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The word amazement shows up numerous times throughout the Gospels. As you might expect, it’s almost always associated with something Jesus said or did. He would heal someone, calm a storm, silence His detractors, or teach persuasively, and the people stood amazed!
But there are two instances where Jesus Himself is amazed.
The first time is when a Roman centurion sends a message to Jesus by way of a servant. This centurion asks Jesus to speak a word of healing over another one of his servants. He says that just a word from Jesus will be sufficient, and he doesn’t need Jesus to personally come to his house.
When Jesus heard this, He was amazed. “Turning to those who were following Him, He said, ‘I tell you the truth, I haven’t seen faith like this in all Israel!’” (Matthew 8:10; Luke 7:9).
Because of this centurion’s faith, his servant was immediately healed!
The second time Jesus was amazed was when He was visiting His hometown. There He discovered people with whom He had grown up that refused to believe that He was who He claimed to be. As a result, Jesus “was amazed at their unbelief” (Mark 6:6).
So either Jesus is amazed at our faith in Him, or He is amazed at our unbelief in Him. When I have faith in Jesus—when I believe He is who He says He is, and that He is willing to do what He says He will do—He is amazed at my faith and can do miracles on my behalf. But when I doubt, when I allow my unbelief to seize my heart, I exclude myself from the miracles He wants to do.
Jesus will be amazed at you. Will He be amazed at your faith in Him? Or will He be amazed at your unbelief in His power that is waiting to be released on your behalf? I pray that Jesus will always be amazed at our faith in Him.
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The word “amazed” shows up numerous times throughout the Gospels, almost always associated with something Jesus said or did. He would heal someone, calm a storm, silence His detractors, or teach persuasively. And the people marveled!
But there are two instances where Jesus Himself is amazed, where the Bible says He marveled at what someone said.
The first is when a centurion asked Jesus for help, but said he didn’t need Jesus to be personally present. He told Jesus that just a word from Him would be more than enough to heal a sick servant. Jesus was amazed at this man’s faith, and as a result, the servant was healed (Matthew 8:10; Luke 7:9)!
The second time that Jesus was amazed was when He was visiting His hometown and the people with whom He grew up didn’t believe He was who He claimed to be. As a result, Jesus was amazed and the Bible says He was unable to do many miracles there (Mark 6:6). How sad!
It’s still true today. Either Jesus will be amazed at our faith or He will be amazed at our unbelief. When we have faith in Him—when we stand amazed and in awe and in expectation of His power—He is amazed and can perform miracles. But when we push Jesus away and say, “We can take care of this ourselves,” Jesus is also amazed. But this type of amazement results in Jesus being unable to unleash His miraculous power on our behalf.
Let’s learn this amazing lesson, and always stand amazed at who Jesus is and what Jesus can do. When we are amazed, and our faith grows stronger, Jesus will be amazed at our faith and will move on our behalf in amazing ways!
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Last week I mentioned over-dramatic kids complaining, “I’m starving!” Or people with expensive phones complaining about a slow internet connection. We’re really good at expressing what we want, aren’t we? In fact, we’re really good at loudly letting everyone around us know that we want something.
But here’s a good question: Are we just as quick to loudly express our gratitude?
It’s innate human nature to behave this way. No one has to teach a child to express their desires—loudly! But we do have to teach our children to say, “Thank you.” And sometimes it takes even more prompting to get them to say it loud enough for others to hear, and sincere enough for others to believe that they are truly grateful.
So why would we expect it to be any different just because we happen to be older? That’s why we’ve noted that the attitude of gratitude is a great attitude, and it’s also an attitude that makes the grateful person stand out from the crowd.
G.K. Chesterton noted, “In life you can take things one of two ways: you can take them for granted or you can take them with gratitude.” Sadly, it seems that “for granted” is what is typically exhibited. In fact, I think the granted-to-grateful ratio is 10-to-1.
