Jesus Responds to Unbelief
“Jesus Responds to Unbelief”
John 4:43-54
Introduction:
We have often said and will continue to say, for that is the purpose of the writing of the Gospel of John that John is always writing here to identify the Deity of the Lord Jesus Christ. Now, that is a very important element to keep in mind. It will change the way that you view this book and it will certainly change the way that you study. There are certain things that John has left out that the other Gospel writers include. For example, the other Gospels show us the entire 16 month ministry of the Lord Jesus Christ is Galilee, but the Gospel of John only show us two works that He did in the region. Some have tried to use that as cause not to be believe in the infallibility of the Word of God because it is contradictory in nature. You know, were there two angels at the tomb or was there one angel of the tomb. And people have used that you try and convince people that the Word of God cannot be trusted. And, of course, the answer to that question is, “both”. You all know the debate. Matthew and Mark record that a (singular) angel was at the tomb and Luke records that there were two angels standing at the tomb. And right away the skeptic says that the Bible because cannot be trusted because it is contradictory in nature. But if the skeptic will just really read the text instead of making false proclamations about the text he will see that Matthew records an angel sitting on the stone when the women arrived and Mark records an angel sitting inside the tomb the where the Body of Christ was. I believe that adds up to two. The Gospels do not contradict, the focus on different things from different angles and when you understand that it changes the way that you read the text.
And just like the Gospel view the same thing from different angles and different perspectives, Christ deals with people in different ways. Why? Because it takes different dealings to deal with different levels of faith. All of us have had times of unbelief. Even as Christians there have been times, maybe more than need be that we have exercised unbelief. Let me sum up the different levels of faith and how John describes them for us in the text. When I say different levels of faith, what I mean is that your unbelief demands fulfillment of a different nature before you will believe.
First, there is the unbelief that all it demands is the person of Jesus Christ. Now, we are going backwards here, because this is the top rung of faith. This kind of faith demands no words, no miracles, just the person of Christ is all that this sort of faith needs to be satisfied. The Apostle John records for us the words of John the Baptist in John 1:29
29 The next day John seeth Jesus coming unto him, and saith, Behold the Lamb of God, which taketh away the sin of the world. You see. There was no miracle that was required in order for John to believe. Christ had not really began His public ministry yet, but John believed the person of Jesus Christ. There are those people that the only drawing revelation that they need is the person of Jesus Christ. There faith is very high and great and God grants to some that kind of faith that can believe just because God is God.
Second, there is the unbelief that it demand a little bit more. It demands the Words of Jesus Christ. This is illustrated in our text that we just finished with the woman at the well. John 4:42
42 And said unto the woman, Now we believe, not because of thy saying: for we have heard him ourselves, and know that this is indeed the Christ, the Saviour of the world.
That unbelief demanded the words of Christ. The person of Christ was not enough, they needed to hear the words of Jesus Christ before they would believe. This faith is the second rung on the faith ladder. Many have this faith that can hear the words of Jesus Christ and then believe. No works of Jesus Christ are required, just the words. Remember Peter, Luke 5:5
5 And Simon answering said unto him, Master, we have toiled all the night, and have taken nothing: nevertheless at thy word I will let down the net. The Scriptures have much to say about the words of Christ. Job 4:4
4 Thy words have upholden him that was falling, and thou hast strengthened the feeble knees.
Psalm 119 is a great tribute by the psalmist about the Words of Christ. The whole Psalm just drips with praise about the Word of Christ.
