![]() ![]() Like many good women in every age.īut the second postscript is most valuable to Matthew’s listeners. And she didn’t even get the recognition of having Matthew record her name in the Gospel. First, Peter’s mother-in-law, like so many moms in every age, immediately took care of the family. Stories of the two healings spread through Capernaum and bring many to be cured through the expulsion of evil spirits. All He does is touch her hand, and her temperature instantly goes down. Jesus arrives at His chief apostle’s home and finds Peter’s mother-in-law sick with a fever. That's the kind of faith that brought Abraham and Sarah the son they never thought to bear.įinally, we get to the third story. “many will come from east and west and sit at table with Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob in the kingdom of heaven, while the sons of the kingdom will be thrown into the outer darkness there men will weep and gnash their teeth.” Faith in Jesus, lived out in charity, would save the Gentiles as well as believing Jews. And Jesus makes a prediction, realized in the Church He founded before the end of the first century. This Gentile, this goy, had faith He had never found in Israel. Even the Jews around Him, people who were brought up to believe the power of the True God, were reluctant to believe in Jesus. So He should be able to heal just by uttering a word. Jesus has authority beyond this world and culture. All he has to do to get something done in the natural world is to tell somebody to do it. He knows that Jesus had power no Roman possessed, with authority even over evil spirits. They were the “cock of the walk,” and wanted everyone to treat them as the big boss of the village. Now understand that centurions in first-century Judea were usually quite imperious and even cruel. The second story records the centurion’s response. Jesus acknowledged both as He began to set out for the centurion’s home to touch the slave and heal him. So this slave earned his special treatment, and the centurion was much better than the average Roman occupier. Servant in the first century almost always meant “slave.” So they had no rights, but when one provided greater than usual service, they might be treated like a member of the family. It shows that the centurion had compassion. ![]() The first is about the Roman centurion asking for healing for a valued servant, paralyzed by some accident or illness. ed., p.518.There are really three stories in today’s Gospel. Compare the remarks in Lange's "Matthew," Am. It is by no means improbable that he was previously acquainted with the Jewish expectations and the claims of Christ. ![]() But Lange and Alford maintain that the centurion used the expression in a Jewish or Christian sense, acknowledging Jesus as the Messiah. The confession, "Truly this (or this man, as Mark has it) was a Son of God" (theou huios), may be taken (with Meyer) in a polytheistic sense, or equivalent to demigod an interpretation which is supported by the absence of the definite article before huios, and by the parallel passage of Luke, who substitutes dikaios for the theou huios of Matthew and Mark. viii.), and the captain Cornelius at Cæsarea (Acts x.), form a triumvirate of believing Gentile soldiers in the New Testament. This centurion, the captain in Capernaum (Matt. The centurion here spoken of is the one who, according to Roman custom, presided over the execution (hence called by Seneca centurio supplicio præpositus or by Tacitus, exactor mortis). "Now, when the centurion saw what was done, he glorified God, saying: Certainly this was a righteous man." "Now, when the centurion, and they that were with him watching Jesus, saw the earthquake, and those things that were done, they feared greatly, saying: Truly this was the Son of God." The Person of Christ - Philip Schaff MATT. ![]()
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