Sermon Tone Analysis

Even Jesus Was Surprised

Matthew 8:5-13

 

/When Jesus had entered Capernaum, a centurion came to him, asking for help.

“Lord,” he said, “my servant lies at home paralysed and in terrible suffering.”

/

/Jesus said to him, “I will go and heal him.”/

/The centurion replied, “Lord, I do not deserve to have you come under my roof.

But just say the word, and my servant will be healed.

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.”/

/When Jesus heard this, he was astonished and said to those following him, “I tell you the truth, I have not found anyone in Israel with such great faith.

I say to you that many will come from the east and the west, and will take their places at the feast with Abraham, Isaac and Jacob in the kingdom of heaven.

But the subjects of the kingdom will be thrown outside, into the darkness, where there will be weeping and gnashing of teeth.”/

/Then Jesus said to the centurion, “Go!

It will be done just as you believed it would.”

And his servant was healed at that very hour/.

| N |

o one who meets Jesus is unchanged.

Some are softened and transformed into one of His disciples.

Others are hardened in their opposition to Him.

What is true today was true when He walked among men.

In the Gospels, nobody who ever met Jesus was unchanged by that encounter.

People changed in different ways in that day as well.

Then, some were hardened while others were softened.

Illnesses were healed.

Lives were redirected.

Moreover, it all happened as the result of meeting God.

The series of messages for Sunday mornings through the coming months will focus on the fourth dimension, that which results from personal involvement with the living God.

Judea was occupied territory.

The Jewish peoples had long ago ceased being masters of their national destiny.

First the Greeks and then the Romans had occupied the land despite repeated and determined resistance by the Jewish peoples.

Like all peoples in all times, not all the occupying troops were thoughtless or cruel.

Certainly there was a marked air of superiority which characterised many of the Roman soldiers and civilian administrators appointed by Rome, but there were also those individuals who were shown to be sensitive to the plight of the peoples over whom they ruled.

In fact, in the pages of the New Testament we meet individuals who were drawn to worship the True and Living God because of what they witnessed as they lived among the Jewish people.

Cornelius, the Roman centurion who received the message of life from Peter and who was the first Gentile to openly identify as a believer in the risen Christ was one such pious Gentile [cf.

*Acts 10:1-48*].

Apparently there were also Roman soldiers who listened intently to John and responded to his message pointing to the coming Messiah [cf.

*Luke 3:14*], and Paul saw some within the praetorian guard converted to Christ [*Philippians 1:13*].

There was also this unnamed centurion who caused Jesus such astonishment.

His story is related in both Matthew’s and Luke’s Gospels.

Though we do not know his name, we know that he was a man of faith in the Son of God … such great faith that Jesus was amazed and the people of Israel were challenged.

Together, let’s learn from this man through exploring the account Matthew has provided.

The Centurion’s Request – “Lord,” he said, “my servant lies at home paralysed and in terrible suffering/./”

Luke’s Gospel provides the parallel passage for this incident [*Luke 7:2-10*].

In that account we have additional details provided concerning the approach with which this man presented his request to the Lord.

In Luke’s account we discover that he did not even deign himself worthy to come to Jesus, but instead he dispatched some from within the Jewish community.

Nor did he treat these Jewish emissaries as mere servants, but he appealed to them on the basis of his pious deeds on behalf of their religion.

You see, he had built a synagogue with his own funds and had demonstrated his love for the Jewish people through various acts.

Thus the Jewish elders appealed to Jesus because they felt assured that he was a worthy man on the basis of his actions toward their people.

Of course, no one merits God’s grace on the basis of mere actions.

However, as Jesus drew near this Gentile home, the centurion sent a second group of his friends to entreat Jesus not to come since he was unworthy of having him in his home.

Whether these friends were also Jewish elders or drawn from his soldier band, we do not know.

What is apparent is that he genuinely considered himself unworthy of coming into Jesus’ presence.

The two accounts provide depth for our understanding.

It is likely that Matthew’s account is essentially a summary of the incident, containing the gist of the messages which were sent to Jesus.

We know that */this centurion esteemed his servant/* according to Luke’s account [*Luke 7:2*].

It is well known that many slaves in that ancient day were well educated and often came from cultured families.

Through the misfortune of war or the vagaries of natal land, men and women were frequently enslaved, though highly valued for their culture and education.

Though enslaved they became virtual members of the family to which they were bound by their slavery.

Matthew says that it was his boy (pai'") which was paralysed, using a term which became current throughout many lands where slavery has been practised.

Luke states that it was his slave (dou'lo") who was on the verge of death [*Luke 7:3*].

What is apparent is that the slave was a youth, and his youth made the paralysis the more difficult to endure and the less likely to be cured.

The hope for his recovery was so remote as to cause despair.

The diseases which were referred to Christ were generally of the most obstinate and hopeless kind, and this is but a representative of those situations in which the people had surrendered all hope save divine intervention.

The request is significant for another reason; the centurion reveals concern for another and not for himself.

*/His motive was compassion for another/*, demonstrating that his heart was tender.

The Lord could not help but notice such compassion.

Luke’s Gospel adds the information that this centurion was respected by the Jewish elders for his generosity toward their Faith.

/This man deserves to have you do this/, they pleaded, because he loves our nation and has built our synagogue [*Luke 7:4*].

Of course, no one deserves grace.

There is nothing anyone of us can do to merit God’s grace.

Yet the acts of this man revealed that he had endeavoured to honour God.

He demonstrated compassion toward the people of God and had erected a house of worship to the glory of God.

I hesitate to mention this fact since some may conclude that we do good deeds in order to merit grace.

It is impossible, however, to merit divine grace.

It is grace precisely because it is extended freely to all who will receive it.

Those who have accepted that grace will demonstrate its effective work in their lives by their actions.

This man though a foreigner to Israel and a pagan by birth demonstrated that the call of God was effectively working in his heart and the Lord took note of this fact.

The Centurion’s Response –/Lord, I do not deserve to have you come under my roof.

But just say the word, and my servant will be healed.

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.”

/ All believers shall be applauded in the life to come, but some believers are in this world confessed and acknowledged by Christ before men/.

I have not found anyone in Israel with such great faith/, was the Master’s affirmation of this Roman soldier.

Perhaps you wonder at such a rich commendation; what could have elicited such astonishment from the Master?

*/The centurion’s response revealed his humility/* before the Lord.

This man weighed his own importance in light of the authority which the Father had vested in Jesus, and he knew he came up short.

He saw submission to the Master as his supreme duty and dared not rely on his own rank as a means by which to appeal to the Lord.

Think with me for a brief moment.

The centurion was part of an occupying force.

He could easily have concluded that the might at his disposal was far superior to the weakness of these despised Jews.

The Roman’s considered themselves to be the master culture, superseding the Greeks as world masters and destined to conquer all the lesser races of the world.

Roman military, architectural and civic achievements were the envy of the world.

Yet this man was humble before the Lord.

Did you ever notice the attitude displayed by the various Romans who interacted with Paul after he was imprisoned?

The commander of the Jerusalem garrison, Claudius Lysias, was prepared to have him flogged, never giving the matter a second thought, until he learned that Paul was a Roman citizen [*Acts 22:23-29*].

When the Jews hatched a plot to murder Paul, that same commander’s letter did not hesitate to assign himself a central heroic role instead of conceding ground to the Jews who had intervened [*Acts 23:26-30*].

Though Pilate equivocates and Felix trembles and Festus and Agrippa are shaken, none dare admit to being bested by a member of the conquered race of the Jews.

This soldier did not deem himself worthy of receiving the Master.