God builds stronger believers

Sermon for Trinity 21

Hosea 13:14  +  Ephesians 6:10-17  +  John 4:46-54

People, in general, come to church on Sunday mornings for different reasons. Some, out of a sense of obligation. Some, to be entertained. Some, for a spiritual “experience” of some kind. Some, to learn how to improve their lives. Some, simply to be seen going to church. Others come for better reasons: to hear the Word of God, to honor Him, to pray, praise and give thanks, to seek help from God, to receive forgiveness in the absolution of His Gospel and in the Sacrament of His body and blood, to encourage their fellow Christians. But regardless of why you came, now that you’re here, understand that God has a reason for you to be here: He wants to work on you.

That implies, of course, that you’re not yet what you should be, that you need work, that you need His help. Your flesh will not like that idea. It doesn’t want to be changed or improved. Your flesh is content to remain as is, because it knows that God’s methods are painful, even fatal to the flesh. But God insists. He insists on forming you, building you into a stronger believer.

We see God building the faith of the nobleman in our Gospel right before our eyes, and as we watch, He does the same for us.

We see the nobleman of Galilee seek out Jesus. This is still early in His ministry. He had performed that one famous miracle in Cana right away at the beginning, changing water into wine. Then He went back down to Judea and performed lots of miracles there, but He wasn’t received well there; the people of Jerusalem didn’t want to be changed. So He went back up to Galilee, and the people there were more receptive—at least, for a while. Word spread about Jesus throughout Galilee—two things in particular. That Jesus has come from God with divine power to heal, and that Jesus is merciful and good.

So when the nobleman from Galilee hears that Jesus is back in the area, he shows a bit of faith, trusting that Jesus will help his son, who is sick and dying. He goes to Him and begs Him to come over to his house to heal his dying son.

The reaction that anyone would want from Jesus would be, “Yes, of course I’ll do what you ask. I’ll come over and heal your son right this instant!” But that’s not the reaction the nobleman got.

Unless you people see signs and wonders, you will by no means believe.

You see, it wasn’t just the nobleman who needed to be built into a stronger believer. “You people,” Jesus said. All the Jews were in danger, either of rejecting Jesus entirely, or of looking to Him mainly as a miracle worker rather than as the Savior from sin, death, and the devil. So He warns them: faith that is rooted in signs that you can see is not good enough.

Did your parents ever tell you when you were little that you shouldn’t drink coffee, because it will stunt your growth? Well, I don’t think that’s probably true. But there is something that will stunt the growth of your faith: too much seeing. Too much human reason. Too much logic. Too much looking to Jesus to miraculously deal with your earthly problems. Those things will stunt the growth of your faith, and if that happens, then faith will eventually fail and become useless on the day when you really need it.

The nobleman wasn’t ready to learn a lesson just yet. He wasn’t interested in being built into a stronger believer. He had a pressing earthly problem. So he begged again, Sir, come down before my child dies! He still insists that Jesus come over to his house to perform a miracle. What’s the problem with that? The problem is that, if Jesus is truly sent from God, if Jesus truly is the Savior He claims to be, then why does He have to come over to the house in order to help? If God is able to speak a word and bring the entire universe into existence, isn’t He perfectly capable of healing an illness in the same way?

And that’s just what He does. Go your way; your son lives. Jesus gave him what he wanted, but not in the way he wanted it. He forced him to settle for a word, a promise. The seeing would come later; it would eventually be there. But first faith had to work. Reason and logic had to step back. Sight had to be turned off. And faith—even blind faith—had to be exercised.

But how? By the power of the Holy Spirit working through Jesus’ word. This is what even Christians fail to grasp. Faith is not the product of logic, reason, and sight. Faith is the product of hearing the word of Christ. The word itself has the power to create faith.

And it did. The man believed the word that Jesus spoke to him, and he went his way. See how Jesus built him into a stronger believer! When he first came, he was panicking. He was fearful. He trusted that Jesus could help, but only if he could see Him helping in person. Now he isn’t afraid; he’s full of hope. Now he doesn’t need to see anything. His faith relies on Jesus’ promise. He goes home expecting to see his son alive, simply because Jesus said that he would be.

Then, when he hears that his son got better the moment Jesus spoke those words and when he sees his son recovered, it says that he himself believed, and his whole household. Believed what? It was no longer a matter of faith to believe that the boy was healed. That had become a matter of sight. The believing was a stronger faith in Jesus Himself as the Savior and in His word as always and utterly reliable.

That’s the kind of faith God seeks to build in each of us, a faith that is ever stronger, ever firmer, ever more leaning, not on reason or logic or sight, but on His word alone. And He does that building by means of His word alone.

You’ll need that kind of faith—stronger, firmer, and word-based—for the fight that’s ahead of you, because it’s not a fight in which you can see your enemies. As Paul wrote in today’s Epistle, we do not wrestle against flesh and blood, but against principalities, against powers, against the rulers of the darkness of this age, against spiritual hosts of wickedness in the heavenly places. We wrestle against the devil and his dark forces. And the only way to fight, the only way to stand is with a faith that has been created and nurtured and built by the word of God. With such a faith, Paul says, you will be able to quench all the fiery darts of the wicked one.

Nowhere is such a faith needed as much as in the day of death, where you see no angels waiting to take your soul to heaven. You see no Christ crucified standing before you. You don’t see the pearly gates opening wide to receive you. All you see is your body failing. And all we see when a loved one dies is the grave standing open. If your faith is founded on reason, logic and sight, then it will surely falter on that day.

But if your faith has been nourished and built by the word of Christ, you will stand. And the words of our first lesson today will be the ones that ring in your ears as God promises ransom and redemption for His dear believers even as He mocks death and the grave: O Death, I will be your plagues! O Grave, I will be your destruction! Pity is hidden from My eyes.

The Lord God has brought you to faith by the word of His Gospel. He has received you as sons in His kingdom through Holy Baptism. Now the Lord would build you up today into stronger and stronger believers. May His good Spirit keep working on you throughout the day and throughout the week as you meditate on the word you have heard today, and may you continue to cling to the word you have heard in the face of every danger and every hardship, in the face of the devil and all his dark forces, and even in the face of death. Amen.