Summary: What makes faith that amazes even Jesus? The centurion had this kind of faith. He knew he was a sinner, humble, and undeserving of the healing that Jesus, Lord supreme, commander above Caesar himself, could give.
I want to talk to you about the greatest faith ever. The story is found in Luke chapter 7, and it's also found in Matthew chapter 8. Can someone read it for us?When Jesus had finished saying all this in the hearing of the people, he entered Capernaum. There a centurion's servant, whom his master valued highly, was sick and about to die. The centurion heard of Jesus and sent some elders of the Jews to him, asking him to come and heal his servant. When they came to Jesus, they pleaded earnestly with him, "This man deserves to have you do this, because he loves our nation and has built our synagogue." So Jesus went with them.He was not far from the house when the centurion sent friends to say to him: "Lord, don't trouble yourself, for I do not deserve to have you come under my roof. That is why I did not even consider myself worthy to come to you. But say the word, and my servant will be healed. For I myself am a man under authority, with soldiers under me. I tell this one, 'Go,' and he goes; and that one, 'Come,' and he comes. I say to my servant, 'Do this,' and he does it."
When Jesus heard this, he was amazed at him, and turning to the crowd following him, he said, "I tell you, I have not found such great faith even in Israel." Then the men who had been sent returned to the house and found the servant well.
Blessed Lord, we pray that as we go through this word, that you open the word to us. Oh Lord, speak straight to our hearts. Minister to every person. Make the message personal to everyone here, Lord. And bring us into this real faith that you talk about in this passage. Father, I pray that you will anoint me with fire and power from on high to deliver your word properly. Not with the zeal of human flesh, not with the power of the human brain, but with the power from on high. We ask this in Jesus name, Amen.
There are only two places in the bible where it says that Jesus was amazed. There are only two places in the bible where it says that Jesus was surprised. One is here when he says that he was amazed at this centurion's faith, and the other is when he is amazed at the unbelief of some people. Jesus knew everything, of course. Nothing caught him by surprise. But there are these two places in the bible where it does say that the son of God was surprised, shocked, amazed. Now why is that? Because the bible says that without faith, no man can please God. without faith, no man can please God. But what is real faith? What is real faith? Is it when you just have this strong feeling of "I know this will happen, I know this will happen." Is that faith? Some people have made it so in the religious circle. They have made it so it is this thing that can get you things. If you only have faith, God can give you that big house, If you only have faith, God can give you that nice car. If you only have faith, God can give you that thing there or that thing there. There are others, mostly at MIT, who say faith is a cloudy bubble. Those of you who are course six know what I am talking about. It is this abstraction. It doesn't exist. It's just out there in your mind. It's an abstract way of representing an idea that you've decided to make up. Does that make sense to you? It's a cloudy bubble. That's what faith is to you. So they say, how can you believe in God? It's just faith, it's an abstraction, it's a cloudy bubble.
If Jesus says he has not found such a great faith anywhere, not even in Israel, then this must be the greatest example of faith, and I want to show you why. The bible says, "When Jesus had finished saying all this in the hearing of the people, he entered Capernaum. There a centurion's servant, whom his master valued highly, was sick and about to die. The centurion heard of Jesus and sent some elders of the Jews to him, asking him to come and heal his servant." There was death in this man's home. There was death in his house. He was a high official in the Roman army, in the Roman military. But he was now in a situation of death where he could do nothing. Where he could do absolutely nothing. He could not heal his servant, he could not do anything. But he had to acknowledge that there was death in his home.
What is real faith? Real faith is faith that is honest about the situation. That is first inward. Real faith is faith that is real, it is faith that is true and honest. This man had a servant, the servant was dying. He did not pretend. He did not say "I am a big Roman military man, I have many servants, if one dies, what does it matter? I have a bunch of servants, if one dies, then that's just fate." And especially people in the military like to play it tough... "I lost a comrade, but you know, that's nothing. I'm going to keep on fighting." That's how many people live. Something inside of them is dying. Something is dying inside, there is death. But they won't acknowledge it. They cover it up, they'll play it tough. I want to ask you, what's dying in your life? What's been coming to death?
You see, real faith begins by being honest. By looking at the situation as it is and recognizing there's something wrong. Unless if you can get to that point where you are real and you can say "listen, there is somewhere inside where I'm dying," God can't start with you. God can't start with people who pretend. with people who cover up their sins. With people who cover up their hurts and their pains. Have you been honest about the death in your life?