Luke alone tells a story in his Gospel about ten men with leprosy (Luke 17:11-19). All ten lepers had no problem calling out their need for healing “in a loud voice.” And they called out to the right Person, as they called Jesus “Master.” This word shows that they believed He could do something no one else could do. Indeed, Jesus shows His authority over leprosy with just the word, “Go” and “as they went, they were cleansed.”
All ten were quick to loudly express their desire for healing and to call on the authority of Jesus, but only “one of them…came back, praising God in a loud voice.” Both Luke and Jesus affirm that all ten men were cleansed on the outside—their skin no longer showed the ravages of leprosy, but only to the one grateful man did Jesus say, “Your faith has healed and saved you” (v. 19 MSG).
The Greek word here is sōzō. This is the same word used for the eternal salvation that Jesus alone can bring. Check out John 3:17, John 10:9, Acts 2:21, and Romans 10:9. This is better than just physical cleansing, it’s wholeness that lasts for eternity!
E.M. Bounds wrote, “Gratitude and murmuring never abide in the same heart at the same time.” Sadly, the ratio of grumblers-to-praisers is only going grow as we move closer and closer to the end of the age, culminating in people who have the outward appearance of godliness (like the nine cleansed lepers) but ignore the true power of God for salvation (see 2 Timothy 3:1-5).
In this take-everything-for-granted, focus-on-the-outward culture, those 1-in-10 stand out. Those who have gone beyond skin-deep cleaning to soul-deep salvation, and who loudly express their gratitude, are the ones the apostle Paul declares shine brightly and influence those around them (Philippians 2:14-16).
The origin of the word influence comes from a power people thought those bright stars had to affect the lives of humans. So your consistent gratitude is influencing those around you, and giving them a star to chart their course, more consistently than almost anything else you can do.
So shine on! Praise God loudly, quickly, and sincerely for what He has done for you! Be the 1-in-10! And then watch your influence impact everyone who encounters you.
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Imagine if 700 years before you were born there was a prophecy given about you (Matthew 3:3). Or if on the day of your birth your father said, “And you, my child, will be called a prophet of the Most High; you will go on before the Lord to prepare the way for Him” (Luke 1:76).
This was John the Baptist.
With these kinds of announcements and the stamp of approval from God Himself, it’s really quite astounding how humble John remained:
“After me comes One Who is more powerful than I, Whose sandals I am not worthy to carry” (Matthew 3:11).
“[Jesus] must increase, but I must decrease” (John 3:30).
The confidence that he was God’s man for the hour gave John boldness to speak truth to religious leaders, wealthy people, and Roman soldiers (Matthew 3:7-12; Luke 3:7-20). Yet his humility was almost his undoing.
John preached boldly, fulfilling the prophecies that were made about him. But when Jesus came to him to be baptized, John’s humility caused him to defer initially. Then Jesus reminded him that His baptism was necessary “to fulfill all righteousness. Then John consented” (Matthew 3:13-15).
Whether I am lacking confidence to speak or lead boldly, or lacking humility to let someone else take the lead, I need to return to the Word of God—just as John did. Both his confidence and his humility were balanced by words spoken over him by God. So it must be for you and me too.
Confidence without humility or humility without confidence can trip me up and cause me to miss out on all that God needs me to do. So my daily prayer must be: Holy Spirit, may I be sensitive to every correction and adjustment You need to make in me. Illuminate the Scriptures that I need to apply to my life that will keep me in a healthy, balanced place.
I wrote about this tension between confidence and humility in my book Shepherd Leadership. This was also a topic of conversation in two interviews I did, which you can find here and here. Healthy leaders need the proper balance of confidence and humility to keep their leadership in a place that God can use powerfully.
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We said last week that nobody likes to be around a complainer, although many complainers would say they’re not complaining but just sharing facts. In their mind, they have a legitimate right to let everyone know how they’ve been short-changed, gotten a bad deal, or experienced something that no one else has gone through.
