Hearing His Voice

Posted on by korgrocker

“Then the man went and told the Jewish leaders that it was Jesus who had healed him. So the Jewish leaders began harassing Jesus for breaking the Sabbath rules. But Jesus replied, “My Father is always working, and so am I.””
John 5:15-17 NLT

The sins of the Jewish leaders were starting to mount up. Not satisfied with telling the Pool man off for carrying his sleeping mat, they continue to interrogate him to find out who had dared to tell him to pick up his sleeping mat, violating their interpretation of the Sabbath day rules. When they found out it was Jesus, they sought Him out and John records that they started to “harass” Him. John’s account doesn’t say what form the harassment took, but I expect it was low level and something Jesus just shrugged off, for the time being. There was coming a time when He would confront their hypocrisy, and He would choose this moment carefully. But Jesus told the Jewish leaders that “My Father is always working, and so am I”. A factually correct statement of course, but one not appreciated by the Jews. Who is this person, they thought, who elevates Himself to the same level as God?

Jesus was a counter-cultural figure in the strict religious times of two thousand years ago. In His society, when it came to things about God, the Jewish faith called upon thousands of years worth of rabbinical teaching, interpretation of the Law and prophetic messages, and ended up with a rigid liturgical and belief system that would not tolerate anything that contradicted it. In that society, a religious elite emerged who did very well by leveraging the religious system for their own benefits, and by so doing kept the population in check. So, anyone who challenged their system was inevitably going to end up harassed, and Jesus was the arch-challenger. Everywhere Jesus went during His public ministry had a pharisaical following waiting to pick up on anything they disagreed with, and there was a within the Jewish leadership a faction who were plotting to kill Him. 

The Old Testament prophets were mostly resented by those around them in their times because their God-given messages were designed to challenge the sinful state that God’s chosen people had achieved. Some of those prophets suffered terribly for delivering their God-given messages. For example, Jeremiah ended up beaten and placed in the stocks on one occasion. On another he was threatened with death. Hebrews 11 gives us a good idea of the treatment of prophets. Even today, anyone who stands up and proclaims God’s message to a wayward church is deeply resented. So, a message about the sanctity of marriage and the Biblical basis of it being between a man and a woman is unwelcome in some denominations. Such prophets are accused of not moving with the times. Hmmm…

We pilgrims know God is always working, just as Jesus said. From Psalm 121, we read the encouragement that God watches over us – “He will not let you stumble; the one who watches over you will not slumber. Indeed, he who watches over Israel never slumbers or sleeps” (Psalm 121:3-4). Why do we fret over things that might happen, when our Heavenly Father is constantly watching over us? We wallow in a mess of “what-if’s” forgetting that God is on our side and looking out for us. And Jesus Himself declared that He was always working, like His father. In His public ministry, Jesus never seemed to have a moment’s rest. He travelled much around Galilee and Judea – someone estimated He could have walked more than three thousand miles in the three years between the carpenter’s shop and the cross. His hours of work seemed to consume all of His waking hours. But Jesus never seemed to be stressed out by the demands made of Him. He just did what His Father told Him to do. John 14:31, “but I will do what the Father requires of me, so that the world will know that I love the Father. Come, let’s be going“.

There is always God’s work to be done by us pilgrims as well. But we need to do only what God requires of us. And no more. So finding a Christian stressed out by his church duties begs the question if there is someone here trying to exceed his mandate on this earth. But we pilgrims have a mission here on earth, to make disciples of the Master, Jesus Himself. The Great Commission, a high level strategic command, is followed by a tactical relationship between us and God, as the details are worked out in our lives. We listen for the Holy Spirit whispers in our souls, leading us to only “do what the Father requires”.

Dear Father God. We get so caught up in the busy-ness of our liturgies and denominations, that we often miss that still small voice of Your Spirit. Please forgive us, we pray, and lead and guide us where we should go. In Jesus’ name. Amen.

