Only say the word and my servant will be healed

Is 2,1-5; Ps 121,1-2.4.6-9; Mt 8,5-11.
3 DECEMBER

The weekday liturgy of the Advent Masses presents the faith of a pagan in Christ Jesus as a model of the faith of every other man, believer and non-believer. The same faith is placed by the Church in every Mass celebration immediately before approaching to receive the Eucharist: “Lord, I am not worthy that you come under my roof, but just say one word and my servant will be healed”. The centurion has the soldier’s faith. The whole military hierarchy is based on the given word which is a true order. The superior says a word, any word, and the inferior executes it, obeys with an immediate listening. Jesus is the Omnipotent Superior of all creation. There is no created element that has not been subjected to him. He commands and even the atoms of matter start listening and with immediate obedience they execute the order received. In the army it is not the superior the one who runs from one place to another. Who runs instead is his Word. This reaches every ear, the will makes it his own and what is commanded is immediately done. Jesus does not need to move. The Word is enough for him.

The centurion takes us back to the first page of Genesis. Only ten words were sufficient to the Lord, and the whole visible and invisible, material and spiritual universe was created. The Lord did not use his hands to create. One Word alone was enough. Let there be light and the light was. It also leads us to what happened with Moses in Egypt for the liberation of the Lord’s people. Through Moses the Lord gave an order to the elements of his creation and they immediately presented themselves to the call, carrying out what was ordered to them. Christ Jesus participates in the same omnipotence of God. No difference between Him and God. He is the omnipotent God. He is infinitely more than Moses and all the prophets that preceded him. All of them spoke in the name of the Lord. Jesus speaks in his name, with his authority of God, with every power that the Father has put in his hands. The Word of Jesus is  creative,  healing, saving and curing. With the Word Jesus frees from leprosy, calls the dead to life and multiplies bread. A Word is sufficient for Jesus to give life to every death.

When he entered Capernaum, a centurion approached him and appealed to him, saying, “Lord, my servant is lying at home paralyzed, suffering dreadfully.” He said to him, “I will come and cure him.” The centurion said in reply, “Lord, I am not worthy to have you enter under my roof; only say the word and my servant will be healed. For I too am a person subject to authority, with soldiers subject to me. And I say to one, ‘Go,’ and he goes; and to another, ‘Come here,’ and he comes; and to my slave, ‘Do this,’ and he does it.” When Jesus heard this, he was amazed and said to those following him, “Amen, I say to you, in no one in Israel have I found such faith. I say to you, many will come from the east and the west, and will recline with Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob at the banquet in the kingdom of heaven.

We walk towards the Christmas of the Lord. We await the birth of the Saviour and of the Redeemer of man. We must go to meet him with a faith that is always new, pure, holy and alive. We must believe that the one born is the Lord Almighty, the eternal Son of the Father, the Word through whose Word the whole universe was created. He comes to give every servant of the Father seriously ill the healing from sin and death. The centurion, that is, every scientific, military, economic, political, social, spiritual, administrative and financial human power, cannot heal man. Thus, the centurion becomes an image, a figure of every power that exists in creation. None of them can heal, cure the servant of the Father that is gravely suffering because of his sin. Then, it is urgent that every power of the earth and of the heavens is bent before Christ Jesus and asks him to utter the Word of salvation and redemption. There is no real celebration of Advent if we approach the Holy Christmas with a perverse thought in the heart: that Jesus is a power as a centurion before another centurion. Jesus is the only source of the Word that can heal the servants of the Father. It is urgent to put this faith into every heart. Jesus is the only one who has Words of eternal life. All the others are centurions who can do nothing. Never.

Mother of God, Angels and Saints give us a pure, holy and live faith in Christ Jesus.