Psalm 119:9
9 BETH. Wherewithal shall a young man cleanse his way? by taking heed thereto according to thy word.
Psalm 119:11
11 Thy word have I hid in mine heart, that I might not sin against thee.
Psalm 119:16
16 I will delight myself in thy statutes: I will not forget thy word.
Psalm 119:28
28 My soul melteth for heaviness: strengthen thou me according unto thy word.
Psalm 119:38
38 Stablish thy word unto thy servant, who is devoted to thy fear.
Psalm 119:41
41 VAU. Let thy mercies come also unto me, O LORD, even thy salvation, according to thy word.
Psalm 119:42
42 So shall I have wherewith to answer him that reproacheth me: for I trust in thy word.
Psalm 119:50
50 This is my comfort in my affliction: for thy word hath quickened me.
Psalm 119:58
58 I intreated thy favour with my whole heart: be merciful unto me according to thy word.
Psalm 119:140
140 Thy word is very pure: therefore thy servant loveth it.
Psalm 119:160
160 Thy word is true from the beginning: and every one of thy righteous judgments endureth for ever.
Psalm 119:162
162 I rejoice at thy word, as one that findeth great spoil.
Psalm 138:2
2 I will worship toward thy holy temple, and praise thy name for thy lovingkindness and for thy truth: for thou hast magnified thy word above all thy name.
Jeremiah 15:16
16 Thy words were found, and I did eat them; and thy word was unto me the joy and rejoicing of mine heart: for I am called by thy name, O LORD God of hosts.
And we could go on and on about how the Scripture Praise God for His words. And some unbelief that is all that it demands, the words of Jesus.
But there is a third and probably the bottom rung of the faith ladder and probably where most people are; it is the unbelief that demands the works of Jesus. That is where our text is and certainly that is where Israel was and where most Christians are. You know, we trust that our faith is moving up the ladder so that all we need is the person of Christ, however, at least in part; this is the demands of our unbelief. I was sixteen years old and fighting God in my mind on some issues. Our basketball team was traveling down Rt. 53, between Charlottesville and Palmyra, on Saturday night in the fall of 1988. It had been raining all day and it did not let up going into the evening. We were all sitting in a turtle bus, about 30 of us, tired from the day’s games. It was late and it was raining. We were traveling at a normal speed, when at one moment a car came around the corner driving us into the side of the Monticello Mountain. I can remember distinctively hitting the mountain three different times. As we hit the mountain the driver instinctively pulled the wheel back to get us into the road, losing control throwing us into the mountain once again. I remember very clearly hitting the mountain the third time, because the third time some heavy equipment fell on me causing some kind of back injury that haunts me to this day. I can remember standing, finally, on the side of Monticello Mountain, with a pain in my back saying, “God, I believe, help thou my unbelief.” That fight was to preach, but that day, the works of Christ moved my faith up the ladder.
This account of Jesus here with the nobleman’s son is a clear picture of how Christ responds to unbelief and moves it up the ladder.
I. Jesus Contemplating Unbelief (vs. 43-44)
“Now after the two days”, which two days? The two days that He had spend in Samaria with the new believers. “He departed and went into Galilee”. If you remember back in verse 3 and 4 of chapter 4, you will remember that Jesus had left Judea in order to go into Galilee, but he must needs go through Samaria. This was a prophetic interlude in the ministry of Christ. Remember now, He told His disciples, in Matt. 10, for them to go and gather from the lost house of Israel. So Christ came to the Jews first, and we have already seen that in some detail. But then He takes a detour through the City of Sychar because He had made a Sovereign appointment with a Gentle woman to show that the Gospel is opened to the both Jews and Gentiles, or a the text puts it, “the whole world”.
As we come into verse 44, we have a problem with the passage. “Jesus Himself” and whenever a writer uses a noun immediately followed by a pronoun, he is emphasizing a point to us. The point is that Jesus testified, “μαρτυρέω” The root of “μαρτυρέω” “μάρτυς” which is a legal term where it denotes one who can and does speak from personal experience about actions in which he took part and which happened to him, or about persons and relations known to him.[1] A prophet has no honor in His own country that is a simple theory. Sort of like, “familiarity breeds contempt”. It’s like the only experts are from out of town, there are no home grown experts. You can’t ever be an expert with those people that you grew up with. So, Jesus says, “A prophet has no honor in his own country, which is why I am going there”. That sounds strange, that is a place that I would stay away from. You remember back in Isaiah how the prophet said that He would be despised and rejected. Jesus knew that He would face rejection and contemplated and went anyway. Why? I believe that there are two ways to look at it.
