Luke 7:1-17
The Faith of the Centurion
1When Jesus had finished saying all this in the hearing of the people, he entered Capernaum. 2There a centurion's servant, whom his master valued highly, was sick and about to die. 3The centurion heard of Jesus and sent some elders of the Jews to him, asking him to come and heal his servant. 4When they came to Jesus, they pleaded earnestly with him, "This man deserves to have you do this, 5because he loves our nation and has built our synagogue." 6So 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. 7That is why I did not even consider myself worthy to come to you. But say the word, and my servant will be healed. 8For 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."
9When 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." 10Then the men who had been sent returned to the house and found the servant well.
Jesus Raises a Widow's Son
11Soon afterward, Jesus went to a town called Nain, and his disciples and a large crowd went along with him. 12As he approached the town gate, a dead person was being carried out—the only son of his mother, and she was a widow. And a large crowd from the town was with her. 13When the Lord saw her, his heart went out to her and he said, "Don't cry."
14Then he went up and touched the coffin, and those carrying it stood still. He said, "Young man, I say to you, get up!" 15The dead man sat up and began to talk, and Jesus gave him back to his mother.
16They were all filled with awe and praised God. "A great prophet has appeared among us," they said. "God has come to help his people." 17This news about Jesus spread throughout Judea and the surrounding country.
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Here, Jesus shows a real human side -- he has compassion and a heart for those that are mourning. If this Jesus is also God, then God is not far removed and uncaring about the specific details of life. He's not just concerned with the "big picture." Each individual life matters to him. He saw people that were overwhelmed with sadness over death, and he had compassion on them.
This speaks a lot about Jesus as a person, and about God, if indeed this Jesus is God.
But it also presents us with a problem -- what about all of the grief, the sadness, the death and dying that God doesn't heal? This is, of course, the Big Question.
We look at what Jesus did, and sometimes we don't see the goodness in all of it. We ask, Why not fix me? Or Why not save that dying boy over there? It's all a good question, but it doesn't discount the fact that in this passage, Jesus is bringing the sick and dead back to life.
God has come to help his people.
posted by FTN @ 2:30 PM
2 comments
2 Comments:
I came across a commentary on the raising of the widow's son recently; and then seeing this here had me scouring my Google archives. The following is from Saltshakers "The Gospel:Hebraic Commentary" Again, like every reference I post, I'm not giving a blanket endorsement of the site, just posting something that I found to be of value.
Vs. 11, 12: Going by the village of Nain, which is just south of Nazareth where He grew up, Yeshua comes by a funeral procession. A woman, who was a widow, had lost her only son. That means that she had also lost the only person that was supposed to take care of her and sustain her in her old age.
Yeshua meets the people carrying the dead body out of the city. Baba Bathra 2:9 says the body had to be buried at least 50 cubits from the city. "Carcasses, sepulchers, and tanneries were to be removed 50 cubits from the city."
vs.13-15: Although this is great miracle in itself, this miracle has a special significance to the people of this particular area. Just over the hill from Nain was located the Old Testament town of Zerepath. A great prophet, Elijah, performed a similar miracle there in restoring another widow's son to life (I Kings 17:17-24). By performing this particular miracle in this particular location, Yeshua was identifying Himself with the Old Testament prophets. The people recognized two things about this happening. By proclaiming Him a great prophet, they recognized the great historical significance of what they saw occur. When they also proclaimed, "God has visited His people," they were saying "Messiah has come!" If that doesn't give you Holy Ghost goose bumps, nothing will.
Fascinating comment, Flutter; 'Biblical geography' isn't my strong suit, so it's all the more fascinating to learn that there's a 'connection of place' between the stories of the Widow of Zarephath and the Widow of Nain, and not just the similarity of the stories themselves. Even more than I had thought, Jesus was making the 'linkage' between Himself and God's work in the Hebrew Scriptures. . .
I've always been fascinated by this story of the centurion.
The centurion starts in talking to Jesus like he's some high-up general or something - "don't trouble yourself with li'l ol' me and my petty problems," and then he goes off talking about military lines of authority.
And Jesus praises him for his great faith. Which, at least sometimes, has struck my 'modern' ears as something of a non-sequitur.
But the centurion's faith came out of a recognition of Jesus' authority, and His authority on a level much deeper than simply, 'I can boss soldiers around'. The centurion was, in effect saying, "I know who you are - the very Universe obeys Your commands." And it was that recognition that Jesus praised as great faith, such as He had not found even in Israel.
This 'linkage' of faith with authority is fascinating, and I think, to 'modern' ears, very counter-intuitive. But, at bottom, it isn't so strange, is it really, to think that the One whom the stars obey in their courses, could look after us. . .
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