A Gentile Centurion Shows Great Faith - Matthew 8:5-13

1:20He graduated from Texas AM here in chemistry, or in chemistry, right? And taught school, felt the Lord calling him into me. Ministry has completed his theological training, and he is the president of the student body over there right now, correct? And so I know he spent some time with a select group of students at Cambridge doing some work there. And so it's exciting to have you come and share the word with us this morning. Come on up. Well, it's good to be here with you. I was telling the college class or the young adult class that I've loved this church from a distance for about five or six years, and so it's a blessing to be here with you. The story that we'll study today is from the Gospels, and it's a really exciting story. It's an amazing story. And it's going to help us solve a puzzle, a theological puzzle.

2:20And that is that we know that the Jews, when Christ came, we know the Jews were supposed to respond in a certain way to Christ. He was their Messiah. He was prophesied about in the Old Testament, and they were waiting for him. They were supposed to be waiting for him, and they were. But then, when the coming one came, they didn't respond to him correctly. Jesus is going to make this clear over and over that they're not responding the way that the Jews should have responded. And then later, Peter will say the same thing in Acts. He'll say that the Jews didn't respond the way they should have responded. Paul will say the same thing in Rome. Romans, that the Jews didn't respond. They rejected their Messiah.

3:05But I've wondered to myself, you know, what were the Jews supposed to do when Jesus came? Because we believe in the deity of Jesus Christ, in the full deity of Jesus Christ. And Dr. Bookman, when he comes this week, if you come to the conference each night, he's going to talk about that. But he's also going to talk about the humanity of Christ. And we also believe in that. And so that means when he came, if you saw him, he would look just like a normal guy. You know, he lived in flesh and bones, skin and bones. He had a normal body.

3:43So just picture it. If you were there, maybe you were a Jew and you lived in this village your whole life and you have this man coming to your small town and he's preaching. And he's making these startling claims about himself that are hard to believe. But he's a simple man. He didn't have book deals or these organizations that are backing him up. He didn't have a website or a Facebook or any kind of brand name or corporate funding, anything like that. He's just a normal guy with this band of followers. And so the question is: you know, how much were they supposed to understand? If you were a Jew, how much would you be required to understand about this man who's coming to Paris? Preach. Were they supposed to trust him?

4:34When they rejected him, who were they rejecting? Why were they rejecting him? And can the generation really be held responsible for rejecting their Messiah? The New Testament authors say that they should be held responsible. And I think we're going to get help with the story today to see why the Jews were responsible for rejecting their Messiah. So we'll be in Matthew chapter 8. Matthew chapter 8, starting in verse 5. It's a story of a centurion who meets Jesus and shows great faith. Faith that's so amazing it's even going to cause Jesus to be startled, to marvel at his faith.

5:21And one of the most surprising developments that we see before we read this throughout the Gospels is that there's these Gentiles that are responding in the way that the Jews should have responded. The people who weren't part of the family of Israel behave exactly in the way that the Jews should have behaved. So let's read the full account. Matthew 8, verse 5. When he had entered Capernaum, a centurion came forward to him, appealing to him. Lord, my servant is lying paralyzed at home, suffering terribly, and he He said to him, I will come and heal him. But the centurion replied, Lord, I am not worthy to have you come under my roof, but only say the word, and my servant will be healed.

6:15For I too am a man under authority, with soldiers under me. And I say to one, go, and he goes. And to another, come, and he comes. And to my servant, do this, and he does it. And when Jesus heard this, he marveled. And said to those who followed him, Truly I tell you, with no one in Israel have I found such faith. I tell you, many will come from east and west and recline at table with Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob in the kingdom of heaven, while the sons of the kingdom will be thrown into outer darkness. In that place there will be weeping and gnashing of teeth. And the centurion said to the centurion, Jesus said, Go, let it be done for you as you have believed. And the servant was healed at that very moment. Let's pray.

7:07Father, we're grateful for your word. We're grateful that we get to study it together this morning. It's an amazing blessing that we as a body of believers get to approach your word and learn from it. And we thank you for the safety that comes from your word when we study your word together after a whole week. Of being in the world with so many different influences that we can't trust, that we can come to your word each day and together on Sunday and know that what we're studying is true. Know that what we're studying is your word. And so we pray that you'd help us understand it this morning.

