THE BOOK OF MATTHEW

Lesson 28, Chapter 8 Continued

As we delve deeper and deeper into Matthew's Gospel, to this point we have found three elements to be always present and repetitive; therefore it is crucial for us to notice them and to understand that Matthew has constructed his Gospel around them. First, Matthew presents Yeshua of Nazareth as the second Moses and thus paints Him in that role as the "prophet like me" that Moses prophesied would come. Second, the Kingdom of Heaven has arrived. It arrived when John the Baptist appeared as a type of Elijah (or, perhaps better, having the spirit of Elijah) announcing that a path is being made in the wilderness for the coming of the Lord. Thus, everything that happens and every utterance of Christ is to be taken in that knowledge and context because it marks the beginning of new era that ushers us into the final era. And third, Matthew highlights the ongoing relevance and efficacy of The Law of Moses for Jesus's followers; only now it is to be accomplished in light of Believers having the Holy Spirit dwelling in us and of Messiah's demand (given in the Sermon on the Mount) that these laws and commandments from His Father are to be taken to an even higher level in our lives, with not only outward but also inward moral perfection as the goal. Not only our behavior is to be conformed to the will of God, but also our intents and motives. 

Many Bible scholars and commentators, as well as numerous of those esteemed men who established the original faith doctrines of the thousands of Christian denominations, would generally agree with my observation as concerns the first two of these three elements we thus far find constantly present within the Book of Matthew. Few would agree with the third element even though a plain, logical (even historical) reading of Matthew's narrative reveals it with a great degree of clarity. I have long found it fascinating and not just a little puzzling why it is this way; and what or who the source of this anti-Law of Moses viewpoint was.  I also know from the many emails sent to me that not just a few of you might like to know how this happened and what the earliest Church thought about this matter; and if this anti-Law stance of the modern Church has always been with us. So before we continue in Matthew chapter 8, we're going to take a substantial detour to look into this rather important matter that has, to my way of thinking, sent the Church hurtling towards the very darkness that Christ was warning against. The way to do this is to study the writings of the Early Church Fathers. 

This is going to be a bit lengthy because I'm going to present to you some of the writings of the Early Church Fathers. Because context matters, I'm not going to quote only a phrase or a sentence, but rather a paragraph or more. So be patient, but please also be focused. This is information that every Believer needs. 

There is a long list of what are commonly called Early Church Fathers. These are Bishops, teachers, and scholars that include the very earliest 1st century Church leaders (apart from the original Apostles) all the way up to 8th century Church leaders. The main dividing points are whether each served in the east or the west, and whether each lived and wrote before or after the Council of Nicea. It was at the Council of Nicea early in the 4th century, convened at the behest of the Roman Emperor Constantine, when the Christian Church began to morph into something more recognizable to us today as the institution that it has become. At Nicea and later at Laodicea the many independent Churches underwent a consolidation of authority to be based in Rome, with a centralized Church government, and under a set of common faith doctrines and principles (although some of the attending Bishops rejected those doctrines and so many of those churches grew on their own outside the authority of Rome). The vast majority of these faith doctrines have shaped and tooled especially the Western Church from that day forward, for the better or worse.

The earliest of the Early Church Fathers is Clement of Rome. Clement was born about 30 A.D., around the time of Christ's crucifixion. So he was alive during the lifetimes of the original 12 Disciples. Not a great deal is known about his early history, or exactly when He became a Believer. What is known is that in the later part of his life he became a member of the Church government of the Church in Rome; thus he had power and authority. What makes him so important for what I'd like to show you is that he represents the absolute earliest of the Church Fathers that operated at a time when Jews still represented the bulk of Church leadership. It is believed that Clement was a gentile and probably a Roman. He was personally discipled by both Peter and Paul. We find him mentioned most prominently in the Book of Philippians, when he was working alongside Paul at the City of Philippi about 57 A.D.

CJB Philippians 4:3 I also request you, loyal Syzygus, to help these women; for they have worked hard proclaiming the Good News with me, along with Clement and the rest of my fellow-workers whose names are in the Book of Life. 