Stop Sinning

Posted on by korgrocker

“But afterward Jesus found him in the Temple and told him, “Now you are well; so stop sinning, or something even worse may happen to you.” Then the man went and told the Jewish leaders that it was Jesus who had healed him.”
John 5:14-15 NLT

The man healed by Jesus at the Pool of Bethesda had been pulled up by the Jewish leaders for carrying his sleeping mat on the Sabbath. They accused the man for working on the Sabbath, exposing their nit-picking approach to religious life. But they sensed an opportunity to extend the focus of their policing, by asking for the name of the person who had told the man to carry his mat. Perhaps, they thought, there was an imposter interpreting the Jewish law incorrectly. But they were too late because Jesus had disappeared into the crowds.

But we read next in John’s account that Jesus found the man who had been healed in the Temple. Did he still have his sleeping mat with him? Was he there to praise and thank God for his healing? Or was he making his way home and found himself in the Temple because he had been caught up with the crowds? But whatever the reason for him being there, Jesus found him, “and told him, “Now you are well; so stop sinning, or something even worse may happen to you.” An interesting statement, loaded with meaning, and one which was just as spiritually life changing as the physical healing had been. I suppose an obvious question we can ask is if the man’s thirty eight years of disability was due to some sort of sin in his life. The implication is there that it was. The psychiatrists and medics today have apparently made a connection between a mental state and a physical ailment. There are also some who may draw the conclusion that the man at the Pool had been punished by God for his sin. But Jesus wasn’t interested in the reason for the man’s paralysis – that was history. He was now concerned about the man’s future.

Regarding sin, we are all expected to follow repentance and forgiveness by a change in lifestyle or behaviour. So, for example, if a man repents of his addiction to pornography, he is subsequently expected to turn his back on the magazines and internet sources of the material. Repentance, God’s forgiveness, must be followed by a change in behaviour. Of course, we will stumble and fall again, but our heart-felt desire is to change and be set free from the sin that has entangled us in its web. Thankfully, God is gracious and merciful, and quick to forgive a repentant sinner.

We don’t hear any more about the man at the Pool. But I’m sure that after his healing encounter with Jesus he would have turned his life around. What else could he do? And for us pilgrims, we too have had an encounter with Jesus. We have turned our backs on sin and sinful lives, choosing instead to follow the Master for the rest of our lives.

Dear Lord Jesus. As the old hymn says, “I have decided to follow Jesus, … no turning back, no turning back”. We sing that song again and again, Lord, each and every day. Amen.

Pick Up Your Mat

Posted on by korgrocker

“so the Jewish leaders objected. They said to the man who was cured, “You can’t work on the Sabbath! The law doesn’t allow you to carry that sleeping mat!” But he replied, “The man who healed me told me, ‘Pick up your mat and walk.’” “Who said such a thing as that?” they demanded. The man didn’t know, for Jesus had disappeared into the crowd.”
John 5:10-13 NLT

The Jewish leaders were not happy at all when they found someone carrying a sleeping mat through the crowds around the Pool of Bethesda. They probably had a point if the man was moving house or was doing some other manual task, but after an amazing miracle the man was probably just heading home, musing in the process about what he was about to tell his family when he got there. He had a lot to think about. It wasn’t just his life that was changed. He would also find that the family dynamic was suddenly altered. The one cared for was no longer needing care. And what about a job – could he now find some way of repaying all the kindness shown to him over the thirty eight years of infirmity? Regarding his sleeping mat, he probably didn’t think about leaving it behind, after all, these things cost money, he thought. And anyway the Man who had healed him told him to take it with him.

But all of a sudden, he was jolted out of his thoughts by the religious police, the Jewish leaders, pulling him up over a simple thing like carrying a mat. The man explained how he had been healed, and how he had been told to pick up his mat by his Healer and walk. But that didn’t make any difference to the Jews. They asked the man, “Who said such a thing as that?”. But the man didn’t know because Jesus wasn’t with him any more. Rather than rejoice with the healed man about the marvellous miracle performed by Jesus, the Jews just wanted to stop a violation of their laws.

