Luke 7:1-17 - Strong Faith

I want to show you this picture here. This right here. Has anyone seen this picture before? Recognize it? Yeah. This is a pretty famous story at the risk of telling it one more time that's perhaps been overdone. This is a man by the name of Charles Blondin. He was a French tightrope artist. I don't know what you call the professional tightrope walkers, but that's what he was, whatever that is. he was that. And this is in the 1800s, I believe. And he went tightrope to cross the Niagara Falls, the Niagara Gorge that separates the U.S. and Canada. Famous, of course, because of how daunting this view would be. He had a crowd in front of him, as the story goes, and he went back and forth with a wheelbarrow on this tightrope and successfully went back and returned to the crowd. And he said, "who here believes that I could go out with a person in this wheelbarrow?" And the crowd cheered, "We do, we believe that you could do it!" And he said, "Who is willing to volunteer?" And believe it or not, he had zero volunteers. Now he never did it with a wheelbarrow. He did, however, carry his manager on his back, like piggyback style, at a later time across the tightrope.

I share this story because it is such a great illustration on faith and what faith really when it's being put to the test. And that is one of the questions that I kept asking myself this week as we look at Luke 7. And it is such a clear and powerful demonstration of what faith really is as we see it played out in this man who is simply known as the centurion. So let's go ahead and take a look at that. In Luke 7, if you're just joining us here, we've been going through the gospel according to Luke, verse by verse, through, and we're already on chapter 7. Man, how time flies when you're having fun, right?

So Jesus has just finished what is famously known as the Sermon on the Mount. This probably wasn't actually the Sermon on the Mount. It was probably a similar one, but he just finished that in Luke 6. And that's where we're going to pick it up. We're going to read the whole passage today. It's actually two stories. You're getting two for the price of one this morning. Verses 1 through 17. And this is what it says: "After he had finished all his sayings in the hearing of the people, he entered Capernaum. Now a centurion had a servant who was sick and at the point of death, who was highly valued by him. When the centurion heard about Jesus, he sent to him elders of the Jews, asking him to come and heal his servant. And when they came to Jesus, they pleaded with him earnestly saying, 'he is worthy to have you do this for him, for he loves our nation, and he is the one who built us our synagogue.' And Jesus went with him. When he was not far from the house, the centurion sent friends, saying to him, 'Lord, do not trouble yourself, for I am not worthy to have you come under my roof. Therefore I did not presume to come to you, but say the word, and let my servant 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 these things, he marveled at him, and turning to the crowd that followed him, said, 'I tell you, not even in Israel have I found such faith.' And when those who had been sent returned to the house, they found the servant well.

Soon afterward, he went to a town called Nain, and his disciples and a great crowd went with him. And as he drew near to the gate of the town, behold, a man who had died was being carried out, the only son of his mother, and she was a widow, and a considerable crowd from the town was with her. And when the Lord saw her, he had compassion on her, and said to her, 'Do not weep.' Then he came up and touched the bier, and the bearers stood still. And he said, 'Young man, I say to you, arise.' And the dead man sat up and began to speak. And Jesus gave him to his mother. Fear seized them all, and they glorified God, saying, 'A great prophet has arisen among us,' and 'God has visited his people.' And this report about him spread throughout the whole of Judea and all the surrounding country."

May God bless the reading of his word. This is Luke 7, verses 1 through 17. Now, we're going to spend most of our time actually in this first story about this centurion. What is a centurion? Well, a centurion is a position in the Roman military. Again, Judea, Israel, Samaria, Galilee, this whole region in which Jesus has been operating for this amount of time, mostly in Galilee, in a town like Capernaum, which was right off the Sea of Galilee. Nain is this other one, his hometown Nazareth. This is where he's been for the most part in the story. Well, this whole area is occupied by the Roman military. It is within the Roman Empire. That's pretty big. We talk about this a lot, usually oftentimes around Easter time, triumphal entry type stuff. But it's important to know just by way of preface that they pay tribute to the Roman Empire. They are run and ruled by Rome, even though they have their own kind of puppet rulers, like "King" Herod, for example, kind of put quotes around that title king because he is there because Rome says it's okay. So anyway, there is a Roman soldier by the name of it, well, by the rank of centurion. That's where we get the word century. Century meaning 100. A centurion wasn't actually exactly 100. It was somewhere around 80 to 100 people, but it was a group or a unit of troops that was about 100 strong. Not quite, but close to it. That's what a centurion was. So this is a pretty high-ranking individual, not the highest ranking. There were many, many higher ranks than a centurion, but this was a very well-respected person who'd be fairly powerful.