Have you ever heard your kids say, “I’m starving”? And perhaps you think, “Do you really know what starving is?” Or what about people waving their very expensive phones around as they complain, “Isn’t there any WiFi here?!”
This isn’t a glass half-full or half-empty thing. This is really closing your eyes to the fact that many people don’t even have a glass, or if they do have a glass, they don’t have access to the water that they need.
I was delivering some Christmas toys to a family and I discovered they had lost everything they owned. When I came to their house their furniture was mismatched, their food and clothes were donated, and their kids only had a couple of simple toys to play with. And yet this family was happy to be together!
That sort of puts things in perspective, doesn’t it?
We have to choose grumbling or gratefulness, but as E.M. Bounds noted, “Gratitude and murmuring never abide in the same heart at the same time.” So if you are complaining about what you don’t have, you cannot be grateful for what you do have.
There is a fascinating story told in all four Gospels of a woman named Mary. She was an uninvited guest at a house where Jesus and His disciples had been invited to dinner. Jesus was not there because someone was grateful to have Him in his home, but because Simon the Pharisee and his cronies were trying to find a reason to accuse Jesus of wrongdoing.
Simon was so focused on his “gotcha” moment that he completely overlooked his host duties. He didn’t wash Jesus’ feet, nor greet Him with a kiss, nor anoint Him with perfume, as the custom of the day demanded. But Mary, standing behind Jesus at the dinner table, washed Jesus’ feet with her tears, kissed His feet, and anointed Him with an entire bottle of costly perfume! She did all of this out of gratitude for what she had received from Jesus.
First, I would like you to consider what Mary didn’t have:
a seat at the table—even though the dinner was in her hometown of Bethany, her brother Lazarus was invited to the meal, and her sister Martha was serving the meal
a good reputation—twice Simon the Pharisee said, “Does Jesus even know what kind of woman she is? Does He know she is a sinner?”
the acceptance or approval of others—even the disciples thought her gesture of anointing Jesus with so much perfume was a wasted extravagance
Next, let’s look at what Simon did have:
an elevated position as a Pharisee
considerable wealth—he had servants and a home large enough for a big dinner party
healing from leprosy—the Gospels refer to him as “Simon the leper” which tells us that he had been healed of his leprosy
Now, let’s consider what the disciples did have:
an enviable position as disciples of Jesus
a dinner invitation to Simon’s house
access to the financial resources that people gave to Christ’s ministry
and let us never overlook the fact that they had access to Jesus Himself like no one else had
Finally, let’s look at what Mary did have:
forgiveness—Luke says this about her, “A woman who HAD lived a sinful life”
Gratitude is truly a great attitude. Grateful people stand out because they don’t grumble about what they don’t have, but they are focused on what they do have.
Mary knew that she didn’t have the outward marks of success or favor or approval, but she did have the assurance that she had been forgiven. For that, she was more than willing to give everything she had to Jesus in thankful worship!
And as a result, look what Mary now has:
the kind words of Jesus—He assured her that she was forgiven (Luke 7:47)
Jesus as her defender—He told His disciples, “Leave her alone” (John 12:7)
an eternal testimony—Jesus said that wherever the Gospel was preached, people would tell Mary’s story (Matthew 26:13)
I think a good way to sum up the distinguishing way grateful people live is like this: They don’t grumble about what they don’t have, but they are extremely grateful for what they do have.
When you find grumbling slipping out of your mouth, remind yourself of just how much you have been given. Even if you think to yourself, “I don’t have much,” you can be assured that you have Jesus, and He is more than enough! And with that assurance, let your gratitude be lifted up in extravagant, fragrant praise to God.
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In my book Shepherd Leadership, I take five chapters to unpack the lessons we can learn from the health of Jesus. Yes, Jesus was mentally, physically, spiritually, and relationally healthy.