Near to or shortly after Paul's death Clement wrote Epistles to various of the Churches that Paul had established because Clement was a natural successor to the martyred Paul having been at his side and learning his doctrine from him. This is a good time to mention that many epistles written by various early church leaders were floating around the many Believing synagogues (which is what the earliest churches were), as were several Gospel accounts of Christ's life. It would not be until early in the 3rd century that a Church council convened and chose from among quite a number of these authoritative documents the few that would be declared holy with the purpose of establishing the first Christian Bible: what we call the New Testament. So Clement's letters carried much weight, as did Paul's, Peter's, and John's. 

Unfortunately, few of Clement's works have survived; we only know of the existence of the others because they are given mention by later Church fathers such as Polycarp, Papias, and Eusibius. However we do have what has become labeled as the 1st Epistle to the Corinthians penned by Clement that reveals some important information about his faith principles and his foundational beliefs. Since there is no known rebuttal of his viewpoint from his era, nor does he disagree with any of the New Testament writings that would come later, it is reasonable to conclude that his can be taken as the earliest doctrinal viewpoint not only of gentile members of the Church of Jesus Christ, but also of its leadership….Jew and gentile. His Epistle is wonderful reading but for the sake of time and for our purposes I will give you only of a couple of excerpts that are especially eye opening and characteristic of his entire Epistle, while at the same time pointing out that the reason for his letter to the Corinthian Church that Paul had established was that the Church there was in turmoil and fighting amongst themselves. The wolves in sheep's clothing that Yeshua warned His followers would come, the false prophets that were to arise within the Church, were the problem.  But the problem behind the problem was disobedience to the Laws of Moses, although perhaps not in ways we might instinctively suspect. Here is Clement of Rome:

These things therefore being manifest to us, and since we look into the depths of the divine knowledge, it behooves us to do all things in [their proper] order, which the Lord has commanded us to perform at stated times. 1 He has enjoined offerings [to be presented] and service to be performed [to Him], and that not thoughtlessly or irregularly, but at the appointed times and hours. Where and by whom He desires these things to be done, He Himself has fixed by His own supreme will, in order that all things being piously done according to His good pleasure, may be acceptable unto Him. 2 Those, therefore, who present their offerings at the appointed times, are accepted and blessed; for inasmuch as they follow the laws of the Lord, they sin not. For his own peculiar services are assigned to the high priest, and their own proper place is prescribed to the priests, and their own special ministrations devolve on the Levites. The layman is bound by the laws that pertain to laymen.

Put on your Jewish mindset for the moment to understand what the gentile Believer and Church leader Clement is saying. He says that the Believers of Corinth are duty bound to do all things in their proper order. By order he means from a Christ follower's perspective the things (ritual things) that are to be done, when they are to be done, and who is to do them. The things that the Believers at Corinth are to do (and therefore this pertains to any and every group of Christians) are the rituals that the Lord has commanded to be observed at their stated times (or, better, at their appointed times). Therefore Clement goes on to say that the required offerings (sacrifices) and the way they are to be presented are fixed by God, and therefore are to be done in a pious manner so that such observances cannot change and will be pleasing to God. This means that when one presents their offerings they should occur at the appointed times (biblical feasts for example) so that they will be accepted and blessed by God. And further that doing the things that are the laws of the Lord means they are thereby avoiding sin. That is, to NOT do these laws and commandments as they are prescribed is sin… and clearly this can only be referring to the Law of Moses. 

While so many in the Church will twist his term "the laws of the Lord" into meaning "the laws of Jesus" (which is simply not so), we find Clement making it clear that it can only be the Law of Moses (the biblical Torah) he is speaking about because he then devolves into saying that the Priests must do what the Lord commanded, as well as the Levites, and then laymen as well (there is no record of Yeshua issuing instructions to Priests and Levites). Priests and Levites each have their own roles that cannot be assigned to the common class of God worshippers….laymen. Yet layman also have their own set of responsibilities (in Clement's language, their own order). Let's read a little further in the 1st Epistle to the Corinthians by Clement.

Let every one of you, brethren, give thanks to God in his own order, living in all good conscience, with becoming gravity, and not going beyond the rule of the ministry prescribed to him. Not in every place, brethren, are the daily sacrifices offered, or the peace-offerings, or the sin-offerings and the trespass-offerings, but in Jerusalem only. And even there they are not offered in any place, but only at the altar before the temple, that which is offered being first carefully examined by the high priest and the ministers already mentioned. Those, therefore, who do anything beyond that which is agreeable to His will, are punished with death. Ye see, 3 brethren, that the greater the knowledge that has been vouchsafed to us, the greater also is the danger to which we are exposed.

