SPIRITUAL DIARY FOR 9/4/2024 8:19 AM
My Worship Time
Focus: PT-2
“Saving Faith”
Bible Reading & Meditation Reference:
Matthew 27:54
Message of the
verse: “54
Now the centurion, and those who were with him keeping guard over Jesus, when they
saw the earthquake and the things that were happening, became very frightened
and said, "Truly this was the Son of God!’”
I want to begin by talking about the 4th
hour of Jesus’ crucifixion for as that hour began, several things happened to
change the soldier’s attitude, and when they saw the earthquake and the things
that were happening the soldiers became very frightened. From what I have read and heard about Roman
soldiers they were very brave and it took a lot of things to unnerve them, but
this was one of them.
Let us look at some of the things
that unnerved these very brave and strong soldiers. The first thing would have been the sudden
darkness. They would not have been aware
of the tearing of the Temple veil and probably not the opening of the graves,
but if they would have known about that I’m sure that too would have unnerved them
even more. Next thing would have been
the earthquake with its violent splitting of rocks, and that was a terrifying
experience even for those hardened legionaries. MacArthur writes “Phobeo (very frightened) is the term
from which we get phobia and refers
to sheer terror, the absolute panic that causes rapid heartbeat, profuse
sweating, and extreme anxiety. It is the
verb form of the word used by Matthew to describe the disciples’ response to
seeing Jesus walk on the water, thinking He was a ghost (14:26). It is also the word used to describe the
reaction of Peter, James, and John when they glimpsed Jesus’ divine glory and
heard the Father speak directly to them on the Mount of Transfiguration (17:6).
“The context and circumstances of
the passage clearly indicate, however, that the centurion and his men were frightened
of much more than the darkness and earthquake.
They sensed that those awesome natural origins and their primary fear
was not of those events themselves but of the divine power behind them. Their emotional fright soon turned to
spiritual, reverential awe, as testified by the fact that they did not run for
their lives or try to find a place of
safety but rather declared, “Truly this was the Son of God!’”
This will be a rather short SD, and Lord willing I
will pick up what Mark tells us in his gospel as I begin the next SD.
9/4/2024 8:43
AM
No comments:
Post a Comment