That was a sad day, because priorities and common sense were qualities conspicuous by their absence. The Jewish leaders missed a life changing encounter with God through the man who was healed. They were so focused on the mundane that they missed a supernatural event. But isn’t that something that we can all be guilty of? Even we pilgrims? How many times has God said something through a brother or sister, or through the preaching of the Word, or through circumstances, and we have ignored it, missing a God-moment? Do we sometimes get anxious over something that we fear might happen, only to find that God has gone before us and removed the problem? “What if’s” disappear before our loving Heavenly Father’s caring gaze. There is a short verse embedded in Peter’s first letter, “Give all your worries and cares to God, for he cares about you” (1 Peter 5:7). That isn’t there by accident – it is a reminder to all us worriers! 

But back to our man carrying his mat on the Sabbath. If something happening before us doesn’t fit into our world view, let us pause and seek God in case He is doing something supernatural. We can’t put God in a box of our own making, restricting Him to a certain way of doing things. He is God after all!

Father God. Please forgive us when we fail to recognise Your hand at work in our lives and the lives of our friends and families. We know that You care for us, Your children, every day, bringing life and hope in our times of need. We are so grateful. Amen.

Sabbath Laws

Posted on by korgrocker

“Jesus said to him, “Rise, take up your bed and walk.” And immediately the man was made well, took up his bed, and walked. And that day was the Sabbath. The Jews therefore said to him who was cured, “It is the Sabbath; it is not lawful for you to carry your bed.””
John 5:8-10 NKJV

An amazing miracle had just taken place. A man who had been severely disabled or even paralysed for thirty eight years had been healed. Totally and completely. It was as though the condition, the infirmity, had never been there in that man’s body. This miracle took place on the Jewish Sabbath, when a whole shed full of laws and regulations applied, rules which were enforced by the Jewish religious authorities. To them, it was unimportant that the man had been set free from a condition that would have otherwise have been with him to his grave. What mattered were their laws – to the Jewish authorities, they superseded anything else that would, or could, take place on the Sabbath.

Jesus Himself also confronted the Jewish Sabbath laws. We can read of an episode recorded by Luke, where the disciples were walking through some fields containing grain, and, because they were hungry, they broke off a few ears, removed the husks, and ate what was left. The Jewish authorities who were there as well, immediately took issue with this, because, in their opinion, this was doing work on the Sabbath, in harvesting grain. In reply, Jesus reminded the Jews that David, when he and his men were hungry, also broke the law by taking and eating the bread intended for priestly consumption. We can read more about this in 1 Samuel 21. But Jesus was having none of their hypocrisy and we read in Luke 6:5, “And Jesus added, “The Son of Man is Lord, even over the Sabbath“”. In Mark 2:27, we read, “And He said to them, “The Sabbath was made for man, and not man for the Sabbath“. Jesus was saying to them that the letter of the law should be overlaid with common sense.

In the Western Isles in Scotland, the fourth commandment, “Remember the Sabbath day, to keep it holy” (Exodus 20:8) is still observed, strictly by some, and particularly on the Isle of Lewis. So shops and cafes are closed, and work forbidden. Even children at play are frowned upon. The definition of what is, and what isn’t, holy is open to interpretation, but the principle of setting aside a day of rest and worship is followed by many there. However, sometimes we forget why God supplied this commandment. It wasn’t just to be an opportunity to engage in religious activities, but it was also there for the benefit of the people, to give them a chance to recover from their busyness and hard work. The Sabbath was supposed to be a day of rest.

But back to the account of the man healed of his infirmity. His was an example of where an instruction from Jesus came up against laws being applied by the authorities. Following God or doing what the civil or religious authorities say can be a fine balancing act. The Apostle Paul wrote, “Everyone must submit to governing authorities. …” (Romans 13:1a), and Peter’s declaration in Acts 5:29, “But Peter and the apostles replied, “We must obey God rather than any human authority“. Obeying God is the higher authority when there is a conflict but taking such a stand can have consequences, as the early Christian martyrs discovered. In Western societies today however, we are free to observe our faith (for now), but in other countries there is no such freedom. 

