The One Who Took Jesus at His Word

This is Christ the King Sermons. Christ the King Sermons is a ministry of Christ the King Presbyterian Church located in Raleigh, North Carolina. CTK is a community rooted in the depth of the gospel, refined by hard conversations, fueled by meaningful relationships, and committed to redemptive work in Raleigh.

Congratulations, graduates. Let's hear it from these guys. What an awesome day. We have a real treat this morning here at CTK as we turn our attention to God's word. We are going to hear from somebody who has been a part of CTK from the very beginning. He and his family have been here for over twenty-five years and he's a friend to many, a mentor to many. He served as an elder in our church, he currently is the founder and head of Eleven Ten Leadership and spends his life helping people connect their faith with their work in really meaningful ways. More than that, he's a loving husband to his wife, Alice, and he's the dad of four amazing adult kids. Someone who deeply loves this church and we're really grateful to have him preaching this morning. So let's welcome David Spickard.

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Well, good morning, everyone. It is a real privilege to preach God's word today. Welcome to summer. We feel it today, right? The heat is here. I hope you have some fun things planned for the summer. And I also want to extend my congratulations to the graduates. This is a very exciting time. Just an amazing accomplishment. So, way to go.

We are continuing our study of the book of John and we're going to finish chapter four. Jesus and his disciples are on a journey from Judea to Galilee and last week, James walked us through the incredible encounter that Jesus had with the woman at the well in Samaria. And now the disciples are continuing their journey. They're leaving Samaria, and they're on their way to Galilee.

So as is our custom, let's read our scripture together. It's John chapter four verses 43 through 54. You can find it on page 926 in your pew Bibles and also on the screen behind me.

After the two days, he departed to Galilee. For Jesus himself testified that a prophet has no honor in his own country. So when he came to Galilee, the Galileans welcomed him having seen all that he had done in Jerusalem at the feast. For they too had gone to the feast. So he came again to Cana in Galilee where he had made the water wine. And at Capernaum, there was an official whose son was ill. When he heard that Jesus had come from Judea to Galilee, he went and begged him to come down and heal his son for he was at the point of death. Jesus therefore said to him, "Unless you see signs and wonders, you will not believe." The official said to him, "Sir, come down before my child dies." Jesus said to him, "Go, your son will live." The man believed the word that Jesus spoke to him and went his way. As he was going down, his servants met him and told him that his son was living. So he asked them the hour when he began to mend and they said to him, "Yesterday at the seventh hour, the fever left him." The father knew that was the hour when Jesus had said to him, "Your son will live." And he himself believed in all his household. This was now the second sign that Jesus did when he had come from Judea to Galilee. — John 4:43-54

Let's pray. Father, we thank you so much for your word. We thank you even for John this morning who was inspired by the Holy Spirit to write these words, to capture this story because you have something to say to us today. And on this Pentecost Sunday, we ask for your spirit to be present, that you would speak to us, that you would help us see who you are, and that we would know you are the one for us to follow. We give you all the glory, give you all the praise in Jesus' name. Amen.

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So, there are two types of people in the world. Those who are directionally gifted and those who are directionally challenged. Now some of you, no matter where we plop you in the world, no matter where it is, without a phone, without a map, somehow you could find your way around. But for others of you, if I were to say, right now, which way is East? That might be an issue. That could be a problem. Anyone want to point to where East is? Let's see who's directionally gifted versus directionally challenged. Now, full disclosure, I had to look at my compass map on my iPhone just to make sure.

So, the past few weeks and into the summer, we're walking through the book of John following Jesus and the signs he performed and these signs are giving us direction whether you're directionally gifted or directionally challenged because they're pointing us to a particular place. And John is very, very clear about what he's trying to do in the book of John. He says it to us at the very end of the book in chapter 20 where he says that Jesus did many other signs in the presence of the disciples, but he didn't write all of them down.

He just wrote a select few. And the ones he wrote are written so that we might believe that Jesus is the Christ, the son of God, and that by believing you might have life in his name. So think about that. John chose the signs. He captured them for us in his book because they contain clues to convince you and me that Jesus really is the son of God and that through our faith, we might have life in him.