Now, he is what we would call an auxiliary. What is an auxiliary? An auxiliary within the Roman military is someone who is not a citizen of Rome. And so what does that mean exactly? Well, it was a pretty rare thing to have Roman citizenship here. It's not quite like we see citizenship work today where you've got to be a citizen of some country or other, but you don't have to be a citizen of Rome, but it is a privileged status that you can ascertain or aspire to. And that's exactly what auxiliaries would do. They could volunteer to be in this position, which would be, it would be like on Mike Rowe's dirty jobs, right? This was not like the thing that you would aspire to, but if you could make it out to the end, your retirement, so to speak, 25 years, you'd be granted Roman citizenship. And so what was the unappealing aspect of it? Well, you would have to be stationed usually on the edge of the empire with people who do not look or feel Roman at all, very different from your culture. They're going to be speaking different languages, having different religions, etc. This is that guy. He was the guy who was stationed on the very edge of the Roman empire out here all the way in Capernaum, which of course is a thousand miles away from Rome. So that's how we know he was an auxiliary.

Now, here's what we come to find is that he is actually pretty sympathetic to the Jewish people. We come to find that he is friends with the Jewish elders in his town. And already maybe you're thinking, "well, hold on, wasn't Jesus kind of like opponents with the Jewish elders?" These would be the respected leaders in this one single community, not the head honchos of the whole religion. We're thinking of like Pharisees and the leaders at the temple all the way down in Jerusalem, 90 miles away. But these would be kind your local people who help out in the synagogue and whatever. Jesus doesn't seem to have a problem with these guys. So anyway, what is going on with this centurion? He has a servant, a slave technically, almost everyone– more often than not, especially in the Roman Empire, you were a slave to someone. Slaves could actually operate business. They could take a wage. It was not like the slavery of today. I'm not defending it, just explaining for you that we actually see that he really likes this slave, this servant of his, a lot. They're friends. And so much so that he is willing to do anything to get this guy healed. This guy's going to die if there is not some intervention to take place.

And so who does the centurion send? Well, he sends people that presumably Jesus would like. He doesn't send Roman soldiers. The centurion had a hundred of them, a hundred Roman soldiers in his household. He had many servants in addition to that, but he sends the Jewish elders. Pretty interesting, right? We can already see that he is trying to appeal to Jesus in a way because he thinks that there's no way Jesus is going to want to heal someone of my household. Like he knows I'm the enemy here. I'm the opponent. Jesus wouldn't like someone like me. In fact, he would not pay me the time of day or so he thinks. And so he sends Jewish elders. And then what do the Jewish elders say? Well, they make a pretty hearty appeal on his behalf, right? they actually say, we really like this guy. We really like this guy. In verse 4, "and when they came to Jesus, they pleaded with him earnestly saying, he is worthy to have you do this for him, for he loves our nation and he is the one who built us our synagogue." So they gives him a few different reasons. He gives Jesus a few different reasons.

I want to actually, Ethan, would you show that picture of the synagogue here? This is two different pictures of the synagogue in the town of Now, the one on the top left, you can see like the full building. That's actually from the fourth century. So it was not the one in question. However, the one on the bottom right there, you can actually see they dug up below the foundation of this synagogue. And what they could see, you kind of almost see layers where there's a layer of much darker flooring underneath the fourth century flooring. And that dates back to the first century. And so what they learned was in the first century, that's Jesus' lifetime, by the way, there was the floor of a synagogue in Capernaum. At some point in the next 200 years, that got destroyed or toppled or was too old and fell down. And so they built another synagogue on top of it. So that dark flooring on the bottom right, you can actually see the synagogue that shows up in this chapter, Luke chapter 7. This is the synagogue that that centurion built. We think, by the way, that means he must have funded it. He would have been a rich guy. He was not a builder by profession. He was a soldier. And so we take that to mean he sponsored the construction of this local synagogue for these people. And so for that reason, the Jewish elders really, really liked this guy.

