Listen to the audio of today’s Reflection:
https://soundcloud.com/hapearce/reflection-for-may-16-2025
Luke 7:1-10
The Faith of the Centurion
When Jesus had finished saying all this to the people who were listening, he entered Capernaum. 2 There a centurion’s servant, whom his master valued highly, was sick and about to die. 3 The centurion heard of Jesus and sent some elders of the Jews to him, asking him to come and heal his servant. 4 When they came to Jesus, they pleaded earnestly with him, “This man deserves to have you do this, 5 because he loves our nation and has built our synagogue.” 6 So Jesus went with them.
He was not far from the house when the centurion sent friends to say to him: “Lord, don’t trouble yourself, for I do not deserve to have you come under my roof. 7 That is why I did not even consider myself worthy to come to you. But say the word, and my servant will be healed. 8 For I myself am a man under authority, with soldiers under me. I tell this one, ‘Go,’ and he goes; and that one, ‘Come,’ and he comes. I say to my servant, ‘Do this,’ and he does it.”
9 When Jesus heard this, he was amazed at him, and turning to the crowd following him, he said, “I tell you, I have not found such great faith even in Israel.” 10 Then the men who had been sent returned to the house and found the servant well.
Luke 7:18-22
Jesus and John the Baptist
18 John’s disciples told him about all these things. Calling two of them, 19 he sent them to the Lord to ask, “Are you the one who is to come, or should we expect someone else?”
20 When the men came to Jesus, they said, “John the Baptist sent us to you to ask, ‘Are you the one who is to come, or should we expect someone else?’”
21 At that very time Jesus cured many who had diseases, sicknesses and evil spirits, and gave sight to many who were blind. 22 So he replied to the messengers, “Go back and report to John what you have seen and heard: The blind receive sight, the lame walk, those who have leprosy are cured, the deaf hear, the dead are raised, and the good news is proclaimed to the poor.”
The two passages we’re using as the basis of our Reflection for today are actually listed by the lectionary for today and for tomorrow. The story of the healing of the centurion’s servant is from the Friday reading and the response to John the Baptist is from the Saturday reading. Over the years, I’ve become more and more convinced that there’s a connection between the two stories. I think reading them together allows us to see a more profound truth than either of them communicates by itself.
The subject of the first story is the centurion. He would have been a career officer in the Roman army. Centurions weren’t graduates of a Military Academy or political appointees; they worked their way up through the ranks of the Roman army by toughness, courage and discipline. Some historians have written that lots of the Roman soldiers hated being stationed in Judea – they didn’t understand the Jews, and the local population never stopped resenting them. But this particular centurion had a reputation for treating the local population well, and had even built the synagogue in Capernaum. The centurion is so well-thought-of by the local Jewish leadership that some of them approach Jesus on his behalf, and ask him to heal the centurion’s servant.
Jesus agrees to go to the centurion’s home and heal the servant. But on the way, he’s met by another delegation. It seems significant that this delegation is made-up, not of Jewish leaders, but rather of friends of the centurion. So you might say that the first request to heal the servant had been sent through official channels, but the second message was personal.
And the message these friends carry is interesting on a couple of levels. First of all, the centurion admits – with a humility that wouldn’t typically be expected of officers of the Roman army – that he is unworthy even to ask a favor of Jesus. And since he seems to be pretty well-versed in the customs of the Jews, the centurion would probably realize that for Jesus to come into a gentile home would make him ritually unclean in Jewish eyes. So apparently the centurion was sensitive to the laws and customs of the Hebrew tradition.
But more importantly, the centurion also recognizes that Jesus is a man of supernatural power. And just as this officer has the power to get things done by virtue of his authority in the Roman army, Jesus has the power to get things done by virtue of his authority in the heavenly kingdom. “Say the word,” the centurion says, “and my servant will be healed.”
This simple statement of faith earns the gentile officer a surprising distinction. “I tell you,” Jesus says to his followers in amazement, “I have not found such great faith even in Israel.” It’s probably safe to assume that this Roman officer didn’t know all the theological details of the Hebrew tradition. But he knew heavenly power when he saw it, and he confessed his unworthiness before Jesus, and as a result God’s healing was poured into the life of a suffering person. The centurion understood the real power Jesus commanded, and his servant was healed.
The second passage follows a few verses after the one about the centurion
John the Baptist sends some disciples to ask Jesus if he’s the Messiah or not. From our perspective, that seems odd, considering that John and Jesus were relatives and their mothers were together during their miraculous pregnancies. And for that matter, John had personally baptized Jesus. He had seen the Spirit come down on Jesus and heard the voice of God claim him as a beloved son. So that makes John’s question even more odd.
We probably need to remind ourselves what the Hebrew people expected from the Messiah: They expected a military liberator, who would drive out the foreigners occupying and ruling their country. They expected someone who would get rid of the Romans.
That helps to explain why John would ask his question. If you expected the Messiah to drive out the Romans, and then you heard that Jesus was doing favors for one of them and announcing that this foreign soldier had more faith than any Jew, you could reasonably come to the conclusion that you had misunderstood something.
But Jesus answers John’s question by calling attention to his healing of the sick and blind and possessed. He reminds John’s disciples that not long before, he had raised a dead man. Then he says, “Go tell John what you saw.” Jesus’ point seems to be that his mission as the Messiah wasn’t to drive out the Romans. His mission as the Messiah was to bring healing to a sick and blind world, to overcome evil with the healing love of God, and to destroy the power of death.
There are still some Christians who believe that at his second coming, Jesus will come back as a mighty conqueror to do in the future what he refused to do in the past. But it seems to me that for us, these two passages make the point that the way to identify those who are really committed to ‘being Jesus’ in the world is to ask whether through them, healing is still coming into a sick and blind world and evil is being overcome, not with armies and weapons, but rather with the healing power of God.
So when people outside the faith look at those of us who claim to be followers of Jesus, do they see us at work doing what he did? Or will they conclude salvation is to be found in “someone else,” and keep looking?
Let’s pray. Lord, move us by your Spirit to reach out in your love to all those around us, even those we might sometimes consider enemies. And help us to model the love of Jesus in all we do, so the world will know us by our love for one another and for all those who suffer. Amen.
Have a great weekend! Worship joyfully on Sunday!
Henry
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