The first thing we can conclude from his words are that since he speaks plainly about the Temple and the altar and the sacrifices thereupon, he wrote this Epistle prior to the destruction of the Temple in 70 A.D. But also notice that clearly Clement was addressing a controversy. It seems that some in the church of Corinth were offering the daily tamid (the every day sacrifices prescribed in the Law of Moses), as well as offering some of the other classes of sacrifices like peace offerings, sin offerings and trespass offerings locally, in Corinth. This could only be happening at an altar the Corinthian Believers built, probably associated with their synagogue (the church) at Corinth. But, that was not their right or position to do so. These sacrificial rituals were to be done only by Priests and Levites and only at the Temple in Jerusalem. So what we find is that Clement, the earliest gentile Church Father, Paul's and Peter's understudy, understands that the Law of Moses including the ongoing Temple sacrifices pertain to Believers. But…. Believers cannot change the Law in the name of Christ such that laymen can now perform sacrifices, or that these sacrifices can now be performed in Corinth or any other place they might choose. Rather, these must only be done by Priests at the Temple altar in Jerusalem as prescribed by the Law. There can be no stronger or straightforward endorsement than Clement's of the continuing relevance and authority of the Law of Moses, as it stood for centuries, for ALL Believers. 

Those of us, the minority in the Church, who believe in Yeshua as Savior, and that only His blood and divine grace can save us, and at the same time also know from Yeshua's own words that we are duty bound to continue following the Law of Moses (not as a means of gaining our salvation but rather as proper evidence of it). This is something that is exactly in line with what Clement was taught by Paul and Peter and so he himself continued the doctrine. We don't have to speculate about this since it is recorded for us. 

Another very early Church Father, Papias, was born when Clement was about 40 years old, and he seems to have personally known Clement. Although there are but fragments of his works available to us, we learn this important fact from Papias:

Matthew put together the oracles [of the Lord] in the Hebrew language, and each one interpreted them as best he could.

So what we are reading in our New Testament from the Jewish Matthew was first written down in Matthew's and Christ's birth language, Hebrew, and this fact lends further weight to Clement's position concerning what he was taught from the Jews Peter and Paul. When we maintain the Jewish context (both cultural and religious) that the New Testament was written in, and Matthew's is the most Jewish of the Gospels, clearly the earliest Christians knew that they were to continue obeying the Law of Moses. However some Believers outside of the Holy Land went so far (too far) by trying to perform the Priestly duties of the Law themselves, and doing them where ever they happened to live (in this case in Corinth). So from around 50 A.D. to around 90 or 100 A.D., the generally held belief within the Church was that the Law of Moses was still relevant, valid, and to be obeyed by both Jewish and gentile Believers. However the "how" of it was being hotly debated within the Church whose congregations were dispersed in foreign nations outside of the Holy Land. 

As we read the works of succeeding Church Fathers we see a decided turn from how to do the Law as Believers, to these leaders being against the Law and then even against Jews. We find this reality boldly expressed in the writings of the Early Church Father Justin Martyr. He was born in 110 A.D. and died at only 55 years old. But, he wrote profusely and his works are greatly revered and taught within Christian Seminaries, at least partly because so many of his documents are complete and well preserved. They are also well pleasing to a gentiles-only Church. I'll read to you some excerpts that he wrote, which come from one of the most famous documents in all of Christendom: A Dialogue with Trypho. 

By all accounts this is a true encounter that the gentile Christian Justin Martyr had with the Jew Trypho (and during part of the conversation some of Trypho's Jewish friends were present). And so in "A Dialogue With Trypho" we read about this back and forth conversation between Justin and Trypho. I want to read a few excerpts from it so that you can see what Christianity had already become by around 150 A.D.; only perhaps 60 or 70 years after the Church Father Clement lived, governed, and wrote. 

(Justin Martyr says) "Is there any other matter, my friends, in which we are blamed, than this, that we live not after the law, and are not circumcised in the flesh as your forefathers were, and do not observe Sabbaths as you do? Are our lives and customs also slandered among you? And I ask this: have you also believed concerning us, that we eat men; and that after the feast, having extinguished the lights, we engage in promiscuous concubinage? Or do you condemn us in this alone, that we adhere to such tenets, and believe in an opinion, untrue, as you think?"