And there's a term here that I want to share with you. It's actually God-fearer. God-fearer. And this was a technical term that you can see a lot of times in the book of Acts. Cornelius was another centurion that you can read about in the book of Acts, who was a God-fearer. And what that means is someone who is not Jewish by birth, they are Gentile by birth, but they are sympathetic. They actually believe in the God of Israel and they worship at the local synagogues and they take part in their religion. They've not been fully proselytized, but they're still attending worship. They're sort of the second layer of followers and believers in the religion. So he was a God-fearer. Now, I want to ask you this question. What makes Cornelius, I'm sorry, not Cornelius, what makes this centurion worthy of being healed? The centurion seems to think, well, if he knows that I appreciate Judaism and I worship and follow the God of Israel, if he knows that, then maybe Jesus will take the time to heal my servant. The Jewish elders, likewise, seem to think the centurion is worthy because he loves our nation and he is the one who built us our synagogue. That's what they think makes him worthy. Okay, so just think about that. Think about that for a second. As we see Jesus, and we're putting together a pattern here, not just looking at this story in a vacuum, but as we look at the other people that he's healed so far and what we're about to see next.

For he loves our nation, verse 6, "and Jesus went with them. When he was not far from the house, the centurion sent his friends saying to him, 'Lord, do not trouble yourself for I am not worthy to have you come under my roof.'" So Jesus agrees. He acquiesces. They're going to go out to the house. I don't know if this guy was like outside of the town or if it was just a few doors down. We're not sure of that. But what we do know is that the centurion catches word that, hey, Jesus is coming. Probably some other servants of his went ahead after Jesus agreed and said, hey, get ready. He's coming. He's here right now. He's going to be on your doorstep any minute. And so the centurion does not come out to greet him, right? But rather he sends more people out and he says, hey, I am not worthy for you to come under my roof.

And think about that for a second. Why would the centurion say that? There's obviously a sense of respect or awe, right? Think back to John the baptizer. And John the baptizer baptized Jesus. And John was like, "are you sure about this? I'm not worthy to touch the strap of your sandal," right? And Jesus says this must be done for righteousness' sake. And so he does it. But that was the attitude John the baptizer had. Think back also to the attitude that Luke had, or sorry, Peter had in Luke 5, right? We just went over this where Peter said, Lord, "we fished all night, but at your word, I will let down the nets on the other side." That's the story about this miraculous catch. And when he does it, the boats are sinking, the nets are breaking with the bountiful catch that they caught because Jesus said, "hey, let down your nets on that side of the boat." And so what does Peter do? He falls down on his knees and he says, "depart from me, Lord, for I am a sinful man." Now those three perspectives seem unique. In fact, they seem to defy everything else that we've heard about Jesus up to this point.

What have we heard about Jesus up to this point? Crowds followed him everywhere. They pressed in on the, and Jesus had to stand on a boat because they were pressing in so close they were going to push him into the water back in Luke 5, right? Like they find him so attractive, like a magnet almost. They can't get close enough to him. They're following him everywhere. So much so that the paralytic, right? Luke 6 or Luke 5, they get on top of the roof and they break open the roof and they lower their paralytic friend right down in front of Jesus' feet. They feel no shame about breaking any personal space boundary. He's attractive. He's approachable. They want him to be as close as possible. That seems to be the trend or the pattern.