On the 200churches podcast with Jeff Keady we talked about a chapter in my book called “The Pinnacle of a Shepherd’s Health.” In that chapter I wrote—
The phrase Dr. Luke uses about Christ’s growth is, “Jesus grew in favor with men” [Luke 2:52]. People liked having Jesus around. The word Luke uses for favor is from the same root word that is also translated “grace.” Jesus was a graceful Man. Or we could say that He was a Man so full of grace that when He was jostled, only grace spilled out of Him.
What does it mean when someone is graceful? It means they are pleasant to be around. It means you feel safe around them, knowing they will never belittle you or put you down. It means that their focus is on your agenda, not their own agenda. It means they are a “there you are!” person, not a “here I am!” person. The bottom line: grace-full people are full of grace for others.
Let’s return to our perfect example in Jesus. He was treated rudely and spoken to condescendingly, even by people who should have been His allies. Then there were those on a constant mission to try to trip Him up or get Him to say or do something that would have undermined His credibility. Yet Jesus never spoke inappropriately nor acted childishly. Jesus never had to say, “My bad, I misspoke there,” or “Sorry, I shouldn’t have done that.”
We can make all of our plans to behave in loving ways toward the sheep under our care, but what happens when the sheep ignore us, bite us, or leave us? As boxer Mike Tyson noted, “Everyone has a plan until they get punched in the mouth.” Surely the best indication of our overall healthiness and servant-like attitude is not so much our actions but our reactions.
If your reactions are less than what you would like them to be, I believe you will find a lot of excellent content in my book that can help you.
If you want to catch up on some of the other clips I’ve already shared from this interview, you can find them here, and I’ll be sharing more clips from this 200churches interview soon, so please stay tuned. Shepherd Leadership: The Metrics That Really Matter is available in print or ebook, and in audiobook through either Audible or Apple.
We have a new kitten in our home and the places she shows up cracks me up!
In the Wall Street Journal, Andy Kessler said that without the discoveries and influence of Michael Faraday, “there would be no modern economy.” John Stonestreet built on this by explaining that “Faraday is an example of how Christians can balance the constructive purposes of science with an accurate understanding of scientific authority.” Indeed, Faraday’s Christian faith made his scientific findings even more powerful.
“For many years, evidence has been found showing that humans were surprisingly intelligent in times that were only supposed to reveal simple, ‘primitive’ man in his brute, evolving condition.” Now a new discovery has shown a surgical amputation that took place about 7000 years ago.
There’s a cool story in three of the Gospels where some creative, persistent friends took their paralyzed friend to Jesus. The Bible notes that “when Jesus saw *their* faith” He healed their friend. Wow! Which of your friends or family are too weak to pray for themselves? Who do you know that feels paralyzed and cannot get to Jesus? Be that friend who has faith for someone else. And be sure to check out more of my Monday Motivation videos too.
We have seen it in countless science fiction movies, but is it possible for artificially intelligent machines to take over the world? This is a great video from Science Uprising—
If you have known someone who has battled cancer, you know that their liver is quite vulnerable to metastatic cancer since everything in our body is filtered through the liver at some point. Researchers have discovered the mechanism by which this metastasis happens, opening the door for defensive measures that can be employed. Let’s pray for divine insight for these researchers!
Is Christianity rational? Cold-case detective J. Warner Wallace explains how Christianity stands up to intense scrutiny—
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Jesus told us twice, “Your Father knows what you need before you ask Him” (Matthew 6:8, 32). He knows the good we need.
When we were children, our parents tried to give us good-for-you food, but sometimes it wasn’t necessarily good. It might have given us nutrients, but perhaps it wasn’t as tasty as we would have liked. Let’s be honest: most junk food tastes really, really good—probably better than the good-for-you food. As a result, sometimes we eat just to eat. We eat because we have to. We choke down the vegetables just so we can get to the dessert.
