Hello, I hope that everyone is having a good day. It is good to be with you today to post another edition of the Weekend Sermon. I thank God for this opportunity.
I want to begin today by asking everyone to pray for the families in Oregon who lost loved ones in the horrible incident that happened at the college out there yesterday. Please pray that the Lord will give to them His comfort and strength in this hard time. Also, let us pray for those affected by hurricane Joaquin.
This week I have not been feeling well. My blood pressure is way up, and I have been having terrible headaches. Please pray that I will feel better. Thank you.
In other areas, let us continue to pray for peace in the world. I would like to ask you all to focus in on praying for peace in Syria this week. The situation in this nation just seems to go from bad to worse. Also, let us continue to pray that the message of the love of Jesus will reach around the world. This week, let us pray that the Gospel will reach Japan, Mongolia and North Korea.
For the past several weeks we have been in a series of messages focusing on the divinity of Jesus as presented in John. We have already discussed the "I Am" statements of Jesus, and last week, we began focusing on the seven sign miracles recorded by John. This week we will look at Jesus encounter with the nobleman and the nobleman's son.
After His miracle of turning the water into wine, Jesus went to Jerusalem. While there, He had a religious discussion with Nicodemus. Upon leaving Jerusalem, Jesus went up through Samaria and spoke to a woman there whom He met by the town's well. Upon returning to Galilee, Jesus went back to the city of Cana where He performed His first sign miracle.
When word got out that Jesus was back in Cana, people from the surrounding area came to Jesus to seek healing and deliverance. One of those who sought out Jesus was a nobleman from the city of Capernaum. This man would probably have been an official in Herod's court. This would have been one of Herod's sons who ruled for the Romans.
This nobleman found Jesus and begged Jesus to come to Capernaum to heal his son. Jesus at first says something surprising. He criticizes the people for refusing to believe in Him unless they see a sign. Upon hearing this, the nobleman once again implored Jesus to come and heal his son.
Actually, Jesus did not go to Capernaum to heal the man's son. Jesus simply said to the official to go. Jesus said, "Your son will live."
The man started back to his home. On the way, one of his servants met him and told him that his son was well. The healing had happened at the exact hour that Jesus had spoken the words of healing to the nobleman.
This great miracle caused the nobleman to believe in Jesus. Also, all of the members of the nobleman's house became followers of Jesus.
So, how is this miracle a sign, and what does it have to teach us today?
The first thing that I would like to mention concerns Jesus' statement about people not believing unless they see a sign. This is often the case, and I believe that Jesus is upset about it now just as much as He was when He walked upon this earth.
Jesus does not want people to follow Him just so that they can get something from Him. Often, the people in the Jesus' day seemed to follow Jesus to be healed or to receive bread. They wanted Jesus for what they could get out of Him.
I find this is often the case today. We will follow Jesus with the hope that we will have good health and prosperity. Much of current teaching focuses on this health and wealth teaching.
Jesus does not want us to follow Him to get something or to treat Him as a means to an end. He wants us to follow Him because we want to have a relationship with Him, and He wants to be Lord of our lives in the good times and the bad.
We should come to Jesus in order to receive forgiveness that we might have a relationship with the God of the universe. So often, salvation is preached to emphasize that we need to get Jesus in order to go to Heaven. This takes the focus off Jesus and puts the focus on what Jesus provides. Knowing Jesus should be the focus of faith.
The clearest way that this miracle demonstrated the divinity of Jesus is in that the boy was healed over a great distance simply by Jesus speaking a word of healing. Jesus simply spoke the word and the boy was healed. Only the God of all creation has the power to speak and call something into existence.
One other thing that strikes me in this account is the nobleman's faith. When Jesus spoke the word of healing, the nobleman did not question Jesus. He did not implore Jesus to come with him to Capernaum any longer. He simply took Jesus at His word believing that Jesus could bring healing to his son.
Also, when the nobleman realized what a great thing that the Lord Jesus had done, the nobleman put his faith and trust in Jesus. His faith led others in his family to trust in the Lord as well.
This is the type of faith that believers in Jesus are called upon to possess. We are to believe the promises from Jesus in the word and act upon them.
Next week, we will look at the third sign that Jesus performed to proclaim His divinity. On Monday I will post the verses, and there will be a review on Wednesday. May God bless you all. Amen.
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