So what do we pilgrims think about the Sabbath day? Do we use this day as a time for attending church or visiting family? Or do we treat it like any other day? In the UK the Sabbath is traditionally a Sunday, and we find that secular demands made by society have largely eliminated God’s command of keeping the day holy. So the shops are still open. Sports are played. Many businesses have extended their working week to include Sunday shifts. It is very much an individual choice but the principle of having a day of rest, a holy day, is often necessary for our own mental health and for spending quality time with our Heavenly Father. The fourth commandment is there for a reason. We neglect it at our peril.

Dear Father God. You created mankind and as part of Your design You built into us the need to have a day of rest, a holy day, after six days of work. Please help us set aside the time we need to recharge our physical and spiritual batteries. For Jesus’ sake. Amen.

Three Things

Posted on by korgrocker

“One of the men lying there had been sick for thirty-eight years. When Jesus saw him and knew he had been ill for a long time, he asked him, “Would you like to get well?” “I can’t, sir,” the sick man said, “for I have no one to put me into the pool when the water bubbles up. Someone else always gets there ahead of me.” Jesus told him, “Stand up, pick up your mat, and walk!” Instantly, the man was healed! He rolled up his sleeping mat and began walking! But this miracle happened on the Sabbath,”
John 5:5-9 NLT

I wonder what that man did every day, just lying there by the pool? Was his mind in neutral, in a living but comatose state? Or had he made friends with those around him, conversing with them every day? But without any meaningful stimulation, what was his mental state? And who fed him and tended to his personal needs? But the man at the Pool was obviously mentally alert and open to the possibility that he could be healed if he could only get to the water in time. What a tragedy – thirty eight years wasted. 

Jesus asked the man, “Would you like to get well?”, but the man’s response was one describing the practical difficulties caused by his disability. Imagine his limited efforts to crawl or squirm his way to the pool edge to reach the bubbling water before anyone else could get there. Imagine his despair when, once again, someone got there before him. Imagine the constant strain of having to look for the tell-tale stirring of the waters. But along comes the Saviour, compassionate and caring, with three instructions that transformed the man’s life. “Jesus told him, “Stand up, pick up your mat, and walk!”” 

There is so much to see behind these words. It wasn’t just the physical healing that made a difference. Once again we see that it is the whole person that Jesus heals. The man’s legs and other parts of his body suddenly had all the muscles, flesh, nerve tissues, and bones restored to them. He would have felt the new surge of energy and the lack of pain, but there was still his mental state that needed to be healed. After thirty eight years his mind would have needed time to adjust to the new situation. But we are told in John’s account that the man was instantly healed. And in accordance with Jesus’ instructions he stood up, rolled up his sleeping mat and started to walk.

People even today sometimes get caught in a rut. It needn’t be a physical disability, like the man at the Pool. It could be one of self pity, or feelings of helplessness through a relationship that has gone sour, or a job that has become full of drudgery or hardship. But Jesus has the words we need to enable us to stand up and move on. He always has a way for us to follow, to get us out of a situation. He always has the words we need to hear in times of stress and anxiety. These words may be difficult to hear and our response may well be one of fear, but through faith we know that God can heal us just as well as He healed the man at the Pool. 

In Romans 8:11, Paul wrote, “The Spirit of God, who raised Jesus from the dead, lives in you. And just as God raised Christ Jesus from the dead, he will give life to your mortal bodies by this same Spirit living within you“. We pilgrims, have the Holy Spirit living within us, giving us life and all the resources we need. After all, if the Holy Spirit was powerful enough to raise Jesus from the dead, He will have no problems with whatever ails us. So in faith we bring our problem to the Saviour and respond in obedience to whatever He tells us to do. 

Dear Father God. Thank Your for Your Son, Jesus, who came to this world for our benefit, for our salvation. Your grace and love is endless. Thank You. Amen.

