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Jesus Heals the Centurion’s Servant.[a] When Jesus entered Capernaum, a centurion approached him and pleaded for his help. “Lord,” he said, “my servant is lying at home paralyzed and enduring agonizing sufferings.” Jesus said to him, “I will come and cure him.” The centurion replied, “Lord, I am not worthy to have you come under my roof. But simply say the word and my servant will be healed.[b] For I myself am a man subject to authority, with soldiers who are subject to me. I say to one ‘Go,’ and he goes, and to another, ‘Come here,’ and he comes, and to my servant, ‘Do this,’ and he does it.”

10 When Jesus heard this, he was amazed, and he said to those who were following him, “Amen, I say to you, in no one throughout Israel have I found faith as great as this. 11 Many, I tell you, will come from the east and the west to sit with Abraham and Isaac and Jacob at the banquet in the kingdom of heaven. 12 But the heirs of the kingdom will be thrown into the outer darkness, where there will be weeping and gnashing of teeth.”

13 Jesus then said to the centurion, “Return home. Your petition has been granted because of your faith.” And at that very hour the servant was healed.

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Footnotes

  1. Matthew 8:5 Jesus commends a Roman centurion (leader of a hundred soldiers) for having greater faith than any Israelite and prophesies the ingathering of the Gentiles before healing his servant from afar. This passage shows that the great pilgrimage of peoples toward the kingdom has begun and evokes the beautiful image of the feast wherein all believers are definitively gathered together. Outside of this communion and joy there is only darkness; the “weeping and gnashing of teeth” (a phrase found outside Matthew only in Lk 13:28) describes the anguish of those who have remained insensitive to the call that has been welcomed by the very people they have denigrated.
  2. Matthew 8:8 Lord, I am not worthy . . . will be healed: these words of the centurion have become those of believers who go to encounter the Lord in Holy Communion.