Luke 7:1–10

Second Sunday after Pentecost

Theme: God has visited his people to save them by the power of his Word in Christ.

¹When Jesus had finished saying all this in the hearing of the people, he entered Capernaum. ²There a centurion's servant, whom his master valued highly, was sick and about to die. ³The centurion heard of Jesus and sent some elders of the Jews to him, asking him to come and heal his servant. ⁴When they came to Jesus, they pleaded earnestly with him, "This man deserves to have you do this, ⁵because he loves our nation and has built our synagogue." ⁶So Jesus went with them. He was not far from the house when the centurion sent friends to say to him: "Lord, don't trouble yourself, for I do not deserve to have you come under my roof. ⁷That is why I did not even consider myself worthy to come to you. But say the word, and my servant must be healed. ⁸For I myself am a man under authority, with soldiers under me. I tell this one, 'Go,' and he goes; and that one, 'Come,' and he comes. I say to my servant, 'Do this,' and he does it." ⁹When Jesus heard this, he was amazed at him, and turning to the crowd following him, he said, "I tell you, I have not found such great faith even in Israel." ¹⁰Then the men who had been sent returned to the house and found the servant well.

The story has been told about a boy who had an ant farm. He had thousands of ants. He loved them all and knew each one by name. He spent hours playing with his pet ants. He left food for them and he sheltered them in stormy weather. If any was sick or broke a leg, he would nurse it and give it special care. He liked to talk to them, even though he knew they could not hear or understand.

Then one day his father decided to make a patio in the back yard. The boy was all excited about having a patio where the family could sit outdoors, play and have cookouts. But then he realized that the patio was going to be over his ant farm. Unless he could move the ants, they would all be killed. He tried everything to get them to move. He left food trails to another location hoping they would follow them. He tried to gather them all up in a jar, but they kept scattering. He finally got desperate and started shouting at them to move, but, of course, they couldn’t hear or understand. It finally occurred to him that if he could become an ant and move into their colony, perhaps he could communicate with them. Then he could warn them and convince them to move. Now that’s where the story usually ends, but I have investigated and found yet another chapter.

Turns out, he then talked to his science teacher at school who invented a potient that he could drink that would turn him into an ant. It worked, and he moved into the ant colony. In order to gain their confidence he went around helping all the ants and taking care of the sick and old ants. He showed them were the food was he left and did all sorts of good deeds for them. They enjoyed all the things he did for them, but when he started telling them about the danger they were in and what they had to do to save themselves they just laughed at him. They were only interested in the food he gave them and in the help he gave to their young, weak ants and the sick ants and the old ants. He told them he was their owner and that it was he who sheltered them from storms and fed them and nursed them when they were sick, but they thought he was crazy. He told them he had built the ant farm and created their colony, but they thought they had done it themselves and they sneered at him. When he told them of the danger they were in and that he had come to save them, they were only interested in the food he gave them and could care less about what was going to happen next month, so they stopped paying attention to him and left him all alone. When he told them he was really a human they got mad and killed him and threw him out of the colony.

Well, I think we can all understand the analogy here: We are the ants and we are about to be destroyed. We are in danger of death and the punishment of God for our sins. Every time someone dies we see the evidence. Every time there is a murder, or terrorist attack, or war we are faced with our sinfulness and its consequences. Every time someone gets sick it is evidence of our weakness and the consequences of sin. But we refuse to listen.

We consider ourselves wise. We have more learning than all the generations before us. We have accumulated so much information that a whole industry of technology has been developed to manage it, record it, and make it accessible to everyone. But so much information and technology sometimes makes us feel invulnerable, like we are superior beings, as if we could solve any and all problems.

We have become affluent and have turned into utter materialists. We spend our lives enjoying ourselves and the pleasures of the world around us. Our primary concerns are enjoying relationships and the material world we live in with all its pleasures and thrills. In many ways life has become for us one big “Great America” theme park: just enjoy the ride and get all the fun and excitement you can while you are here. Now it’s not wrong to enjoy the creation that God made for us; he certainly intended for us to enjoy things the gifts he gives. But man, being a sinner, has forgotten the giver and has turned to worship the creation instead of the creator.

We are happy as long as we are free to choose what we want to enjoy and do and no one else gets in our way, we. “Live and let live,” has become our motto. There is no time to think about tomorrow, about God, about sin, or death. We try to avoid these topics because they seem irrelevant to our enjoyment and perhaps even would take away our pleasure in living.

In the end, we become proud and arrogant. Thinking that we are self-sufficient beings and that God is irrelevant. We feel superior and pride ourselves in our accomplishments and goodness.

But the reality is we are made of clay. Dust we are, and unto dust we shall return. We are like the ants who don’t want to bother ourselves with the really big issues like saving our colony, forgiveness of sins and life after death. We just want to enjoy the food and pleasures we have now and not worry about what is going to happen tomorrow.