"This is what we are amazed at," said Trypho, "but those things about which the multitude speak are not worthy of belief; for they are most repugnant to human nature. Moreover, I am aware that your precepts in the so-called Gospel are so wonderful and so great, that I suspect no one can keep them; for I have carefully read them. But this is what we are most at a loss about: that you, professing to be pious, and supposing yourselves better than others, are not in any particular separated from them, and do not alter your mode of living from the nations, in that you observe no festivals or sabbaths, and do not have the rite of circumcision; and further, resting your hopes on a man that was crucified, you yet expect to obtain some good thing from God, while you do not obey His commandments. Have you not read, that that soul shall be cut off from his people who shall not have been circumcised on the eighth day? And this has been ordained for strangers and for slaves equally. But you, despising this covenant rashly, reject the consequent duties, and attempt to persuade yourselves that you know God, when, however, you perform none of those things which they do who fear God. If, therefore, you can defend yourself on these points, and make it manifest in what way you hope for anything whatsoever, even though you do not observe the law, this we would very gladly hear from you, and we shall make other similar investigations."

So Justin Martyr says that there are all kinds of slanderous accusations by Jews about what Christians do, even including cannibalism and having wild festive orgies. Let me pause to point out that by this time gentiles fully controlled the Church; Jewish Believers had been marginalized and mostly pushed out. So what Jews said about Christians was essentially a retort and response to what a gentile, exclusionary Christianity now falsely claimed against Jews. A tit for tat if you would.

Trypho responds to Justin that he is intelligent and observant enough to know that some of the more outrageous things said about Christians aren't true. However, he does believe that some other things said are true and they completely puzzle him. He says that he has carefully read the Gospel (which of the several in circulation at that time we don't know, but my bet is that it was Matthew's because his was written at first in Hebrew and was written to Jews in a Jewish context). And these things that puzzle him are: how can you read the Gospel and say you believe what was written, and then turn around and refuse to obey the Law of Moses as a basic doctrine? How can you defend dropping the feasts, the Sabbath, and refuse circumcision when the subject of the Gospel, Jesus, Himself obeyed these laws and has said His followers should, too? Trypho, it seems to me, received some of the truths of the Gospel better than did Justin Martyr. It's only that Trypho rejected it on the principle of Yeshua of Nazareth being the Messiah and the Son of God. 

Here is Justin's response to Trypho's accusation:

"There will be no other God, O Trypho, nor was there from eternity any other existing" (I thus addressed him), "but He who made and disposed all this universe. Nor do we think that there is one God for us, another for you, but that He alone is God who led your fathers out from Egypt with a strong hand and a high arm. Nor have we trusted in any other (for there is no other), but in Him in whom you also have trusted, the God of Abraham, and of Isaac, and of Jacob. But we do not trust through Moses or through the law; for then we would do the same as yourselves.

Justin then goes on to attack a few of God's laws and commandments of the Torah. 

"And God himself proclaimed by Moses, speaking thus: ‘And circumcise the hardness of your hearts, and no longer stiffen the neck. For the Lord your God is both Lord of lords, and a great, mighty, and terrible God, who regardeth not persons, and taketh not rewards.' 4 And in Leviticus: ‘Because they have transgressed against Me, and despised Me, and because they have walked contrary to Me, I also walked contrary to them, and I shall cut them off in the land of their enemies. Then shall their uncircumcised heart be turned. 5 For the circumcision according to the flesh, which is from Abraham, was given for a sign; that you may be separated from other nations, and from us; and that you alone may suffer that which you now justly suffer; and that your land may be desolate, and your cities burned with fire; and that strangers may eat your fruit in your presence, and not one of you may go up to Jerusalem.' 6 For you are not recognized among the rest of men by any other mark than your fleshly circumcision. For none of you, I suppose, will venture to say that God neither did nor does foresee the events, which are future, nor foreordained his deserts for each one. Accordingly, these things have happened to you in fairness and justice, for you have slain the Just One, and His prophets before Him; and now you reject those who hope in Him, and in Him who sent Him–God the Almighty and Maker of all things –cursing in your synagogues those that believe on Christ. For you have not the power to lay hands upon us, on account of those who now have the mastery.