7:49In Jesus' name we pray. Amen. So far in his book, Matthew has told the beginning of Jesus' life. If you remember the early chapters, he's talking about Jesus' birth. He tells you where Jesus lived, how he went down to Egypt, and then he came to Nazareth. Then Matthew introduces John the Baptist and talks about the ministry that he has there and how Jesus went to him and was baptized and then Jesus went to go be tempted.

8:19And after that, if you'll turn over just a couple chapters to Matthew 4, we hear about what kind of ministry Jesus is having after his temptation. Matthew chapter 4, verse 23. He went throughout all Galilee, teaching in their synagogues and preaching the gospel of the kingdom and healing every disease and every affliction among the people. So his fame spread throughout all Syria, and they brought him all the sick, those afflicted with various diseases and pains, those oppressed by demons, epileptics, and paralytics, and he healed them. In great Crowds followed him from Galilee and the Decapolis and from Jerusalem and Judea and from beyond the Jordan.

9:06So we find out at the end of Matthew 4 that Jesus is having this wildly successful ministry for about a year and a half. He's healing people, he's teaching, and everyone in the whole region knows who he is. They're coming from near and far to listen to him teach. And as he's proclaiming the good news, he's also giving testimony to his claims by doing all these amazing things, showing that he has authority over demons, showing that he has authority over disease. We'll see in another account that he has authority over the weather when he calms the storm.

9:44So then he launches into this long sermon from Matthew 5 to 7 called the Sermon of the Mount, Sermon on the Mount. And if you look at the end of Matthew 7, it's the same thing. It's his authority that just smacks the crowd. Look at Matthew 7, verse 28 and 29. When Jesus finished these sayings, the crowds were astonished at his teaching, for he was teaching them as one who had authority and not as their scribes. And so Jesus is having this successful ministry. Then he teaches this amazing sermon. Everyone's amazed at the authority that he's teaching with. And he starts to head back towards his city. He leaves the mount that he gave the sermon on, and he starts to head back to the middle of the middle. Head back toward the city. On the way, he heals a very respectful and kind leper. And then after that, as he's coming into Jerusalem, he gets approached by this company of men. And he's going to have a conversation with them where he gets amazed at what happens. He gets astonished.

10:55He's going to be approached by a centurion through some delegates. And the centurion is going to say something so spot-on that Jesus will be taken aback. And as we step through this account, I want you to pay attention to what's going on and especially to three things. We're going to look at how the centurion is humble, how the centurion is believing, he has faith, and how the centurion is a converted Gentile. Three things that we can imitate from this centurion. Let's look at the first one. Look at verse 5. When he had entered Capernaum, a centurion came forward to him, appealing to him. Lord, my servant is lying paralyzed at home, suffering terribly. And he said to him, I will come and heal him. So, in order to fully understand this, if you haven't heard, I want you to remember that a centurion is a well-ranked military leader. This would have been something that, by his position, he already would have commanded respect. Of the people. People would have known who he was.

12:03We find out in Luke's account that this centurion was also wealthy. You know, here we see that he has servants, so obviously he has some wealth. So not only is he a centurion, but he's wealthy enough to have servants, even more respect. And in Luke's account, we find out that he's a philanthropist. He gives a lot of his money to the Jews so that they can build their temple. And the Jews know who he is. The Jews testify that he's a good man, that he is giving this money to the temple. So this man, more than most, if you saw him walking on the street, he would demand your respect. You know, it'd be just like if a president walked down the street, maybe not that high, but maybe a well-decorated soldier who's coming and he's got the badges here. And you can tell the way he's walking that that is a man that when he's walking up to you, you're going to immediately respect. You know, if you're like me, you might stutter a little when you're talking to him because he's demanding this sort of respect.