It takes a person to say "Hey, I've been watching this pornography, and it's killing something in me. Something in me is dying." Oh, and I've heard this many times. "Something in me is dying," or "I am in this relationship and it is immoral, and I need to break off from it, and something in me is dying." But many people, instead of acknowledging it, they cover it up, they find loopholes in the bible, they justify it, they hide it. You should be able to say "Hey, there is just something wrong in my home. Things between me and my wife are not working. There is a death somewhere, what can I do?" In the bible, there is only one thing that brings death, that's sin. Whenever the bible speaks about death, it speaks about sin. One thing will kill you--that's sin. Because the bible says "The wages of sin is death." You aught to be able to say "I used to go to church. I used to follow the Lord. But then I started doing this, and I started doing that, and I've been dying spiritually." What in your life has been killing you? What has been your sin bringing you to death? And I'll show you that this was about sin if it is not already obvious to you yet.
That's the first thing. Real faith acknowledges that there is something that's been dying in you, and it owns up to it. Secondly, the bible says verse 3:
"The centurion heard of Jesus and sent some elders of the Jews to him, asking him to come and heal his servant."
The people went, ran to Jesus, ran to Jesus, told Jesus about the situation, and Jesus started going to this man's And Jesus "No Lord, no! I'm not worthy for you to come in to my Why is Why didn't this man say, "Hey, Jesus is coming to my house, I'll be one of the lucky ones who have housed Because he recognized that he was sinful man, and this was the Holy Son of He acknowledged that there was a separation, a gap between he and Jesus that nothing could It was much like we shared the other time, when Peter in the boat (or Simon at the time in the boat) backed away and said, Jesus, Lord, stay away from me, I am a sinful Real faith is faith that acknowledges our condition of sin before the It acknowledges the distance that we have between us and the The bible says "For all men have fallen short of the glory of God." All of us!
You see, it's the self-righteous who think, "Yeah, I'm worthy, God can come to my I've been a Christian, I've been going to church, I've been doing all these things. I'm a good person, I deserve Jesus' Real faith is faith that humbles itself before the Lord, acknowledge the holiness of the Lord, and acknowledges our sinfulness. help."house.Lord.Lord.man."fill.God.Jesus."Hallelujah.that?home."says.home.
It is known that David danced--that he went to the temple and rejoiced, but in one of his famous psalms, he says "And in that great compassion, I will come into thy house. There I will bow, and there I will fear your holiness, O Lord." That is, it's only in the compassion of God that he dared to go to the house of God. And there, he didn't go carelessly. He bowed down and feared the holiness of the Lord. The same holy fear that this man had. Real faith humbles itself before the Lord and acknowledges the sinfulness of man and the holiness of the Lord. I want to ask you, have you come to that point, when you realize that something separates you from the Lord?
It happened to me when I was ten years old. Someone shared with me the gospel just like I'm sharing with you now. I was going to church, I was doing a bunch of good things. You could say of me like this man said about the centurion, "This man deserves to have you do this, because he loves our nation and has built our synagogue." They were saying, "This is a religious man, he is so good, just go help him." But the man himself knew his heart, and knew that he did not deserve anything. He was a lost sinner.
Has this been what people have said about you? "Oh this guy is such a good guy, oh this girl is such a good girl, God really deserved to do great things through him and for Maybe you've heard that about yourself many I'll be honest with you, I've heard that so many times that it now goes in one ear and out the But when I'm in that secret closet of prayer, and I spend time with the Lord, and people's praises and--what you may call it--people's high opinion of me fades away, and I can see myself in the light of the Holy Spirit, I can only say "Lord have mercy on me, I am a Real faith acknowledges the holiness of God, and the lowliness and sinfulness and lostness of All those who come to the Lord, they say, "Oh I have faith, faith, faith. I have faith, faith, They've never confronted their They haven't started with real faith All those who think, "Oh, I built the synagogue, I gave money for the I did this, and I did I was going here, and I was going I was doing this, and I was doing I sang in the I even went out and shared the All those things are good, but they did not make this man worthy of God coming into his home.
