“Has no one returned to give praise to God?”—Luke 17:17, NIV
Have you ever tried hard to please someone like a boss or family member only to have your good intentions go unnoticed and unappreciated? It disappoints you, and the other person misses out on the benefits of expressing gratitude.
Gratitude brings blessings of health and well-being. The opposite is also true.
Jesus walked into a village and was met by ten men afflicted with leprosy. They called out to Him for mercy, and they were healed.
But only one of them, when he realized they had been healed, came back to Jesus, praising God. He “threw himself at Jesus’ feet and thanked Him,” Luke recounts, then adds an important detail: “And he was a Samaritan.”
Samaritans were the wrong race, wrong religion to Jews. Not someone to be blessed by a Jewish healer.
But no one else came back.
Did Jesus shrug this off as unimportant? Not at all.
“Were not all ten cleansed?” He asked. “Where are the other nine? Has no one returned to give praise to God except this foreigner?”
The other nine were physically healed, but they missed out on the added blessing Jesus gave the Samaritan for his thankful attitude: physical and spiritual healing.
“Rise and go; your faith has made you well,” Jesus declared (Luke 17:19).
The Samaritan wouldn’t have heard Jesus say those powerful words if he hadn’t returned.
When we thank God, we are more than physically healed. We are well.
A lack of gratitude clouds our thinking and darkens our hearts, Romans warns us (Romans 1:21).
Gratitude blesses you, the people you thank, and honors and blesses the Lord.
“It is only with gratitude that life becomes rich!”— Dietrich Bonhoeffer
