November 7, 2021 Sermon - Remembrance Day - Matthew 8:5-13
Today we mark Remembrance Day in Canada. Remembrance Day is about honouring those who gave their lives in the service of this country.
I want to respect that as the focus of today, because it is truly important, and those who have served and those who have given their lives for Canada deserve to be remembered, absolutely.
But I also want to say, in the light of very unfortunate and unpleasant discoveries during the Covid pandemic, they we all know that there is much more for us to remember.
And some of those things fly in the face of the ‘freedom’ for which our soldiers fought and died in WW1 and WW2 in particular. See, those soldiers fought for Canada, all of Canada, all her citizens.
But all her citizens have not benefited from the freedom for which the soldiers we remember today fought.
I want to say that we remember the indigenous children of Canada who died at the hands or in the presence of those who ran the residential school system in Canada.
We remember those who suffer today bitterly because of the abuses they suffered in that system, because of children that were lost to the evils of the residential school system.
Just imagine one of your children being taken away by the government. Imagine that child ‘disappearing’. Imagine the news, that’s been circulating in your community for years, being confirmed that your child was among many that suffered and died in a Residential School.
A dear brother in Christ, James Peters, (Show cover) who was a part of Church on the Street, one of the two churches that this church emerged from, has recently written a book about his experiences in the residential school system.
As much as this was and is a horrific stain on Canada as a nation, I don’t want to remember the failed administrators and perpetrators who caused such pain, in direct violation of all that is good and holy. Hopefully justice will find them.
Those who have passed and those who remain alive to this day will face a reckoning for their sins before Almighty God. I want to remember the children who died, and the families who to today still grieve the terrible loss.
If you are not familiar with this part of Canada‘s history, I encourage you to spend some time online reading about it. I was not taught about it in school, and likely neither were you.
There is a lot to remember. But today we are also remembering, with respect, those who fought for Canada, both those who fought for the commonwealth of Great Britain in what are considered legitimate wars, such as WWII.
We also remember those who fought in wars manufactured with huge influence from the military industrial complex in the US, such as the Vietnam War, or to satisfy misplaced revenge, and bloodlust, such as the massive fiasco that was the war in Iraq, all based on misinformation about weapons of mass destruction that were never found in Iraq because they never existed.
We remember the soldiers. Young men back in those wars, but of course also young women in more recent wars and peace keeping missions, who fought, who were injured, often in life-altering ways, or who died.
Soldiers die. Always young, most often poor. Soldiers die. Valiant, full of hope and promise, trusting their nation's leaders, believing their cause to be worth risking or giving their life for.
Today we owe our gratitude to men and women such as those mentioned, and we pause to honor them and to remember and reflect on their sacrifices both past and present. Let’s take a moment right now to pause and remember.
Today we want to look at a particular moment, an encounter that took place some 2000 years ago in present day Israel when it was occupied by a foreign force from Rome.
The encounter involves Jesus and a Roman Centurion. It is very interesting meeting between the Divine One, and a person who represented the military, which was the part of the Roman government created to maintain the Pax Romana, or the Roman Peace, through threat of violence and death.
“When Jesus had entered Capernaum, a centurion came to him, asking for help. 6 “Lord,” he said, “my servant lies at home paralyzed, suffering terribly.” 7 Jesus said to him, “Shall I come and heal him?”
8 The centurion replied, “Lord, I do not deserve to have you come under my roof. But just say the word, and my servant will be healed.
So here, an enemy of Israel, a Roman Centurion with 100 soldiers under him, is hesitant, we will find, to approach Jesus who commands only 12 men. “The Centurion replied, “Lord I do not deserve to have you come under my roof. But say the word, and my servant will be healed.”
Wow, that’s quite a statement coming from a soldier who represents an occupying army. Why would he go to Jesus? We’re left scratching our heads a bit and wondering how and why this Roman Centurion came to seek Jesus out.
It’s weird if you think about it, because there was massive tension between Rome and Jesus’ people, the Jews, who were kept tightly controlled by soldiers just like this centurion.
Jesus and this Roman commander were not natural friends, not at all. There was a very uneasy relationship between the people that inhabited the land, mostly the Jews, and a pagan, military dictatorship. You have to kind of wonder here.
It could have been that this Centurion had a heart that was seeking after God even though he was surrounded by folks the Bible calls pagans, and he was absolutely compelled to pay homage to the Emperor as a god, as well as pay respect to the numerous gods of the empire.
A centurion was the equivalent of a regimental sergeant-major; and the centurions were the backbone of the Roman army. Wherever they are spoken of in the New Testament they are spoken of well.
The Greek historian Polybius describes their qualifications: They must be not so much "seekers after danger as men who can command, steady in action, and reliable; they ought not to be over anxious to rush into the fight; but when hard pressed they must be ready to hold their ground and die at their posts."
It’s enough to say that the centurion must have been a man amongst men or he would never have held the post which was his.
Once again, Jesus reminds us not to judge a book by it’s cover. It would be very easy to focus on the apparent disconnects and incompatibility between Jesus and the centurion, and think that they could not ever connect simply as people.
But Luke, in chapter 7 of his gospel, gives us some helpful background. He tells us this Centurion had done something rather odd and unexpected for a person in his position. He paid good money to build the Jewish Synagogue in Capernaum.
