Only One Came Back

But before we hastily condemn those nine ungrateful former lepers, we should take a good look in the mirror. Don’t we, too, take an awful lot for granted? We live in the greatest, richest country in the world, enjoy the blessings of liberty, plenty, and other of God’s blessings but seldom pause to thank Him for it all. In fact, we sort of look upon it all as our right, and we too often complain about what we do have.

Many of us will stand in line for hours in the wee watches of the dark night for a chance to purchase some material item that will be used up, worn out, torn up, lost, or stolen soon thereafter without giving a thought to those who must work to make that item available to us or to the God who has blessed us with the financial and physical means to obtain it. We’ll spend hours pushing and shoving and elbowing total strangers and waste time we could be spending in meaningful interaction with those who should be the closest to us.

Such ingratitude and unthankfulness is a prophesied sign of the end times (2 Tim. 3:2). It seems that the more we have the less we appreciate it. That’s a sad commentary on our modern times. As the founder of my alma mater was fond of repeating to his audiences, “When the seed of gratitude dies in the heart of a man, that person is well nigh hopeless.”

Don’t be part of the 90 percent (like the nine healed but ungrateful lepers) who fail to show their appreciation for what God has given them. Rather, be a 10 percenter, like the one thankful healed leper, who truly appreciate the bounty with which God has bless them. Start counting your blessings, and you’ll find that your problems seem so much fewer and smaller.

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