Now when the centurion and they that were with him, watching Jesus, saw the earthquake and those things that were done, they feared greatly, saying, Truly, This was the Son of God. Matthew 27:54
They were professional soldiers discharging their duties to the letter, but the Roman squad tasked with the crucifixion of the Lord Jesus and the two malefactors were rough and hardened by their brutal lifestyle. They had seen many men die because they deserved to die, and they had heard many curses and screams from the condemned. But this case was different and the Roman soldiers quickly realized they were into a situation that they had never encountered before. The malefactors had struggled and fought against the bonds and the nails of the cross, but the Nazarene had gently submitted to it all, and had not lifted up His voice against His executioners. They were struck by His words of forgiveness and His silent suffering. The darkness that fell at noontime was a great shock, and when the loud cry of ‘Tetelestai’ was immediately followed by his death, they were puzzled beyond belief. Then the earthquake happened, and the Roman squad finally realized that they had just crucified the Christ. And their realization rings down to us today.
We usually relate Peter’s message to the centurion Cornelius in Caesarea, recorded in Acts 10, as the opening up of the Gospel to the Gentiles. But there were Gentiles saved before that message was preached, and our text records one of those cases. In fact, the very first people saved after the death of the Lord Jesus were the centurion and his band of soldiers. These men came to know what all of us need to know before we can be saved, that the Lord Jesus is the Son of God, and that He died on the cross. They understood, because of the earthquake, the unnatural darkness, and the other events, that the Lord Jesus was on the cross and died because He chose to do so, not because He was forced by men to do so. These men knew that the Lord Jesus died, not for Himself, but for others. And those men paved the way for what a flood of Gentiles ever since have experienced, the new birth through the death of the Saviour.
The centurion and his squad had an unusual first-hand look at the events of that greatest day in human history. They could see everything that transpired, other than during the great darkness. They could observe the scoffers and tormentors, they could see the pitiful few who stood by in sorrow and shock, they could see the wounds that had been inflicted on the Man on the middle cross; in act, they had taken His clothes as their share of the booty for the day’s work. Every word that the Lord Jesus spoke was audible to them, and His compassion to the crowd and to the repentant thief was duly noted. If their observations led them to the declaration of Jesus as the Son of God, we have a powerful confirmation of our faith as we read of their acknowledgment. -Jim MacIntosh