What the Centurion Sees

English Standard Version Chapter 8

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

The Centurion makes a startling statement to Jesus. One that amazes Jesus. What is it about the Centurion, what gift or grace does he have that causes him to make such a statement?

Last week I introduced you to the Invisible Gorilla. I introduced this to you because I want you to learn to see with new eyes and cultivate a new awareness. I want you to learn to notice God in the circumstances of your life and learn to see with eyes of faith.

The test developed to show how our view of the world is not always what it seems and that we use selective attention to block out some things while we focus on others. Selective attention can be down-right dangerous. We know how dangerous it can be when we think about driving while texting, for example.

The Gorilla was test developed to show how our view of the world is not always what it seems and that we use selective attention to block out some things while we focus on others. Our ability to pay attention to the unexpected, the peripheral, the spiritual is limited because we do not practice awareness.

Selective attention can be exacerbated by negative emotions or experiences. If you tend to view the world negatively, if you are unhappy, depressed, anxious, or angry, it has been proven that you will select out positive experiences and focus on the negative ones. On top of that we all have biases that color our perception. There are ideas that we are not prepared to accept, ideas that challenge our comfortable world-view, there are political perspectives that we are closed to, there are moral considerations we patently reject. Not all of this is bad, but not all of it is good either. This is why humility is such a necessary virtue. Humility -the admittance that we may not be right, may not see all that should be understood, or that we may suffer some some degree of selective attention is so vital.

So we must learn to see with new eyes. The story of the Centurion, like the story of the wedding at Cana, is another story that can help us learn to see God at work in the world. In the wedding at Cana water was turned to wine unexpectedly, and only a few recognized what happened and believed. In the gospel reading today, one pagan is applauded for his spiritual perception.

The Centurion

When we presume sight we are blind. When we presume blindness we see.

Jesus arrives in Capernaum after having preached the sermon on the mount in Galilee. There, upon arriving in the city, a Roman Centurion meets him, imploring him to heal his servant.

The Centurion is a commander of 100 men and was often responsible for the area that he was command. It was a prestigious position for a soldier, about as high a rank as a Roman soldier could hope to attain. His pay was good, he had servants, and he had authority. If a servant died, he could have probably purchased one easily enough. But there are a few other things that single this Centurion out. We will call our Soldier Gallus (Lat. Rooster).

· Gallus about his servant. This person was probably highly valued and nearly considered family. Even though they occupied different stations in life, there was genuine love and concern.

· Gallus obviously had heard about Jesus and knew that he had healed others. It was his duty to know what was happening in the region that was under his authority and the deeds and words of Jesus had no doubt been reported back to him.

· He perceived something that others did not. Other people, like the leper that precedes our Gallus, typically made no declaration about the power or authority of Jesus. Gallus makes a declaration based on something he perceives in the ministry of Jesus and therefore about Jesus himself.

What does our Centurion, Gallus, see? He declares,

“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.”

Gallus perceives something like his own authority in the activities and words of Jesus. He does not merely have hope, or a little faith. There is no “If you are willing”, such as the leper ekes out. Rather, he sees in Jesus a person who wields a supernatural authority over the world he knows. Gallus sees Jesus and the authority of the kingdom of God working through him.

These things cannot be seen with natural sight. For many of us, we hear about the might acts of God, we read about them in the scriptures, but we do not recognize the activity, the willingness of God in our every day lives.

The leper asks, “if you are willing, you can make me whole”. And Jesus replies, “I am willing”. Yet we do not see a willing God. Too often, we see a withholding God. We do not expect God to show up, so we do not see him. We do not expect God to be willing to intervene, so we take control. We do not expect God to show up in our lives, and so we are not looking.

The moment Jesus walked into Capernaum Gallus the Centurion saw God walk into his life and he saw through Jesus to someone who had supernatural authority to completely change the circumstances. This is why He is celebrated for having great faith. Faith is nothing but noticing God in the picture and recognizing what he is capable of.

Jesus also tells us that some people will never see it. The people of Israel, though they were expecting a messiah, still did not see it. The “sons of the kingdom” will be cast out into the darkness because they could not see God in the picture. They are cast into what they already occupy, spiritual darkness and blindness - spiritual poverty.

39 And Jesus said, “For judgment I have come into this world, that those who do not see may see, and that those who see may be made blind.”

40 Then some of the Pharisees who were with Him heard these words, and said to Him, “Are we blind also?” ().

That! Is a really good question to ask yourself. Do you, presuming sight, really see God? Are you really living as if you expected God to show up? Are you prepared to notice God as he walks across the playing field of your life?

Humility is the price of spiritual perception, so the Centurion says, “Lord I’m not worthy that you should come under my roof”.

A Christian does not presume sight. A Christian presumes blindness and this blindness assumes the position of a blind beggar asking God for the ability to see Him at work in the world. This is why humility is a necessary virtue. It bestows the grace of sight and all other graces.

Humility -the admittance that we may not be right, may not see all that should be understood, or that we may suffer some degree of selective attention is so vital. We are often so focused on the ball, that we fail to see God.

Humility -the admittance that we may not be right, may not see all that should be understood, or that we may suffer some degree of selective attention is so vital. We are often so focused on the ball, that we fail to see God.

Just like the Invisible Gorilla Test, we can miss Jesus walking through the game. Life is sometimes more like the Superbowl in which we are both players and spectators. It is hard, amidst the tosses and pressure and tackles, to see Jesus walk onto the field. He does not interrupt the game, but he might be ready to block for you, or show you a path down the field if you were simply looking.