Wednesday, January 23, 2008


I found this passage by William Ellery Channing thought provoking—

“ A Roman Centurion who approached Jesus and made application to him for a cure of a servant, whom he particularly valued; and on expressing, in a strong manner, his conviction of the power of Jesus to heal at a distance, Jesus, marveled and said to those that followed, ‘Verily I say unto you, I have not found so great faith in Israel; and I say unto you, that many shall come from the east and west, and shall sit down with Abraham, and Isaac, and Jacob in the Kingdom of heaven; but the children of the kingdom” (that is the Jews) “shall be cast out.” Here all the hopes which the Jews had cherished of an exclusive or peculiar possession of the Messiah’s kingdom were crushed.

Now I thought about how that stung the Jews, but I wonder, are we any different? If the words of that account were changed, and instead of a Roman Centurion, it said Jehovah’s Witness or Mormon, and instead of Jews we insert the word Christians, would we recoil in indignation like the Jews did?

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