Ever read the passage below and ask yourself, how did the centurion know? What were the signs? What did he see that others didn’t?
And when the centurion, who stood facing him, saw that in this way he breathed his last, he said, Truly this man was the Son of God! (Mark 15:39)
So to frame this story, Jesus was left for dead, abandoned by his friends, stripped of his clothes, and hanging on a cross with two convicted criminals. His hearing and public flogging was a mockery of law. Pilate himself washed his hands of the whole ordeal. It’s not anything uncommon in history. The centurion has seen people crucified his entire military career, that’s what the Romans did to maintain peace throughout their vast empire. Surely, he’s seen hundreds of innocents crucified. But, when the centurion calls Jesus the “son of God” there must have been some evidence for him to do so! You see, the centurion didn’t know that Jesus was the “Son of God” with a capital “S.” Not at all, I mean, how could he– the guy wasn’t even Christian. What he did know was that Jesus, who had just died on the cross, for no reason, was favored by God. He knew this when the “darkness covered the whole land.” Call it superstitious or call it intuition, call it whatever you want– but the centurion saw the sign. A lot of us have been exposed to the sign that Jesus is in fact the “Son of God.” We don’t have to wonder about that like the centurion did. The centurion could only assume it and make a blanket statement calling Jesus a “child of God”; but we know better. We know that the signs pointing to Jesus as THE Son. If Jesus is THE SON, then shouldn’t we know that by trusting in Jesus, we too become positioned to know God? Moreover, wouldn’t we know the will of God for our lives a bit more clearly? It’s something to think about.
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