Archive for November 9th, 2008|Daily archive page
How do you surprise an all knowing God? Faith.
Filed under: Uncategorized | Tags: bible, christ, christianity, faith, god, Jesus, Religion
Leave a Comment Matthew 8:10 When Jesus heard it, he marvelled, and said to them that followed, Verily I say unto you, I have not found so great faith, no, not in Israel.
Jesus was approached by a centurion who begged for healing for a servant. Depending on which gospel you read, the centurion was there himself, or sent others on his behalf. We’ll overlook that discrepancy for the sake of clarity and treat the encounter as a direct and immediate communication between the centurion and Jesus.
Jesus answers the centurion that he will go with him to the centurion’s place. The centurion humbles himself as unworthy to have Jesus under his roof, and places his faith in Jesus’ healing power as being greater than his as a centurion. As a powerful man able to accomplish much with the utterance of a word, the centurion could appreciate how much more powerful a word was from Jesus.
The bible explicitly states that upon hearing this, Jesus marvelled. Jesus was not aware of the centurion’s wishes before he approached, nor did Jesus marvel when he first heard the centurion’s request. Implying that Jesus in some way hid his marvelling at the centurion’s faith until that faith was explicitly expressed casts aspersions on Jesus’ honesty. In the end, regardless of when he marvelled, Jesus still marvelled; an expression of astonishment at something miraculous. It is an expression akin, if not the same as surprise.
This speaks to the nature of our free will and how our faith shapes our relationship with God. Just as Adam was able to hide himself so that God asked where he was in the garden of Eden, so can we hide ourselves from God in spirit if that’s how faith effects our heart. Prayer is the proactive action of opening up the lines of communication, the consensual opening of the door behind the privacy of our free will to the spiritual support of God. In these communications we can continue to be the marvel of our creator, even when, as with the centurion, it is in asking for God’s service. Something to take heart in I think.
