I sat on the couch Wednesday night, phone in hand, trying to figure out how to say “thank you.” You’d think writing a simple birthday post wouldn’t be that big of a deal. But apparently, for me? It was.
An hour went by—no exaggeration—as I typed and deleted, typed and deleted. How do you put into words a gratitude that stretches across decades? Birthday wishes from teaching colleagues I haven’t seen since 1992, from college roommates, from church folks scattered across seasons of my life. Every message felt like someone tapping me on the shoulder saying, “I remember you.”
And still… I never posted it.
I meant to. I planned to. But you know how it goes—the highway to hell is paved with “I meant to.”
Here’s what hit me:
Behavior is a language.
And sometimes the language I speak—accidentally—is silence.
It made me think about the story in Luke 17, the ten lepers who were healed. We’re so quick to judge the nine who never came back to say thank you. But honestly? I get them. They weren’t ungrateful monsters. They were people who finally had their lives handed back to them. They ran to the places they’d been banned from. They had families to hug, jobs to reclaim, faith communities to re-enter. After living so long without… they were grabbing tightly to whatever good they could finally hold.
Scarcity makes us clench. It makes us run fast. It makes us forget.
But that tenth leper? He understood something deeper—something I’m slowly learning myself. Gratitude isn’t a feeling; it’s a practice. A posture. A way of living that changes us from the inside out.
All ten were healed—katharizō—made clean.
But only one turned back.
Only one opened his hands, fell at Jesus’ feet, and let gratitude undo him enough to make him whole.
That’s where the second word comes in: sōzō—not just healed, but saved, restored, put back together in a way that touches every part of a person’s being.
Ten were cured. One was changed.
And so the question that’s been poking at me ever since:
Which one am I?
Which one are you?
Are we living lives so busy, so full, so chased by scarcity or urgency or just the plain-old chaos of being human—that we forget to stop, turn around, and let gratitude actually transform us?
Reflection
What goodness in your life are you holding onto with clenched fists?
Where are you rushing ahead, meaning to say thank you “later”?
Today, try this: put both feet on the floor. Open your palms. Literally—hands open. Let your body preach the sermon your heart needs.
Gratitude doesn’t just cure what’s wrong.
It changes what’s possible.
Grace and Peace,
Andrea