Can you remember when you were the most frightened you have ever been? You might be thinking of a near accident or a roller coaster ride or a haunted house or a scary movie. However, let me challenge you with a time when someone you loved was seriously ill, maybe even close to dying. That kind of panic makes most other fears look minor in comparison.
So when have you prayed the most often? Probably when you were terrified of losing that same loved one. It’s also most likely to be when you enlisted the prayer support from the greatest number of family and friends. When a loved one is facing serious health problems, we often fear the worst and our anxiety and worries overwhelm us. That is when we cry out the most often to God for help; over and over and over again. No one has to remind us to pray; our mental focus can think of little else.
In Jn 4:43-50, Jesus encountered such a man; a father with a dying son. 43 “After the two days he left for Galilee. 44(Now Jesus himself had pointed out that prophets have no honor in their own country.) 45When he arrived in Galilee, the Galileans welcomed him. They had seen all that he had done in Jerusalem at the Passover Festival, for they also had been there. 46Once more he visited Cana in Galilee, where he had turned the water into wine. And there was a certain royal official whose son lay sick at Capernaum. 47When this man heard that Jesus had arrived in Galilee from Judea, he went to him and begged him to come and heal his son, who was close to death.
This was no ordinary man, the text describes him as a “royal official”. The Greek word is basilikos and refers to an officer who belonged to the king and served him in some special way.
Mark Moore notes: “This royal official is quite possibly a servant of Herod Antipas. Josephus uses this same word some 600 times to designate a servant of Herod. We find other noble servants of Herod in the NT such as Cuza (Lk 8:3) and Manaen (Acts 12:1), who are, perhaps, co-laborers with this man.”
Merril Tenny observes, “It is possible that the official was a Gentile. If so, the three persons Jesus interviewed in this early ministry represented the Jews, the Samaritans, and the Gentiles—in short, the world he came to save”.
No doubt this nobleman had already tried the royal physicians and struck out; Jesus most likely wasn’t his first choice. But as his son moved closer and closer to death, the report he had heard that Jesus was in Galilee screamed, “Find this Jesus and go to him before it is too late.” (Finding Jesus would be no simple task. Galilee was 1,600 sq miles in size, 60 miles north to south and 30 miles east to west.) Surely he used all of the royal resources at his disposal and finally found Jesus in Cana, 20 miles away from Capernaum. The stories he had heard about the wedding there in Cana and the water turned into wine, stirred up hope for a possible miracle for his son. So he, “begged him to come and heal his son, who was close to death.”
Jesus’ first words were not only directed to the father, but to the surrounding crowd and they seemed completely out of character with the mental picture that most people have of him. “Unless you people see signs and wonders, you will never believe.” He actually rebuked the crowd and the father of the dying son, for being sign-seekers. Jesus wanted people to believe him because of who he was and what he taught, not just the signs he could do. (this would not be the last time Jesus rebuked miracle-mongers: Jn 10:38; 14:11; 15:22–24; 20:29). He wanted what he had found in the Samaritans in Sychar who: “And because of his words many more became believers.” Jn 4:41
This most certainly tested the boy’s father, who no doubt was not accustomed to being rebuked by anyone, much less this Galilean Jew. But his love for his son and his fear for his life rose to the top. 49The royal official said, “Sir, come down before my child dies.”
Jesus left the rebuke behind and said, 50“Go, your son will live.”
But that isn’t the end of this story. “The man took Jesus at his word and departed. 51While he was still on the way, his servants met him with the news that his boy was living. 52When he inquired as to the time when his son got better, they said to him, “Yesterday, at one in the afternoon, the fever left him.” 53Then the father realized that this was the exact time at which Jesus had said to him, “Your son will live.” So he and his whole household believed.
54 This was the second sign Jesus performed after coming from Judea to Galilee.” An entire Gentile family “believed” and a royal family at that.
So what was Jesus really like? Kind? Merciful? Hard? Sharp-tongued? Yes, to all 4. Jesus was always what his Father asked him to be, no matter what others would think of his words and actions. Heaven’s smile was all that really counted to Jesus.
Mike “Pawdad” Sublett, Pastor @ Hi-Land Christian Church, Pampa, Texas 79065, 630-730-8015
