A young woman had become critically ill and her prognosis was grim; she would likely die within the year. Her family had a nominal “Easter and Christmas” commitment to the church, so the discussions in the hospital between this young pastor and the family always ploughed new ground. The woman challenged him – if Jesus healed in the Bible, he should be able to heal me today. If not, what use was he? So she begged and bargained. “If only” God would show mercy, the family urged, they would completely recommit themselves and come to church every Sunday. This earnest young pastor prayed with all his heart. He refused to join the ranks of those who said, “If it is thy will.” It was God’s will that she be healed, he concluded.
Then to his amazement, God healed her—completely. And with the physicians shaking their heads, she was sent home from the hospital. Next Sunday, the entire family was there in the front pew, dressed and sparkling. The young woman gave her testimony, praising God for his goodness. The following Sunday, the family was there again. In four weeks, it was only the woman and her husband. And after that, attendance was sporadic until they dropped into their previous pattern. Before long, the woman rationalised the entire incident. She had experienced the most dramatic sign God could give her: healing, bathed in prayer and surrounded by the church. But after only two months, its power dimmed to nothing.
The passage today gives us a chance to reassess our faith. What it is based upon – the miracle that Jesus has performed in our lives, the lives of others, or miracles that we hope he will perform? Or is it truly based on faith in Jesus himself?
The story in John 4 tells us of a certain “royal official” from Capernaum. John doesn’t tell us his name – perhaps he didn’t need to for his original audience may have known who he was from this title. Much like if I we to say the “Prime Minister” or the “Mayor of the City”, you would know who those individuals are.
In any case, he was a man of stature, of significance in his community, and a man who held influence over important matters. But this particular day his immediate family situation brought him to a place where he was no different from anyone else. This man of dignity and respect behaved the same way that any parent with a sick child would – he went wherever he could to get help.
He had heard about Jesus and the miracles that had been performed by him in Jerusalem. Here was an opportunity for this royal official to get help. We can read into the story that his son was too sick to travel, but perhaps he could convince Jesus to come to Capernaum to see him, and hopefully even heal him. So the desperate father travels the trip of about twenty miles from Capernaum to Cana to see Jesus.
Twenty miles is not a small trip when you have to walk it. It is also an uphill journey from Capernaum on the coast of the Sea of Galilee, west to inland Cana. So it is likely that the father rose early for his trip. We are later told that the son was healed at the seventh hour – or about 1:00pm in the afternoon – so its likely the father left early in the morning to get there. A sign of his determination to do whatever it took to get help for his dying son.
When he arrives in Cana he finds Jesus and begs him to come and heal his son. There is desperation in his actions. Royal Officials do not normally beg carpenters to travel twenty miles to their home. But he knew that there was something different about Jesus and he desperately needed help for his son.
Now it’s normal for us when we need to see a doctor to make an appointment at the surgery or, if we a very sick, request a home visit. Face to face consultation is required for a doctor to give a good diagnosis of the problem. This was the assumption that this royal official made about Jesus. He must need to be present with his boy in order to heal him, so he must come to Capernaum, see his son and heal him. So this man of stature in society gets on his knees and begs Jesus to come and heal his son.
Jesus’ reaction to this man seems almost heartless and cold. Speaking to everyone around him, as well as the man, he says “Unless you people see miraculous signs and wonders you will never believe.”
But Jesus knows how fickle people can be. We will move heaven and earth to achieve what we want, even if our motives are true such as this desperate father’s attempt to bring healing to his sick boy. Yet, Jesus knows that if healing, or any other miracle is all that we want, then when it’s done nothing else remains. In a sense what Jesus is saying is this “You won’t believe unless you have proof of who I am.” What Jesus offers this royal official, and indeed us, is the opportunity to have faith in him – not proof. It isn’t that Jesus isn’t concerned about the boy. If that were true he wouldn’t have healed him. No, rather Jesus is more concerned with the eternal destiny of this man and his entire family.
What Jesus does in this situation is place himself between the father and the miracle he desperately desires. Jesus could have gone to Capernaum and healed the boy, but that would have likely been the end of the relationship between Jesus and the family. When Jesus said to the man, “You may go, your son will live.” He forces the man to make a choice based on faith. Either he doesn’t believe that Jesus can heal him from a distance and keeps pestering him until he comes to see the boy, or he travels home believing in faith that his boy is alive as Jesus has promised. Verse 50 tells us a marvellous thing about this man’s choice. “He took Jesus at his word and departed.”
This passage teaches us a lot about Jesus. You hear it said “If God is a healer, then why are there sick children in the world? If God is peaceful, then why do wars happen? If God is loving, then why do bad things happen to good people?”