So Justin (who is now sarcastic and talking down to Trypho) says that circumcision of the flesh is only for Jews; and Jews are circumcised only because they are rebellious and evil before God. That is, circumcision has always been more punishment and curse than blessing. And further, Jews have no place in leading Christians (laying hands upon us), because gentile Christians are now in control (those who now have the mastery). A little more of Justin:

"Moreover, that God enjoined you to keep the Sabbath, and impose on you other precepts for a sign, as I have already said, on account of your unrighteousness, and that of your fathers,–

"Moreover, you were commanded to abstain from certain kinds of food, in order that you might keep God before your eyes while you ate and drank, seeing that you were prone and very ready to depart from His knowledge…..

So we see that by about 150 A.D. it had become doctrine that Christians not only should not obey the Law, they saw God's commandments as inherently bad and essentially God  created them to be a curse set upon a people (the Hebrews) and given to them due to their unrighteousness. 

It gets worse from there forward as the Early Church Fathers that follow Justin Martyr become more and more entrenched in anti-Jewish, anti-Law rhetoric and doctrine until we come to the time of the Council of Nicea in 325 A.D., which began a series of ecumenical council meetings that wrote and forever embedded within Christianity those same anti-Jewish, anti-Law views of Justin Martyr that would have startled and dismayed the earliest Church Father, Clement of Rome. Sadly, Justin Martyr is held up by the institutional Church as exemplary and his views are to be taken dearly and more or less followed as doctrine. Therefore it is not hard to trace what happened within Christianity that it became anti-Law of Moses and anti-Jewish, as it corresponds directly to the deaths of Peter, Paul, and John, the end of the authority in the Church of Jewish Apostles and gentiles like Clement, and then the takeover of gentiles who very quickly abandoned and then outlawed anything within Christianity that even resembled something that the Jews did. By definition this included no further obedience to the Law of Moses and the end of observing God-appointed times like Sabbath, the biblical feasts, the ordinance of male circumcision, and more. 

I believe I've said enough to get my point across. It was not my intention to teach a course on the Early Church Fathers today, but rather to show you the path that was taken so early in the development of Christianity to disavow the Law of Moses. So we'll stop here and get back into Matthew chapter 8. 

We ended last time at verse 13, the story of the Roman Centurion in Capernaum asking Yeshua to heal his ill house slave. While it is erroneously taught that this is about a gentile coming to faith in Jesus Christ as Lord and Savior, that is not evident in this story. There is nothing said about a conversion. It is only that the Centurion knew of, or was eyewitness to, Yeshua's miraculous healing powers and so asked Him if he would do the same for his house slave (obviously this servant was dear to the Centurion's heart). Yeshua was not astonished because this gentile soldier had a religious faith in Yeshua or was perhaps a secret convert (such was not the case); rather He saw the unyielding trust in Yeshua's ability to heal as a good illustration for the Jews to pattern themselves after as the unyielding type and depth of faith they ought to have in God. But because so many Jews in general (He calls them "those born for the Kingdom") have nothing like this kind of faith, then Christ says the consequence is that they will not be admitted into the Kingdom of Heaven but rather will be thrown into the darkness outside of it. Bottom line: a deep unequivocal trust in God is needed to be part of the Kingdom; a trust that is reflected in their lives and actions. Simply being born of a Hebrew heritage does not give any Jew a free ticket into the Kingdom of Heaven. Only those Jews who heed the warning shall enter the Kingdom. 

Let's read a little more. Open your Bibles to Matthew chapter 8.

READ MATTHEW CHAPTER 8:14 – 17

The Gospel of Mark also reports on the story of Yeshua going to Peter's house to tend to Peter's ill mother-in-law. Before we discuss it, let's read Mark's version.

CJB Mark 1:29-31 29 They left the synagogue and went with Ya'akov and Yochanan to the home of Shim'on and Andrew. 30 Shim'on's mother-in-law was lying sick with a fever, and they told Yeshua about her. 31 He came, took her by the hand and lifted her onto her feet. The fever left her, and she began helping them. 

So from Mark we learn that Yeshua had been in a synagogue in Capernaum, along with his brother James and His disciple John (the eventual writer of Revelation). This has to have occurred after Yeshua had returned to Capernaum from speaking His Sermon on the Mount. Although it is hard to tell when because Mark never even mentions the Sermon on the Mount. The 3 men went to Peter's (Shimon's) house (apparently the disciple Andrew was also living there at the time) where Christ would perform yet another miracle healing. One take away from these couple of verses is that Peter indeed was a married man (although his wife, and the existence of children, is never explicitly mentioned). 

