Daily Bible Reading 15th June 2026 // Luke 7:1-10
1 After he had finished all his sayings in the hearing of the people, he entered Capernaum. 2 Now a centurion had a servant who was sick and at the point of death, who was highly valued by him. 3 When the centurion heard about Jesus, he sent to him elders of the Jews, asking him to come and heal his servant. 4 And when they came to Jesus, they pleaded with him earnestly, saying, “He is worthy to have you do this for him, 5 for he loves our nation, and he is the one who built us our synagogue.” 6 And Jesus went with them. When he was not far from the house, the centurion sent friends, saying to him, “Lord, do not trouble yourself, for I am not worthy to have you come under my roof. 7 Therefore I did not presume to come to you. But say the word, and let my servant be healed. 8 For I too am a man set under authority, with soldiers under me: and I say to one, ‘Go’, and he goes; and to another, ‘Come’, and he comes; and to my servant, ‘Do this’, and he does it.” 9 When Jesus heard these things, he marvelled at him, and turning to the crowd that followed him, said, “I tell you, not even in Israel have I found such faith.” 10 And when those who had been sent returned to the house, they found the servant well.
The third and final point in this story is this: Luke was a Gentile, and he was writing to Gentiles, and from the Gentile point of view. And this story, of faith in a Gentile must surely have appealed to Luke's mind, and to the mind of the Gentile Church, as showing forth one basic principle of the gospel. What we mean is this: Jesus had come to the Jews in person; but to the Gentiles He did not come in person, but only in His Word, in the word of the gospel. And this is how it was with the centurion. For him, Christ's word was as good as His presence: 'Say in a word, and my servant shall be healed'. This is how the gospel works today. Christ does not come to us in person, in the flesh, but in the word of the gospel, and by the Spirit. And the same faith that was in the centurion can operate in us also.
A final postscript: how can we be like this man, how can we have a faith like this? Ah, we have to be under authority, like him, before it can be possible. Only those under the authority of Christ can ever have authority in Christian life. The hymn says,
My will is not my own
Till Thou hast made it Thine
And this expresses the necessary and glorious paradox that is as true for the further reaches of the Christian life as for its beginning. We shall never know freedom till we are captive to Christ and His will, and shall therefore never know authority and power over sin until we are under authority to Him. John's words in the Prologue of his gospel are very pertinent in this regard: 'As many as received Him, to them gave He authority...'