Do You Want to Get Well

Posted on by korgrocker

“After this there was a feast of the Jews, and Jesus went up to Jerusalem. Now there is in Jerusalem by the Sheep Gate a pool, which is called in Hebrew, Bethesda, having five porches. In these lay a great multitude of sick people, blind, lame, paralyzed, waiting for the moving of the water. For an angel went down at a certain time into the pool and stirred up the water; then whoever stepped in first, after the stirring of the water, was made well of whatever disease he had. Now a certain man was there who had an infirmity thirty-eight years. When Jesus saw him lying there, and knew that he already had been in that condition a long time, He said to him, “Do you want to be made well?””
John 5:1-6 NKJV

To be sick, blind, lame, or paralysed in the days when Jesus lived in Palestine was a terrible and hopeless condition to be in. There was no remedy from the medics, such as they had, or anyone else. But there was a glimmer of hope in the gloom. Apparently, someone had discovered that the turbulence caused by the spring that fed the Pool of Bethesda had healing powers, because they believed it was caused by an angel, who came down from Heaven and stirred up the waters. Whoever made it into the Pool first was then healed. As a consequence, the Pool was populated by a “great multitude of sick people”, all there in the hope that they would be the first to make it into the Pool. The verses today don’t say how often the waters were stirred up, but in a society without any other alternative, there was no other choice.

In modern times, there is another spring of water with, it is claimed, healing properties. This spring is at Lourdes, in France, and many Catholic visitors go there to bathe in its waters, also in the hope that healing powers can be found. There have been many documented miracles, enough to attract thousands of sick visitors every year. To many of these people, Lourdes is a last resort. They have been told that there is little or no hope that they will get better from whatever ails them, and these people have much in common with the sick people lying around the pool of Bethesda. From Wikipedia, “According to Catholic tradition, the location of the spring was described to Bernadette Soubirous by an apparition of Our Lady of Lourdes on 25 February 1858. Since that time, many millions of pilgrims to Lourdes have followed the instruction of the Blessed Virgin Mary to “drink at the spring and bathe in it”.”

Picking up the account in our verses today, we see that during His visit to Jerusalem, Jesus visited the Pool of Bethesda. We are not told why He went there, but, in the knowledge Jesus only did what His Father commanded, He was there for a purpose. We also don’t know if His disciples were with Him, though John must have been to include the story in his Gospel account. But by the Pool, Jesus found a man with an “infirmity”. We don’t know what this was, but it was such that he was practically helpless, needing someone to help him into the pool when the waters bubbled up. But then, Jesus asked the man a strange question, “Do you want to be made well?” Surely the man wanted to be healed because otherwise why was he there? I have met two ladies with illnesses or disabilities who have responded to prayer for healing. One was made totally well, but the other, although apparently healed, quickly lapsed back into her previous state. The first lady bravely faced into the consequences of her healing with the loss of disability benefits and consequent financial challenges. The second lady realised that through healing she would lose her identity as the “lady in a wheelchair”, as well as the loss of a full time carer and other financial benefits. The first wanted to be healed. The second didn’t. But they were both healed through prayer and by a miracle of God’s grace.

The man at the pool had been in a desperate paralysed condition for thirty eight years, and amongst all the people sitting or lying around the Pool, he was the only one that Jesus sought out. Why was that, I wonder? The quick answer is that I don’t really know. There have been suggestions, such as Jesus might have known the man from a previous encounter, or that for most of the people there, God had already supplied a miraculous solution for the first person to enter the water after it bubbled up. Of course, Jesus may have healed others, but John’s Gospel account doesn’t record any.

We pilgrims know that God, regardless of our human state of health, can heal us. He does so through the medical profession, but He also heals through miraculous encounters with the Holy Spirit. Through our faith in Him, we trust Him with our life on this earth, and the life to come. There is no other way.

Dear Father God. You are the One who heals us, and we give You all the glory for the occasions when that happens. Please forgive us for our lack of faith. Amen.