And so we have these two diametrically opposing views of Jesus. Most people, they can't get enough of him. They want to be as close as they can to him. But then, on rare occasions, there seems to be someone, usually with a particular rare insight on Jesus, where they are floored. They become self-conscious. They become afraid, filled with awe and reverence, where they say, "get away from me because I am not worthy to be even in your presence." Isn't that so interesting how both of these views seem to be appropriate? Jesus wants these people, he wants the crowds to come to hear him and to be healed, and he wants to perform these miracles. And then on the other hand, there are people who say, I can't be in your presence, Jesus. But what does the centurion say? Not just, I'm not worthy to have you come under my roof, but he says, "I did not presume to come to you, but say the word, just say the word, and let my servant be healed. For I too 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 servant 'do this' and he does it."

We'll pause there for a second. The centurion is using his experience being in the military as his own illustration. If you sermon illustration or analogy, if you will, he says, "I know what authority is like because I've been living this life for X amount of years now. I know what it's like. And therefore I know that you have authority to just say the word and it will be done. It doesn't even matter if you're here. In fact, I'd rather you weren't here." That's what he says.

I want to point out this interesting phrase, what the soldier says. He says, "I also, I too am a man under authority." What does that mean? Was Jesus under authority? Well, yes, he was actually, even though we don't immediately see that. But I want to share with you a couple of other verses. One of these is from Acts 10, which we shared as a scripture reading four or five or six weeks ago. This is such an important sermon, and I encourage you to go back and look at it. This is Peter speaking, and he is speaking about who this Jesus is. I just want to share with you these two verses in 37 and 38. "You yourselves know what happened throughout all Judea, beginning from Galilee,"– that's where we are right now in Luke 7– "beginning from Galilee and after the baptism that John proclaimed, how God anointed Jesus of Nazareth with the Holy Spirit and with power." That's right, power. "He went about doing good and healing all who were oppressed by the devil for God was with him."

Okay, so what is anointing? Anointing is, even in the first century, it was already an ancient, ancient term. It was a practice. Usually kings or prophets would be anointed, And it is just quite literally just a pouring of oil on someone. It's like their perfume or their cleaning process, right? And so they would douse oil on someone that smelled nice. But it was symbolic of a way, a ceremony, if you will, of commissioning someone, of setting them apart or aside for a specific task. The kings of Israel were anointed. And that was usually the high priest or the prophet of that nation, if it was before the priesthood, would anoint that person and say, "hey, God is setting you aside for this task," right? Later, it becomes this bigger gesture where it's not just about the oil, but it is this mark that God is on you. And here we see actually that the Holy Spirit is what anoints us. We are covered with the Holy Spirit. That's the kind of language that is offered up as we read about this. And John actually also compares the Holy Spirit to a baptism, like water that we are being immersed into.

Okay. So Jesus is covered or anointed with the Holy Spirit and with power by God. And this, according to Peter, is what allows him to go out through all of Galilee and then through Judea and doing what? "Good and healing all who were oppressed." So that's what we see there. And then second verse for you, John 5:36, this is Jesus speaking. He says, "but the testimony that I have is greater than that of John," John the baptizer, "for the works that the Father has given me to accomplish, the very works that I am doing, bear witness about me that the Father has sent me."

So yes, Jesus was under authority. The Father had commissioned him, sent him, and anointed him with the Holy Spirit and with power to do these things. So we don't know how much of this the centurion is aware of, but this is what he knows at least, that "you have authority, Jesus. You have power on you, Jesus." And for that reason, that's the lesson here, that the centurion just knows he can do this thing. And I know that Jesus has authority over even this sickness, that this sickness has to obey. We're going to get later to the wind and the waves. And the disciples are shocked and in awe that they say, "who is this that even the wind and the waves obey him?" Jesus has authority over that. We believe that he has been given the authority of all heaven and earth, that he upholds the universe by his powerful word. That is Jesus. And again, we don't know how much of this the centurion understands, but we know that if he says the word, this sickness will depart from my servants.

