Sermon for the Third Sunday after the Epiphany
admin | 24 January 2010“Speak the word only”
Before I begin, let me thank Fr. Harris for the kindness of his invitation to preach this morning here at St. Peter’s. I bring you greetings from Windsor, Nova Scotia, from Christ Church and, on behalf of the Headmaster, Mr. Joe Seagram, and our assistant Headmaster, Mr. Darcy Walsh, who is also here with us this morning, I bring you greetings from King’s-Edgehill School. It is wonderful, too, that Canon Tuck, an old boy of the School, is assisting with the liturgy this morning. All these wonderful Maritime connections!
Along with my colleague, Mr. Kevin Lakes, and our Junior Boys Basketball Team consisting of Christian, Zachary, Devon, Sam, Fernando, Ryan, Ben and Tom, we have been delighted to come and play on your island and now to be able to come and pray on your island, especially here in this wonderful and holy place.
Everything is “charged with the grandeur of God,” the poet Gerard Manley Hopkins suggests. But, then, there is the misery, too, the misery of suffering and death in Haiti, for instance. The grandeur and the misery. The grandeur of God meets the misery of man in the Epiphany season; “signs and wonders” abound in that meeting.
Epiphany is the season of miracles and in today’s gospel we are given not just one but two miracles, a double healing, the healing of the leper and the healing of the centurion’s servant. It is a kind of two-for-one deal, perfect for the post-Christmas season where our theme song is most likely Deep Dark Wood’s mantra “All the money I had is gone.”
Epiphany season is the season of teaching. The miracles of Jesus teach us something about God and something about the divine will and purpose for our humanity. The miracles belong to the making visible of the glory of God. They are not for our entertainment but for our enlightenment.
A miracle is, of course, a sign and a wonder. The healing miracles are a wonder. They awaken awe and wonder in us. Consider what we see in the miracles of healing. Signs of the glory of God in the effects of what is said and done. Notice, too, the close connection between word and deed, between what is said and what is done. The miracles of the gospel are all about the word in action, the word of Christ written in the very fabric of our humanity, redeemed and restored. The wonder, really, is the wonder of Christ.
Christ heals a leper. Christ heals the paralyzed servant of the Centurion. Christ speaks and Christ acts. There is healing. These two healings, so closely juxtaposed, are within and beyond the spiritual boundaries of Israel. Through the history and meaning of Israel, the glory of God is not only made known to the world but is shown to be for the world. The leper, on the one hand, is healed within the context of the religious culture of Israel and is held to the requirements of the Law. “Go thy way, show thyself to the priest, and offer the gift that Moses commanded, for a testimony unto them.”
The Centurion, on the other hand, is from outside Israel. He is a soldier, a commander of a hundred men or more in the Roman army at the time of Jesus. We sometimes overlook the role and place of Roman order and law in our thinking about Jesus and his ministry, concentrating instead on questions about the Jewish or Hebrew and the Hellenic or Greek background to the story of Jesus in the subsequent emergence of Christianity. Yet the Gospels are full of events that have to do with Jesus’ encounter with figures from the political and military world of Roman antiquity.
The stories of such encounters are illuminating. They serve to teach us something about the essential divinity of Christ and something about our humanity as redeemed in him. The Centurion comes to Jesus seeking the healing of his servant who lies “at home sick of the palsy, grievously tormented.” Notice the concern here; it is the concern of the Centurion, the officer-in-command, for those under his command, in this case, one of the lowliest, a mere servant. Somehow he sees in Jesus one who can heal and save; in short, something divine. Jesus’ response is direct: “I will come and heal him.” All well and good, it seems. Another healing miracle story that relates to the purpose of Christ’s coming, we might say. At least, Jesus is willing to make house calls. That, too, might be regarded as a kind of miracle! But that is not the interest of the story. The interest of the story is in what comes next. The astounding thing, the real lesson and teaching, is found in the Centurion’s answer.
“Lord,” he says, “I am not worthy that thou shouldest come under my roof; but speak the word only, and my servant shall be healed.” He goes on to explain the command structure. Let the word be passed on down the line.
“Speak the word only.” It is a marvelous insight into the power and nature of God’s Word, a marvelous insight and instinct about Jesus as the one in whom that Word is alive and present, the one, really, who is the Word Incarnate. The Centurion has grasped what many never grasp or often forget, namely that God’s Word cannot be constrained and limited to our human condition and experience. It comes to us and brings healing and comfort, life and resurrection. The Centurion has realized and understood this. That he has is a marvel and wonder itself as Jesus acknowledges. “I have not found so great faith, no not in all Israel,” he says. “Go thy way, as thou hast believed, so be it done unto thee. And his servant was healed in the self-same hour.”
For both the leper and the centurion, Christ is the wonder. There is an epiphany and, yet, in the wonder of Christ, we see something greater, namely God’s delight in us through our taking hold of his word.
The light of Epiphany opens us out to the glory of God in Jesus Christ. The hand that is “put forth” to heal the leper is the hand of glory; the voice that speaks is the voice of glory. They go forth to effect our healing, our salvation. But our healing, our salvation, is about nothing more than the effect of God’s glory upon our lives. Christ is the glory. He puts forth his hand; he speaks his word and only so are we healed.
We enter into the glory of his presence, here and now, in the Word proclaimed and the Sacraments celebrated. “Lord, I am not worthy that thou shouldest come under my roof; but speak the word only and my servant shall be healed”.
Such words evoke Christ’s wonder but as well his judgment, a judgment upon our indifference and neglect of the Word that is spoken in our midst. When we turn our backs on the light then we find ourselves in the darkness. Such are “the children of the kingdom” who are “cast out into outer darkness.”
The Centurion’s words are words of “great faith” and words that challenge us. They have their application for us as a devotional prayer, especially at the time of receiving communion: “Lord, I am not worthy that thou shouldest come under my roof, but speak the word only and my [soul] shall be healed”.
The glory is present and proclaimed. It has only to be received in us and then we become the wonder, the wonder of Christ in us.
“Speak the word only”
Fr. David Curry
Epiphany III
St. Peter’s Cathedral,
Charlottetown, PEI
January 24th, 2010