Luke 17:17

And Jesus answering said, Were not the ten cleansed? but where are the nine? Were there none found that returned to give glory to God, save this stranger?

Sadness seems to have been the dominant emotion as Jesus contemplated the ingratitude of the nine. How could men be so thoughtless and unappreciative of God's favors? Why, it may be asked, did the nine not return?

One waited to see if the cure was real.

One waited to see if it would last.

One said he would see Jesus later.

One decided that he had never had leprosy.

One said he would have gotten well anyway.

One gave the glory to the priests.

One said, O well, Jesus didn't really DO anything.

One said, just any rabbi could have done it.

One said, "I was already much improved."

"How often do the love and life of the pardoned sinner fail to respond to the grace that saved him!"[24]

These lepers had come to Jesus in the extremity of a most loathsome and pitiful disease; they pleaded with him to help, and he healed them; but nine of them never even said, "Thanks." Barclay developed a sermon on ingratitude from this text stressing: (1) the ingratitude of children to their parents, (2) the ingratitude toward our fellow men, and (3) man's ingratitude toward God.[25]

Except this stranger ... Significant words indeed are these.

This very word, "foreigner" ([@allogenes]) is found on the limestone block from the temple of Israel in Jerusalem. It was placed in the court of the Gentiles next to the Court of the Women. "Let no foreigner enter," it said. Alas, a foreigner might not be permitted to enter the Jewish part of the temple (upon penalty of death); but one "foreigner," or "stranger," found grace with the Lord of the temple![26]

Twice in this episode, the worship of the healed Samaritan, was called "giving God the glory" (Luke 17:15,18); and as it was Jesus whom he worshipped, we must understand that Jesus is God in human form; worshiping Jesus is worshiping God. Both the sacred historian and the Christ himself teach this in this passage.

[24] J. S. Lamar, The New Testament Commentary (Cincinnati, Ohio: Chase and Hall, 1877), Vol. II, p. 219.

[25] William Barclay, The Gospel of Luke (Philadelphia: Westminster Press, 1956), p. 226.

[26] Herschel H. Hobbs, op. cit., p. 250.