And so that's what the centurion says, and then look at Jesus here. He says, "when Jesus heard these things, he marveled at him. And turning to the crowd that followed him said, I tell you, not even in Israel have I found such faith." Now remember earlier, what makes the centurion worthy? The centurion thought, well, I'm not a Jew by birth. I'm a Gentile. But maybe if I show him that I care enough, If I care enough, Jesus might pay me the time of day. But as we get to this, what do we find? Jesus seems to not care that much about whether or not he's a part of Israel. He says, I tell you, not even in Israel have I found such faith. What Jesus seems to be interested in is the faith that this centurion has. Do you believe in me? And at the end of that Sermon on the Mount from last chapter, right, what is Jesus saying? I tell you the one who hears these words of mine and builds his life on them right that is what Jesus wants is for people who are all in about hearing his word and obeying it and following him and that is the faith that the centurion has shown and that is what Jesus cares about.

That is what makes him worthy not his works or not his pedigree or his birth not the fact that he built the synagogue, but this faith that he had. Now, that is the whole point today. There's another story that we're going to look at because we could end it here, but then there's this big question mark about, well, what if, right? But this is the lesson today, is that faith alone would change our lives if we could have this kind of faith. I mean, how many times have we said, God, if you're really there, if you really care, will you just do X, Y, or Z for me? Will you just show me just this once? And it's like saying, Jesus, will you come under my roof? I need to see you do it. Otherwise, I'm not going to believe. Right? Jesus said, John 20:29 to Thomas, "blessed are those who believe without seeing." And that is the kind of faith, the heart and spirit of faith that the centurion is showing here. That I believe without seeing. I'm all in. I believe wholeheartedly. And that changed the centurion's life.

Now, I believe that this means that we can experience healing. And I believe that this means we can experience deliverance from addiction, from trauma and damage that we carry, scars that we carry in our life, hurts, habits, and hang-ups, as they say. I do believe that. But I also believe that it is just a little bit bigger than this. I kept coming back to this sentence right here where he says, "I tell you not even in Israel have I found such faith." And really thinking about what does it mean to believe? What would that look like day in and day out for me to believe? What if I feel like, "you know what, there's not a whole lot that I need to be healed from." Do I not need faith anymore? Well, no, I absolutely need faith. So at the end of the day, what is this that Jesus is applauding and urging us to have? What would this kind of faith look like in our lives?

Well, for one, I believe that– not all, do not hear me say that– but a lot of the insecurity that we feel, anger or bitterness that we feel, fear that we feel, doubt that we feel that we are holding on to because life has been unfortunate. We feel that we've been robbed, denied this job or that raise, that promotion, that this person has wronged me and I can't get over it. How much of that are we holding on to because we just don't trust enough that it's okay? It's in God's hands that Jesus holds the whole universe together God's son right that's who I follow that is my Lord that is who I'm putting my faith in and it's okay if he doesn't come to my roof come under my roof right now. It's okay if I can't visibly see him working in my life.

So how much of the pain that we're feeling is because we don't trust enough we haven't really given it over to God yet. We don't have enough faith in him. There is, and like I said, we could end it here, right? There's this other story though, that at first I felt like was disconnected. It's a story of this widow in this town called Nain or Nain. If you say Nain, not a big deal, guys. You can just call it what you want. But this town called Nain, which means "pleasant" or "beautiful," and I really believe there's some deeper meaning to that because of what's going to happen next. Jesus is on his way. It's about a 25-mile journey southwest of Capernaum, where he just was. So it's taking him some time to get there, maybe a full day, maybe overnight, a walk for him to get there. And when he gets there, the crowd's been following all this time. They find that, oh, there's a funeral procession going on. They're burying someone. Turns out it's a young man, right? Or at least a man of working age who's able to provide for his mother, who happens to be a widow. And that was her only son. I mean, it just keeps getting worse and worse, this situation. This funeral procession going on, and Jesus walks into it right in the middle of this. There was a funeral procession just the other day, and I almost didn't see it at first, so I was passing some cars that were parked on the side of the road, and then I was able to get over and park and leave this moment in reverence for for those who have died.

But Jesus walks right into it, interrupts this funeral procession, and he goes up to the bier, B-I-E-R, which is like a stand or something that you put a casket on. There are the pallbearers walking around, and he tells him to stop. It says Jesus had compassion on the widow. That's so like Jesus. That tells us so much about who he is, his heart. He had compassion on this woman. And then he said something next that seems to defy the first sentence. He says, "do not weep."

