Here is the heart of the passage, even more than the healing itself. Jesus takes the moment of praising this outsider’s faith and turns it into an announcement about the end of history. The prophets had promised a great banquet, a Messianic feast where God sets...
Stop and feel the weight of two words: Jesus marveled. The Son of God, through whom all things were made, was amazed. There are only two moments in all the Gospels where we are told Jesus marveled. Once it was at the unbelief of His own hometown in Mark 6, and once it...
Jesus answers instantly, “I will come and heal him.” We should not rush past that willingness; it tells us what kind of King He is. But the centurion’s reply is what stops the whole scene. He does not want Jesus to trouble Himself with the trip. He...
Do not read past the word centurion too quickly. To us it is an old military term, but to the crowd around Jesus it named the face of the enemy. A centurion was a Roman officer, the backbone of the army occupying their land, a man who could ruin a Jewish family on a...
Step back and see the whole scene. In four short verses Matthew has begun to answer the question that will echo through the chapter until the disciples finally shout it in the storm, What sort of man is this? He is a King with authority to speak cleanness into a...
