A Roman's Faith

Once again, I am straying from my original intent with this blog (which was to provide logical and emotional evidence for Christ that inspires a true relationship with Christ over the comfortable and non-threatening religion that permeates churches today), but God has placed something on my heart that I feel pressed to write about. I was watching late-night TV a couple of weeks ago. I had watched Family Guy and Futurama, and even caught an episode of Robot Chicken and was just channel surfing to avoid going to bed when I saw him. A semi-elderly man in a white suit was praying over an elderly woman who was in a wheelchair. As he finished praying, she amazingly got up and walked around as the man began some sales pitch. After watching for few minutes, I shrugged it off and switched to the history channel for something I could actually believe.

I didn’t give the televangelist faith healer much thought after that night, but the idea of healing by faith has stayed with me. After Spring Break, I went on a brief overnight camping trip both to spend some quiet time with God and to avoid the massive amount of work I had to do for classes. This was an amazing trip and I recommend it for anyone, but that is a whole other tangent. I worshipped (with the aide of an ipod because I have no musical talent whatsoever,) roasted smores, spent sometime in prayer, and just read through the bible as my heart led me. The issue of healing by faith came up once again, in a way that I wasn’t expecting it.
I was reading in Matthew chapter eight about the faith of the Centurion. For those of you that haven’t heard the story, Jesus is in Capernaum and a centurion comes to him asking for help for a servant that “lies at home paralyzed and in terrible suffering.” Jesus’ response was action, and He prepares to go to the home of the Centurion and heal his servant, just as He did for the ruler’s daughter (Matthew 9:18-25) and countless others. But it is the Centurion’s response that “astonished Christ.” “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.’” Jesus is astonished at the man’s faith (there is plenty more to this story than what I am writing, notably the fact that the Centurion was a gentile whose faith surpassed any Jew that Christ had yet met) and replies, “Go! It will be done just as you believed it would.” (NIV)

The rationale for the Centurion’s faith was simple. In verse nine, it tells us that he was a man under authority. Although he was a Centurion and in control of 100 men, he was still part of the larger Roman army and ultimately answered to the Emperor of Rome. To his military mind, a command was to be followed. When the Emperor ordered for troops to be moved, the command was handed down the various levels until it was given to the Centurion, who then gave it to his troops and the action was committed. By this logic, the Centurion knew that if Christ, who spoke on behalf of the God of the universe, gave the command for his servant to be healed, then it would happen. To him, it was just that simple. For some reason, this story stayed with me as I packed up my tent and headed back to my dorm the next day. It stayed with me as I went through my classes and went on with life. The man’s complete faith that Christ would heal his servant ended exactly as he thought it would, the servant was healed. I thought about my own life and if I was modeling this faith, and how it would look in today’s world.

Maybe its because I fought with sexual temptation for so long that I would characterize it more as an addiction than a temptation. Maybe its because I have a close friend who struggles with the lines that have been drawn separating homosexuality and Christianity. Maybe its because my mom is having oral problems that we don’t have the money to treat. Maybe its because that is the normal state of the world, for us to always be surrounded by sickness, pain, and suffering. I don’t know to which aspect of my life I first applied this story, but once I did, I was captured. This previous summer, at a youth camp in Marble Falls, I worked with kids from the age of seven to 17. Before I went to work there, I had a habit of cussing. I had tried to quit before for various reasons, but always on my own ability; I had always failed. But this time, I was just able to stop. No slip ups, no mistakes for an entire summer. Sadly, when I returned to UT, I began to curse again but I know that God will “heal” me of this again.

Most notably in my own life is the healing of my sexual addiction. From junior high I have fought with sexual temptation, masturbation, pornography, and even sexual acts. I was probably at some point proud of this, but as I grew older, I lost control while sex gained control over me. It wasn’t until a little over a year ago that Christ spoke into my heart and told me that I was free of this addiction. I was able to enter into a relationship that was free of any sexual acts and grow closer to God with this barrier removed. As the idiot that I am, I didn’t see God’s hand in this and thought it to be my own self-will that had changed my actions. Of course, under the power of my own self-will, I failed again in the following year and it wasn’t until a good friend of mine told me that he was thankful for God freeing me from sexual addiction that I realized whose hand was truly in control of the situation. Earlier this year, at a bible study, a group of men (some of whom I am close friends with, others I barely know) laid hands on me and prayed for me to be free and to be able to fully live in Christ. Right then, any of the last chords of bondage snapped and all of the emotional baggage from my addiction was taken from me. For the first time since junior high, I felt free. When I got home that night, I discovered that the STD tests I had taken the previous week had come back negative, I was completely free of my previous life. Faith in Christ, both mine and others (which also served to inspire mine, because you are much more confident in your own if you know that others also believe with you) had healed me of my sexual addiction.

