One In Ten
“Lord, we pray
that your grace may always precede and follow us,
that we may
continually be given to good works.”
Grace, Grateful, and Gratitude all come from the same Latin root: gratus = meaning pleasing, thankful; feeling or showing an appreciation of kindness. I remember sitting in the living room growing up in Oak Park, IL, watching Captain Kangaroo and Mr. Green Jeans teaching us those two Magic Words: Thank you, and Please. In that order. Instilling young people with gratefulness, gratitude, and grace.
In a village between Samaria and Judea, ten lepers beg Jesus for mercy. He sends them off to the priests in Jerusalem and on the way, they are healed. One turns back to praise God and Jesus. “And he was a Samaritan.” Samaritans were outsiders. They worshipped in a different temple. One in ten expresses gratitude for being freed from stigma. Freed from isolation. Restored to his community in Samaria. Only one in ten stops to say thank you. Only one in ten fully recognizes the amazing grace that had saved them all. And he was a Samaritan. A quintessential outsider.
We might notice, he is part of the group of Judeans who were isolated from the rest of the community for having a skin disorder. Considered an outsider, because he shared the same disorder, they welcomed him. As they all head to Jerusalem, he stops and realizes his priests are not in Jerusalem. He likely will not be welcomed there. Samaritans and the Judeans, as a rule, did not fraternize with one another. But the skin condition they shared seems to have transcended all of that. No doubt there is a lesson for us all in that small detail of the story as Luke tells it. Despite a polarized population, the health crisis brings disparate people together. Together looking for the grace and mercy we pray for to “always precede and follow us.”
It's a story that features gratefulness prominently, and in addition to Captain Kangaroo, I think of the Benedictine monk, Brother David Steindl-Rast, O.S.B., currently 99 years-old! In addition to his Ph.D. in experimental psychology, and a life-long pursuit if Inter-Faith dialogue, Brother David has discovered that gratefulness as at the core of the spiritual life in most, if not all, the world’s religions. We may think that pursuit of the spiritual life is about attaining happiness. After all, the right to the pursuit of happiness is enshrined for all persons in our Declaration of Independence. Brother David says no. It’s gratefulness.
In his extended writing, teaching, and speaking on Gratefulness, he maintains that, “It is not happiness that makes us grateful. It is gratefulness that makes us happy.” [i] While exploring the connection between happiness and gratefulness, we tend to think that’s easy: people who are happy are grateful. Yet, we all know people who have everything one could imagine but are not happy. Maybe because they want more of the same, or something different than what they already have. And we know people who suffer every kind of misfortune, misfortune we would not like to have ourselves, but who are deeply happy. People who seem to radiate happiness no matter what. Why? Because they are grateful. Because it is gratefulness that makes us happy.
So, the question becomes, how might we be grateful all of the time? What is gratefulness anyway? Brother David appeals to our experience. We are grateful for something of value that we have. Something that is given to us; that is valuable. And it is truly given. It is a gift. We did not earn it. We have not bought it. We have not worked for it. It was given. These two things need to come together to make us grateful: it is valuable and it is truly a gift! When these two things come together, then gratefulness arises in our hearts, and happiness arises out of our gratefulness.
But, he says, it is not enough to only experience gratefulness and happiness once in a while. The question becomes how can I be grateful all of the time? He believes we can become a people who live gratefully. And we can do this when we become aware that every moment we are alive is a gift. But it is not just the gift that makes us grateful. For with each moment, every gift-moment, there is an opportunity to enjoy life. Opportunity is the gift-within-the-gift! If every moment is a gift, then every moment is an opportunity be grateful. We say opportunity knocks but once, but understood in this way, opportunity is there before us every moment of every day!
Brother David suggests that we can have this experience of gift-moments and opportunity all the time if we remember one thing we were taught as a child when crossing a street: we are taught to Stop. Look. And Go! We may notice right now that this is just what the Samaritan does. As he runs off toward Jerusalem with the other nine, suddenly he stops. He looks at the gift of new life he has experienced. He realizes there is an opportunity to give thanks. And so, he turns around, gets down on his knees before Jesus and gives thanks and praises God. He is grateful, profoundly grateful. Jesus, also recognizes that this moment of gratitude and praise is another gift-moment itself. Jesus stops, looks, and then says, “Get up and go on your way; your faith has made you well." Which in turn presents the Samaritan with yet another gift-moment. He learns that he has faith, yet he knows not how! We are not told what this new opportunity inspires him to do next, but we can be sure, given that his story made it into the tradition, that he told others what had just happened to him, he who was isolated and made to live outside of the community, and now was changed by a hated Judean and was made whole to experience yet more gift-moments, more opportunities to be grateful, and more opportunities to be happy. Stop. Look. Go. Every moment we live and breathe can be another gift-moment for which we are grateful, and gives us the opportunity to share our happiness with others. All others.
Brother David Steindl-Rast asks, “Does that mean that we can be grateful for everything? Certainly not. We cannot be grateful for violence, for war, for oppression, for exploitation. On the personal level, we cannot be grateful for the loss of a friend, for unfaithfulness, for bereavement. But I didn't say we can be grateful for everything. I said we can be grateful in every given moment for the opportunity, and even when we are confronted with something that is terribly difficult, we can rise to this occasion and respond to the opportunity that is given to us. It isn't as bad as it might seem. Actually, when you look at it and experience it, you find that most of the time, what is given to us is the opportunity to enjoy, and we only miss it because we are rushing through life and we are not stopping to see the opportunity.” [ii]
One final note: the Bible, from Genesis through the New Testament, has a particular understanding of One-in-Ten. In Genesis 28:22, Abraham’s grandson, Jacob, has a dream at Bethel, of angels ascending and descending a ladder. He hears the voice of God, “Know that I am with you and will keep you wherever you go.” After which Jacob vows to give a tenth of all he receives from God back to the Lord out of gratefulness. This would later be codified as “the tithe – ten percent, or one-in-ten – a sign of our gratefulness for each moment we are given to live this life in God’s world. For the Earth is the Lord’s, and everything therein!
Thank you, and Please. Stop, Look, and Go. Gratefulness. When we stop, look, and go, like the Samaritan, like Jacob, like Jesus, we too can be One-in-Ten. Like Jacob, we can give back to God one-in-ten off all God’s gifts we are given to enjoy, moment by moment, day by day, now and forever. Living this sort of Gratefulness will make us all happier than we have ever known before. If only we will slow down. Stop. Look at the real opportunities before us. And go forward with gratitude. Amen.
[ii] Ibid,
TED Talk
