Children of the Kingdom

(Matthew 8:5-13) (4th Sunday after Pentecost)

Here’s the bottom line on today’s reading from the Gospel according to St. Matthew: An outsider has more faith than the children of the kingdom. The centurion is praised by our Lord, and held up by Him as an example, to warn those who think they are the children of the kingdom that, in effect, their seat at the table is not guaranteed – that there will be weeping and wailing and gnashing of teeth among many who thought that they were “in.” We need to be careful, because, today, it is not the scribes and Pharisees who are at risk; rather, we are the children of the kingdom – and the warning is thus meant for us. What, then, must we do to be saved?

The answer is found in the Gospel; it can be summed up in one statement made by the centurion. Let’s take a look at the sequence of steps that leads us to the answer.

The centurion has a servant who is dying, and he desires that the Lord heal his servant. He knows it is not necessary for the servant to be brought into the physical presence of the Lord, for the Lord can heal the servant with a word. The Lord does not merely grant the centurion’s request, but offers to go with the centurion to his house. The centurion replies that it is not any more necessary for the Lord to come to the servant than it is for the servant to come to the Lord. His authority is such that His commands will be obeyed, without regard to His physical location.

The key is how the centurion begins his declaration of faith in the Lord’s power to heal: “Lord, I am not worthy that thou shouldest come under my roof.” By declaring that he was a sinner, and therefore not worthy to have the Lord enter into his dwelling place, he gained not only the healing of his servant, but also a place in the household of God, a place of glory in the kingdom of heaven.

The mistake that so burdened the scribes and the Pharisees was that they thought that, as they were the children of Abraham, they were automatically going to receive the reward that Abraham received – a place in the kingdom of God. But, as our Lord tells them at another time, “The Lord is able to raise up children of Abraham from these stones.” Our mistake is very similar. We think, because we have been “born again,” baptized into Christ, that we are automatically heirs of the promise. We must recognize that our failure to “put on Christ,” evidenced by our sins, makes us unworthy, unless we repent of our sins, and confess them, and do all we can to assist in the transformation of our being, through prayer, and fasting, the giving of alms, and the struggle to uproot our passions and establish the godly virtues in their place. If we think we are worthy, we will not examine our lives, or confess, or repent – and so we will be at risk of finding ourselves cast into the outer darkness, and the torments that will follow for all eternity.

Brothers and sisters, called to be saints: Let us ask God for grace to examine ourselves; and for grace to repent and confess our sins, and our own unworthiness. We must be honest about who we are; even as we do not give up the hope that God loves us, and desires not the death of sinners, but that all should come unto Him and be saved. Let us give thanks for God’s love and mercy, that He accepts us even as we are unworthy, making us clean once more by our confession – that He may enter under the roof of our lives, and dwell with us, that we may live with Him forever.