The Second Sign

Posted on by korgrocker

“This was the second miraculous sign Jesus did in Galilee after coming from Judea. Afterward Jesus returned to Jerusalem for one of the Jewish holy days.”
John 4:54-5:1 NLT

A miracle happened when Jesus turned water into wine, and here John records that the healing of the government official’s son was the second that had taken place in Galilee. Both events were, as John wrote, miraculous occasions, inexplicable to anyone taking them at face value, but there will always be someone who attempts to explain them away by attributing to them some natural cause. Perhaps, such people say, the healing of the official’s son was a coincidence. The boy might have been very sick when his father decided to journey to find Jesus, but in the meantime he became well through the normal course of an illness, in which some people get better and others died. Perhaps the water turned into wine was some form of hoax perpetrated by the bridegroom or someone else at the wedding reception. We will always be able to find the sceptics and deniers, people who don’t want to believe what they see or hear, because to do so would result in them having to abandon their world view and take on board something that will change and even transform their lives. These people are very comfortable with their sinful lives, for now.

Jesus said, as recorded in John 4:48, “ … Will you never believe in me unless you see miraculous signs and wonders?” What was there about the Galileans that seemed to indicate that they didn’t believe Jesus’ message on its own? Was Jesus a bit exasperated that His words of eternal life were rejected until He reinforced them with a miracle or two? After all, He had a tremendous reception in Sychar, and the people there believed what He said, not what He did. John 4:42, “Then they said to the woman, “Now we believe, not just because of what you told us, but because we have heard him ourselves. Now we know that he is indeed the Saviour of the world.“”

The people in Jesus’ day had the benefit of the Son of God living with them. He walked amongst the Jewish people spreading His message of hope about the Kingdom of God. He preached in their synagogues, He taught in the fields and educated His disciples as they journeyed from one place to another. And yet, most people He met had a problem believing what He said. But before we condemn them, we need to walk in their shoes. If someone came to our societies today, even Jesus Himself, preaching the message that Jesus preached, what reception would they get? It would be even more difficult today, because the spirit of the age promotes any message, any ideology, that feels good. Anything that satisfies the sinful yearnings within human beings. So people today will reject any message that confronts their sin, even if their rejection of it comes with a warning that hell beckons, just over the horizons of their lives. There is a man who lives close by who I shared the Gospel with, and his response was that he would be taking part in the “big party downstairs”. Not for him a life with God in Heaven. Such a response staggered me, because its intensity in its rejection of the love of God was basically a self-imposed death sentence.

Do miracles happen today? There are many that have been documented, but still most people choose to reject the Gospel. They reject even the resurrection of the Man who was cruelly put to death on a Roman cross, perhaps the biggest miracle that this world has ever seen. But miracles or not, there is only one way to Heaven and that is through repentance and believing in Jesus. Our Heavenly Father loved the people He created so much that He was prepared to sacrifice His only Son to save them from the consequences of their sins. The people of Galilee had a choice, and that same choice is still hanging in the air, for now. It won’t be there for ever, because one day we will die and the option of believing in Jesus will die with us. We pilgrims have an opportunity to tell others about the wonderful future people can have, both in this life and beyond. And every time someone we tell about Jesus decides to believe in Him, they hold a party in Heaven. There is nothing more important in this life than the Good News brought to this world by the Son of God.

Dear Father God. All we can do is to worship You, with grateful hearts. Amen.

Believing Jesus

Posted on by korgrocker

“The official pleaded, “Lord, please come now before my little boy dies.” Then Jesus told him, “Go back home. Your son will live!” And the man believed what Jesus said and started home. While the man was on his way, some of his servants met him with the news that his son was alive and well. He asked them when the boy had begun to get better, and they replied, “Yesterday afternoon at one o’clock his fever suddenly disappeared!” Then the father realized that that was the very time Jesus had told him, “Your son will live.” And he and his entire household believed in Jesus.”
John 4:49-53 NLT

Perhaps the government official, the civil servant, was worried that Jesus wouldn’t heal his son. So he begged Jesus a second time to go with him to his home to heal his “little boy”. We don’t know the lad’s age but the impression was that he was much loved and in a family that obviously was fairly wealthy, because there were servants. But this was another example of Jesus’ compassion. He saw the man’s distress and immediately responded with the instruction to “Go back home”, followed by the reassurance “Your son will live”. 

