Heres an excerpt from tomorrows sermon The Motive of the Mission Pt. II: ...There’s one leper with good motives. The difference between THEM and HIM is THEY were driven by GREED... but HE was driven by GRACE... THEY were driven by CONVERSION... But HE was driven by COMPASSION! I got evidence.... look at the text... All of them ask for the same thing, but most scholars suggest that 9 of them are Jewish. Therefore when Jesus extends the mission to them, their get overcome by their privilege. When Jesus sends them to the priests, as they went, they were healed... this means that the Jews can be reconciled back to the community that marginalized them. And when they get access to privilege, they forget about their encounter with God. When they get access to the in-crowd.... when they get the invitation to the upper rooms... when the check can cover the balance... when the bed isn’t cold like it used to be... when the kids act right... when the church starts growing... they forget where their HELP came from! They forget how desperate they were for the LORD... But Jesus’ motive isn’t to give them an engagement with greed... it is to give them a closer encounter with God. That’s why it’s obvious to me that the Samaritan wants the same thing Jesus wants. He just wanted a closer walk with the lord. When the text opens, he (just like the other lepers) are speaking with Jesus FROM A DISTANCE. They want to get close to him, but the law says they can’t get close to him. They have to keep their distance because they are unclean. Jesus SAW them and sent them to the priest. As they went, they were healed... but according to the text... only one person SAW like Jesus SAW. The bible says that the Samaritan leper.... SAW that he was healed... This term SAW means that he has received a revelatory or spiritual insight that Jesus was the gateway to the Gospel of liberation... and the God of love gave him an experience with grace! And when the Samaritan leper SAW that he was healed... WHEN HE SAW... he turned back (possibly before ever making it to the priests)... and he gets into a place and into a posture that he had previously been hindered from. The first time he speaks it is from a distance... but now... he gets closer to Jesus... he recognized that Jesus GRANTED a closer walk... When he went back to the LORD... he got CLOSER!!!
Posted on: Sun, 24 Nov 2013 05:17:02 +0000
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