The mother of a little boy questioned him, “Why didn’t you pray last night like you usually do?” His frank response was, “I didn’t want anything from God last night.” But is prayer only petition and intercession? Surely, “thanksgiving” is an integral part of prayer.

People in Jesus’ time were threatened by leprosy, even more than we are today by the advent of AIDS. Definite regulations had been set up for the Jewish community to protect themselves from coming in contact with lepers. For example, in Leviticus 13:45-46:

“The person who has the leprous disease shall wear torn clothing and let the hair of his head be disheveled; and he shall cover his upper lip and cry out, “unclean, unclean.” He shall remain unclean as long as he has the disease; he is unclean. He shall live alone: his dwel…