Our Lord offers us Healing and Unity with Him

Archbishop Seraphim : Homily
Our Lord offers us Healing and Unity with Him
4th Sunday after Pentecost
20 June, 2010
Romans 6:18-23 ; Matthew 8:5-13


In the Name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit.

Human beings have a tendency to want to have rules so that if we follow the rules we think that we are okay with the Lord, somehow. Yet, when we have rules, we are always finding ways to get around them because we do not like rules. It is not dissimilar from living in Canada as it has recently become. I remember that when I was a child there were rules, certainly, about living in Canadian society, but the rules were not nearly as numerous as they have become. Nevertheless, even in my childhood people were getting around the rules one way or another, and as a result, parliament had to pass stricter rules. Then people seem to find ways of getting around those rules, too. Parliament is pressed by the media and the voters to defend us from all these rule-breakers, and they pass stricter laws yet. People get around those rules yet more. It goes around and around like this for us human beings because we are not stable creatures. We are called “rational sheep” but we do not behave very rationally when it comes down to it. We want to have our cake and eat it, too.

We have a tendency to presume on God’s mercy and His love because we tend to think that God is “nice” like a Canadian, and that He will not say or do anything if things are out of order. This is a complete misunderstanding of our Lord who created everything that exists – you and me included. He put order into everything – you and me included. If we are in a mess as human beings, we are in a mess not because God wanted any sort of mess, ever. It is because we, with Adam and Eve, started getting around the rules. There is an ironic humour in that we were given one “No” at the beginning : “Eat everything in the garden, but do not eat that particular fruit”. What did we do ? We ate the particular fruit. Then we complained to God that we were in trouble. We complained that we did not have anymore the joy which we had had in the Garden of Eden. We had it no longer, because we had spoiled everything. It is noteworthy that our forefather and our foremother, Adam and Eve, did not say : “Forgive me. I am sorry”.

This is another reason why we human beings are in the predicament that we are in. Even until the 21st century, even within the Orthodox Church, people are reluctant to say : “I made a mistake. Forgive me. I am sorry. I was stupid at that moment. Please forgive me”. We are not doing this. We are still demanding rights and expecting something. We think that we are owed something, somehow. However, what we really deserve because of our stubborn behaviour, is to be with those who are cast out, and amongst those who are weeping and gnashing teeth.

Today, we are with our Saviour in the town of Capernaum on the north end of the Sea of Galilee. A centurion comes to Him. A centurion is a leader of 100 men in the Roman army. I suppose this would be the equivalent of a major in the Canadian army. This commander of a hundred has a household. The first thing for us to understand about this centurion as a commander in the Roman army is that he is definitely not Jewish. He is living as an occupying army officer in and on Jewish territory. This is not the most friendly and comfortable position to be in, either for the Jewish people who are being occupied or for the Roman officers who are doing the occupying. Yet we see time-and-again in the Gospels that this centurion is not alone. Many are the Roman officers who have encountered God either through Judaism or through our Saviour, Himself. They have come to understand God as the one God, and they have come to love and to serve God. They have seen the difference between the multitude of pagan gods in which the Roman Empire had been living, and this God, who is the God of all and who actually loves His creatures. This is in contrast with the pagan gods of which everyone is always afraid. People live in fear of these gods and idols. We who live in a relationship of love with God, the Creator of all, are not living in fear. We might be in fear of our own stupidity and failings, but we are not afraid of God who loves us. Our life is not lived in perpetual fear that He is going to strike us and beat us up ; but rather, we live in response to His life-creating love for us.

This centurion was amongst those God-believing centurions whom the Jewish people were constantly rejecting because they were not Jewish. That is how it was in those days. The rules of society were that if you were a Jew you were not supposed to have any association with someone who was not Jewish because of contamination of some sort. People were simply living according to the way society functioned in those days. Therefore, the Jews had to keep away from people such as this centurion even though he had come to be a believer. Yet he could not go the whole way and become Jewish because he was a member of the Roman army. Therefore, he was in no-man’s-land, as it were. Knowing that Christ can do something for his servant, and being confident that He will, the Roman centurion comes now to our Saviour. I will make here a little digression, because the word “servant” is often used in a misleading way. The actual Greek word used for “servant” in the Gospel according to Matthew is one which can possibly mean “slave”, but it more usually is used to mean a son or a child. Nevertheless, the Evangelist Luke, as he presents the same event, plainly uses the Greek word for a slave. North American translators seem to be shy to use the word “slave”, but it was a fact of life then, just as it is now (albeit frequently hidden). We can, therefore, correctly understand that the centurion is not talking about a domestic servant that he hires and pays. This man is a slave. (We forget about slavery because we have not lived with it in our midst, at least visibly, for a long time.) The man about whom the centurion is concerned is his property and not an employee. However, unlike many slave-owners, this centurion cares deeply for his slave ; the Evangelist Luke writes that this slave is dear to him. He cares, not merely because the slave is incapacitated, paralysed and cannot do his work. He loves and cares for this slave as if he were a member of his own family. We have encountered other persons like this in the Scriptures whose slaves were really like members of their own families.

