Power Over Sickness and Disease BIBLE STORY A Leper’s Story Luke 17:11-19

BIBLE TRUTH God has power over disease. This lesson will help middle elementary children . . . • Realize that God can take away sickness and disease • Realize that all healing is the result of God’s power, even when He chooses to use doctors and medicine as part of the process • Thank God for health and for healing of sickness • Pray for sick people, trusting God’s care for them

VERSE-A-MONTH CLUB “God is able to do far more than we could ever ask for or imagine. He does everything by his power that is working in us.” Ephesians 3:20, nirv

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Week 2 of 4

Reflect on the Word

In this story we find Jesus coming from the north along the border between Samaria and Galilee. There He crosses the Jordan River near Beth Shan and joins the Galilean caravan down through Perea to Jerusalem. Just outside one of the villages along the way, Jesus had an encounter with ten lepers. According to the Law of Moses lepers were required to leave their families and live in isolated areas outside the city. In biblical times, leprosy was a dreaded and hopeless disease. The word leprosy means to strike or to receive a blow. The Hebrews believed that leprosy was God striking or punishing the afflicted person. In their thinking, it was a God-given disease and, therefore, could be cured only by God. Unchecked, leprosy destroyed the human body. It often began with specks on the eyelids and the palms. It gradually spread over the whole body, bleaching the hair white, crusting the affected parts with white scales and causing terrible sores and swelling. Eventually, leprosy was a fatal disease. Certainly the ten lepers in Luke 17 knew that their physical condition was hopeless. No doctor or priest could help them; only God could cure their disease. You are here We do not know for sure what the lepers asked for when they cried in unison, (the meaning of the original words) to Jesus, “Have mercy on us.” They may simply have been begging alms. However, it’s also possible that they had heard reports of Jesus and were asking for healing. (See Luke 4:37, 5:15, 7:17, and 8:39.) Notice how the lepers were finally cured. First, they cried out for mercy, and then they obeyed the command of Jesus. As they went, they were all healed. These lepers would not have been healed if they had not been obedient to the command of Christ to go and show themselves to the priest. The time of healing now becomes a dividing time for the ten lepers. The Samaritan returned to give glory to God, and in so doing, he humbled himself and opened himself to more of God’s grace through Jesus. The other nine, for reasons we do not know, left with their healing and never looked back, never returned to thank Jesus. Grateful acceptance of the gift of healing was an expression of faith that brought the Samaritan to wholeness that was more than just physical healing. The nine, very much like the Jews, knew the benefits of Jesus’ healing touch, but refused the relationship that would save them. The miracle story reveals the healing presence of the Messiah, exercising the power and authority of the Kingdom in the healing of disease. His presence, however, calls for response, for decision, for commitment. The nine took their benefits where they could get them and went their way. The Samaritan, in gratitude and humility, found wholeness as a child of the Kingdom. Christ does good even to those who will not be thankful, but the benefits of God to salvation only profit those who are thankful. —James Folsom

The proper response to God’s saving mercy . . . is not presumption that it is something we deserve but untainted gratitude and pure praise of God. —R. Alan Culpepper Luke, in The New Interpreter’s Bible, 327

Creation >>> The Fall >>> Abraham >>> Exodus >>> Judges >>> David >>> The Prophets >>> The Exile >>> Return >>> All Scripture quotations, unless indicated, are taken from the Holy Bible, New International Version® (niv®). Copyright © 1973, 1978, 1984 by International Bible Society. Used by permission of Zondervan Publishing House. All rights reserved. Verses marked nirv are from the Holy Bible, New International Reader’s Version (nirv). Copyright 1995, 1996, 1998 by International Bible Society. Used by permission of Zondervan Publishing House. All rights reserved. Scripture marked nlt is taken from the Holy Bible, New Living Translation (nlt), copyright © 1996. Used by permission of Tyndale House Publishers, Inc., Wheaton, IL 60189. All rights reserved. Scripture marked tm is taken from The Message™. Copyright © 1993. Used by permission of NavPress Publishing Group. Middle Elementary Teacher is published quarterly by WordAction Publishing Company, 2923 Troost Ave., Kansas City, MO 64109. Copyright 2011 by WordAction Publishing Company®.

