Quite early in Jesus’ public life a Roman military Officer came to Him asking that he would heal a young servant who’d become paralyzed. Jesus offered to go right over to his home and heal the young man. The Officer refused. The reason he gave for refusing to have Jesus in his home was that he wasn’t worthy to have a man of Jesus stature visit his home. “I am,” he said, “under the authority of my superior officers, and I have authority over my soldiers. I only need to say, ‘Go,’ and they go, or ‘Come,’ and they come. And if I say to my slaves, ‘Do this,’ they do it. Because of this I know that if you just say the word from where you are, my servant will be healed.” (Matthew 8: 5 – 12 New Living Translation)
Jesus was ecstatic over what this man said. “Nowhere in Israel,” He exclaimed,” have I seen such faith.”
From a career in a world completely preoccupied with command and control and polytheistic in its worldview this Officer had learned something about the true nature of things that enabled Him to recognize Jesus as a superior authority. And he humbled himself in the Lord’s presence. That humble acknowledgement of His authority, Jesus said, was faith; a kind of faith that would insure this Officer’s place in the “Kingdom of Heaven.”
How many people do we Christ-followers run into, in our day-to-days, who, even though they’ve lived in a world very different from ours, have learned something which prepares them to recognize Jesus should they meet Him? In those encounters it is critical that they are meeting the true Jesus in us and not some fabrication we’ve constructed in a self-serving attempt to make Him “our” Christ.