This centurion also has great humility. When our Saviour is immediately volunteering to come with him to the slave, the centurion understands that there would be certain implications on the Saviour’s part. The centurion, who is not Jewish, is well aware that if a Jewish person comes into his household, there would be consequences for our Saviour, such as having to take a ritual bath and the equivalent of confession. He would be regarded as ritually unclean. The centurion also understands his own situation as a soldier. Therefore, he says to the Saviour, as it were : “I am an officer. I have people under me, and they do what they are commanded to do. If I say : ‘go’, then they go ; and if I say : ‘come’, then they come”. He concludes by saying plainly to our Saviour : “‘I am not worthy that You should come under my roof. But only speak a word, and my servant will be healed’”. Thus, our Saviour comments to everyone that amongst the believers, He has not seen such great faith as this man has. The servant is immediately healed.

Our Saviour can do this, because He is the Lord of all. He does not have to be there personally and physically, although very often He is there physically because He knows that we need to see His hand touch someone. We very often have to hear Him speak a word and see the healing happen. Just like the blind man, we need to have mud put on our eyes and then go to the pool of Siloam in obedience to the Law, and wash and then see (see John 9:6, 7). The Lord knows us. He knows our hearts. He knows all situations. He knows that we want to live in love with Him.

If we do want to live in love with Him, then it will not be at all out of order for us to have the same confidence in Him that this centurion has today. Because the Lord loves us, we will know that what He will do for us is right for us. Not everyone is visibly healed ; but regardless, something does occur. I have been asked many times when we have been praying the prayers of the special Service of Anointing (with the reading of the seven Gospels) : “What happens when we apply the oil to the people who are coming to be anointed ?” About forty years ago I was told the following by an experienced priest and I found it to be the best explanation. One of four things happens when the oil is applied. The first is that the person will receive from the Lord complete healing : spiritual, physical, everything. The second is that partial healing will occur : spiritual, physical, but not complete. The Lord knows why it is not complete, and He gives us the strength to continue. The third is that there is no visible change in the body but Grace is given to the person to live a holy life despite the difficulties and the illness. Some people not receiving complete or even partial physical healing do have spiritual healing enough so that they can continue to live a life that glorifies God in the middle of suffering. The fourth is that the person is given Grace to come to the end of his or her life in a holy, God-pleasing, God-praising manner.

No matter which of the four occurs at Unction, the Lord’s Holy Spirit is conveyed to each person who is anointed, and the person is given Grace in one of these four ways : to be healed ; to be partially healed ; to be able to live a holy life in the middle of difficulty and suffering ; or to come to the end of life and to die in a manner that is God-pleasing and God-praising. All four are good and positive ways. Which way it is for each one of us depends on what the Lord is showing through us. When people are healed, it is glorifying to God. Even when it is a partial healing, it is glorifying to God, and people can see it very easily. We need to see things sometimes. However, in other cases, a person’s ability to suffer and still to glorify God in the middle of everything says a great deal to other people who are suffering. People need encouragement.

I know of many such persons whose lives continue without physical healing. However, their lives are glorifying the Lord in such a way that others can see the joy that is there despite the suffering, the peace that is there despite the suffering. There is also the witness of coming to the end of life in a beautiful and God-pleasing manner. Recently, the sister of a man I know was found to have terminal cancer. She was expected to die rather rapidly because the various therapies were not successful. Her condition went down so much that at the time of Great and Holy Friday her family was being called to her side because it did not seem that she had more than a few hours up to a couple of days left. Her family gathered. She had been prayed for ; she had received anointing, Holy Communion, prayers, love – everything that the Church could give her. In the hospice where she was, she fell into a coma and was expected to die at any moment. It was Pascha. A doctor-friend of hers, sitting beside her, had fallen asleep. Suddenly she woke up and said to him : “What are you doing here ?” He said to her : “And what are you doing awake ?” Immediately she began to talk very lucidly and very clearly, and said that she wanted to eat. The result of this was that she went home.

She went home with the same diagnosis and the same terminal prognosis. She has obviously been given time with her family by the Lord in order to encourage her family, to strengthen her family, to remind her family of the right way. Her brother said that she is declining physically but she is still speaking to them in the same way. They are even making jokes. Her time is still expected to come again. The Lord works in these ways because He not only knows what we, ourselves, need, but also what those around us need. We are not some sort of solitary island creatures that are not affecting anyone around us. If we are suffering or dying in the context of glorifying God, it is good for those around us who are also suffering. All people around us are suffering in one way or another, even if they do not show it. Canadians, especially, do not show it. Canadians pretend that everything is just fine (but it is not). When they see how suffering can be good and can glorify God, then they are encouraged.

I am saying all these things to underline how much the Lord loves us, and how He cares for the details of our lives. He knows what He is doing with us. It is important to entrust our lives to Him and to try our best not to get around the rules. Let us rather co-operate with Him, and say to Him : “Here I am, Lord, send me” (see Isaiah 6:8). In so doing, we will glorify Him in all aspects of our lives : the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit, now, and ever, and unto the ages of ages.