I don’t know if I had the faith of the Roman Centurion while this was happening… I doubt that I did. But I have seen God’s faithfulness, and know that His commands will be obeyed. I’m sure you’re saying, “that’s nice and all… but what if God doesn’t decide he wants to heal me?” Well, on some level, that is something you may have no control over (and I am being completely honest here, I thought about leaving this part out and skipping to the part where you do have control, but I intend this blog to be a completely honest source for people who want the truth, not just something they would hear in church.) God has His own plan and if our healing is not in it for some reason, then it will not happen. But remember that the same God also loves us enough to send His own son to suffer in our place (John 3:16) so why would it make sense that he would allow us to suffer with no end in sight? Hope is found in the first chapter of James, Jesus’ brother, who writes, “Consider it all joy, my brethren, when you encounter various trials, knowing that the testing of your faith produces endurance. And let endurance have its perfect result, so that you may be perfect and complete, lacking in nothing.” (NASB) In these three verses (2-4), suffering is understood. We face trials and temptations so that we may develop endurance. Why do we need endurance? Because the ultimate goal of endurance is to make us “perfect and complete, lacking in nothing.” Romans 5:3-5 tells us the same thing; “We also rejoice in our sufferings, because we know that suffering produces perseverance; perseverance, character; and character, hope. And hope does not disappoint us, because God has poured out His love into our hearts by the Holy Spirit, whom He has given us.” (NIV)

Once again, I read this and thought… “that’s great… but so what?” I get that endurance produces completeness and even get the point that we should be happy when we have problems in our lives because it allows us to develop hope and endurance… but what if we stink at the whole endurance thing? What if we are so controlled by our addictions and desires that endurance to us is maybe lasting one week before plunging back into immorality? What if, we don’t even want to change? (That last one hit me for a while, as I believed that I enjoyed a lot of the immorality I had immersed myself in. But that brings up the issue of freedom in Christ and His will versus our own, all of which will be discussed in a later chapter.) The next verse of James gives us the answer to the last problem. “But if any of you lacks wisdom (wisdom being the ability to choose to endure) let him ask of God, who gives to all generously and without reproach, and it will be given to him. But he must ask in faith without and doubting, for the one who doubts is like the surf of the sea, driven and tossed by the wind.” (NASB.)

The answer lies in the faith of the Roman Centurion. A man who knew that with Christ’s words, the action would be completed. It didn’t say that it would be completed immediately, and we don’t know if the Centurion returned to find his servant still sick but as the month went on, to find him improving. But, in the gospel of Luke (shortly following the same story of the Roman Centurion,) it does tell us to “ask and it will be given to you; seek and you will find; knock and the door will be opened to you. For everyone who asks receives; he who seeks finds; and to him who knocks, the door will be opened.” (11:9-10, NIV.) When we ask without doubting that our request will be given to us, it will be given. Christ tells us this again in Matthew 21:22, “If you believe, you will receive whatever you ask for in prayer.”

I know that this is a long post, and I am surprised that any of you have continued to read to this point. I promise that I am almost finished (which the little scroll bar on your computer could also tell you) but I want to include the story of a man I met at a Young Life camp. He told us that he used to be a pastor and all of his pastor-friends used to use this demonstration where the would put their child on a high surface and have them jump into their dad’s arms. When they did it, they would ask the child why, to which the child would respond, “I knew you would catch me daddy.” They would then go on to say, “this is how our relationship with Christ should be.” After he heard this story, he had to try it. So one day, when his wife wasn’t home, he placed his three-year old daughter on the kitchen counter top and told her to jump. She stared at him, and sat down. Humiliated, he tried again to the same result. It wasn’t until after ten attempts that she finally jumped into his arms. When she realized how much fun this was, she kept doing it over and over again until he took her from the counter top and placed her on the refrigerator with the same request. “Jump!” he said. She sat down and the process was repeated. This is truly how our relationship with Christ is. There was never a point where the father was not going to catch his child. Instead, it was fear and doubt that kept the child from trusting and jumping. Once the risk was taken, he proved faithful and it became easier to do… until it was a larger jump.

Think of this story and everything else in this blog that is quickly becoming a short novel. Remember the faith of the Roman Centurion and his complete confidence in Christ’s words to be carried to action. Remember the words of Romans and James that speak of suffering and to rejoice in it. Remember the following words of James that require the absence of doubt and the promises of Christ in Luke and Matthew. At this moment, I am praying constantly for my mom and her oral problems. She isn’t a believer and I pray for a miracle of healing that will show her of God’s presence. And God is faithful. He has already begun to work. My mom recently told me that a doctor’s second opinion didn’t show the majority of the problems the first dentist had seen and the work has become largely less expensive. Remember her in your prayers.


In Christ, the Risen Lord,

-Dustin L. Taylor