13:05But this man, even though he's a man of rank and a man with a good name, he doesn't treat Jesus as a peer. He doesn't speak to Jesus as if he's just another soldier or just another person even underneath him. He treats Jesus with respect, as he would a superior. And we see it first in verse 6, the first word. Out of his mouth is the word Lord, the word Lord, which sometimes is used of God and may be used in that case in that way here, since he is a believer, we'll find out later. But it seems more likely to me that this centurion is using the language that he has to use all the time. You know, soldiers, they're having to call each other sir and Lord. Their superiors, they'll call sir, even today. And the people underneath them will call them sir. And so the centurion comes up to Jesus and he calls him sir before he says anything. He says Lord. And he actually does it every time, both times that he talks to Jesus. The first word out of his lips is Lord.

14:14You know, I have a feeling that when this happened, if you were in the crowd and you were following Jesus, you just heard the Sermon on the Mount, you're trying to figure out who this guy is, and then all of a sudden this centurion walks up to him and the first word out of his lip is Lord, I think your eyes would have just, you know, widened just a little bit. You know, what did he say? What did he call Jesus? I think there would have been a little bit of shock that this man of rank was calling this other man who probably looks pretty normal. You know, he's not wearing a formal uniform or anything like that. He's calling him sir.

14:53So after this, the centurion moves on to describe the terrible situation. He says, Lord, my servant has been laid in the house. A paralytic suffering terribly. And so the centurion makes his formal request on behalf of another man, one of his own servants. The servant has been paralyzed by some sickness so that he couldn't even go to his own bed. He had to be laid by someone else in his own bed. And he's suffering terribly. It's causing some kind of pain that's just making him constantly suffer.

15:29It's also probably a financial problem for the centurion. You know, if your servant who you have supported and works for you is suffering, then it'll be a financial hit. But also, this centurion, from his attitude, we'd guess that he also loves this centurion. So this is a, or he also loves this servant. So this is an urgent request. Jesus understands the need and responds immediately, I will come and heal him. Or better, he says, coming, I will heal him. So remember what I said at the beginning, that this is happening through some delegates, and Luke talks about that more in his account. But these delegates come, and I think this gives you a better picture of what's going on. So these delegates are sent by the centurion, and they say, you know, on behalf of the centurion, the servant is lying at home, paralyzed, and Jesus says, okay, I'm going to come to your home. Coming, I'm going to heal him.

16:31And so those delegates get excited, and they're going to run home and tell the centurion that. Only once they go to the centurion and come back, Jesus hasn't made it there. And so the centurions come back and they do something really surprising. They tell Jesus to stop. They say, Jesus, stop coming. You know, they hear a word from the centurion. Look at verse 8. The centurion replied, Lord, I am not worthy to have you come under my roof, but only say the word, and my servant will be healed. Well, you know, if the crowd got a little wide-eyed earlier, I think that when the centurion says this, I think their jaw would have just hit the floor.

17:20Now the centurion is not just showing respect to Jesus, but he's saying this man of rank, who, you know, we might be embarrassed to even go over to his house because we feel unworthy. He's saying that he's not even worthy enough to have Jesus come to his house. He's not even worthy enough for Jesus to come under his roof. Well, in reality, we shouldn't be startled, right? Because we know who Jesus is. We're not just a member of the crowd. We know exactly who he is. We know that even the highest in society are not worthy to be in the company of the Son of God. The centurion has not shown a false. Humility, he has declared what is exactly true. He's displayed an accurate understanding of who Jesus is.

18:10So, before we go on with the rest of the story, I just want to encourage you to show this same kind of humility, to say, to have this same kind of humility before Christ, if you really understand who He is. For us, we don't get to walk up to Him as a man, but we can still show that respect. You know, some of you, by the world standards, are very respectable. Maybe you're a professor, or maybe you're just very classy, or very sociable, or you're a hard-working mother. And nothing's wrong with any of these things.