But we should note the civil servant’s response. In spite of his begging, we are told two things about the man – he believed in Jesus and he was obedient to Jesus’ command. We read, “And the man believed what Jesus said and started home”. No more begging Jesus to come to his home. No more emotional pressure. We don’t know how he heard that Jesus was back in Galilee but he journeyed to meet the Master. The urgency of his son’s illness spurred him on. He was probably thinking about where he could find Jesus. What would his reception be? Would Jesus go with him? What if he said “no”? Doubts would have pressed in on his thoughts. But regardless of all of this he kept going, ignoring anything that would have made him turn back. That’s faith in action.

The man was hurrying home, desperate to see if his son was better. What was he expecting? A small improvement? Total healing? Would he find his son back to normal, playing with the other children? What did he think when he saw some of his servants coming towards him? Were they bringing bad news? Or was it the answer to a father’s desperate encounter with Jesus, the answer he yearned for? And then, the joy when he found out that his son was well, with the fever not present anymore, and it all happened at the very moment Jesus had said, “Your son will live”. 

We pilgrim believers are a people of faith. But do we have faith like that government official? Faith that will persevere through difficulties and troubles? God will always reward the faith of His children. We don’t have to beg, but believe what Jesus said, as we read in Matthew 7:9-11, “You parents—if your children ask for a loaf of bread, do you give them a stone instead? Or if they ask for a fish, do you give them a snake? Of course not! So if you sinful people know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more will your heavenly Father give good gifts to those who ask him”. The problem is that we “people of faith” fail to ask God for what we need. We often try every other avenue until desperation or lethargy kick in and spoil the opportunity. Or as a last resort we fall to our knees in prayer and ask God to help us. I keep a prayer diary and often find myself writing in the answers to prayers offered up days before. It’s faith building to know that God not only hears my prayers but answers them as well.

This cameo of the encounter between Jesus and the government official ends with more joy. We read, “And he and his entire household believed in Jesus”. What a tremendous outcome to find that the whole household, presumably servants and all, came to a belief in Jesus. All through a few gracious words from Jesus and the father’s faith.

Dear Father God. It must grieve You so much to see Your children struggling with issues that You have the answer to. Please forgive us. For Jesus’ sake. Amen.

Signs and Wonders

Posted on by korgrocker

“Jesus asked, “Will you never believe in me unless you see miraculous signs and wonders?””
John 4:48 NLT

The civil servant from Capernaum came to Jesus and begged Him to heal his sick son. He was desperate and probably sick himself with worry over his son’s threatened demise. But Jesus’ response was to ask a question about how people can come to believe in Him. Did they believe in Him because of His message or because He healed them and did other miracles in their society? Did the “miraculous signs and wonders” convince people that He was who He said He was, or was it because of His message about the Kingdom of God? Here was a people who were anticipating the imminent appearance of their Messiah. But they were suffering under the Roman occupation, in poverty (apart from a select few, the landowners and others) and desperate for a solution to their suffering. The Messiah they were expecting would set them free from all this, or so they thought, and transform Israel into an utopian state.  

Jesus’ message was about the Kingdom of God and was about a world that differed from that of His fellow Jews. And he came to give them the opportunity to join their Heavenly Father there. It was not going to happen totally during their earthly lives but happen it would one day. Jesus’ message was simple – repent of your sins, believe in Me, and follow Me. He taught about a relationship that would blossom into eternal life and He showed the compassion God had for His people by doing “miraculous signs and wonders” in their society. In those days, Heaven touched earth, and crowds of people came to hear Him and be healed of their ailments. On two occasions, when they were hungry, He even fed them. To be near Jesus was an incredible and life changing experience, and yet most people rejected Him. 

In John 1:10-13, we read, “He came into the very world he created, but the world didn’t recognize him. He came to his own people, and even they rejected him. But to all who believed him and accepted him, he gave the right to become children of God. They are reborn—not with a physical birth resulting from human passion or plan, but a birth that comes from God“. Sadly, many of the people on His day failed to recognise their Messiah and instead of believing in Him they rejected Him, even though He did some amazing “signs and wonders” amongst them. But it wasn’t all bad news and a wasted opportunity. In spite of all of this, there were many people who did believe in Him and were born again into His Kingdom. The Church was birthed and has been growing ever since. The early believers, fronted by the disciples, turned their world upside down with their message of hope.

