It was customary for the Saviour as He went about healing the sick throughout Judea, to come and lay His hand upon them, or allow them to touch Him, and thus impart to them the healing virtue which restored their strength.
And as we read the narrative of His ministry among the sick and afflicted, we naturally receive the impression that the miraculous blessings which He bestowed upon the people came through their personal contact with Him.
We think that if we but had the chance to secure personal contact with the visible, tangible Jesus of Nazareth whom they knew, our opportunities of being blessed as they were would be much greater than they are.
But there was one miracle performed by the Saviour, the account of which leads the thoughtful mind toward quite another conclusion. We refer to the healing of the centurion's servant. The event is thus related by Matthew: "And when Jesus was entered into Capernaum, there came unto Him a centurion, beseeching Him, And saying, Lord, my servant lies at home sick of the palsy, grievously tormented. And Jesus said unto him, I will come and heal him. The centurion answered and said, Lord, I am not worthy that you should come under my roof: but speak the word only, and my servant shall be healed. For I am a man under authority, having soldiers under me; and I say to this man, Go, and he goes; and to another, Come, and he comes; and to my servant, Do this, and he does it. When Jesus heard it, He marveled, and said to them that followed, Verily I say unto you, I have not found so great faith, no, not in Israel. ... And Jesus said unto the centurion, Go your way; and as you have believed, so be it done unto you. And his servant was healed in the selfsame hour." (Matthew 8:5-10,13)
Jesus did not come near the centurion's servant; the latter neither touched Him nor saw Him; yet he was healed as effectually as were any upon whom Christ laid His hands. The centurion said to Jesus, "Speak the word only, and my servant shall be healed." (Matthew 8:8)
And the Saviour put the stamp of truthfulness upon the utterance by saying, "I have not found so great faith, no, not in Israel." (Matthew 8:10)
"The word only"! That is sufficient, and this is the language of faith. Those words, and not "I will come," spoke the necessity of the occasion.
Then cannot we speak them with the same assurance, and do we not stand upon a level with the centurion in relation to the healing power of Christ? How far off from the needy one must the Saviour be for His word to lose its power? Farther, we may be sure, than heaven is from the earth.
And this is what we read in another scripture. For it is declared that: "The righteousness which is of faith speaks on this wise, Saynot in your heart, Who shall ascend into heaven (that is, to bring Christ down from above)? Or who shall descend into the deep (that is, to bring up Christ again from the dead)? But what does it say? The word is near you, even in your mouth and in your heart,-that is, the word of faith which we preach; That if you shall confess with your mouth the Lord Jesus, and shall believe in your heart that God has raised Him from the dead, you shall be saved." (Romans 10:6-9)
And this is the same word by which Christ healed all diseases.--Present Truth, April 26, 1894--Timeline: IV-16 (The Centurion's Servant)--Matthew 8:5-13.