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LUKE
7:1-10
1After Jesus had finished
all his sayings in the hearing of the people,
he entered Capernaum.
2A centurion there had a slave whom he valued highly,
and who was ill and close to death.
3When he heard about Jesus,
he sent some Jewish elders to him,
asking him to come and heal his slave.
4When they came to Jesus,
they appealed to him earnestly, saying,
“He is worthy of having you do this for him, 5for he loves our people,
and it is he who built our synagogue for us.”
6And Jesus went with them,
but when he was not far from the house,
the centurion sent friends to say to him,
“Lord, do not trouble yourself, for I am not worthy to have you
come under my roof; 7therefore I did not presume to come to you.
But only speak the word, and let my servant be healed.
8For I also am a man set
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 slave, ‘Do this,’ and the slave does it.
8For I also am a man set
under authority.”
9When Jesus heard this he was
amazed at him,
and turning to the crowd that followed him, he said,
“I tell you, not even in Israel have I found such faith.”
10When those who had been
sent returned to the house, they found the slave in good health.
***
I’ve got a
friend who is really sick. I have a friend whose been sick for a long time. I
have a friend who is finally giving up hope, in healing, in God. I have a
friend who is in desperate need. This friend has been a sister to me, a
listener, an adventurer, a comforter, a guide, someone who knows my story and
walked with me piece by piece. Like the salve for the Centurion, Susie, makes
me wish I was worthy of having Jesus heal a friend for me.
I wish I had
the power to command armies; a Centurion of a hundred healers, and legions upon
legions of doctors. I wish I could be so upstanding, so generous, and so kind,
that even elders of another religion would appeal to the healer among them and
earnestly say, “She is worthy of having you do this for her, 5for she loves our people, and
it is she who built our synagogue for us.” I wish I could offer some proof good
enough. ‘She is a pastor, she loves her people, she loves you Lord.’
Yet there is
nothing I can do, or be, that would make me worthy of having Jesus heal my
friend. There is nothing anyone can say or suggest that makes me worthy to have
Jesus heal Susie. There is nothing at all. I am not even worthy to tie the
thong of his sandal, much less have him come in my house and heal my friend. It
is likewise for the Centurion. For Jesus, as a Jew, to enter the Centurion, a
Gentile’s house, would have made Jesus unclean, and defiled him in the customs
of the time. The Centurion would not have been worthy for Jesus to come in his
house, no matter the grandeur of the house. It would have been lavish as the
commander of an army, and there is a lavishness about being a pastor with a
manse, but like Jews and Gentiles, Jesus and I are too different for me to be a
worthy host.
I can imagine
Jesus going with my friends to heal Susie. Though she lives in Florida, I
imagine Jesus walking down Ninth Drive and “When he was not far from the manse,
I, the pastor, sent friends to say to him,
“Lord, do not trouble yourself, for I am not worthy to have you come
under my roof; 7therefore I did not presume to come to you. But only speak the
word, and let my servant be healed.”
I am not worthy
to have Jesus heal my friend, but I do have the faith, that he can. I have
faith that Jesus is doing everything he can to find healing for Susie. I have
faith that through the wisdom of the doctors, and the love of her family and
her friends, and her persevering spirit
that healing will come.
This is the
point in writing my sermon when Susie called. Immediately she sounded
different, there was an old familiar hope in her voice. “Kate,” she calls me,
“When’s the last time we talked?” “About a week ago, when you had to come home
from camping from the pain,” I say. Then
she proceeded to update me that a friend of her sister’s, was a specific type
of doctor, and spent an hour with Susie, listening, and giving her hope, giving
her answers that made sense, giving her a process to toward healing. I listened
to Susie’s story for some time. I was staring at that last written piece of
text on screen that read.
“I am not
worthy to have Jesus heal my friend, but I do have the faith, that he can. I
have faith that Jesus is doing everything he can to find healing for Susie. I
have faith that through the wisdom of the doctors, and the love of her family
and her friends, and her persevering spirit the that healing will come”
There were
tears in my eyes. Healing was coming. Jesus was at work in healing my friend.
Jesus is at work in healing Susie. I listened to her for awhile, and then
shared the miracle that was at work half way though the sermon. The miracle
that I was not worthy of, but believed in. The miracle that you did too.
Like the
Centurion, who says to his soldiers, “go” and they go. I too am one with
authority. I had asked you to pray, and you did. You had the faith to pray. You
knew Jesus was at work healing. While it is not our prayers which healed Susie,
our prayers were acts of faith, a faith in Jesus’ ability to heal, a faith in
the authority of God in Jesus, an amazing faith, a faith like the Centurion who
says, “Only speak the word, and let my servant be healed.”
This faith of
the Centurion, and the faith of our prayers, amazes Jesus when he hears. The
scripture says,
9When Jesus heard the
Centurion, Jesus was amazed at him,
and turning to the crowd
that followed Jesus, he said,
“I tell you, not even in Israel have I
found such faith.”
Yet, I know
this amazing faith can be found in this church in Baker City, Oregon.
This is the faith of our prayers, and our proclamations, of half written sermons,
and Prayers of the People. This is our amazing faith in Jesus who heals the
friend of the unworthy, who heals the slave of the Centurion, and who is
healing my friend Susie. This is the faith, that knows that while we are
unworthy, we will return to the house and find the slave in good health, find
Susie with good news, find Lindsey Bingman back in Molly’s class, find Makela
with a transplant, find Andy Ferns with a job and more than month sober, find
Boston Marathoners this week finishing the last mile, find a school shooting
thwarted in an Albany, Oregon, and find Guantanamo’s hunger strike
working. This is the amazing faith of
our prayers, that while we are unworthy, Jesus heals. This is an amazing faith,
that while we are unworthy, Jesus heals.
