Tuesday, 20 September 2022

Being under authority.


This is the text of a sermon preached at Central Methodist Chippenham on 15th September 2022. The Church requested that we hold a memorial / thanksgiving service for the life of Her Majesty Queen Elizabeth II. 


 

When it was suggested that we postpone our harvest festival and instead have a service to remember and pay tribute to her majesty the Queen the Bible passage from Luke’s gospel we’ve heard came to mind. (Luke 7: 1 – 10)

It is a fascinating story.

Jesus was returning to Capernaum after preaching and ministering elsewhere. Capernaum was a minor trade centre and toll station where roads crossed the Galilee. Jesus enters Capernaum where we must assume the centurion, this Roman officer, was based. He was clearly quite well off as he had servants or slaves – depending on which translation of the Bible we read. One of his servants was seriously ill and close to death. The centurion had heard about Jesus and therefore when he heard Jesus was back in town, the centurion sent a deputation to Jesus:

When he heard about Jesus, he sent some Jewish elders to him, asking him to come and heal his slave.

Note that. He sent Jewish elders. Which shows he must have been well regarded by the Jewish community. Luke then tells us:

When they came to Jesus, they appealed to him earnestly, saying, ‘He is worthy of having you do this for him, for he loves our people, and it is he who built our synagogue for us.’

The Centurion mentioned in the passage, must have been something of an exception, as he clearly has close ties with the Jewish community in Capernaum. Remember the Jewish elders say to Jesus about the Centurion:

This man deserves to have you do this, because he loves our nation and has built our synagogue.’ Luke 7: 4 – 5

This doesn’t mean that the Centurion was a practising Jew. I suspect that would not have been permissible to a Roman officer. But clearly the centurion felt able to assist the Jewish community in Capernaum.

As is often the way with the Gospels, Luke doesn’t give us much information about the Centurion. There are several unanswered questions. As I’ve said we may wonder about whether he was a practising Jew or not. And then we might wonder why he was in Capernaum?

According to J L Reed in his book “Archaeology and the Galilean Jesus: A Re-examination of the Evidence”, at the time of Jesus Capernaum had a population of around 1,500. It was a fishing village on the northern shore of the Sea of Galilee. Given this would a Roman legion have been stationed there? Perhaps our Centurion had his home there and was based elsewhere? Or perhaps he was retired?

Another question. How could a Centurion afford to build a synagogue?

As you may know centurions were officers of the regular Roman army. They had worked their way up through the ranks and were promoted for their dedication and courage. These veterans commanded 100 men each within a legion of 6,000. Therefore, there were 60 centuries in a legion, each century under the command of a centurion.

A centurion received pay that amounted to more than 20 times the pay of an ordinary solider. A centurion received around 5,000 denarii a year whereas a common soldier received around 200 – 300 denarii a year. Within a legion there were five senior centurions who received 10,000 denarii a year and the chief centurion received 20,000 denarii a year.

My point is, centurions were comparatively wealthy. Our Centurion could well have been able to afford to build a synagogue in place like Capernaum for in a small town like Capernaum the synagogue would not have been much more than a large house.

We can only speculate why the Centurion was living in Capernaum and we can have an informed guess about how he managed to pay for the synagogue. But one further question must be Why did he do what he did?

As I said earlier, it is unlikely that he was Jewish. In fact, careful reading of the passage seems to confirm this. If he was Jewish, he would have felt able to welcome Jesus into his home. But given that he sends people to Jesus with a message, suggests that the Centurion was sufficiently sensitive to Jewish purity laws that forbade a Jew entering the home of a Gentile. He wanted the help of a Jew (Jesus), but he knew that a Jew could not enter a Gentile home. Though as we know, Jesus was not concerned about such things.

Again, why did the centurion do what he did? Why did he send for Jesus?

A soldier is always aware of the chain of command. And although a centurion was a relatively senior officer in the Roman army he was himself

“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 slave, “Do this”, and the slave does it.’ Luke 7:8

The Centurion had his own authority but he was under the authority of seniors. No doubt he recognised authority when he saw it. And in Jesus he saw someone who was under authority – God’s authority. 

When Jesus heard this he was amazed at him, and turning to the crowd that followed him, he said, ‘I tell you, not even in Israel have I found such faith.’

Jesus is astonished at the second message. And we are astonished at his astonishment! Normally in the gospels Jesus says things that surprise people. This is one of the few places where Jesus himself is surprised. And the reason is the sheer quality of the Centurion's faith. It is the simple clear belief that when Jesus commands that something be done, it will be done. The Centurion regards Jesus like a military officer, with authority over sickness. If Jesus says that someone is to get well, they will get well. What could be simpler?

Where the centurion got his faith we do not know. If he had lived in Capernaum for a while, he had no doubt heard of Jesus and even perhaps seen him perform remarkable cures already. Whatever the reason, the Centurion recognised that in Jesus there was a power at work that could carry all before it.

This story isn’t about the healing of the slave – though of course that is miraculous. This story is about the nature of faith. And how a powerful person such as the Centurion has faith and recognises the authority of Jesus.

Which of course brings me to Her Majesty the Queen. It has been well documented, and we have seen it more and more in her Christmas Day broadcasts, that Her Majesty had a deep Christian faith. This woman, probably the most well known woman in the world, was Sovereign of 14 Commonwealth realms in addition to the UK. She was Head of the Commonwealth itself, which comprises 54 countries with a combined population of 2.5 billion.

Whilst compared to monarchs of old her authority might be described as “gentle” she still had authority. And yet even this powerful, wealthy, woman recognised that she too was under authority. By faith in Jesus Christ, she was under his authority.

In 2000 she said: 'To many of us our beliefs are of fundamental importance. For me the teachings of Christ and my own personal accountability before God provide a framework in which I try to lead my life. I, like so many of you, have drawn great comfort in difficult times from Christ's words and example.' [1]

“My own personal accountability before God” is the recognition that she was under God’s authority.

And in 2002 she said:

'I know just how much I rely on my faith to guide me through the good times and the bad. Each day is a new beginning. I know that the only way to live my life is to try to do what is right, to take the long view, to give of my best in all that the day brings, and to put my trust in God!'[2]

I was aware that at her Coronation she had sworn an oath before God to serve her people. But it wasn’t until her death that I became aware of what she said in her Christmas broadcast in December 1952. She said

'Pray for me … that God may give me wisdom and strength to carry out the solemn promises I shall be making, and that I may faithfully serve Him and you, all the days of my life.’

Throughout her long life, Christ’s example and teaching were acted out in the dutiful and faithful life of the Queen. 

May she rest in peace and rise in glory



[1] https://www.premierchristianity.com/obituaries/10-brilliant-things-the-queen-has-said-about-god/146.article

[2] https://www.premierchristianity.com/obituaries/10-brilliant-things-the-queen-has-said-about-god/146.article

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