As in all the cases of resurrection and healing mentioned by the evangelists, here before us is the manifestation of the Kingdom that Jesus brought into the world. In this Kingdom there is no place for sickness or death, and everyone...
As in all the cases of resurrection and healing mentioned by the evangelists, here before us is the manifestation of the Kingdom that Jesus brought into the world. In this Kingdom there is no place for sickness or death, and everyone who comes into contact with it receives life and health in all their fullness, insofar as such fullness is accessible to him within the framework of humanity not yet transformed.
But the Kingdom is not simply some place or space, even one that is somehow specially arranged or organized. The Kingdom is first of all relationships binding people with Christ and with one another. One could even say that the Kingdom as a special kind of place or space is determined by these relationships and depends on them. Indeed, if we take, for example, the story of the healing of the centurion's servant, here there is not really any single continuous physical or mystical space: at the moment when the centurion's servant was healed, Jesus was quite far from him, and the servant himself very possibly may not even have known that his master was asking for his healing. But there is one spiritual space, and it is generated by the relationships of love and trust that bound the centurion both to his servant and to Jesus.
It is quite obvious that the centurion had an altogether special attitude toward his servant, who in the original is directly called a slave: such concern for a sick slave was plainly unusual for Romans, who were by no means inclined to sentimentality. Evidently this love forced him to turn to the Teacher, about whom all kinds of rumors circulated among the people, but about whom it was known for certain that He healed everyone ready to trust Him. And the centurion truly managed to trust Jesus in a way that, according to Jesus' own testimony, few had trusted Him even among the people of God, verse 9: he did not dare call the Teacher to his house, being completely certain that His desire alone would be enough for healing, verses 6-8.
The measure of trust and love proved so great that the Kingdom became a reality not only for the centurion himself, but also for his servant, who did not see Jesus at all and perhaps even knew nothing about Him. Thus relationships give birth to the Kingdom. And then it becomes clear why Jesus is ready to enter every house where He is awaited. For those who wait for Him and receive Him thereby increase the space of the Kingdom, themselves becoming part of it, and therefore its witnesses and servants. The same kind of witnesses and servants Jesus wants to see in each of us.
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3:12 Having therefore this hope - Being fully persuaded of this.
3:13 And we do not act as Moses did, who put a veil over his face - Which is to be understood with regard to his writings also. So that the children of Israel could not look steadfastly to the end of that dispensation which is now abolished - The end of this was Christ. The whole Mosaic dispensation tended to, and terminated in, him; but the Israelites had only a dim, wavering sight of him, of whom Moses spake in an obscure, covert manner.
3:14 The same veil remaineth on their understanding unremoved - Not so much as folded back, (so the word implies,) so as to admit a little, glimmering light. On the public reading of the Old Testament - The veil is not now on the face of Moses or of his writings, but on the reading of them, and on the heart of them that believe not. Which is taken away in Christ - That is, from the heart of them that truly believe on him.
3:16 When it - Their heart. Shall turn to the Lord - To Christ, by living faith. The veil is taken away - That very moment; and they see, with the utmost clearness, how all the types and prophecies of the law are fully accomplished in him.
3:17 Now the Lord - Christ is that Spirit of the law whereof I speak, to which the letter was intended to lead. And where the Spirit of the Lord, Christ, is, there is liberty - Not the veil, the emblem of slavery. There is liberty from servile fear, liberty from the guilt and from the power of sin, liberty to behold with open face the glory of the Lord.
3:18 And, accordingly, all we that believe in him, beholding as in a glass - In the mirror of the gospel. The glory of the Lord - His glorious love. Are transformed into the same image - Into the same love. From one degree of this glory to another, in a manner worthy of his almighty Spirit. What a beautiful contrast is here! Moses saw the glory of theLord, and it rendered his face so bright, that he covered it with a veil; Israel not being able to bear the reflected light.We behold his glory in the glass of his word, and our faces shine too; yet we veil them not, but diffuse the lustre which is continually increasing, as we fix the eye of our mind more and more steadfastly on his glory displayed in the gospel.