First, He was going to show that this proverb was true. Did it ever happen! Matthew 13:58 tells us that he did not many works there because of their unbelief. But also in Luke 4, they tried to throw Him off a hill because He claimed to be fulfillment of the text He was reading from Isaiah 61. And so, the proverb was true. He was totally rejected in His own town.
Second, and both of these may be true, but I think that He went there even though He knew that He would face rejection and no honor because He wanted to show that He had power over that proverb. Although Jesus was rejected in His hometown of Nazareth, He had a wonderful ministry in the rest of Galilee. As we said, 16 months worth.
If fact, verse 45 tells us that He was received in Galilee. But this was not genuine faith. Why? “πᾶς ὁράω” The received Him because of all the things that they had seen. Listen, “πᾶς” or “all” is emphasized in the Greek text and John does that so that the readers will see that was the reason for their acceptance of Jesus. There acceptance was based upon what they seen Him do at Jerusalem. When was that? Well, they were all good Jews, they went to Jerusalem for Passover week; we saw that in chapter 2-3. They saw Him cleansed the temple, they heard about His discourse with Nicodemus and many other works. So they received Him, but not out of truth faith, they are on the bottom rung of the faith ladder.
II. Jesus Confronts Unbelief (vs. 46-49)
Here we have the introduction to the man. Now, He is not totally unbelieving, he has a little of faith. But it is the characteristic faith of the Galileans that need a sign to convince them. “When He came into Galilee” and John lets us know that this is place where He had turned water to wine. The text tells us that He was met by a “Roman official”. “βασιλικός” whose root word means “king”, this man was a official of the King. He was from Capernaum which was between 16-20 miles away. This man came and was obviously worried about his son. The Scriptures call him an official to the King. Which King? Now by Herod I mean Herod the tetrarch, Herod Antipas, not Herod the Great, just a little history, very brief. When Christ was born Herod the Great, the Idumaean king was reigning. But he died right after Christ's birth, remember it was after he died that Christ could come back out of hiding. After Herod died he divided up everything among his four sons, Philip, Archelaus, Herod, and Aritobulus. But Herod Antipas, the son of Herod the Great, just had one portion and his portion was Galilee and Peraea, the northern portion. And he's the Herod, you know, who finally got John's head and he's the Herod whom you read about all through the gospel accounts and who is around when Christ dies and all these things, this is the Herod that it's talking about there, not Herod the Great who has already died. This is his son.
This Roman Official comes to Christ begging Him to come down to Capernaum to heal his son. He didn’t just believe that Christ could do it, He needed that miracle, that bottom rung faith to believe that He could do it. Now, I want you to see this, it is very probable that if this man’s son was not dying that would never have sought out Christ. It would have been no big deal to him that Christ was coming to town, except for the fact that His son was dying and He had probably seen some of the miracles that Christ had performed and thought He could do the same for his son. But that is OK, because no one every came to Christ that was not driven by a need. Matthew 9:12
12 But when Jesus heard that, he said unto them, They that be whole need not a physician, but they that are sick.
Until a man knows that he is sick, until he has a crying need to eating his heart out, he will never come to Christ. Someone once said this, “Affliction is often God’s Medicine”. This man illustrates different kinds of faith:
1. The fearful Faith
It is the kind of faith that says that I don’t know whether he can do it or not, but I sure hope He can. It’s more hope than faith. Yet it was this kind of faith that caused this man to get up and walk 20 miles to a man that he hoped could save his son. This faith atleast got his feet going, it did not do much for his head, but it got his feet going in the right direction.