The Apostle Thomas wasn’t present with the other disciples when Jesus appeared to them after His resurrection. He had to wait for Jesus’ next appearance and his response to Jesus, after he had the opportunity to examine His wounds, was “My Lord and my God” (John 20:28). But Jesus’ reply was significant – “Then Jesus told him, “You believe because you have seen me. Blessed are those who believe without seeing me” (John 20:29). We pilgrims heard the Good News about Jesus and believed in Him, but we have never seen Him bodily. However we will one day and in the meantime we share that message today with anyone who will listen. We perhaps think we don’t see many “signs and wonders” today, but we should pause and think. Many good things happen today and we do God a disservice by not giving Him the glory for them. The amazing strides made in science and medicine, for example. These would have been “signs and wonders” to the people of Jesus’ day. Perhaps we should thank God for His gifts, even though arrogant people claim the credit for themselves. God’s compassion for humanity, and His “signs and wonders”, didn’t end on a cross at a place called Calvary.

Dear God. We thank You for doing so much for us, even when we don’t ask or recognise Your hand in the answers to our prayers. We worship You today. Amen.

A Desperate Dad

Posted on by korgrocker

“As he travelled through Galilee, he came to Cana, where he had turned the water into wine. There was a government official in nearby Capernaum whose son was very sick. When he heard that Jesus had come from Judea to Galilee, he went and begged Jesus to come to Capernaum to heal his son, who was about to die.“
John 4:46-47 NLT

Jesus finally arrived in Galilee after all the excitement in Sychar in Samaria, and John then records that Jesus “travelled through Galilee”. Why was that? Well, Jesus had an itinerant ministry, that started when He was twelve. We read in Luke 2:49b, ” …  Did you not know that I must be about My Father’s business?” Further on in Luke we read why Jesus travelled around. Luke wrote, “For the Son of Man came to seek and save those who are lost” (Luke 19:10). Such a mission involved teaching about the Kingdom of God, healing the sick, raising the dead and doing many miraculous signs. There was a prophecy in Isaiah 61 about the Messiah’s mission, and Jesus read it out while in the synagogue in Nazareth. “The Spirit of the Lord is upon me, for he has anointed me to bring Good News to the poor. He has sent me to proclaim that captives will be released, that the blind will see, that the oppressed will be set free, and that the time of the Lord’s favour has come”” (Luke 4:18-19). Jesus was on a mission and there was no time to lose because He was about His Father’s business.

Jesus’ reputation had preceded Him, and a civil servant needed help with a sick son, who was so ill that his family were afraid he was going to die. A nightmare scenario for any parent, because I know – I’ve been there. My daughter somehow contracted a particular type of encephalitis and spent nearly four months in hospital. The medics could do nothing other than supply nursing care, and it was only God who brought her through to full health some months later. That fact that this happened at all was recorded on her medical notes as “nothing short of a miracle”. In Jesus’ day there was little in the way of medical solutions to illness. People either got better or they died. All their families could do was to supply nursing care. It is only in the last century or so that medicine, with drugs and vaccines, have protected or treated people with otherwise fatal illnesses. 

The father of the sick son came to Jesus in desperation, and we are told that he “begged Jesus to come to Capernaum to heal his son”. But, today, is that what we have to do with God? When we have a loved one who is seriously ill, do we get on our knees and beg God to do something? I suppose it depends on our relationship with God. Those who don’t know Him will perhaps, in desperation, try anything as a last resort, and this may have been the situation with the civil servant from Capernaum. Sadly, other people will reject the only One who can heal, and instead blame Him for their situation. But the children of God, those who believe in Jesus and have been forgiven of their sins, don’t have to beg. Our loving Heavenly Father knows what we need, and begging is something we don’t have to do.  Instead, we pray the prayer of faith, trusting that God knows best. And as Jesus taught, we pray and keep on praying.

Dear Heavenly Father, You only have good gifts for Your children and You give them so freely when we ask and pray. We are so grateful. Amen.