The Grateful Samaritan

Praise the Lord! Today was my Holy Ghost birthday and over the last couple of weeks I have been reflecting on everything the Lord has done for me and all He has brought my family and I out of. This won’t be a long post but I just wanted to write about being grateful in a world of unthankfulness. Life is not perfect, it’s not always easy, but God is good and He is faithful! And if we can just remind ourselves that we have many reasons to be grateful, I believe we won’t be led astray when the hard times come.

I was reminded today of the story of the 10 lepers in Luke 17:11-19.

 11 And it came to pass, as he went to Jerusalem, that he passed through the midst of Samaria and Galilee.

12 And as he entered into a certain village, there met him ten men that were lepers, which stood afar off:

13 And they lifted up their voices, and said, Jesus, Master, have mercy on us.

14 And when he saw them, he said unto them, Go shew yourselves unto the priests. And it came to pass, 
that, as they went, they were cleansed.

15 And one of them, when he saw that he was healed, turned back, and with a loud voice glorified God,

16 And fell down on his face at his feet, giving him thanks: and he was a Samaritan.

17 And Jesus answering said, Were there not ten cleansed? but where are the nine?

18 There are not found that returned to give glory to God, save this stranger.

19 And he said unto him, Arise, go thy way: thy faith hath made thee whole.

The heading in my Bible calls this section of the chapter, “The Grateful Samaritan.” In these verses, there were 10 lepers who came to Jesus seeking a healing in their bodies. And when all 10 of them received their healings, there was only ONE who came back and thanked the Lord. The Bible says he turned back and glorified God with a loud voice! And he was a Samaritan! He was not even a Jew!

My youth leader, Bro. Chris Sosa pointed out something interesting one time about Jesus’s response to this grateful Samaritan and I wanted to share it. He pointed out how Jesus healed all 10 lepers from their sicknesses, but only one, the grateful Samaritan, was made whole in the end (verse 19). And one could speculate and try and give excuses for the other nine lepers. The Bible tells us that the Samaritan physically “turned back” and glorified God once he was healed. The other nine kept on going. Perhaps, they were too busy to turn back around, or it was not convenient for them. But there was one, a grateful Samaritan who was not only healed but he was made whole, all because of his grateful spirit.

And today I feel like that grateful Samaritan. I am not a Jew, but I was grafted into this wonderful heritage and I am so grateful for the Lord. I truly do not know where I would be without Him. Today and everyday I want to be like that grateful Samaritan. I want to worship and glorify God with a LOUD voice, for He has been so good to me. We all have many reasons to be grateful. We cannot forget what God has brought each of us out of. And if you were born in the church, you have even more of a reason to be grateful.

We need to stop focusing on all of the things we don’t have and be grateful for the wonderful things the Lord has blessed us with. This world will tell us that we need more. More money, more friends, more materialistic things, more appreciation, etc. But as the Church we need to grateful for what we do have. And I believe that when we humble ourselves and are truly grateful, like the Samaritan, God will see us and bless us with what we were not even expecting. So lets not allow our present circumstances to determine our level of gratefulness to the Lord. Each and everyday we need to remind ourselves that the Lord is SO good and we have an endless number of reasons to be grateful.

God bless you all! And thank you so much for reading ☺️

 In every thing give thanks: for this is the will of God in Christ Jesus concerning you.
-1 Thessalonians 5:18