"Therefore, whosoever heareth these sayings of mine, and doeth them, I
will liken him unto a wise man, which built his house upon a rock:

"And the rain descended, and the floods came, and the winds blew, and
beat upon that house; and it fell not; for it was founded upon a rock.

"And every one that heareth these sayings of mine, and doeth them not,
shall be likened unto a foolish man, which built his house upon the
sand:

"And the rain descended, and the floods came, and the winds blew, and
beat upon that house; and it fell: and great was the fall of it."

THE STORY OF THE MIRACLE WORKER

There was at Capernaum an officer of the Roman army, a man who had under
him a company of a hundred men. They called him "a centurion," a word
which means "commanding a hundred"; but we should call him "a captain."
This man was not a Jew, but was what the Jews called "a Gentile," "a
foreigner"; a name which the Jews gave to all people outside their own
race. All the world except the Jews themselves were Gentiles.

This Roman centurion was a good man, and he loved the Jews, because
through them he had heard of God, and had learned how to worship God.
Out of his love for the Jews, he had built for them with his own money a
synagogue, which may have been the very synagogue in which Jesus taught
on the Sabbath days.

The centurion had a young servant, a boy whom he loved greatly; and this
boy was very sick with a palsy, and near to death. The centurion had
heard that Jesus could cure those who were sick; and he asked the chief
men of the synagogue, who were called its "elders," to go to Jesus and
ask him to come and cure his young servant.

[Illustration: _"Speak the word and my servant shall be cured"_]

The elders spoke to Jesus, just as he came again to Capernaum, after the
Sermon on the Mount. They asked Jesus to go with them to the centurion's
house; and they said:

"He is a worthy man, and it is fitting that you should help him, for,
though a Gentile, he loves our people, and he has built for us our
synagogue."

Then Jesus said, "I will go and heal him."

But while he was on his way--and with him were the elders, and his
disciples, and a great crowd of people, who hoped to see the work of
healing--the centurion sent some other friends to Jesus with this
message:

"Lord, do not take the trouble to come to my house; for I am not worthy
that one so high as you are should come under my roof; and I did not
think that