18:47But we know that to think that this earns us respect in the eyes of God, this way of living earned us respect, we know that that's wrong. Only the grace of God can make us able to approach Him. Maybe you've been a Christian for a while now, and you've seen good deeds show up as a fruit of your faith, and it's an exciting thing, but after several years, you're beginning to forget the way you first came to Christ. And you're acting more like the Jew who stood and thanked God for making him different from the sinners. You guys remember that story? And you're becoming less like the miserable man who beats his breast and pleads for mercy. I know this. Is a trap that I fall into all the time. So I'd just like to encourage you before we move on to remember your place. Remember that you didn't do anything to earn your ability to approach God, that it's all by grace. Remember and be thankful that he has brought you to himself, that he's your Lord. And I think that practically the way that we show this respect is by obedience. Obedience to his commandments. You know, the opposite of humility would be saying, I've been part of this church for several years. I give a lot, so I think it's okay to live a little. Or I think it's okay to blur the edges here, to dabble in drunkenness, or stick my feet in the water of pornography, or something like that. These little things, these little steps. But true humility that respects Christ as Lord, like the centurion does, would say, I want to follow God's commandments. I want to honor the Lord.

20:33Jesus said like this in Luke 17, so you also, when you have done all that you are commanded, say, we are unworthy servants. We have only done what was our duty. So the first characteristic that we get to see from the centurion is that he's humble. The second characteristic is that he has faith. He's believing. Verses 8 through 10. Centurion replied, I am not worthy to have you come under my roof, but only say the word, and my servant will be healed. For I too am a man under authority with soldiers under me. And I say to one, go, and he goes, and to another, come, and he comes, and to my servant, do this, and he does it. When Jesus heard this, he marveled and said to those who followed him, Truly, I tell you, with no one in Israel have I found such faith. So the word here, when it says that Jesus marveled, it means he marveled. You know, it's not like when we go to a good restaurant and we say we had a marvelous enchilada or something like that. No, it's really the word marvel. He stops and he marvels, and he's amazed at what this centurion says.

21:47And he's talking about this centurion's faith. And so we get an example of what true faith looks like. I know when I was a younger believer, I thought that faith was something mystical that I couldn't quite figure out. And I would get worried sometimes and think, you know, do I really have faith? I know I need faith to be saved, but do I really have it? What is it? And I thought it was something elusive that I couldn't grab onto.

22:14But here we get a tangible example. I knew the definition when I was a younger Christian that we find in Hebrews 11:1. Faith is the assurance of things hoped for and conviction of not seen. But I hadn't really thought about what that means. You know, I hadn't thought about. What faith was. And so it's exciting to me when we get to see what true faith looks like. And Jesus makes it clear that we get a tangible example in this. So Jesus says, I will come and heal him. Coming, I will heal him. And the centurion only wants Jesus to heal, but not to come.

22:53And so the centurion says the most amazing thing to Jesus. He says this: only say the word, and my servant will be healed. Only say the word. You know, in our superstitious culture, whenever they think about Christ, sometimes they think maybe he's not as powerful as he really is. And I can't picture them saying something like this: you know, only say the word and he'll be healed. If Jesus said he had to come, I think their assumption would be, well, maybe Jesus has to come and do something special, you know, something mystical and put his hand on him or some ritual or something like that. But the centurion is the opposite of this. He has such great faith that he knows that Jesus has power in a single word, in a single word. And he says how he knows this.

23:49He goes on to give examples about how he, the centurion, has authority. And this authority shows itself in the ways that he reacts or interacts. With his servants. He'll have servants, and with one word, he can make them do something. He can say to a servant, go, and the servant goes. He can say, come, and the servant will come. He can say, do this thing, and the servant will do it. With a single word, the centurion can get an immediate response from those who are under his authority. So I think what the centurion is saying is that he's put two and two together. You know, he's seen the ministry of Jesus. This ministry would have been going on for about 18 months already in this small region. And he's seen how Jesus has healed diseases, how Jesus has cast out demons, how Jesus has had the authority to forgive sins, if you remember that story. And so he knows that Jesus has this special authority. The centurion has soldiers underneath him who are under his authority. But the Son of God has the entire natural world as his servants.

25:11Paralysis must obey every word of Christ. Disease is like a man in rank under Jesus. Well, this is what makes Jesus marvel. This is the Amazing faith that Jesus sees. And Jesus will turn to the crowd and make a point out of how great this man's faith is. I hope that you'll be full of this kind of faith as well. We know that God is perfectly faithful. We know that we can trust Him. We see that over and over in the Old Testament and in the New. But God has also proven that He has the power to fulfill what He's promised.