Behind all of these questions, and others like it, is the desire to see God prove himself by taking these evil things away then we’ll all believe in him and live happily ever after. If God proves himself by taking away suffering in the world, then we will know for certain that he is God, and believe in him.
But this logic doesn’t work. Although all of us experience pain and suffering at some stage in our lives, there a plenty of people who are sick. Plenty who have enough to eat, aren’t struggling with the effects of war, plenty who have food on the table and a roof over their heads. Yet plenty of those people do not have a relationship with God.
Our relationship with God is not based on his ability to heal us, or perform other miracles in our lives. Rather it is based on who he is and what Jesus says about him and we, like the Royal Official in this passage, are to take him at his word.
Throughout the Bible there are stories of people who have taken God at his word and who base their relationship with him on faith, not just the miraculous things he can do in their life.
Luke 17:11-19 tells the story of the ten lepers who met Jesus as he was travelling towards Jerusalem. They too begged Jesus for a miracle, and asked him to have pity on them. He sent them to the priests and, as they went they were healed. Sadly, only one of the men returned to praise God and give thanks to Jesus for saving him. His faith continued past the miracle, for the others the miracle was all they were after, and once they had it, they were gone.
The book of Daniel in the Old Testament tells the story of Hananiah, Mishael and Azariah – better known as Shadrach, Meshach and Abednego. When faced with the threat of being thrown into the furnace unless they renounced their faith and bowed to the idol that the king had erected, they responded in this way (Daniel 3:16-18):
O Nebuchadnezzar, we do not need to defend ourselves before you in this matter. It we are thrown into the blazing furnace, the God we serve is able to save us from it, and he will rescue us from your hand, O king. But even if he does not, we want you to know, O king, that we will not serve your gods or worship the image of gold you have set up.
They knew that God could save them, but their relationship was not determined by whether he did or did not save them. For by faith he already had.
Paul was another pillar of the faith. He faced flogging, prison, verbal abuse, threats of death, hunger, pain and disappointment time and time again, yet still he put his faith in God regardless of the circumstances he found himself in. 2 Corinthians 12:7-10 tells us that Paul had some physical ailment that he prayed three times to God for healing. Now you would think that Paul, one of the most important Christians of all time, a man whose writings make up a large portion of the New Testament, and whose theology has impacted the church for all time, that God would heal him when he asked. But no, God’s response to Paul when he sought a miracle from the Lord was this, “My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness.” Paul’s reaction is astounding. Not only does he accept God’s response to his prayer, he actually now boasts in his weakness so that Christ’s power may rest on him. And so he “delights in weaknesses, in insults, in hardships, in persecution, in difficulties, for when I am weak, then I am strong.”
That is a response based not on proof, but on faith.
So let me ask you this morning, what is your relationship with God based upon? Are your prayers marked by bargains, deals and “if onlys” with God? When you think of your relationship with him do you think that everything will be alright if only something wasn’t in the way? Are you waiting upon that next miracle to confirm that God is really who he says he is?
Or do you, like the royal official, take him at his word and believe by faith that Jesus can save you regardless of your circumstances. Do you, like Shadrach, Meshach and Abednego believe that God can save you, that he can perform a miracle in your life, but even if he does not there’s no way I’m going to abandon my faith in him or my relationship with him? And do you, like Paul boast in your weaknesses, believing that in that place Christ’s power is made perfect. Do you delight in your weakness, in insults, in hardship and in persecution and in difficulties for when we are weak, then we are strong?
When Thomas heard that Jesus had risen from the dead he wanted proof. He wanted to put his hands in the holes in Jesus’ hands and into his side where the spear had been. Thomas received that miraculous event and worshiped Jesus as his Lord and his God.
Jesus’ response to him was this, “Because you have seen me, you have believed; blessed are those who have not seen and yet have believed.” In effect, you believed based on the proof in front of you. Everyone else is not going to have that available to them and will need to believe in me in spite of the circumstances of their life at the time. They will need to be believe in me by faith – and when they do they will be blessed.
Bad things happen to good people. People get sick, and unfortunately age is not a predetermining factor in that. People lose their jobs, marriage’s breakdown, war, theft, murder and death occur all throughout this sinful world and we are all affected by them. But Jesus calls us to put our faith in him regardless of the circumstances of life that surround us.
We believe, by faith, that a time is coming when all of those things will disappear. When sickness, breakdown of relationships, war and death will all disappear. So we live, by faith, believing with hope that that time is coming. No, we don’t ignore the fact that we, or a loved one, may be struggling with illness. We don’t forget that there are those suffering from the effects of war. We don’t pretend that the grief of death doesn’t affect us. But we live in the knowledge that Jesus has promised to return someday and will take all those who believe in him home to be with him for eternity. And, like the royal official, we take him at his word.