All this merely demonstrates just how far away from God we have strayed. All this shows us our sin and fallenness. Such an attitude is a colossal monument to our sinful, human nature. Rather than being so wise and clever, so intelligent and self-sufficient, so worthy of praise for our knowledge and accomplishments, we are lost in a material world of lusts and pleasure. We live in a Candy Land of pleasure and have become drunk on the sweet, sugary treats of this life. In reality we are lost and hopeless. We are not even worthy of God’s presence. We are not worthy for God to come into our homes, much less into our hearts.

But, like the boy in our story, God loves us and wants to rescue us from our sin and eventual death. He sent his prophets to warn us and tell us to repent. We did not. He sent his Son to become one of us so he could tell us to repent and believe in him, but we killed him.

God, in Christ, has visited man. He has raised up a great prophet and has visited his people in order to save us from our own foolishness and death that we have brought upon ourselves by our sin. Christ is the strong arm of God outstretched to bring salvation to his lost people; people who are on the road to destruction. The greatest event in all history was when the Son of God made himself a man and died for our salvation. God has visited man! God has reached out his arm and saved us!

Though we killed his Son, it was by his very death that he saved us by atoning for our sin and reconciling us to God. Though we were separated from God and declared ourselves to be his enemies, he poured out his very blood to save us from destruction.

It is by the authoritative word of Christ, which the Holy Spirit brings to us, that we are saved. By his word we are convicted of our sin and brought to repentance. By his word of love on the cross he forgives our sins. This fact is brought home for us in our gospel reading for today. The slave of a Roman centurion was sick to the point of death. But this Roman centurion, even though he was a gentile, had believed the Scriptures and knew that this man Jesus was a great prophet. He knew that was even more than a prophet, he was God visiting his people and stretching out his arm to save them.

So he sent word for Jesus to come and save this slave who was dying. He trusted in the one sent from God to save his people. He trusted in God’s salvation.

Then, before Jesus arrived at his house, he sent word to Jesus not to come any closer. Only to give the command and his slave would be healed. This man had faith in the authority and power of Jesus’ word. He himself was an officer in the Roman army and he knew the authority and power of his own commands which he gave to his men. So he understood that Jesus’ word had authority and yielded the power of God. He trusted that Jesus’ Word had authority over sin, sickness, death, and even demons. “Just give the order,” he said to Jesus, “and it must be done.” I love the word “must”. The centurion used the imperative verb form here. So great was his faith! It “must” be done. There is no option. There is not doubt. There is no way that it would not be done. It was the word of authority over rulers and principalities, over the heavens and the earth. Even the wind and the rain and the devil himself must obey his command. It must be done as Jesus commands.

Jesus’ word has authority and power. And that very authoritative word that saves comes to us today verbally and in the sacraments. The Holy Spirit works to bring us the saving word of Jesus through the Scriptures, preaching and teaching, in the absolution, through liturgy and hymn, and in the sacraments.

We can trust the authority of Christ’s word. When Christ announces in the absolution that our sins are forgiven, we are forgiven. When Christ gives us his blood for the forgiveness of sins, our sins are forgiven. When Christ says that in baptism we are joined to him in his death and resurrection and are the children of God, we indeed become God’s children and inherit eternal life.

The centurion trusted Christ’s word and did not doubt in the least that by the power of his word his slave would be saved.

And the faith of this centurion produced the fruit in his life. It produced humility. In contrast to us who so often feel we deserve God’s favor, this centurion did not consider himself worthy that Jesus even enter his house. We who proudly “invite Christ into our hearts” forget that our hearts are filthy, sinful, and repugnant to Christ. We who boast of how good we are and how much good we do forget that we are sinners completely unworthy to even look upon Christ. The faith of the centurion produced a true humility that recognized that he needed the Word of Christ’s forgiveness.

Likewise his faith produced love for his neighbor. This was evidenced in his love for the nation of Israel which motivated him to even build them a synagogue in Capernaum. So evident was this love produced by his faith in Christ, that even the Jewish elders begged Jesus to help the man. In spite of their hatred for gentiles, whom they called dogs and sinners, and even though he was an official of the oppressive Roman government, they pleaded fervently with Jesus on his behalf.

Even Jesus marveled at his faith. Here is an example of the life of faith for all of us who have faith in Christ to follow. We can trust the word of Christ. His word is indeed powerful and has the authority to accomplish what he says. Therefore when he says he is with us until the end of the age; he is with us. When he promises to supply our daily bread, he does. When he says we are the forgiven children of God, then we are. We can be assured that even the demons fear and tremble at his word so we can rest sure that we are saved by the powerful arm of God who is Jesus Christ himself.

Amen.