A Centurion’s Servant Healed by Great Faith

Only two times in all four Gospels did Jesus ever compliment people on their faith, and both times it was Gentiles (Non-Jews) who received His praise. The first is found in Matthew 15:28, when a Canaanite woman came to Jesus whose daughter was afflicted by a demon. Her words to Jesus expressed persevering faith. The second person recorded in the Gospels is found in Luke 7, the story of a Roman centurion whose servant was sick:

¹When He had completed all His discourse in the hearing of the people, He went to Capernaum. ²And a centurion’s slave, who was highly regarded by him, was sick and about to die. ³When he heard about Jesus, he sent some Jewish elders asking Him to come and save the life of his slave. ⁴When they came to Jesus, they earnestly implored Him, saying, “He is worthy for You to grant this to him; ⁵for he loves our nation and it was he who built us our synagogue.” ⁶Now Jesus started on His way with them; and when He was not far from the house, the centurion sent friends, saying to Him, “Lord, do not trouble Yourself further, for I am not worthy for You to come under my roof; ⁷for this reason I did not even consider myself worthy to come to You, but just say the word, and my servant will be healed. ⁸“For I also am a man placed under authority, with soldiers under me; and I say to this one, ‘Go!’ and he goes, and to another, ‘Come!’ and he comes, and to my slave, ‘Do this!’ and he does it.” ⁹Now when Jesus heard this, He marveled at him, and turned and said to the crowd that was following Him, “I say to you, not even in Israel have I found such great faith.” ¹⁰When those who had been sent returned to the house, they found the slave in good health (Luke 7:1-10).

This servant had endeared himself to his master so much that, when the centurion saw his servant slipping away into death, he became desperate enough to spend his relational capital with the Jewish elders by asking them if they would mediate with Jesus to heal his servant. When the centurion heard that the Jewish elders had succeeded in their intercession with Jesus and that the Lord was on His way to his house, he sent another person to stop Him before Christ got to the house. His faith was expressed by his actions.

Faith Expressed by Action: Christ was amazed at the centurion’s faith in taking a risk by asking Jesus to just speak the word of healing. This man recognized that Jesus has authority on earth to heal sicknesses without coming under a Gentile’s roof. The centurion felt unworthy to be in Christ’s presence, knowing that it was forbidden for a Jew to enter the house of a Gentile and to do so would make a Jew ceremonially unclean. Yes, it was risky for the centurion to stop Jesus on the way, but this tells us something of the faith that pleased the Lord. In his mind, his servant was worthy of being healed, but the centurion was considerate of Jesus and expressed faith in healing without Christ’s presence in his house.Faith expressed by action is God-pleasing. Let me give you an example: 

It hadn’t rained in a long time, and things were getting desperate. The ministers decided that they were going to call a prayer meeting. They said, “Look, we want the whole town to come to the prayer meeting and bring their religious symbols.” So, the whole town showed up for the prayer meeting and people brought crosses, they brought their Bibles, the Catholics brought their rosaries, and they all cried out to God. They finished the prayer meeting. No rain was in sight. They all went home. The next day, though, in the town square where they had the meeting, there was a little boy. “Oh, God, we need rain.” God, show your power, and give us rain.” The day before, with all the preachers and all the religious symbols, calling on God, no rain. The little boy shows up the next day by himself in the town square, and as he was praying, rumbling occurred. As he was praying, the shower hit, and it was pouring with rain. What was it about this little boy? He said the same things that all the people said the day before, but the day the young boy came, when the clouds got dark, he lifted up his symbol that he brought: an umbrella. He expected it to rain. When the weatherman tells you on the news that it will rain the next day, we believe his word and most of us take our umbrellas. Why is it, when it comes to God, who is never wrong, we hesitate to believe His Word and act on it.[1] Keith Thomas

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[1] Tony Evans, Tony Evans Book of Illustrations, Printed by Moody Publishers, 2009, Page 98.