Challenges To A Father's Faith
I think that God wants to develop us – grow us – mature us much more than we want. God is infinite, but we find that too hard to understand. In fact, we’re very happy to just know Him a little. We’re happy with our salvation, and we’re hopeful for many blessings in our lives, but often, that’s all that we want from God. We’re almost saying, “I’m OK the way I am; I don’t need to grow anymore, thank You.” Some of us are happy enough with just graduating or being ordained or being named pastor of a church. We think that we have “arrived.”
But God has so much more for us! He has so much more of Himself for us! So, He faithfully, lovingly challenges us. He challenges us to grow in Him, and to keep growing, and then to grow some more! No way? Of course, there’s a way! God is more than big enough! He wants to reveal to us more of Himself. He wants to show us more of His power and grace and holiness and love and all of His attributes. So, He challenges us with tests of our faith relationship with Him. We see that in one example in the Gospel of John:
John 4:46-53 (New American Standard Bible)
“46 Therefore Jesus came again to Cana of Galilee, where He had made the water into wine. Now there was a royal official whose son was sick at Capernaum. 47 When he heard that Jesus had come from Judea into Galilee, he went to Him and began asking Him to come down and heal his son; for he was at the point of death.”
(1) This was the first challenge for the man: his son was sick and was at the point of death.
Every one of us has faced, personally, some scary health challenges – maybe with our parents, close family members, or even ourselves. And it shakes us to the core when it’s a matter of life and death, and we are helpless. We don’t know what to do. Of course, we pray, but there’s nothing really that we can do. And I think that it is a thousand times worse – the fear is the very highest – if this happens to one of our children!
It is horrible to face this today in the modern world. Can you imagine what it must have been like for those people in the First Century? I read that the rate of infant mortality – how many babies survive to adulthood – was close to 50% for many centuries! Half the children born, never made it to adults.
This royal official, even with his power and authority, was totally helpless to save his dying child.
And one more thing, the son was in Capernaum, and Jesus was in Cana. Capernaum was on the shores of the Sea of Galilee and Cana was 25 miles away in the hills – that’s why the Scripture says that the royal official “went to Jesus and began asking Him to come down and heal his son.” The man needed Jesus to travel with him 25 miles down to the town of Capernaum. 25 miles walking could take 8-10 hours! This man was asking a lot!
But it also shows us the first glimpse of the man’s faith. After all, he traveled 25 miles uphill to reach Jesus and to beg Jesus to go with him. Verse 47 says “When he heard that Jesus had come from Judea into Galilee, he went to Him.” The man was truly desperate. His son was close to death! 25 miles uphill to beg a carpenter to heal his son. And yet he made the trip. And he began asking Him to come down and heal his son. There was an urgency and insistence in his asking. Some translations use the words “begging” or “pleading.” The man was desperate, but he had some measure of faith that Jesus could come and heal his dying son.
48 Then Jesus said to him, “Unless you people see signs and wonders, you simply will not believe.”
(2) The second challenge for the man came in Jesus’ first response. It was a harsh rebuke. Jesus sounds very exasperated. He sounds fed up! This response ignores the desperate situation and the man’s pleading completely. “Unless you people see miracles, you simply won’t believe.” But it was plural here: it was addressed to the man and to all the people around him that day.
49 The royal official said to Him, “Lord, come down before my child dies.”
Isn’t it interesting that the royal official doesn’t respond to Jesus’ words; he just keeps on asking. He actually uses the word “Lord” (Kyrie).
And the man also changes the word for son to the word for child, and he adds the word “my” to his request: “Lord, come down before my child dies.” There’s no question that the man’s son is precious to him. He ignores the rebuke and keeps on asking.
50 Jesus said to him, “Go; your son lives.”
(3) This is the third challenge for the man, and it is the toughest so far. Jesus said four words: one word of command: “go!” and three words of information: “your son lives.” The man hears the information that he most urgently wanted to hear – but how can he possibly believe it? The child is 25 miles away. The child is dying and might already be dead, and it’s an 8-10 hour walk to get there! Jesus is not getting up to leave with him. All Jesus says is “GO! Your son lives.”
Today, we have doctors online and, if there are two good Internet connections, a doctor halfway around the world can treat a patient. But not in the First Century. There were no cell phones… no internet… no instant contact. To believe this news required a belief that this man was truly God. This was a matter of divine healing; No doctor can heal without being present with the patient! Jesus did not go. Jesus did not give anyone a sign or a miracle. There was nothing for the people to see. The crowd would never know whether this child lived or died.
Jesus only said, “Go; Your son lives.” In a way, this is God the Son saying, “I am not going to go. I’m right there with your son, and I’ve already healed him.” This was a huge challenge of faith. It was a matter of life and death – and that of the man’s most precious treasure – his little boy – and God said, “Go! But I’m not going with you.”
“The man believed the word that Jesus spoke to him and went home.”
The man turned around and began the 8-10-hour trip back to Capernaum. I believe this must have been a very tough walk for the man - eight hours. Did he replay the scene in his mind a thousand times? Did he ask himself with each step on the road, “Now what did Jesus say? What were His exact words: “Go! Your son lives!” Did I hear Him correct? Was it true? Did I only dream this? Can Jesus heal? Is He really God? Eight hours is an eternity!
Didn’t the royal official have doubts? Why didn’t he continue to beg Jesus to come? Why didn’t he insist? Why did he just believe Jesus, turn around, and go home so quickly? It would have been so much better if Jesus had accompanied him on the 8-hour trip! If Jesus had only come with him! It’s one thing if Jesus went with him; it’s much tougher to walk home alone, taking Jesus at His word.
“Seeing is believing?” No. Faith is believing before seeing! Faith is taking Jesus’ words as fact. That’s because they are! There was a multitude of people in Cana that day who wanted to see miracles. That wasn’t faith. That wasn’t belief in Jesus the Son of God. That was people wanting entertainment! They wanted a show! Jesus said, “No!” “No, I’m not going to entertain you all!” But Jesus spoke four short words to this royal official, and the man walked away. The crowd probably missed what happened.
51 And as he was now going down, his servants met him, saying “your son lives!” 52 So he inquired of them the hour when he began to get better. And they said to him, “Yesterday at the seventh hour the fever left him.” 53 So the father knew that it was at that hour in which Jesus said to him, “Your son lives”; and he himself believed, and his entire household.
I’m sure that the man was thrilled that his son was alive, but Scripture doesn’t say so. And he didn’t ask about the details of the child’s sickness; he went straight to the point: “When exactly did he begin to get better?" "Last night at 7 pm, the fever left him!” (Once again, we see how far away Cana was from Capernaum, because the man doesn’t make it home until the next day.) But the main point was that it was at that hour in which Jesus said to him, “Your son lives” The man knew it! The servants didn’t; the mother and child didn’t. But the man, the father, knew it, and he himself believed, and his entire household.
This entire encounter between Jesus and the royal official is very significant. Not only was a dying child healed, but a man and his family became genuine believers in Jesus. The man’s faith was severely tested, and Jesus was revealed to him and his family as more than a healer; they now knew and believed that Jesus was the Messiah, the Son of God – the One who did not need to go anywhere, say anything or do anything to heal; God was already there with the child, and the healing was already done.
Do we have that kind of faith?
Dr. Timothy McKeithen, NBC Director Hispanic Pastoral Ministries Program
Published: 10/14/2022
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