Reflective Bible Study

Following Jesus’ trip through Samaria and His encounter and conversation with a Samaritan woman, Jesus heads to Galilee, and specifically to Cana. While there, Jesus has the opportunity to help someone else while also challenging that individual’s faith.

Let’s read about what happened. Our passage is found in John’s gospel, chapter 4, and we will read from the New Century Version of the Bible. Starting in verse 46, John tells us that:

⁴⁶ Jesus went again to visit Cana in Galilee where he had changed the water into wine. One of the king’s important officers lived in the city of Capernaum, and his son was sick. ⁴⁷ When he heard that Jesus had come from Judea to Galilee, he went to Jesus and begged him to come to Capernaum and heal his son, because his son was almost dead. ⁴⁸ Jesus said to him, “You people must see signs and miracles before you will believe in me.”

⁴⁹ The officer said, “Sir, come before my child dies.”

⁵⁰ Jesus answered, “Go. Your son will live.”

The man believed what Jesus told him and went home. ⁵¹ On the way the man’s servants came and met him and told him, “Your son is alive.”

⁵² The man asked, “What time did my son begin to get well?”

They answered, “Yesterday at one o’clock the fever left him.”

⁵³ The father knew that one o’clock was the exact time that Jesus had said, “Your son will live.” So the man and all the people who lived in his house believed in Jesus.

⁵⁴ That was the second miracle Jesus did after coming from Judea to Galilee.

While reading this event just now, I find it interesting what the man’s request is to Jesus, how Jesus responds, how the man replies to Jesus’ response, and what ultimately happens.

First, the man comes from the nearby town of Capernaum to ask Jesus to come and heal his son. This official wants Jesus to physically travel with Him to Capernaum so that Jesus can personally heal his son.

In response, Jesus makes an insensitive remark towards this official and to whatever stereotype we might want to group this official into. It is likely Jesus was speaking towards this entire generation, including everyone within earshot. It is also likely that Jesus was speaking to every single person in sinful humanity. The temptation for every single person at every point in history is that we must see a sign before we belief in Jesus.

However, like I probably would have done if I was in this official’s place, this official ignores Jesus’ insensitive response and asks for help a second time.

Jesus then tells the official that his son will live. The official’s big worry was that his son’s illness would end his son’s life, and Jesus reassures him that this illness will not end in his son’s death.

The official then leaves without Jesus, taking Jesus at His word, and ultimately discovers after meeting the messengers that were coming to find him, that at the exact point when Jesus told him that his son would live, his son’s fever left and that his son was recovering.

This event is amazing in my mind because of how everything takes place. While there likely were different ways Jesus could have said what He said about people needing to see in order to believe, and perhaps some of the other ways would have been more sensitive, I wonder if this was a challenge directly to this father who earnestly wanted help for his son. I suspect that this father only knew of miracles where Jesus had laid His hands on people to heal them, and if this is the case, I wonder if that was as far as this man’s faith in Jesus had grown.

However, Jesus pushes this man’s faith by pressing him to believe Jesus’ words without seeing them directly come to pass. With what happens, the man must believe Jesus and begin to head home before finding out whether Jesus’ promise would happen. In some ways, having faith stretched in this way is one of the most emotionally challenging things for us, because there is a period of unknown and a period of time when doubt like to crowd in.

From the point when this father leaves Jesus and up to learning the news about his son, I’m certain that Satan threw as much doubt his way to try to discourage him that his trip to Jesus was a failed trip where Jesus insulted him rather than helped him.

However, any doubts Satan threw this man’s way were lies and at the moment the servants met the man on his way home, all the doubts running through this man’s mind were exposed as lies in the face of the truth.

To contrast this miracle, we have a miracle in Matthew and Luke about a centurion who has almost the exact opposite conversation with Jesus. In that miracle, Jesus offers to come and lay His hands on the centurion’s servant to heal him, and the centurion pushes back saying that all he needs is Jesus’ word that his servant would be healed. These two miracles are the perfect opposites in many ways because each man requesting the miracle had Jesus respond in a way that he was not expecting.

This mirrors what we may face in our own lives.

When looking at Jesus’ miracles, sometimes Jesus personally goes to touch the person, while other times, Jesus says the word and we are called to have faith in Jesus’ promise. This is powerful for us to keep in mind, because when we pray and ask Jesus for help with something, sometimes we will directly see Jesus’ answer to our prayers, while other times the answer might be a long time in coming.

Know that just like the official in our passage had a period of time between leaving Jesus with a promise, and then receiving confirmation that his request had been answered, we also will have a period of time between our request and seeing confirmation of a response. We can claim Jesus’ promises in our own lives, but often there is a period of time after we have claimed God’s promise before we see confirmation of His response.

The challenges every one of us face when in this waiting period are to trust God during this period of unknown, to push back against the doubts Satan pushes at us, and to press forward knowing that God will reveal His answer to our prayer when the time is right for us. While all this takes trust, we can look to all of Jesus’ promises in the Bible and realize that no word from God will ever fail. If God has promised something, it will come to pass. We might not know when or how, but we can trust that God’s promises are solid and trustworthy because He has never failed those who place their trust in Him!

Just remember that when we trust God, we trust that He knows best and we understand that His perspective and goal for our lives are bigger than we can comprehend, and His desire for us extends beyond what we can even being to imagine.

As we come to the end of another podcast episode, here are the challenges I will leave you with:

As I always challenge you to do, intentionally seek God first in your life and choose to trust His promises and His perspective over what Satan tries to doubt us into believing. Satan’s doubts are lies, and we can trust God because God’s promises will never fail us from eternity’s perspective. With God, we will outlast sin, Satan, and whatever challenge that is prompting us to doubt.