26:00With a word, God can command the natural world to obey Him. With a single word, God can command the spiritual world to obey Him. And so we can trust that He's not going to let you fall through the cracks. If you've trusted in Him, He will not let you slip through His fingers into judgment. You can know also that He's in perfect control over the trials in your life. If with a single word He could change your circumstance and He doesn't, then we can trust that He knows what He's doing, that He's in control.

26:44So the Centurion shows great faith. He shows that Christ has power over all these things. He shows that He knows who Christ is. He's been observing Jesus' ministry, and He understands who Jesus is. He understands. What kind of power Jesus has. And so he says, Don't come. Just say the word, and my servant will be healed. So we see that the servant is humble, or the centurion is humble. We see that the centurion has faith. And both of those are things we can copy, things we can mimic. They're great examples. But the third characteristic: the centurion is a converted Gentile.

27:31The centurion has a seat at the table in the kingdom of heaven. The way the passage as a whole is structured tells us that this is actually the main point of this story. And Jesus makes it the main point. He stops and he marvels and he turns to the crowd and he gets their attention and tells them to listen and tells them to pay attention. And this is the point: that though the Jews should be having this kind of faith, it's actually a Gentile who shows the greatest faith.

28:09Look at verse 10. When Jesus heard this, he marveled and said to those who followed him, Truly I tell you, with no one in Israel have I found such faith. I tell you, many will come from east and west and recline at table with Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob in the kingdom of heaven, while the Son. Of the kingdom will be thrown into the outer darkness. So Jesus says, listen up. He says, everybody, stop what you're doing and listen to me, because he has something important to tell them. And having caught their ears, he said, I have found such faith with no one in Israel. I have found such faith with no one in Israel. There's no one in Israel who had this kind of faith that the centurion had. So we get a glimpse into the puzzle that I mentioned at the beginning.

29:04Why were the Jews held responsible for rejecting their Messiah? What were they expected to understand? I think the answer comes when we realize Jesus wasn't an elusive mystic who was off in the woods or out in the wilderness, who people just heard about, but never got to see. First off, Jesus had a forerunner, John the Baptist. And the entire nation knew about John the Baptist. They may have hated him, or they may have loved him, but everyone knew who he was. Everyone was listening to him. John the Baptist, if you remember, was saying things about Herod. John the Baptist would have been in the tabloids. Everyone would have known who he was. He would have been famous throughout the region because he's having this preaching ministry, and it's expensive. Extremely bold. All your leaders are getting called to repent by this man in the wilderness, John the Baptist. So, first, Christ had a forerunner, and this forerunner, John the Baptist, who everyone had heard of, announced that Jesus was the Lamb of God.

30:20He announced what he thought about Jesus. And so, at the very beginning of Jesus' ministry, this would have put Jesus on the radar. Everyone would have started to hear about him. And not only this, but now for 18 months, for a whole year and a half, Jesus had been traveling through this region of Galilee. And it's not a very big region. You know, it's not like he was traveling through America. Donald Trump traveled through America, and we all knew who he was. And of course, we have TV and newspapers and things like that. But that's a huge area. It's not even like he was traveling around in Texas, which is another huge area. He was traveling around in one part of Israel. You know, the whole country of Israel could fit inside of the greater Houston area where I'm from. And he wasn't even in that. He was just in one part, Galilee. When my wife and I got to go to Israel two years ago, we were able to stand on this mountain. It was really a big hill, but they called it a mountain. But on top of this hill called Mount Arbel, you could stand up there and point at each of the cities. I mean, you could see Capernaum. It's right there. And then a little ways off is Bethlehem, and you can point at it. And you can see pretty much the whole region. You can see all the little cities dotting the region. It's not that big of a region.

