But if I’m being honest with myself, that makes for a pretty lazy interpretation. After all, these stories didn’t blend together for those who were directly affected by them, and I doubt that they were all the same to Jesus, either. His healings are so much more than mere transactions, written down for our benefit 2000 years later. Each and every one must have been emotionally charged for everyone involved. That’s part of what it means to be human. When Jesus’ healings start running together in our minds, we really should try to mine the details of each story for a point of connection, of empathy – in other words, to try and figure out what makes it relatable. Very few of us have experienced a miraculous healing, but all of us have experience being human.
On its surface, the Centurion in today’s reading doesn’t seem especially relatable. His behavior is strange and erratic. First he summons Jesus to his home, then he tells Jesus NOT to come. First Jesus is assured that the Centurion deserves his help, then informed that he absolutely does NOT. First the Centurion seems to project extreme humility, then he’s lifting up the fact that he has authority over soldiers and servants. And he’s communicating all of this through third-person messengers. I suppose one could argue that this reflects the scattered mindset of someone in the middle of a crisis, but I suspect that, as a military man, the Centurion had plenty of experience keeping his wits about him during an emergency. And this certainly doesn’t explain why Jesus is so impressed with him.
But when I put myself in his shoes – or, more accurately, in his mind – another explanation for this behavior occurs to me. What if the reason that the Centurion doesn’t speak to Jesus directly is because he’s plagued by self-doubt? What if, instead of acting humble as a bid for Jesus’ attention, he *actually believes* that he’s unworthy of Jesus’ help? What if his strange actions aren’t evidence of emotional disorientation or even calculated social engineering, but of a conflicted inner life? Now THAT’S relatable!
By a show of hands, how many here have ever experienced self-doubt? It’s a nearly universal experience, isn’t it? At different points in our lives, we all wonder, “Why can’t I do anything right?” “Am I just an inconvenience?” “Does anyone even like me?” Sometimes we even question our own worth as a human being. No amount of external reassurance can help; when you’re deep in a pit of self-doubt, praise doesn’t feel like affirmation – it feels like a lie. And any sort of mental illness makes all of it a hundred times worse. Self-doubt doesn’t have to be based on any sort of objective reality; in fact, it’s often not. But even if we’re intellectually able to recognize that our insecurities aren’t true, the feeling of self-doubt can still stop us in our tracks. Of course, there’s no way to know for sure if this was what motivated the Centurion’s actions, but this theory is infinitely more relatable to me.
Now that I’ve put the idea in your head, can you see it in the story? This centurion, distraught over the imminent death of a beloved servant but not believing himself worthy of Jesus’ help, sends some Jewish elders to speak on his servant’s behalf. HE may not deserve to ask for help from this famous Jewish healer, he thinks, but surely religious leaders do. He instructs them to (and I quote) “ask [Jesus] to come and heal his servant”. That’s it – that’s the extent of his message. Jesus can determine for himself whether or not to grant his request.
But the Jewish elders, obviously grateful to the Centurion for his past help, decide to improvise a little bit. They tell Jesus what a great guy the Centurion is, in the hopes that their personal testimony might move the needle a little in his favor. They insist that the Centurion’s compassion and love for their people makes him worthy of this favor – a perfectly reasonable assessment. Most people would consider their interjection to be a kindness.
But not someone plagued by self-doubt. Upon learning what the elders had said, the Centurion is horrified. So horrified that he can’t bear the thought of meeting Jesus face to face anymore. He doesn’t want Jesus helping him on the basis of (what he perceives as) a lie. So he sends a *second* convoy out to meet Jesus on the road, this time selecting trusted friends and giving them a detailed script – he doesn’t want to risk any “misunderstandings” this time: “Despite what the elders told you, I am absolutely NOT worthy of your presence. PLEASE don’t come.”
If the Centurion had been asking for help for himself, this might have been the end of it. His desire to avoid the cognitive dissonance of receiving help that he doesn’t deserve might have outweighed whatever his own need was. But he WASN’T asking for himself. And what’s more, it was a matter of life and death. So despite his own conviction that he is not worthy, he didn’t allow his shame to silence him as it otherwise might have. The Centurion persisted in his request: “Please, just say the word and my servant will be healed.”
This, I think, was the thing that must have impressed Jesus the most. Not faith in Jesus’ power to heal (Jesus already had a reputation as a skilled healer by this time). Not faith in the power of Jesus’ word (by his own admission, the Centurion already knew the power of words from his professional life). Jesus was impressed by the Centurion’s faith that, even though every fiber of his being told him he was unworthy, his request would still be honored, even from a distance. This faith didn’t erase his self-doubt, but it was so strong that it was able to push past it for the sake of his servant.
We all have moments of self-doubt. Sometimes those moments turn into seasons, and sometimes those seasons never seem to end. Maybe it happens when you’re a student in seminary learning about Calvin’s theology of total depravity and you think, “Why does it feel like he’s describing me personally?” Maybe it happens when you’re a first-time parent unable to get your baby to sleep and you think, “Who on earth thought it was a good idea to put me in charge of this tiny human being?” Maybe it happens when you’re in over your head at work and you think, “I deserve to be fired.” Maybe it happens when you see powerful organizations like the Church or the government acting in opposition to your values and you think, “Nothing I do can make any sort of difference.” These thoughts can be overwhelming and, frankly, terrifying.
But like the Centurion, we cannot let our self-doubt stop us from doing what we need to do – especially when someone else, whether a servant or an infant or even a stranger, is depending on us. We have to push past the cognitive dissonance and fear, because as followers of Christ, we know that love for our fellow human beings is ALWAYS more important – no exceptions. It may be really, REALLY hard, it may take a long time, and it may not ultimately change the way you feel about yourself. But if we believe in the kindom of God, we have to be willing to share the Centurion’s faith.
Because at the end of the day, we know that the Centurion’s faith wasn’t misplaced. Jesus’ love and mercy is not conditional. Whether we believe that we’re worthy or not is completely irrelevant to our relationship with God – God chooses to be with us either way. Whether we believe that we deserve to have our prayers answered or not, God answers them. Whether we believe that we deserve to be loved or not, God loves us. Whether we believe that we deserve support or not, God supports us. And whether we believe that we deserve a world full of kindness and justice – God is building it right alongside us. Even in the throes of self-doubt, the Centurion was able to believe this – why shouldn’t we?
One last thing. The narrative lectionary pairs the account of the Centurion’s servant with that of the widow’s son in this week’s reading, but it’s not clear why these two stories are presented together. All the commentaries I read and listened to this week had interesting things to say about each of them, but not much connecting the two. The only hint we get is the Greek word “hexés” – meaning “next” or “subsequently” or “immediately after” – indicating that the events of the second story follow directly from the first.
This suggests that Jesus may have still had the Centurion on his mind when he encountered the funeral procession. It makes me wonder if Jesus’ experience with the Centurion might have influenced his compassion for the widow. It makes me wonder if the Centurian’s emotional bravery might have inspired Jesus’ greatest miracle yet, even though no one had requested it. It makes me wonder if, in fact, a gentile man who refused to let his own self-doubt stand in his way was indirectly responsible for an event that inspired the faith of so many others. It makes me wonder, too, if our own persistence in spite of our feelings of unworthiness might create sacred ripple effects far beyond what we can see for ourselves.
I hope it makes you wonder, too. Amen.
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