Now, the widow doesn't have some big overt demonstration of faith. We don't know. He doesn't say your faith has healed you or healed your son. He just does it. He touches the bier and he says to this young man, "arise." And then just so that we have no doubt or confusion in our minds, Luke says in verse 15, "and the dead man sat up and began to speak, and Jesus gave him to his mother."

Now, like I said, these seem like two disconnected, entirely independent stories of one another. But if we go back to the first story, this lesson of, hey, have faith no matter what. Like Jesus, his authority knows no distance. He can even heal from a distance. Even sitting at the right hand of the Father in heaven, he can still heal. But there's this what if, right? "What if he doesn't? What if the worst case scenario really does happen? Well, then he failed me, right? Then I guess my faith wasn't good enough, right? I guess he isn't there, right? He doesn't care, right?"

And that's why I think that this story comes immediately next. Because there's nothing more permanent than death. But we find that death can actually be overcome. And can be undone. And we find that Jesus' authority is actually so great that it's never too late. Even when the worst case has already happened. Even when it is over and done with. Right? Or so we think it's not over yet. Even the worst can be reversed. That's the kind of authority that the Son of God has.

And so this is, I think, the nail in the coffin on death, but on everything else that can happen in our lives. That faith really is all we need. It is everything to us. And it would overcome and serve us in any manner of circumstances in life. And I would argue, once again, that so much of the pain that we carry is voluntary. We just choose not to let go. We choose not to trust God. So much of the anger that we're holding on to is actually doubt. It's a form of doubt. Not all, but so much. And if we could say, "even in the worst case scenario, God, I still trust you. Even in the worst case scenario, Jesus, I'm putting faith in you as the master of it all. As the one whom the wind and waves obey and the sickness has to leave when you say so, I'm still trusting. Even if I die. Someone else dies. I'm still trusting. Because the worst case scenario is still not enough to overcome your authority."

Now in closing today, I just want to envision a world of what this kind of faith looks like. I really believe it's contagious that this has an impact not just on our lives, but our family's lives, perhaps for generations to come. Generations to come. It's Father's Day, obviously. This really isn't just about fathers, but I do think about my father. And I think about growing up, man, he had this level of confidence. That's something that I remember about him, just being so confident. You felt like there was nothing that could rattle him or shake him, right? That's kind of like faith. And just this sense of peace and calm that I had because my dad's got it under control, right?

My dad got sick. He had cancer. And he fought that battle for two years. And at that point in time, he learned, I think he knew, but he learned to a greater degree in this moment that "my own strength's not enough. I need faith in something bigger, something stronger, higher power." And it was that time in my life that I learned what it looked like for him to have a sense of trust and belief and faith in God. And I could see a sense of peace and calm of assurance that "even if the worst comes, I trust God. It's not over."

And the worst did come. My dad lost his fight to cancer in 2020, November 2020. Now, at that point, I have an opportunity to either be angry, to hold on to that, to say, "well, I guess faith wasn't enough. I guess my trust in God wasn't enough. My prayers did not get answered." Or I have an opportunity to say, "still, I have faith. I might not have seen God working in my life yet. I might not have seen a miracle, but still I know that death is not the end."

So that's where we leave it today. Do you want to have that kind of faith? Do you want to have that sense of peace and calm that overcomes literally anything that this life will throw at you? Do you want to show that kind of peace and calm and trust in God to your family, your marriage, to your kids for generations to come? Let's pray.

Dear Heavenly Father, I thank you for this centurion. and I just wonder, how can I have that kind of faith in my life? That's what Jesus cares about more than anything. More than anything. Any kind of works or accolades or achievements I can have, but what does my faith look like? And I pray that we each would ask what that would look like in our lives, that we would lay everything down at the foot of the cross and know that God, your Son, Jesus the Christ, the Messiah, the Lord of heaven and earth, has authority in it all. We hand it over to Him. It's in His name we pray. Amen.