Also, continue praying and studying the Bible for yourself to keep your personal connection with God strong. While pastors or podcasters can give you ideas to think about, never let your relationship with God rest on someone else. Always take what you learn, see, or hear and test it personally against God’s Word. Discover in the Bible the truth about a God who gives everything to redeem humanity from sin and a God who wants you saved out of sin for eternity!

And as I end every set of challenges by saying in one way or another, never stop short of, back away from, chicken out of, or doubt yourself out of where God wants to lead you to in your life with Him!

Continuing into the gospel and the parables Jesus shared, we turn our attention to a parable that includes a statement that sounds like the opposite of how we would expect it to be written. As I read the parable for this episode, listen for a verse or idea that seems to be the opposite of what you’d expect it to be, because in this opposite sounding idea, I believe we can discover something amazing about God.

Let’s read this passage and parable together and discover what we can learn about God’s character from what Jesus illustrated for us. Our parable and passage are found in Luke’s gospel, chapter 12, and we will read from the New Century Version. Starting in verse 35, Jesus continued teaching those present saying:

³⁵ “Be dressed, ready for service, and have your lamps shining. ³⁶ Be like servants who are waiting for their master to come home from a wedding party. When he comes and knocks, the servants immediately open the door for him. ³⁷ They will be blessed when their master comes home, because he sees that they were watching for him. I tell you the truth, the master will dress himself to serve and tell the servants to sit at the table, and he will serve them. ³⁸ Those servants will be blessed when he comes in and finds them still waiting, even if it is midnight or later.

³⁹ “Remember this: If the owner of the house knew what time a thief was coming, he would not allow the thief to enter his house. ⁴⁰ So you also must be ready, because the Son of Man will come at a time when you don’t expect him!”

In this passage, did you catch the idea that sounds backwards or opposite of what we’d think. While it might be easy to focus in on how this passage ended, and how we should always be ready because we don’t know when Jesus, the Son of Man, will return, what stood out to me is what Jesus will do when He does come back.

This passage, specifically verse 37, describes the master’s reaction when he returns and finds his servants ready for his return. In verse 37, Jesus tells us that these servants who were ready and watching, “will be blessed when their master comes home, because he sees that they were watching for him. I tell you the truth, the master will dress himself to serve and tell the servants to sit at the table, and he will serve them.”

Picture this scene with me for a moment. It is late at night. All the servants have been up all day and they are tired. They are eagerly waiting the master’s return, but they don’t know when it will be. The master is off at a wedding, and it is anyone’s guess how long that will take. When the master returns at 3am, he is likely just as tired as the servants, but according to Jesus’ description, the master will reward the servants who stayed up for Him by serving them.

This sounds completely backwards in my mind. When the master, owner, or boss of anything comes in, the last thing we would expect is that they would step down and serve the servants, the slaves, or if we modernize the context, the employees. Instead, the boss would thank and praise those who were doing what they were supposed to be doing, but probably not go much further.

Part of me wonders if this is just a nuance of this translation. When comparing versions of the Bible, some translations pull out unique and interesting angles on the text, which might not fit with the interpretation of other ones. If we read verse 37 from the New American Standard Bible, which is one of the more trusted, word-for-word translations, it tells us Jesus said “Blessed are those slaves whom the master will find on the alert when he comes; truly I say to you, that he will gird himself and have them recline and will come up and wait on them.”

In this word-for-word translation, we see the exact same response. In this parable, the master returns and he serves the servants or slaves who were waiting for him.

While this is completely backward thinking for our minds and our culture, we discover that this idea reflects God’s character. When we look at Jesus’ life, there were times when Jesus went away to be alone to rest, and there were times when Jesus attempted to go away to be alone where people found Him who wanted help, healing, and guidance. In every case that I can think of right now, Jesus always adjusted His own plans to help those who came desiring help. When Jesus was tired, He didn’t turn people away. Instead, He kept on serving.

This is Jesus’ model for us. While we shouldn’t neglect rest and down time, we should always remember that when God sends someone into our lives, it is for a reason, and sometimes that reason is because we are to help that person. Other times, the reason is because that person can teach us something about ourselves. Jesus modeled God’s method of serving, and when the Master, Jesus, returns to the earth for His people, while we would be more than happy to serve Him more fully with Him present, He will turn the tables on us and serve us as our reward.

God modeled service through Jesus. When we look at Jesus, we see how God continually stepped down to serve when and where there was a need. He has called us to serve like He served, and when we are serving Him through serving others, we will be doing exactly what He called us to do and we will be ready for His soon return.

As we come to the end of another podcast episode, here are the challenges I will leave you with:

As I always challenge you to do, be sure to intentionally seek God first in your life and to serve Him by serving others. Choose to serve God and others not because we are scared of God’s bad side, but because of what Jesus has already done for us. Choose to serve because you love God, not because you fear some sort of punishment.

Also, always keep praying and studying the Bible for yourself to learn more about God and to grow closer to Him each and every day. While other people can give you ideas to think about, filter everything you learn through the lens of the Bible to determine if it is truly worthwhile from the perspective of eternity. When history is finished, the only thing that will matter is where we have placed our hope, faith, trust and belief, and the only right answer is Jesus!

And as I end every set of challenges by saying in one way or another, never stop short of, back away from, chicken out of, or deviate from where God wants to lead you to in your life with Him!