So as we're walking through the book of John, we're on our treasure hunt. We're looking at these clues. What are the clues that John wants us to discover so that we can have a deeper meaning with what he's trying to communicate? And so that's what we're to do this morning. We're going to go on a little treasure hunt with our story of Jesus and the official and the official's son, and we're going to do that in three parts. First, seeing a sign. Next, needing a sign. And finally, believing the sign.

Seeing a Sign

So after staying in Samaria for two days, Jesus and his disciples have now arrived in Galilee, and the Galileans were really excited to see him. You can picture the scene. They arrive. People know that Jesus is coming. They all come out. They have come to see him because, one, Jesus—this is his home country, Galilee—and he's back in Cana. If you remember about Cana, this is his first miracle that he did where he turned the water into wine at the wedding, and people were talking about that.

And then we see in verse 45 that John tells us that they had also seen all he had done at the feast in Jerusalem, which, if you remember, Paul preached on this a few weeks ago—it was when Jesus got angry. He went to the temple because they had turned it into a marketplace. He got a whip. He cleared the tables. He cleansed the temple. And then he said:

Tear down the temple and I'll rebuild it in three days. — John 2:19

So the crowds are like, what's he going to do next? The miracle worker is back. He's here. He's come home. The temple rebuilder is here. Their enthusiasm to see Jesus was real, but it wasn't soundly based. They wanted to see another sign. They knew about Jesus, but they did not honor him the way they should have.

And Jesus knew this. That's why he said, before they arrived:

A prophet has no honor in his home country. — John 4:44

They were going to his home country. A prophet doesn't have honor there.

And for us, this is extremely important. There is such a thing as a false familiarity with Jesus—a dangerous reality that we see him, we even know all about him, but do we know him? This is true for the people in Galilee, his home country, and it's also true for us. We live in a home city for Jesus. In the Triangle, it's very easy to be familiar with who Jesus is, to know the language, to come to church, to do the things, but only engage him because we really just want him to perform a sign—something to help us feel good or to meet a need that we have.

The crowd's excitement in Jesus was dependent on the wonders arising from seeing the signs, not on a realization that Jesus was indeed the Christ, the savior of the world. And the same can be true for us.

Needing a Sign

Now in the midst of all this, an official shows up, and he's there not just to see a sign, but he's there because he needed a sign.

What do we know about the official? Well, he's royal. Commentators believe that he was a high-ranking official in the service to King Herod. He had servants. He came from Capernaum, which is Jesus' hometown where Jesus lived when he was an adult, and it was 20 to 25 miles away from Cana. And through the grapevine, he heard Jesus was traveling from Judea to Galilee. And like most everyone else, he had heard of Jesus, but he didn't really know him. But he had to go see him.

You can imagine he hurried those 20 miles to get from Capernaum to Cana because his son was about to die. And he needed a sign. There was nowhere else for him to go.

So we see in verse 47:

He went and begged Jesus to come down and heal my son. — John 4:47

Picture it. This royal man of power, wealth, and influence in front of all of the crowds begging Jesus to come down and heal his son.

And what does Jesus say? Verse 48:

Unless you see signs and wonders, you will not believe. — John 4:48

Well, that's a tough answer for the official to hear. Can you imagine feeling this sense of maybe rebuke and something that feels harsh? Where's the compassion? Where's the emotional intelligence of Jesus? Come on.

What's important to see is that "you" is not just directed to the official. That "you" is plural. It's to the crowd and ultimately to us. What's Jesus doing? He's challenging the official. He's challenging the crowd and ultimately us to move beyond a superficial faith that seeks constant external validation, expecting God to prove himself to us that he's real by performing signs, and to embrace a faith that is grounded in trust, understanding of his word, and having a deep relationship with him.

So if we have to ask ourselves, do you need a sign for Jesus to perform to prove himself to you? What expectations do we have of God to prove he is real and who he says he is? From getting that perfect parking spot to landing the job, to finding our soul mate, to healing our loved one, to healing ourselves. Signs and wonders from God are obviously good things, but they should not form the foundation of our faith. We should not depend on them to prove God to us. In themselves, signs and wonders cannot change our heart.