LESSON PLANNER See

Hear & Say n

Attentetrios Get

Bible

Explora

tions

Con

ne To ction Lif s e

HERE

Sing

NOTES Do

Solve

Turn Around

Resources, Item 6

Helping Hands

Connections, p. 1

Read & Write

Optional Activity: Leper Tag Bible Story

Connections, pp. 2-3; Resources, Item 5

Bible Story Review Optional Activity: CSI: Story Investigation

Connections, pp. 2-3

Power Players

Resources, Item 7

Rx for Compassion

Connections, p. 4

Closing and Prayer

Kid Zone

Optional Activity: You Touch and Tell

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PRE-SESSION POPPERS Use one or more of these activities to involve students who arrive early. Choose those your students would enjoy most. 1. Welcome children warmly and ask them a specific question about the past week. You might ask them about their families’ vacation plans or the most exciting events that happened this past week. 2. Review last week’s Bible story using the conversation balloons from Item 8. Let students read them and put the conversations in story sequence. 3. If any student did not get to draw an illustration of the story last week, review the main events from the story. Then hand out a papyrus sheet and let the student draw something from the Bible story last week. 4. If you have access to a computer, have interested students research leprosy also called Hanson’s disease. They could share any information they find with other students. If you do not have computer capability, provide an encyclopedia for students to use for research. 5. Play a Bible trivia game. 6. Let students make a list of things people do to stay healthy. For example: eat nutritious foods, get plenty of sleep, exercise regularly, and make regular visits to the dentist. 7. Provide art materials and let interested students create get-well cards for someone who is sick or in the hospital. Obtain names from your church office, children’s pastor, or director. 8. Provide chenille wires in a variety of colors. Let students use them to create something they might see in a hospital or doctor’s office: stethoscope, needle, wheelchair, medicine bottle, and so on.

LESSON HELPS       HELPING HAND         Tips for teachers

  DIGGING DEEPER

   Important biblical and theological insights

FAITH WORDS

Foundational words of the faith

You are

here

400 Years of Silence >>> Birth of Christ >>> Ministry of Jesus >>> Easter >>> Early Church >>> Letters >>> Last Things

on ttenti rs Gette

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Use these activities to help focus the children’s attention and prepare them to learn today’s Bible Truth.

Turn Around Before class, Prepare Item 6 if you did not do so last week. In class, Hand out the signs to four students. Have them hold up the signs as you say You’ll need • Resources, Item 6, the verse together. Then have one student turn Verse-a-Month Club around his or her sign so that the words cannot be seen. Say the verse again. Continue turning Signs around the signs until students are saying the verse from memory. TRANSITION: Say, Our memory verse tells us God is able to do far more than we could ever ask for or imagine. Listen and see if the people in today’s Bible story got more than they imagined.

Helping Hands Hand out Connections and direct students’ You’ll need attention to page 1. Say, All of our bod• Connections p.1 ies need help, at least sometime, because • Pencils or pens they are not working the way God originally designed them to work. Taking turns, have students explain how each item pictured can help our bodies. Next ask them to circle the items they use or have used. TRANSITION: Say, Many of the items pictured were not available while Jesus walked the earth. As far as we know, none of these did help or could help the man in today’s Bible story. How do you think someone would feel if he had nothing to help him? Listen to this man’s story.

This might be a good time to discuss with your class people with permanent disabilities. If you know someone who could help your class understand the challenges those with disabilities have, invite the person to speak with your Before class, Choose an appropriate class. You might have to discuss You’ll need location for this game. The room or space the question of why God does 7 • Open room or space Lessoonn should be open and free of obstacles. not heal everyone. You might • Blindfold pti O also want to discuss the role In class, Play this variation of the of doctors and medicine in the kids’ game, Marco Polo. One person is the leper and is blindfolded. healing process. Everyone else is not a leper (not blindfolded). The leper starts in the

Leper Tag

If it is too difficult for the leper to catch anyone allow the leper to walk while everyone else must crawl. Alternatively, shrink the area in which the non-lepers can roam. If you have enough blindfolds you could add each tagged person to your leper colony until everyone is tagged.

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middle of the room. The child who is in the middle says, “Unclean” as often as desired but every time the child says it everyone else must say, “Clean.” By listening for voices, the leper tries to find and tag other students. If he or she does tag someone the tagged person becomes the new leper with the blindfold. TRANSITION: Ask, How did you feel when you were the leper and had to call out “Unclean” and everyone was trying to stay away from you? We were just playing a game but in the time of Jesus, people who had a skin disease had to stay away from anyone who did not have the skin disease. And when they went near others they had to call out, “Unclean” as a warning to them. Today’s story is about people who really had this skin disease called leprosy. Try to think about how they must have felt as you listen.