Yeshua touched Peter's mother-in-law by taking her hand, and she was healed (specifically healed of her fever). Then, because the healing was immediate, she got up out of her sickbed and began to serve Yeshua. In the Jewish culture of that day, as it pertains to women, to "serve him" didn't hold a religious meaning. Rather it merely meant to prepare and serve Jesus a meal. The lack of detailed information and Jesus's knowledge of the woman's illness implies a closer relationship with her than with the others He healed. That is, she seems to have been known and familiar to Him. 

I think another, but much shorter, detour is in order. The truth of this story is further validated by the discovery of Peter's house in Capernaum; a rather well preserved archeological sight. Peter's house is only a hundred feet or so from the ruins of a large synagogue. However those ruins are of a later synagogue built in the 300's A.D., which likely lies upon the ruins of the earlier one (such was the way things were done during biblical times).  I've had the pleasure of taking many of you there on tours to Israel. At present a Catholic Church is built over the sight. That is to say, it is a building built on pillars above the ruins of Peter's house to both commemorate it and to preserve it. 

Peter's house was typical of the era; small, simple, and unadorned. However archeologists discovered that perhaps late in the 1st century or very early in the 2nd there were additions to it, including an octagonal structure built around the original, with the original walls plastered and incorporated into the newer structure. There is little doubt that Peter's house was well known among early Believers and held to be very special (probably because it was with Peter that Yeshua lived), and so it was used as a small church that was later expanded to a larger one.  

During Yeshua's day Capernaum was a medium-sized town of about 1500 or so people; obviously it was a fishing village as it was built on the shore of the Sea of Galilee. But it also lay along an important trade route so the town was a mix of Jews and non-Jews….. mostly Romans. Doubling back to the story of the Roman Centurion we read about, he actually lived in Capernaum, which explains his presence there. The Romans always carefully guarded the all-important trade routes so a garrison of soldiers stationed there would be logical. It would have been a very short walk from Jesus's encounter with the Centurion to the Centurion's house for Christ to heal his house slave. So even though the rules of Jewish Tradition made the homes of gentiles unclean, they lived side by side with Jews. The Romans and the Jews encountered and worked with one another daily and thus the Centurion would have been well schooled about Jewish attitudes and customs towards gentiles. 

As a history buff and a former archeology major at university, it is always important to me to notice what kinds of materials were used for construction. Peter's house and the subsequent additions to it over the next couple of centuries were made of the local stone: basalt. Basalt is volcanic in origin. In fact, the volcano that spewed out the basalt and lava that came to be used for the construction of Capernaum is to be found at what is known today as the Golan Heights. So the buildings and houses at that time were very rough looking, although the hardness of the basalt stone made the homes very sturdy and has allowed these structures to survive for centuries (and they will survive for many more; their real enemy is earthquakes). Thus the first and most obvious clue that the present synagogue in Capernaum is not the original one from Christ's time is that it was built using limestone, which had to come from some distance away; an expensive operation that a village of Jewish fishermen could never have contemplated. 

So although Christ was born in Bethlehem, and He lived for many years with His parents in Nazareth, during His days of ministry on earth He lived most of the time in Capernaum. Luke's version of this story puts several pieces of it together, so we'll conclude today with it. 

 CJB Luke 7:1-10 1 When Yeshua had finished speaking to the people, he went back to K'far-Nachum. 2 A Roman army officer there had a servant he regarded highly, who was sick to the point of death. 3 Hearing about Yeshua, the officer sent some Jewish elders to him with the request that he come and heal his servant. 4 They came to Yeshua and pleaded earnestly with him, "He really deserves to have you do this, 5 for he loves our people- in fact, he built the synagogue for us!" 6 So Yeshua went with them. He had not gone far from the house, when the officer sent friends who said to him, "Sir, don't trouble yourself. I'm not worthy to have you come under my roof- 7 this is why I didn't presume to approach you myself. Instead, just give a command and let my servant recover. 8 For I too am a man set under authority. I have soldiers under me; and I say to this one, 'Go!' and he goes; and to another, 'Come!' and he comes; and to my slave, 'Do this!' and he does it." 9 Yeshua was astonished at him when he heard this; and he turned and said to the crowd following him, "I tell you, not even in Isra'el have I found such trust!" 10 When the messengers got back to the officer's house, they found the servant in good health. 

We'll continue in Matthew next week.