31:55If Jesus is traveling and doing these amazing things in this city for a whole year and a half, surely everybody would have heard about it. I can't help but think that everyone in the region, if they hadn't encountered Jesus personally themselves, they at least knew someone who had. It was likely the case that nearly everyone in Galilee had one of their very own family members who was healed by Jesus, or had at least spoken with him. You know, it's a small area. So throughout this time, he had been healing multitudes and teaching with authority. Everyone would have been aware of it. It would have been the hottest topic. They knew John the Baptist's testimony. And so if they're hearing all these Old Testament prophecies being fulfilled, if they're hearing that this man is doing these amazing things and they're still rejecting him, I don't think it could be classified as ignorance. I don't think we can give them the benefit of the doubt that they just didn't know what was going on. I think it has to be classified as rebellion. They didn't display faith like the centurion did. The centurion saw these same things, and he had faith. He understood that Christ had power, even in a single word. Christ could do these amazing things. And so Jesus turns to the crowd and makes this point. Verse 11, I tell you, many will come from east and west and recline at table with Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob in the kingdom of heaven, while the sons of the kingdom, that's the Jews, will be thrown into outer darkness. In that place, there will be weeping and gnashing of teeth. And so he's saying the Jews should have responded to Christ in this way. They're the sons of the kingdom.

33:46But these other people that are coming from the east and the west, Gentiles, they're going to be able to sit at the table in this millennial kingdom. I believe this is a real meal. You know, it might not be a table like we're used to, but I think this is a real meal. I think that God is going to come and celebrate his victory someday and eat with his people. It's going to be great. And Jesus is saying that all the Jews should be at this meal. That's going to happen later. They're the very family of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. They should be at this meal, but they've decided not to have situations. In Christ. They've refused to have faith in Christ, and so they're not going to be at this table.

34:37But on the other hand, those who have believed in Christ, Jew and Gentile, they will be at this future table. And I want to encourage you to fix your hope on the promise that we see here before we conclude. Just the promise that what we've believed is not an empty promise, that there's a real tangible future for people who have believed in Christ. That there are these real events that are going to happen, that we're really going to get to be with God who we love and be with Christ who saved us. If you have imitated the centurion's true faith, then you also will share his characteristic of being a converted Gentile, of being converted to Christ. If you have put your faith in Jesus and trusted in him for the forgiveness of sins, then you also have a seat at the table in the kingdom of heaven.

35:40Well, to finish, look at verse 13. To the centurion, Jesus said, Go, let it be done for you as you have believed. And the servant was healed at that very moment. Jesus literally uses a one-word command. He says to the centurion, just Like you said, let it be. That's one word for you. He says, done, finish. It's done for you. Just like the centurion asked him to, with a single word, just like the centurion talks to a servant and says, go, and the servant responds, Jesus commands this paralysis with a single word. And it says, in that very moment, the servant was healed.

36:31So if you are able to think back on this passage this week, remember some of the things we saw today. Remember the humility that the centurion showed? That Christ is truly your Lord and you are truly his servant. Work hard to keep a worshipful attitude toward Christ. Remember that even though you have a seat at the table as a Christian, that you didn't earn that seat by your own rank or your own deeds, but it was given to you in grace through faith. So, second, remember to have faith, trust in Christ's amazing authority over the natural and spiritual realm, trust that he's good and that he has the power to fulfill his promises, that he can control all things with a single word.

37:24And remember that when you trust in Christ, you, a Gentile, will have a Reserved seat with Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. The Jews of Jesus' day should have obeyed Jesus' commands. They should have recognized who he was. They should have obeyed him instead of rebelling against him. If you have not put your trust in Christ, don't be like the Jews who had every evidence that Christ was who he said he was, who had every evidence that Christ was a Messiah, but they still rejected him. Instead, be like the centurion who examined the evidence, he saw what Jesus was doing, and he humbly trusted in Jesus' authority. Let's pray.

38:17Father, we are humbled as we come to this story. We pray that you would help us remember to have this kind of faith, to remember that you are all-powerful, and to trust in you, that you are good, and that you've done everything necessary to save us. We're grateful for the study of your word. We're grateful that you are so faithful to your people, that you keep all of your promises. We pray that you'd help us remember this. Week as we encounter various trials, that we'd remember to have faith in you and trust in you. In Jesus' name, amen.