Bible Story Say, In our last lesson we heard the story of a pig herder who was an eye witness to Jesus freeing a man possessed by demons. This week we’ll hear another story of an eye witness to one of Jesus’ miracles, but this time it is the man himself who is helped by Jesus.

A Leper’s Story

You’ll need

• Connections, pp. 2-3 • Resources, Item 5, “God’s Power” Bulletin Board • Photocopier and paper • Pencils or markers • Tacks

Use these activities to help the children learn from the Bible story.

Luke 17:11-19

Why are you looking at me so funny? Oh, I understand now. You don’t know me, do you? Or at least you don’t recognize me like this. Perhaps you would have recognized me if I were still all white and blotchy and scarred. Or maybe you would recognize me from a distance if I were to yell out, ‘Unclean! Unclean! Leper, unclean!’ as I have been doing for the last several years. This is my story. One day Jesus was traveling along the border between Samaria and Galilee. As He came near our village my friends and I met Him. There were ten of us and we all had leprosy. We called out to Him to have pity on us. He told my friends and me, “Go, show yourselves to the priests.” He spoke with such authority, and with such compassion, that we obeyed, each of us wondering why we would do such a thing. But along the way, just as we were reconsidering doing such a foolish thing as going to show our leprosy to the priests again, we noticed that we were changed. We had been cured, healed of our leprosy! Praise the God of Heaven, all of us were clean! We were normal again. Free to go back to our families and our jobs and our ordinary lives! You would not believe the celebration we had right there on the road; hugging and laughing and singing and jumping—I’m sure if anyone saw us he would have thought we were absolutely raving mad. But I didn’t care and I don’t care now, I’M CLEAN! Glory to God! Well, in the midst of the celebration, it dawned on me, Jesus. Jesus is the One who did this. He is the One who has given me new life. I must go back and thank Him. And so I ran back to find Him. I shouted praise to God and threw myself at Jesus’ feet. I thanked Him with all my heart that He helped me, even though I am a Samaritan. You know that Jews do not normally even want to talk to us. Jesus asked me, “Were not all ten cleansed? Where are the other nine? Was no one found to return and give praise to God except this foreigner?” Jesus looked at me with compassion in His eyes and told me, “Rise and go; your faith has made you well.” I’ll never forget that day. The day I met Jesus and He changed my life! Underlined words are from Luke 17:11-14.

For additional insight into leprosy, find copies of Paul Brand’s books (coauthored with Philip Yancey) Fearfully and Wonderfully Made and In His Image. Dr. Brand worked with modern day lepers and does a marvelous job of relating spiritual lessons as well as giving medical insight.

After the story, Give students time to discuss the Bible story. Ask, Can you imagine how the leper must have felt when Jesus gave him his whole life back? It is kind of like he was born all over again. When we become Christians it is similar to what happened to the leper. We are given a new life; a life no longer separated from God and with the opportunity to show others God’s love. Give each student a copy of the papyrus sheet from Item 5. Students may choose an event from the story to illustrate, or they may choose to draw an illustration of how God deals with disease today. After students create their drawings, let them share them with the class. Then attach them to the bulletin board under the correct heading, Then or Now.

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Bible Story Review Play a game similar to hangman, but for every correct answer another body part is healed. The goal is for the class to have the entire person healed before you run out of questions. Draw an enYou’ll need • White board and marker tire person with “leprosy” spots on his head, arm and hand (x2), body, leg and foot (x2). Take turns asking questions but allow the rest of the class to help the student who is answering. If they answer a question correctly erase the spots on one body part.