Thirdly, the man "But say the word, and my servant will be Real faith is based on God's It is taking this bible and believing what it says, the commands and the It is faith that acknowledges no matter what man says, "I will stand on the word of the "Just say the word, and my servant will be It is faith that is based entirely on God and on God It is not based on how much I have done, how much I've contributed, it is based only on the word of Why are we saved? It is because the word of God says that there is that "there is no other name given under heaven by which we may be saved, save the name of We base our faith on God's word, and on God It has nothing to do with He didn't say, Lord, just accept this gift from me, and then a miracle will happen, as many popular evangelists do today: "Send me Give me a $1000 Plant your seed in here, and then God will bless you in That's saying that this, your faith, is giving money to this man first, plus God's The giving the money plus the word of God will produce the Real faith is faith that is based on God and on God You can go and give things to the You can bless a man of God, it's But it never puts a man in a position where a man can say "Okay, God, I've done this, now you give me And so many people have abused of So much so that I'll be very honest with you, that having seen it so abused so many times, in my flesh, I even fear to preach on the side of it that is even biblical, and that's still good and can be legitimately That's why those of you who have been in this church know that I have rarely mentioned Though it is part of the bible, God does say " But it has been so abused that I generally just shrink away from even mentioning it ever.
But these people went to Jesus and said "Hey, he built our synagogue, he gave things. Bless him!" But this man who had real faith said "No, no, no, Lord, don't come to my house. I don't deserve anything--your word, and your word alone." It was based on God and God himself. Not on going to church. Not on giving. It was based on God, and on God himself. He recognized that in himself there was nothing good. Nothing he could claim. He goes on to say something very interesting: "For I myself am a man under authority, with soldiers under me. I tell this one, 'Go,' and he goes; and that one, 'Come,' and he comes. I say to my servant, 'Do this,' and he does it."
What was this man He said that I'm a soldier, and I have people above me, and I also have people below But when I command to my subordinates, "Do this, and do that," they go ahead and they do it, they don't argue. I say to this one "Come," and he comes, and I say to that one "Go," and he And he was saying, "So Lord, you are on top of There is no one on top of How much more must your command be When you say 'Come!' whatever you say 'come' to must When you say 'Go!' whatever you say 'go' to must also He was acknowledging the uttermost authority of He was saying that Jesus is Lord beyond any military officer in the Roman He was saying that Jesus was even above Caesar the emperor himself, who was his highest He was acknowledging Jesus as the King of kings, the one above Caesar, above himself, above everyone in the Roman government which ruled the world at the Now, keep in mind when this was taking This was taking place when the Roman empire ruled the whole world, where Caesar was worshiped as And this man is saying that I have been in this army, and I know the authority of even the emperor, but I know that yours is above even Jesus was the only person that he knew that was above the Roman emperor, and the Roman empire So that his words, upon commanding anything and anyone, that thing must What is real It is faith that acknowledges and submits to the authority of the Son of Let me say it True faith, real faith is faith that acknowledges and submits to the authority of Jesus Christ, the Son of So that when he tells you "Go!" you go, and when he tells you "Come!" you Obviously, this man was a man who was ready to obey Jesus, whatever Jesus would have told him to do.
Now, this is very contrary to what people call faith I see people going around They break God's commands here, and they break God's commands here, but when you bring it up to them, they say "Hey, we are saved by I have That is the cloudy bubble faith, it's the one that is an abstraction in your "I can live like the world, I can live a sinful lifestyle, but because I have this cloudy bubble called faith, I can still make it into That's not biblical faith, biblical faith is faith that is shown by submitting to and obeying the authority of the Son of The bible says that (from the King James) "faith is the substance of the things hoped I must be able to see your If you look at me right now, and I say "Hey, I have lots of Do you see any Look at me, do you see any Where is the faith? Is it on my Is it on my Real faith is shown by your Real faith is shown by your submitting to the Why is Because of what we said Because real faith is based on God's Faith is living, thinking, acting according to the word of the Therefore, the person who has real faith will obey the He will walk in holiness, he will walk in obedience.
And therefore, John says in 1 John 5 that "This is the power of the Lord that overcomes the world, even our What does that It means that everyone else can go on drinking, but because I have faith in the Lord Jesus, I will overcome that pressure from the world, and I will live It means everyone is running after money, but for me who has faith, and who walks according to faith in the Lord Jesus, I overcome that pressure of the world to live by greed, and I live by trusting in the Lord, and surrendering all my wealth to It means that while the world is saying "Hey, you're so weird, why don't you have a girlfriend?" "Hey, you're weird, why don't you have a boyfriend?" "What's this thing about waiting till you get married, are you gay or I've heard That's the pressure of the But the bible says this is the power that overcomes the world, even our If Christians are living like the world is living, something is wrong with their If Christians are living just like the world is living, something is wrong with their faith. And I want to tell you, as a church that is starting, this is the devil's goal, is to establish a continuum, so that you don't quite know where the world ends and where the church The devil wants to mingle the standards of the bible and the standards of the world--the standards of the gospel and the standards of hell, and create something that still looks like the church--it has the building, it has the worship, it has the sermon--but when you look into the people's lives, it's just the That's the devil's goal.
