomplish our salvation.

These two groups happen upon one another, and right there, in the middle of the road, mercy breaks into the world and changes lives and brings a man into relationship with Jesus Christ and his people.

In both stories, people of God see a need for mercy in someone else’ life; they are willing to pause whatever they are doing to bring persons in need to the place where they can encounter the mercy of God. Naaman never realized, let alone articulated his need for mercy, but faithful people around him connected him with God’s healing power anyway. The lepers were very aware of their need and cried out for it, and Jesus stopped on the road and healed them.

We who are gathered here this morning, we have acknowledged our need for mercy. We are part of a community that connects us with God and each other. We have an attitude of praise and thanksgiving that highlights just how blessed we are. All this strengthens the faith we received in baptism so that it can shape the way we live.

All this also trains and empowers us to see where a child of God is in need of mercy. Whether they are aware of it or not, whether they cry out for it like the lepers or stubbornly fight it like Naaman, we are called to invite, prod, urge, drag, lead, cajole, encourage them to come with us to the place where Jesus’ mercy touches and heals and changes them. Being witness to that transformation is powerful to behold.

Bishop Gohl shared such a story with us pastors and deacons. It was from the annual retreat when high school students graduate out of the synod’s Lutheran Youth Organization. They get to address the whole group. Many give powerful testimony.

Bishop Gohl told us about a man who had been removed from his home early on and had been in many foster homes; his journey was complicated further by his being black and gay. He shared with the group that in his whole life, the only place where he felt welcome and safe was the church. Not his home, not countless foster homes, not school, only church. It helped him feel good about himself. Jesus’ mercy touched and changed him there. And because the church had been faithful to him, he now pledged to be faithful to the church for the rest of his life.

Mercy, community, praise and thanksgiving – they all connect us with each other and with the healing power of Christ. Thank you for being part of that. May you always feel the joy of being blessed in order to be a blessing. Amen.