REVIEW QUESTIONS:   1. W  hy did the man have to show himself to the priest a couple times? (Priests diagnosed leprosy, when you had it and when you were cured)   2. H  ow do you think you would feel if you had to live the life of a leper, separated from everyone but other lepers? (Answers will vary)   3. W  hat would be the most difficult thing for you to give up if you had to leave everything and everyone behind? (Answers will vary)   4. L uke 9:51 tells us that Jesus was on His way to Jerusalem. Why do you think Jesus took the time to help the lepers when He was on an important mission? (Maybe because Jesus’ mission always was to care for people)   5. H  ow many lepers were healed? How many lepers came back to thank Jesus? (ten; one)   6. H  ow many of the lepers were Jewish and how many Samaritans? (The text implies nine Jews, one Samaritan)   7. L uke 9:53 tells us that Samaritans in one village did not welcome Jesus. Why didn’t Jesus heal only the nine Jews and not the Samaritan? (Because Jesus loves all people, not just the Jews)   8. H  ow did Jesus know all ten lepers were healed? (We are not told but possibly because the one returning leper told Him or, more likely, Jesus knew the miracle He was doing was to heal all ten lepers)   9. W  hat can we learn from Jesus telling us that all were healed but only a Samaritan came back to thank Him? (We should all be thankful. Sometimes the person who we are least likely to think would be thankful is the most thankful.) 10. R  ead Luke 17:18. Who did Jesus want to receive the credit for this miracle? (God)

MIRACLE: An amazing act that God does to help people. God’s miracles show people His character and help them trust Him.

CSI: Story Investigation Lessonon7 i Opt Suggested answers: Who? Jewish leper(s) What? Failure to pay what is owed (proper thanks) When? After services rendered (i.e. After he was healed) Where? Along the border between Samaria and Galilee Why? Too excited to return to his family

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Say, We are going to pretend that we are at You’ll need the scene of another crime shortly after it oc• Connections pp.2-3 curred to investigate what happened. Some of • Pens or pencils you are going to role play the characters that witnessed what happened in our story and you will be interviewed by the investigators. We will use our Connections page to record important notes from our investigation. Assign these parts before you read the story so the students can think about their assigned character: Jesus, the Samaritan leper, a member of the leper’s family (wife or child), one or more Jewish lepers, and one or two investigators (not in the story; maybe the teacher should be an investigator to help guide the questioning). After reading the story aloud, have your investigator call up one witness at a time for questioning. In this scenario the Jewish leper has been charged with “failure to pay what is owed” (thanks or payment to Jesus) or something else you make up. The investigator should ask about the Who, What, When, Where, Why of the event. See HELPING HAND for suggested answers.

Power Players Before class, Prepare Item 7 as directed on the You’ll need item. Have the cards for lessons 6 and 7 ready to use. • Resources, Item 7, In class, Say, The questions for this game will rePower Players Game view the Bible story as well as help you think about • Scissors what the story taught. Form two teams or let individuals play. Have the students take turns spinning and moving the number of spaces indicated by the lightning bolts. When a child lands on an outlet, he or she must draw a game card and answer the question. You may use just the cards for this lesson or both sets of cards for the first two lessons of this unit.

Use these activities to help students connect the Bible Truth to life.

Rx for Compassion Say, Today we saw how Jesus had compassion on the ten lepers. There were many, many people that You’ll need Jesus had compassion on during His time on earth. • Connections, p. 4 This is one way we should try to be like Jesus. We • Pens or pencils can’t heal people like Jesus, but we can find other ways to have compassion on them and help them. On the Connections page, look at each picture and read each caption. Then write how you could show compassion. Write how you—not someone else—could help in each case.

Closing and Prayer Say, Today we have learned that God can heal You’ll need those who are sick. Sometimes God heals with a • Kid Zone for each child miracle and sometimes He heals through doctors and medicine. But all healing comes from God. Let’s thank God for health and for healing. Let’s also pray for those who need God’s healing touch. Close by asking if any students have a prayer request for someone who is sick. Encourage students to pray silently, thanking God for healing. Ask them to remember those who are sick and need God’s healing touch. Then pray for your students and the requests, asking God to help us trust Him. Hand out Kid Zone for each child to take home and enjoy with family.

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Lessonon7 i Opt

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Have students stand in a circle. Say, Think of a one sentence praise for good health or the healing of sickness. For example, “I thank God for good health” or “I thank God for helping my dad when he was sick.” When I touch your shoulder, say your sentence. Then touch someone else in our circle who has not spoken yet. Say, Remember, God is concerned about all our needs. But there are times when He doesn’t answer our prayers the way we ask or the way that we think He should. Do you think that means God doesn’t care or doesn’t answer? (No, God may want to work in other ways, or He may choose not to break the natural laws that He set into motion. He may have another purpose in mind—one we could not possibly know or understand.) Our job is to trust God always, even when He doesn’t do what we ask Him to do, or in the way we ask. He still loves us and cares about us.

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