There are a couple of examples of having faith in the unseen in the Gospels and I would like to examine them to see how we can have faith for the unseen today.

In my last post, I described the authority Jesus gave over sickness that we still have today. In this post, I want to look at a couple of examples of faith for the unseen in the Gospels.

You could say that faith itself is seeing the unseen before it happens. God gives you the ability to trust Him even though you have not seen what He’s going to do. Some people describe faith as “seeing is believing.” But that is not how the Bible describes faith.

To have faith, you must trust God for what you cannot see. If you see it, there’s no need to believe because you are seeing the effect of reality. If you live in the spiritual realm of “faith without sight,” you have to trust it until you see it. There are a couple of examples of faith for the unseen miracles God did in the Gospels.

Uncommon Faith for the Unseen

I only have a couple examples of faith for the unseen miracles of Jesus because it was rare. Jesus was impressed with the faith of the centurion. Trusting that Jesus healed his servant without seeing it happen or verifying it did not usually happen.

People want to see the reality of their faith. If they believe for healing, financial stability, success in their jobs, or anything else in life, they pray for it and expect it to happen. If it doesn’t, their faith is shaken. These two people in the Gospels did not need to verify if Jesus did the miracle.

A Father’s Faith for the Unseen

Our first example of faith for the unseen comes from John 4:46-54. A father who is an official in the royal court of King Herod heard about Jesus. He made the 30 mile trek across challenging terrain to reach Jesus and ask Him to heal his son.

His son was at death’s door. He begged Jesus to come with him. Jesus’s response must have been puzzling. Jesus said, “Unless you people see signs and wonders, you simply will not believe” (John 4:48).

Why would you say such a thing to this father who needed so much help? Jesus was addressing the crowd, not the father. Earlier in John’s Gospel, Jesus changed water to wine. (John 2:1-12). The father was asking Him for another miracle.

Jesus wanted the people to realize He is not a magic genie. The desperate father begged Jesus to come with him, but Jesus refused. Instead, He simply said, “Go, your son is alive.” The father must choose to trust Jesus. He trusted that Jesus healed his son from a great distance.

Imagine what it was like for this father who loved his son so much to walk 30 miles back to his home with no guarantee that Jesus’s word was enough. With every step, his faith was being strengthened.

That faith was rewarded when he was on his way back home. Some of his servants came to him and reported that his son was alive. He must have been overjoyed, but he also wanted more details. It is not wrong to ask Jesus for more details in your healing process.

He wanted to know exactly when his son was beginning to get better. The servants told him it was yesterday at the seventh hour (about 1 PM). He realized this was the same time he had asked Jesus to heal his son.

The journey could take 6-9 hours. The man was returning home and the reference to “yesterday” would have been them reaching him in that 6-9 hour journey. Genesis shows that Jewish understanding of a day started in the evening (Genesis 1:5, 8, 13, 19, 23, 31). “Yesterday” referred to earlier that day.

A Soldier’s Faith for the Unseen

Another record of having faith for the unseen is the faith of the centurion (Matthew 8:5-13; Luke 7:1-10). I was surprised when I looked into Luke’s account because it is not about the healing as much as it is about the worthiness of the centurion.

The Jewish leaders begged Jesus to heal this centurion’s slave because he is worthy. They are referring to his character and what he has done for them. They base his worthiness for Jesus to heal his slave on his character and works.

But when Jesus begins to go to his house, he sends people to tell Jesus he is not worthy to be anywhere near Him. The word he uses for worthy is different than what the Jewish leaders use. His word refers to meeting a standard, or to be fit, to be in Jesus’s presence. He knows his place.

He appeals to Jesus to just say the word, and he expects that to be enough. He trusts Jesus’s powerful word to heal from a distance. It is about His authority over sickness. Jesus says this centurion has great faith that He has not seen in all of Israel. I am sure that did not go over well with His Jewish audience. Jesus is the word that heals his slave from afar.

Increase Your Faith for the Unseen

These two accounts show us how to have faith for the unseen. If you have ever been concerned about the distance of the person praying for healing and the one who needs it, distance is not a factor. God can heal anyone anywhere because He is everywhere. Let this build your faith.

The father in our first example had changing faith. He began with desperate faith. Jesus turned it into trusting faith in His word. When this father heard Jesus’s word and saw his son healed, he had confirmed faith. It is okay to be in the middle of the process of believing for healing.

The soldier realized the true measure of worthiness to stand before Jesus. He was unworthy of Jesus’s healing for his slave. Instead of demanding an audience, he trusted in Jesus’s powerful and authoritative word for healing and his faith in Jesus’s authority and power. Jesus has the authority, ability, and will to heal today.

Praying for Your Healing

Mighty Lord Jesus, thank You for these incredible examples of Your healing power that transcends distance and time. Just as You healed the official’s son and centurion’s slave with a word, we ask You to speak healing over our bodies today. Help us to trust Your word even when we can’t see immediate evidence of healing. Stretch our faith from desperation to trust to confirmed conviction in Your power. Remind us that Your word carries the same authority today as it did in biblical times. Help us to believe that Your healing power knows no boundaries. In Your mighty name, Amen.

Up Next

Now that we have seen people who had faith for the unseen in the miracles of healing they needed from Jesus, we will turn next to the opposite of faith in the Bible.

Image by Muhammad Haseeb Muhammad Suleman from Pixabay