Jesus Loves Me, This I Know

When Jesus had entered Capernaum, a centurion came to him, asking for help. “Lord,” he said, “my servant lies at home paralyzed, suffering terribly.”
Jesus said to him, “Shall I come and heal him?”
The centurion replied, “Lord, I do not deserve to have you come under my roof. But just 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.”
Then Jesus said to the centurion, “Go! Let it be done just as you believed it would.” And his servant was healed at that moment.

The gospels are full of these kinds of stories – people asking Jesus for help, and Jesus responding to their faith. In fact, sometimes we almost look at these stories like magic formulae for tapping into cosmic power. Because Jesus healed people based on their faith, if we just have enough faith, He will heal us too! Maybe. But have you ever thought about the people that Jesus healed who didn’t have faith? In this story, Jesus says that he hasn’t seen faith as great as the centurions in all Israel – but we know Jesus was healing all over Israel. We also have the story of the servant in Gethsemane – when Peter cut off his ear, Jesus healed him, even though the servant didn’t ask for help and likely was trying to arrest Jesus or kill Peter. But Jesus healed him anyway. You see, we sometimes forget that Jesus loves us – all of us – unconditionally. Jesus wants to heal people, because he loves them and cares for them. This is one reason we can be sure that any suffering we experience is for our own good. Jesus is in the habit of relieving suffering, and if he delays it is not because he hates us, but rather that he loves us enough to let us grow! So don’t worry about how much faith you have; instead look to Jesus, and rest in the fact that you are loved by Him.