2. Feeble faith
This is illustrated in the words that the man says to Jesus. “Jesus, you have got to come down to Capernaum and heal my son”. Its like saying, “Jesus I know that you can do miracles, but you cant do them from a distance. You’ve got to be where he is”. Remember Jairus in Mark 5, he had the same problem, he said, "Oh," he says, "come down and lay Your hands on my daughter." Jesus incidently didn't go down to Capernaum with this man because if He had of He would have exceeded to his feeble faith and He wanted to transmit him to a higher level, so He never went.
A beautiful contrast to this would be Matthew 8:5. In that account centurion comes to Jesus and asks Him to heal his servant that is sick and Jesus tells him that He will come down to his house. But notice this contrast in verse 8. Matthew 8:8
8 The centurion answered and said, Lord, I am not worthy that thou shouldest come under my roof: but speak the word only, and my servant shall be healed. Jesus commends this man’s faith; Matthew 8:10
10 When Jesus heard it, he marvelled, and said to them that followed, Verily I say unto you, I have not found so great faith, no, not in Israel.
This kind of faith says, “Lord, you do not have to come to my house just say the words and it will happen.”
3. A Fractional Faith
This is the kind of faith that says, “God you can do some things, but some things are a little tough”. You know what he is saying, “Lord, come down to my house, I believe that you can heal him, but you cannot raise him.” Remember what Martha said in John 11, “Lord, if you had been here, my brother would not have died”. In other words, “Lord, I believe that you could heal him, but I don’t believe that you can raise him.” But this is typical for most Christians. We saw how we believe in the miracles of God, but in the practical matters of life, we don’t believe.
III. Unbelief Conquered (vs. 50-54)
Jesus was not to go down there because that would have kept this man on the third rung of unbelief and Christ wants to bring him up. Jesus says to this man, “Go thy way; your son lives”. And while he was speaking the omniscient, omnipotent power of God was working 20 miles away. The text says, “the man believed…” “πιστεύω” in the Greek and means “to consider someth. to be true and therefore worthy of one’s trust, believe[2] What made the man just take off? The Spirit of God had raised his unbelief to the second rung. Now all he needed was the words of Christ. This man doesn’t even realize it but he had taken the next step in belief to go from deep unbelief in needing to see the miracles to just taking off and believing the words of Jesus. What a tremendous truth this is and how Christ takes these people to faith without even knowing it, but that is how sovereign grace works.
Verse 51, his faith was verified. John 4:51-52
51 And as he was now going down, his servants met him, and told him, saying, Thy son liveth. 52 Then enquired he of them the hour when he began to amend. And they said unto him, Yesterday at the seventh hour the fever left him.
‘Seventh Hour” Roman time seven o’clock in the evening. The exact moment that Christ told him that his son was well; his servants told him that his son began to get better. This solidified this man’s faith and went from the bottom rung of the typical faith of needing to see a miracle to the second rung of believing the word of Christ to verse 53b, to his house believing. This is a beautiful picture of faith that is brought to fruitfulness is faith in the Lord Jesus Christ.
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[1]Theological dictionary of the New Testament. 1964-c1976. Vols. 5-9 edited by Gerhard Friedrich. Vol. 10 compiled by Ronald Pitkin. (G. Kittel, G. W. Bromiley & G. Friedrich, Ed.) (electronic ed.) (4:476). Grand Rapids, MI: Eerdmans.
someth. someth. = something
[2]Arndt, W., Danker, F. W., & Bauer, W. (2000). A Greek-English lexicon of the New Testament and other early Christian literature. "Based on Walter Bauer's Griechisch-deutsches Wr̲terbuch zu den Schriften des Neuen Testaments und der frhchristlichen [sic] Literatur, sixth edition, ed. Kurt Aland and Barbara Aland, with Viktor Reichmann and on previous English editions by W.F. Arndt, F.W. Gingrich, and F.W. Danker." (3rd ed.) (816). Chicago: University of Chicago Press.