We see this with the people of Israel when in Exodus, they were with God on Mount Sinai. They interacted with him, they even heard the voice of God. And not a long time after that, they worshiped a golden calf. And the crazy thing is—and we all know this—God demonstrates his power, his majesty, and his presence all around us in small and big ways. The heavens declare the glory of the Lord and yet we still want him to show us a sign. We need proof.

That's why the official's response to Jesus is so powerful. You see, needing a sign is not bad. It's not bad to need a sign as long as it's for the right reason. The official needed a sign not because he needed proof. He needed a sign because he was desperate. And there's a big difference. His son was dying. He was not going to leave in the face of what Jesus said. He was not deflated. Instead, he responded to Jesus.

Sir, come down before my child dies. — John 4:49

The official's statement demonstrates he's starting to get who Jesus is. The word for "sir" means someone who possesses authority and power, underscoring Jesus' divine nature and authority. The root words for "come down" are used throughout the New Testament to describe the action of descending or going down, which can be both physical or spiritual. The same words are used in Matthew 3 where it describes God descending as a dove, and in Matthew 28, Jesus being descended from heaven.

And finally, the Greek word for "child" in the official's statement is translated as "dear little one," which is a really important clue. The official's son is an infant, a baby boy. His son, his hope for a future, was dying. He needed a miracle. He was desperate. And so he said, "Sir, come down before my child dies." His request shows that he properly understood that Jesus wasn't discouraging him from asking for a miracle. Jesus wants us to ask for miracles. He instead understood that Jesus was discouraging a faith that only seeks the miraculous.

Believing the Sign

And so what does Jesus say to him in verse 50?

Jesus said to him, "Go, your son will live." — John 4:50

Now the official has a choice. He came to Jesus because he needed a sign. Now the question is, will he believe the sign? What Jesus tells the official is worse than what he said in the first statement when he said, "Unless you see signs and wonders, you will not believe." Why is it worse? When Jesus said, "Go and your son will live," the official was in a bind. No one had ever done a healing without being present. And his son was twenty miles away. The official asked Jesus to come down, and Jesus said, I'm not gonna go with you. There was no sign for the official to believe except for Jesus' word.

So what would the official do?

The man believed the word that Jesus spoke to him and went his way. — John 4:50

This is an amazing step of faith. Jesus essentially was saying, trust me. I can heal your son with my word. And the official had to ask himself, am I gonna trust my son's life with this man's word? And he said, yeah, I am. He believed and he went.

Now notice what John does in verse 50. He uses the word "man" instead of "official." And that word "man" means all of mankind. He's kind of winking at us a little bit because what Jesus is offering is available to all of us. So the question is the same for us. Will we believe and take Jesus at his word?

In that moment, the official went from an intellectual rational belief in Jesus' power to personal trust, which is the same transition we all have to make. It's not enough just to know about Jesus. We need to know him and have a personal relationship with him. From seeing Jesus as a miracle worker to seeing him as the Messiah.

And this is what happened:

As he was going down, his servants met him and told him that his son was living. So he asked them the hour when he began to mend and they said, "Yesterday, at the seventh hour, the fever left him." — John 4:51-52

Now there are two details, two clues in these verses that John does not want us to overlook. First, the servant said "yesterday," which means that the official took his time when he returned from meeting with Jesus in Cana back to his home in Capernaum. His leisurely pace was a demonstration of his faith.

In fear, the official ran from Capernaum to Cana, and in faith, he walked back from Cana to Capernaum. And second clue: they said the seventh hour, the fever left him. If you guys were here in the spring to hear from Marty Solomon, you would remember that a Hebrew audience would perk up when hearing the number seven. The seventh hour represents completeness and divine intervention. The number seven signifies perfection and fulfillment, aligning with the idea of Jesus being the perfect and complete revelation of God's power and love.