Question from the congregation: Would you say that the Catholic church is the devil's With all of the slave labor camps in Iowa and sex crimes?
I would say that any church where the ministers are not walking with the Lord has lost Because if that's what the leaders are, God only knows the However, there is always a danger in There is always a danger in throwing broad For those specific people who have been guilty of those certain things, yes, the bible does say a man who is leading the church, who is leading God's people, those that bear the vessels of the Lord must have clean hands and pure hearts, the bible That's the When that is wrong, everything else is It's the foundation, before you get everywhere.
But I don't want to talk too much about the other people, I want to talk about us: me, you, and the rest of the people Are you overcoming the world, or is the world overcoming They say "Hey, everybody is going to watch this movie, why don't you go watch it? Everybody is watching it, everybody is talking about But the movie is full of cursing, sexual immorality, and damning the name of Those who are pressured by the world, they go and they watch But those who have true faith overcome the world.
There was a movie that came out, the first one was very The second one came out--the Friday that it came out, I went to a prayer meeting in Usually, around the place where I took the train, there were so many people But that night, there were so few people, and I asked why, and they said, well a lot of people have gone to watch this movie--the second one that came out that follows from the And it was so broadly So broadly--it was on all the On Sunday, I was at my frat house, and I took the newspaper--the New York Times--and I saw the advertisement of the paper, and I asked the people, my other frat brothers, who aren't Christian, and asked them "was the movie worth all the noise about For you guys who went to see it, was it all And the guy told "Well, it was okay, but you know, it was not as good as the first one, but I don't think you'd like I said "Yeah, He said, it portrays a kind of lifestyle that you won't quite agree I said "why is He said "It's filled with a lot of sexual immorality, violence, and a kind of music that won't appeal to you."
This was a non-Christian telling me that according to his judgement, this was no movie for a My shock was that when I check my email, Christians gathered field trips to go watch this They were saying "Hey, let's gather here and let's go and watch this Now, no wonder the same people were complaining about struggling with I can't break off from this sexual immorality, I can't do this and What you feed upon--and I just want to mention this in passing--what you feed upon will make you who you Just like a person who eats lots of junk food becomes physically So does the person who feeds on the junk will die And a lot of spiritual junk comes out of Hollywood, more than anywhere Feed yourself on the holy Word, not Feed yourself from the holy bible, leave Hollywood to the For you who follow the Lord, feed yourself on Jesus who is the bread of The more you feed yourself on him, the more you become like The more you fill yourself with Hollywood, the more you become Hollywood-like.
This man said, I say to one 'Come!', and he comes, I say to the other 'Go!', and he goes. Through faith submits to the Lord, through faith obeys the Lord.
And I want to end by saying this:
"When Jesus heard this, he was amazed at him, and turning to the crowd following him, he said, "I tell you, I have not found such great faith even in Israel."
He turned to the crowd, Because many of them were following him just out of He was telling them, "Look, do you really want to follow me, do you want real faith? Look at this Many of you are just running, saying, hey, look at me I am a Christian, I follow But never stop to say, 'hey, am I living under his authority, am I walking according to his word, have I acknowledge my sin and my separation from the lord?'"
The bible says, "Then the men who had been sent returned to the house and found the servant well."
Faith is seeing God's word come true for Faith is experiencing--and this is why I was mentioning the cloudy Because real faith is not an It's not something that lives in the Real faith is It is you looking at God's word, seeing what it says, and seeing it come to pass for This man's servant was healed the moment his faith came in contact with The moment his faith came in contact with Jesus, God responded to his faith, and his servant was You can't go to this man and say, "Hey, what's this faith? Faith is just an He'll say "No, look at there; my servant was dying, now he is walking and he is That's not abstraction, that is Real faith sees things come to pass.