It is obvious that this Centurion was a man of faith, who favored the Jews. And that he was perfectly content to do what he felt was right despite the apparent strangeness of it.
He built the temple, favoured the Jews, and then in turn, in the course of his duties or in the course of simply being a temporary citizen in the occupying army, he discovered Jesus the Miracle worker. He heard about Jesus. He heard and he believed.
We have no idea where or how this centurion developed respect for Jesus, such that he would come to Him in his hour of need.
He may have been on crowd control at some gathering where Jesus was present and this may have lit a spark of faith within him?
Perhaps he witnessed one of the many miraculous and quite impossible healings that Jesus performed, and was convinced by those signs that God was indeed in Jesus.
We see over and over again in the gospels how different individuals responded to the exact same miracles of Jesus and the exact same teachings of Jesus.
Some saw the impossible unfolding in front of their eyes, the blind, the lane, lepers healed, the dead raised, and their best thinking was that Jesus was a threat who had to be killed.
Others, witnessing precisely the same events, turned to Jesus in faith. They turned to follow him, turned a corner in their lives and began to live a whole new life because of their faith in Jesus. [Pause]
So, we don’t know how the centurion developed his faith, his confidence in Jesus’ power. Maybe it was due to word-of-mouth about Jesus.
We do not know how he came to have a measure of faith in Christ but all we do know suggests that he came to saving faith in Jesus.
Now, clearly the life of his servant slave was extremely important to the centurion, so precious to the Centurion that he willingly humbled himself before Jesus.
He gave no thought to the uniform he wore or the political animosity that he was duty bound to recognize and to enforce.
A life hung in the balance, someone he cared a great deal about. It is obvious that as a Soldier this Centurion knew the value of a single life, and he knew from experience how needlessly death separates us from life.
He had witnessed it numerous times on the battlefield with his comrades and in the course of his regular duties as well.
Soldiers place their lives on the line regularly and willingly. This is why we honour them. And the Bible tells us that it was in the person of Jesus that this Centurion saw the answer to his prayers.
In Jesus was the power of life and death and it is because he was a soldier that he knew and believed by faith that just a word from Jesus would make all the difference between life and death.
8 The centurion replied, “Lord, I do not deserve to have you come under my roof. But just say the word, and my servant will be healed. 9 For 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.”
Jesus has an authority like none other than he had ever witnessed. Jesus has a power that annihilates distance. Jesus, by His very being and character, created connection with an enemy of his people.
As he did with this centurion, so he did with Jew and Gentile.
This Soldier truly comprehended that Jesus held in His hands ALL Authority under Heaven and Earth. He understood authority since he too was a man under authority.
Jesus marvels at such a faith. Here a Roman Soldier put his stature as a leader, his authority as a representative of Rome, who are absolutely no friends to the Jews, on the line to save a slave, a servant.
He loved this slave and would go to any trouble to save him. In Roman law a slave was defined as a living tool; he had no rights; a master could ill-treat him and even kill him if he chose.
A Roman writer on estate management wrote and recommended that the farmer examine his farming implements every year and to throw out those which are old and broken, and to do the same with his slaves.
Normally when a slave was past his work he was thrown out to die. So, yes, the attitude of this centurion to his slave was quite unusual.
He was willing to risk reputation to reach across the divide of distrust and disdain between Rome and the Jewish people.
The centurion was a soldier who recognized that Jesus had authority, and Jesus marvels at his faith: 10 When Jesus heard this, he was amazed and said to those following him, “Truly I tell you, I have not found anyone in Israel with such great faith.
That’s quite a statement, and it’s a statement about faith that recognizes Jesus' authority. Do you recognize the authority of Jesus? Can you see yourself at all in this story?
What authority do you cling to today? Is it the church? Your boss? The government? Is it, when you really think about it, somehow your impulses, your addictions. Is it you?
Our culture is all about the importance and authority of the individual, to choose their own path, to decide for themselves what is right and wrong.
That’s the very nature of the first sin committed in the garden of Eden. It was a rejection of God’s authority.
It was a rejection of God’s authority and also, sadly, of any real relationship with God. It was in reality a rejection of God’s love.
Because of Jesus, a real relationship with God begins with hearing the gospel, and the gospel by God’s grace then finds a pathway into our hearts, enabling us to believe the truth.
The truth that Jesus gave His life for us, that He suffered the penalty we deserve, that on the cross He willingly laid down His life for us, in order to take away our sins -
– the sin and unholiness that separates us, creates a terrible chasm between us and God.
We repent and turn from everything in our lives that is not the truth, from every sin. And we receive Jesus Christ as our Lord, as our King, as the Saviour of our souls, our very lives.
And then we live our lives free, and we submit ourselves completely, spirit, soul, mind and body, to Jesus' authority, and call on His name. By coming to Jesus in humility and brokenness and need, we find what we are looking for.
May each of us, even as we remember today the terrible sacrifices made by soldiers who defended Canada and who served as peacekeepers internationally; may we remember the one, greatest sacrifice of all.
The sacrifice to which no other sacrifice can ever compare. And may we respond in gratitude to the gift of life, the gift of freedom, the gift of relationship with God, the gift of salvation, that Jesus won for us. Amen.
