Pentecost+18/Proper 23C (Luke 17:11-19)

Are healing and cure the same? In the gospel lesson this morning, we see how they’re different. All ten lepers who come to Jesus are physically cured. No more disease. Yet, only one of them who returns to Jesus after being made clean or cured is healed. You might wonder what the difference between healing and cure is. We can consider two differences. One is that cure is physical while healing involves both the body and the mind. Healing is not limited to the body but brings a sense of wholeness, being made whole, which leads to holiness. The other difference is that cure is temporarily maintained while healing can be sustained despite physical, thus temporary, conditions of the body. Cure has an expiration date whereas healing doesn’t. 

These differences may suggest that cure doesn’t automatically guarantee healing, which in turn can mean healing doesn’t always require a cure. One can be healed while not physically cured. We see the nine lepers are cured but not necessarily healed in Jesus’ eyes. If their illness is no longer in remission, they will be excluded from their community again. (Jesus’ instruction of telling them to go to the priests is to gain reentry to their community. These are outcasts because of their disease.) 

We might then ask ourselves what this healing entails. The Samaritan’s action after being cured and healed gives us a clue: “Then one of them, when he saw that he was healed, turned back, praising God with a loud voice. He prostrated himself at Jesus' feet and thanked him.” He stops going to the priests so that he can go back home, back to his community. Instead, he turns back and praises God. This praise is an expression of gratitude. Of course, he’s grateful for the cure of his illness but I want to believe there’s something more than that. He’s able to reflect retrospectively on this curing process. He re-examines his graceful experience of encountering someone who genuinely cares about his well-being. This is someone who compassionately has the best intentions and goodwill for him. 

What may have cured his illness can be considered supernatural, that is, going against nature, but what heals him goes beyond both natural and supernatural phenomena. It is love that heals. This love neither shames who he is nor requires who he ought to be in order to be cured. This same rule of love equally applies to the other nine lepers. Note that Jesus doesn’t even request any prerequisites for them to be cured. He sells nothing. Grace is free of charge. 

What differentiates the Samaritan from the other nine is his act of turning back. This turning back (traditionally expressed as metanoia in Greek) signifies his return to the source of that healing. He goes deeper into that which healing arises. Jesus calls this act of gratitude faith. So, he declares, “Get up and go on your way; your faith has made you well.” The Samaritan’s faith is demonstrated in his act of metanoia and thankfulness. His initial experience of being cured of his disease would probably fade away but his experience of being healed, being made whole in God’s grace and love is embodied and ensouled. 

Here’s an interesting point that Jesus makes in the story. He reveals and highlights the background of the one who returns to him. This may at first sound like his criticism of the cultural superiority that his fellow Jewish siblings might have towards the Samaritans. Yet, I would rather see this as his way of shifting people’s focus from one’s identity to one’s action. What matters is not “who” does what but “what” one does. The Samaritan’s act of gratitude and humility is the basis of his faith that has him well according to Jesus. 

Friends in Christ, we Christians go after healing. Of course, we desire for cure as the poet Ron Padgett says, “the idea of immortality” is “the birthright of every human being.” Yet, we chose the path of healing which is the narrow way Jesus takes. We are called to mend what’s broken and divided because in Christ we know healing is always available for all as long as the kingdom of God is within us. All the wounds that seem impossible to be healed are made whole. In this union, we become holy, for God is holy. “Thank you” then becomes the sacred expression of healing.