As parents, we want our kids to have good-for-you food. God wants that too, but He wants more than that for us: He wants it to be savory as well. Jesus talked about how evil parents knew enough to give good things to their children, but then He reminded us how much more does God want to give us (Luke 11:11-13)!
It usually takes much longer to prepare food than it does to eat it. This is especially true for more savory gourmet meals. When we gulp down our food, we don’t really appreciate or savor the tastes, the subtle hints the chef has mixed in, and certainly not the time involved to prepare such a lovely feast.
When we gulp down our food without savoring it…
…we don’t honor the one who prepared the food
…we don’t savor the goodness so we don’t appreciate the goodness
…we move on to dessert (or junk food) before our body is ready for it
In Psalm 106 we read a history lesson of Israel’s ups-and-downs—the trouble they were in and the deliverance God prepared for them. The psalmist directly connects their lack of savoring God’s good things to their rebellion and their carnal, godless cravings. Instead of slowing down to be grateful for what God had given them, they just wanted to move on to the next dessert. That attitude may have been what was behind the spoiled girl named Veruca Salt in the movie “Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory” who sang the song “I Want It NOW!”
David gives us the antidote for this tasteless gulping of God’s good and good-for-us food: “Taste and see that the Lord is good…” (Psalm 34:8a). This deliberate tasting allows us to see how excellent the things of God are, better than anything else the world has to offer!
David concludes his counsel with these words, “Blessed is the man who takes refuge in Him. Fear the Lord, you His saints, for those who fear Him lack nothing” (Psalm 34:8b).
In the New Testament, the apostle Peter gives us a similar word: “Like newborn babies, you must crave pure spiritual milk so that you will grow into a full experience of salvation. Cry out for this nourishment, now that you have had a taste of the Lord’s kindness” (1 Peter 2:2-3 NLT).
It’s this savoring that will help us appreciate the sweet and the bitter. It’s this appreciation that brings glory to God and keeps us craving more of the ultimate good that only He has for us.
If we will slow down to savor God’s Word, if we will delight to spend time in prayer, if we won’t rush through the good-for-you trials, we will taste and see that there is nothing that can satisfy like our Savior!
Listen to the podcast of this post by clicking on the player below, and you can also subscribe on Apple, Spotify, or Audible.
I am always interested when I see contrasts in the Bible. Things like:
Live this way, not that way
These people are blessed, these people have trouble
If you do this, you won’t have this
So an interesting contrast caught my eye in the story where Jesus calms the storm (Matthew 8:23–27). Jesus is sleeping peacefully in the middle of a storm that is described as “furious [where] the waves swept over the boat.” The disciples were anything but peaceful—they thought they were going to drown—so they yelled for Jesus to wake up.
Before Jesus calmed the storm, He says, “You of little faith, why are you so afraid?”
That’s the phrase that caught my attention. Notice the contrast between “little faith” and “so afraid.” In other words, small faith means big fear!
Strong’s Greek dictionary defines “little faith” as “dread (by implication) faithless.” So it appears there is an inverse proportion between faith and fear.
The word that Jesus used for “afraid” is only used here and in the same story in Mark 4:40, and in Revelation 21:8 which lists people who will be excluded from entrance into heaven.
The phrase “so afraid” (or “O ye of little faith” in the King James Version) is just one word in Greek: olgiopistos. The root word pistos is faith, but I find the prefix oligos very descriptive. It means:
small in quantity
short in time
slight in intensity
In other words, it is faith that is immature, or hasn’t been used much, or hasn’t been applied to a particular circumstance. This word olgiopistos is used five times in the New Testament, and only used by Jesus.
In addition to this story, it is used in Matthew 6:30 and Luke 12:28 when Jesus tells us not to worry about the things that God will provide for us—things like food, clothing, and shelter. Jesus uses this word for Peter when he began to sink in the water after walking a few steps toward Jesus. And Jesus uses it in Matthew 16:8 when He warns His disciples about the “yeast” of the Pharisees and Sadducees that can creep into their hearts and spoil their faith. (Check out all of these verses here.)