The official is convicted. He gets it. Jesus is the Messiah. He already demonstrated belief when he left Jesus, but he really believed when he got home and realized his son's recovery was because of Jesus, and that led to his whole household believing—everyone becoming whole and complete. So the official saw a sign, he needed a sign, and ultimately, he believed the sign.

Now we could end there, but the story begs a question I believe we need to ask before we close: What if the official's son was not healed? What if when he got home, he found out it was too late? So many of us have prayed for healing—for our friends, for our parents, for our husbands, for our wives, for our sons, and for our daughters. And many times, it has seemed like those prayers and our begging have fallen short.

A Story of Hope and Loss

In June 2020, my brother called me to let me know that his son, my nephew Lucas, had been diagnosed with an aggressive form of leukemia. He was 26 years old at the time and faced not only a brutal recovery through chemotherapy during COVID, but also had to have a bone marrow transplant if and when the chemotherapy got him to remission. And so a Facebook site was put together called Hope for Lucas by his wife who happened to be named Hope. And that gathered hundreds of people to pray for Lucas' healing, and their prayers miraculously worked. Not only did the chemo work, but when it was time to produce the bone marrow transplant, it was determined that Lucas' older sister, Anna, was born with the perfect immune system—the exact same as Lucas'—making her the perfect match for the transplant.

So in 2020, the transplant took place and it was an absolute miracle. Lucas' system took on Anna's blood and he lived as if nothing had ever happened. He was completely himself, completely healed until he wasn't. Four months later, the leukemia came back, and it was as if he was starting all over again, having to go through the whole process from the very beginning. And this time, the leukemia was too aggressive. And on 11/11/2021, Lucas died with Hope and his family by his side. The sign came through, and then it didn't. What do we do with that?

This is what Anna said at Lucas' funeral: "The Lord knew Lucas' number of days. A few weeks before he died, Lucas and I were contemplating the verse in First Corinthians where Paul talks about the weight of glory. He writes:

For this slight momentary affliction is preparing for us an eternal weight of glory beyond all comparison. — 1 Corinthians 4:17

Anna went on to say, the weight of glory is heavy. It's costly. It's not a nice fluffy thing to make us less scared of dying. It cost us everything, yet it returns so much more. Lucas eagerly awaited future glory in heaven with Jesus—not at all because of the suffering of his leukemia, but because the way he experienced God his entire life assured him that the promises of heaven far outweigh the temporary joys of Earth. His life reflects the divine narrative that spills beyond the boundaries of this current time. The fullness of what our souls long for has become true for Lucas. He is healed, transformed, and redeemed in his true home. To God be the glory."

You see, the sign actually did come through. Lucas is healed. Why? Because Jesus is the sign. Remember what the official said to Jesus: "Sir, come down before my child dies, my baby." Jesus says to us, I came down. I descended from heaven and became a baby and died so that you can have life.

And John hammers this idea home even with one more clue. It's another wink that we can't overlook. Notice in verse 53, he refers to the official as the father instead of the official—instead of the man. That word is the same word that means Abba Father or heavenly father. John is wanting us to see in the official a shadow of our heavenly Father who is also royal, the King of Kings, who happens to be from Jesus' hometown—heaven—who sent his Son, Jesus, to descend from heaven to conquer death and is alive so that we all can be healed, complete, and perfect. Amen?

We don't need a sign to prove Jesus is real. Jesus is the sign, and we can trust him with his word. So if your faith is in Christ, you are and forever healed. Why keep living as if that's not true? Can we, like the official, walk slowly through life with our souls at rest, believing and taking Jesus at his word? And if your faith is not in Christ, what sign are you looking for to believe?

Jesus is the sign, and he doesn't need for you to do anything except believe in and follow him. Will you trust him today?

Let's pray.

Jesus, we can't thank you enough for this story, and using John to write it so that we can talk about it like this today and have your spirit well up inside of us. We need to know that you are the sign. You are who you say you are, and we thank you for the many ways in which you do that.

Would you touch our hearts that we would fall more deeply in love with you, that we would believe you and take you at your word? And if our faith is not in you, may this be the day. This is the day we trust you because you are the one, you are the Messiah, and we can put all of our hope in you.

To your power we pray. Amen.