The Faith of a Centurion

The Faith of a Centurion

"5 When he had entered Capernaum, a centurion came forward to him, appealing to him, 6 “Lord, my servant is lying paralyzed at home, suffering terribly.” 7 And he said to him, “I will come and heal him.” 8 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. 9 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.” 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. 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, 12 while the sons of the kingdom will be thrown into the outer darkness. In that place there will be weeping and gnashing of teeth.” 13 And 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."

The Centurion of Mat. 8 has huge faith, unlike any Jesus has met before, but he also has huge respect for who Jesus is, Lord, and sees his own depravity reflected off of Christ's righteousness. He is one of the few who looked at his own condition honestly in the presence of Jesus and understood his unworthyness. Yet, he also knew Jesus was full of mercy and grace, so never gave up hope that Jesus could and would help. What can we all learn from this? Approaching Jesus with what is in our hearts is important, but we must recognize the importance of understanding the difference and significance between our unrighteousness and Christ's perfection. We must first ask him to reveal to us our own condition, and seek honestly what needs to be dealt with in our own hearts, and then once that work is addressed, we can work on the things he has laid on our hearts. I personally feel that we are so limited in our prayer lives because we come so insistently and persistently with requests we hold dear, but forget that God is first and foremost concerned with our personal conditions. He always wants to bring it back around so it is about us, even when we crave for it to be about something else, beyond us for once! It just proves that he really does want what us best for us, and has our best interests in the center of his heart.