You know the story of the sister that my family and I shared the gospel with back when I was fifteen, who was HIV positive with three tests showing that she was She came to I preached the gospel to her, I was just fifteen years I didn't even know God as well as I do I wasn't even a good preacher--not that have become one since But she believed in the There were two of them, one chose not to They were roommates, both of them were HIV positive, they were loose women at the time. They were older in their She gave her life to the The other was angry, and she wouldn't She went But this other one gave her life to Christ and humbly She came to know that there was this thing between her and God that just separated her from the And the church prayed for her, we were at sister Julie's We prayed for her, and sent her back for another She came back We were back in Cameroon--she was coming to the U.S., and before you enter the U.S. you have to go through the health screening that's how they found she had And that's no The U.S. government makes sure that its doctors are And he is a graduate from Johns Hopkins, actually, who runs the And a couple of years Though she had no proof of her healing, she continued to follow Jesus and have faith in A few years afterwards she wrote to me and said she was I didn't believe But she was healed in fact, and has two tests to show And of course, she went back to the embassy to verify They sent her back to the doctor the doctor because they didn't believe They sent her back to the doctor once more, and they gave her a visa, and she doesn't know She called me last month to wish me a happy new But what's in her It's not just that she is healed, but her life just changed, she lives under the authority of Jesus, she obeys She has learned to serve I believe that the Lord just kept her there for those few That's why when you pray for a sick person and nothing that happens once again after you Don't think that there's I believe that that prayer we prayed for her was still the one that healed But God left her there because, I heard, everywhere she went people just turned to Her life became so exemplary, she cut all those fooling around with That is real You can't go to her and say "Hey, faith, that's a cloudy bubble, it's just abstract. It's just something you have in your bible and in your Faith is a Like we said, it is the substance of things hoped It is the proof of what you believe, so to So have you got this faith?
What's more important is this, what we see in Matthew. And we'll end with that.
When Jesus heard this, he was astonished and said to those following him, "I tell you the truth, I have not found anyone in Israel with such great faith. 11I say to you that many will come from the east and the west, and will take their places at the feast with Abraham, Isaac and Jacob in the kingdom of heaven. 12But the subjects of the kingdom will be thrown outside, into the darkness, where there will be weeping and gnashing of teeth."
Do you hear what Jesus is This faith issue is not just a matter of "yeah, this person got healed and This faith comes down to a matter of eternal life and eternal It determines where you will spend Jesus says that because of this man who was not a Jew, who was not allowed into the Jewish priesthood because he was a He said that this man and many others will be in the kingdom of heaven because of this kind of faith, but others will be thrown out into the darkness where there is weeping and gnashing of I want to say that only this kind of faith that we've described leads a person to A faith that acknowledges that you are dying because of A faith that acknowledges that because of your sin, there is a gap and a You can't even come to God You are not worthy for him to even come to your A faith that believes God's A faith that comes under the authority of Jesus in obedience to That's the faith that leads a person to So I want to ask you, do you have this In other words, I am asking you, are you going to Will you be at the feast with Abraham, Isaac, and Can Jesus say of your faith, I tell you the truth, I have not found such a faith, not even at Can he say of this church, I have not found such faith, not even in This is saving This man's servant lived because the person who was over his house, the Centurion, though so high in the military, so respected even by the religious leader, was willing to come down and humble himself before the Was nothing other than a sinful man, acknowledged that he was nothing other than a sinful man undeserving of And proclaimed himself to be just a servant under Jesus' I want to ask that if you know in your life, there is something that's dying, there's a sin that's been killing If there is death somewhere, if somewhere your life is not fully submitted to the Lord Jesus, settle it If that's you, I want you to pray with Ask the Lord to come into your Ask him to take Tell him you want to come under his That you want to come under his If that's the desire of your heart, do pray with me:
Lord Jesus, I want to believe you, I want to obey I want to follow I bring my whole life under your I bring my whole life under your Give me the power to obey Give me the power to love Give me the power to become a child of Give me the faith that sees your word come true for Give me the faith that is the proof of things hoped And help me to live in that faith until you come and take me to Thank you Amen
I encourage you to go before the Look over these Read the bible for You see it's good to come to But here, we only blow on a spark that must have been kindled in your own time with the Your walk with God should not be just a church on Spend time with the Spend time in It helps to pray with We pray every morning in the CFL. You can find information on the website about We have lots of books that can help We are setting up a Sam will be setting up a system to check them out on They are all quality Books that are simple, straightforward, and written out They have been the greatest factor in shaping my spritiual life, and they will help you They are on all sorts of Very practical books that we received as a book from our mother They sent it to us.
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Praise the Lord.