In mathematical circles, this relationship between faith and fear is one that would be called inversely proportional. When our faith is high, our fear is low; when our fear is high, our faith is low. I also think it is very eye-opening that the mathematical symbol for inverse proportionality (∝) is the same symbol called ichthus that the early church used to represent Jesus.
Faith and fear cannot coexist in the same heart. Sometimes our faith is small in quantity because we haven’t fed our faith with God’s promises. Sometimes our faith is short in time because we want things done on our time schedule. And sometimes our faith is slight in intensity because we are unsure if God can “come through” in this particular situation.
Whatever the case, when we feel any fear, we need to ask for faith. We need to return to God’s Word and be assured that His promises are applicable regardless of the situation we are in. As our faith grows, our fear has to diminish!
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We see a pattern throughout the history of the Israelites in the Old Testament: They wanted to have all their bases covered, so they kept up the pretense of worshiping Jehovah, but they also added the idolatrous practices of the nations around them. It got pretty vile (see Jeremiah 2:23-25 as an example).
These cravings for more than God had provided led to their punishment. As we quoted last week from Isaiah, they lost their “matchless, unbroken companionship” with God (Isaiah 30:18 AMP).
Craving for our self-created idols creates anxiety in our hearts that shows up in three nagging questions.
(1) What will others think of me if they have things I don’t have?
Worrying about what others think of us has always been a trap. We play games, posture, and frequently hide the truth so that we “look right” to others. But this dishonesty only hurts us in the long run.
Dr. Tony Evans noted, “satan uses our legitimate need for acceptance in an illegitimate way that can result in us living under a false identity.” Jesus warned us not to show off to try to get others to think well of us (Matthew 6:1) and He lived this out in His own life. He said, “I receive not glory from men—I crave no human honor, I look for no mortal fame” (John 5:41 AMP).
To avoid this trap remember: Recognition from God > Recognition from men. We should be living to hear Jesus say, “Well done, good and faithful servant!” (Matthew 25:21, 23).
(2) Will I have enough to survive?
Because the things of this earth pass away, it is natural to think that our supply may just <poof!> be gone in an instant. So we can crave the security of having our shelves fully stocked for the future.
Jesus twice tells us that our Heavenly Father knows what we need (Matthew 6:8, 32). Then over a span of ten verses, Jesus tells us four times, “Do not worry” (Matthew 6:25-34). He can assure us of this because of this rock-solid reality: Heaven’s provisions > Earth’s provisions.
(3) Will God accept me?
Just as satan tried to get Jesus to doubt that He was the Son of God, the devil will also try to get you to doubt whether or not you measure up in God’s sight. But in the Sermon on the Mount, Jesus emphasizes the Fatherhood of God thirteen times—usually calling Him “your Father.”
This tells me that we can cling to this: Being accepted by your Father > Being accepted by anyone else. Paul uses a wonderful description in Ephesians when he tells us we are “accepted in the Beloved” (Ephesians 1:6 NKJV).
Isaiah told us that God longs to be gracious to us, and Jesus emphasizes that idea when He says, “Only aim at and strive for and seek His kingdom, and all these things shall be supplied to you also. Do not be seized with alarm and struck with fear, little flock, for it is your Father’s good pleasure to give you the kingdom!” (Luke 12:31-32 AMP)
Just as God craves to bless you, so you are to crave your fulfillment in what He alone can supply. You must crave the only One Who can eternally satisfy you, Who longs to reward you, and Who delights to give you the inestimable rewards of His kingdom!
The word amazement shows up numerous times throughout the Gospels. As you might expect, it’s almost always associated with something Jesus said or did. He would heal someone, calm a storm, silence His detractors, or teach persuasively, and the people stood amazed! 
Craig T. Owens 