How do you perceive Jesus?

Mathew Chapter 8

How do you perceive Jesus?  In this chapter we experience some amazing healings.  There are many reasons one ventures over to Jesus, and our reasons are formulated by our perspective of the personhood of Christ.  In this chapter we see first an enthusiastic leper who could not keep quiet about what happen to him.  The only reason for not telling people was to allow Jesus to minister more in the city, but now because of His fame Christ had to move outside the city.  The next person we see healed is a humble man.  This centurion was very powerful and rich but understood that Jesus was God and above all.  The centurion did not feel worthy to have Christ in His home.  Because of this demonstration of humility and awe before the Son of God, Christ said there was not anyone else with any greater faith.  True faith is void of pride and totally surrenders to the power and ways of Christ.   As we continue through the chapter we see Peter’s mother-in-law (by the way this means Peter was married) was healed to serve Christ.  Further in the chapter we see people being compassionate for others and bringing them to Christ.  There are many reasons we get excited about following Christ and bringing others to Him.  Your perspective must be generated out of a sense of need for Christ, and that He is truly God.  Without a solid truthful perspective we will fall away when earthly things call us.  The Apostles had not yet developed a deep faith that could withstand a storm in their life.  Jesus said they had little faith.  I think I would have woken Jesus up as well in the storm.  The point is do we trust Christ with our eternal life as well as our earthly life?

The last perception of Christ in the chapter is that Christ is bad for business.  Jesus cast demons out of two men.  The demons who knew Jesus as the Son of God were cast into the swine.  This of course caused the business to go under and the people not wanting Jesus to be in their region any longer.  No celebration for these two men! There wasn’t any celebration for these men being set free.  Is Christ more important than your business?  Are people more important than your business?  There is so much about saving dogs on facebook.  I am against treating animals poorly, but don’t lose sight that we humans are God’s crowning creation.  Humans are the only creation where God breathed in the breath of life and we became a living soul.