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Nov 04, 2025 06:00am

Walking Through Luke: Jesus Responds to Faith

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Have you ever cared about something that seemed to matter to no one else? Something that was very important to you, but that you felt was too silly to tell someone else about? Maybe it even seemed too silly to pray about?

Sometimes, we think we can only pray about big, important things. And certainly, the men who came to Jesus in Luke 5:12–26 had big, important problems. But maybe they felt a little nervous going before Jesus, too. Maybe they feared He would say He had more important things to take care of. The people in this story were on the fringes of society—people whom most others would have walked by without a second look.

Do things like that matter to Jesus? Yes, they do.

My family used to have a dog. His name was Rocky, and he was with us for almost 16 years before he died in 2021. That poor dog went through a lot in his life. Every Fourth of July, fireworks terrified him. More than once, this led to him slipping his chain and running off. We lived on the edge of a small town in rural Kansas at the time, so it would have been easy for him to run off into the plains and get lost for good. On one Fourth of July in particular, we came home from a church event. When we realized he had gotten loose, we all prayed he would come back. Sure enough, the next morning, some kid from down the street brought him back. He had found and recognized him from our backyard, so he brought him home.

Another time, we noticed Rocky was acting a little odd. He was slow, he kept bumping into things, he was missing his food or water bowl when he tried to eat or drink. My mom went out and looked at him, and she realized he had gone blind. We were all brokenhearted about it and even worried that we might have to put him down. But we prayed, and we took him to the vet, and the vet prescribed medicine for him to take. It wasn’t long before, somehow, Rocky was able to see again.

But he also ate rat poison—and a plastic Ziploc bag.

Rocky had a ton of close calls. But we always prayed for him, and God always brought him back or made him better. Why? I think it’s because God sees childlike faith and cares—even about the little things. The things that don’t seem like they’d matter much to Him actually do.

The first man Luke 5:12 brings to our attention had leprosy. Leprosy was a devastating skin disease. The term can actually refer to a couple different types of skin diseases, but the kind of leprosy everybody associates with the name is incredibly contagious, and back then, there was no cure. Because of that, anyone who got leprosy was an outcast. They had to leave their town and live in leper colonies, away from anyone healthy. The only way they could return to society was if a priest examined them and determined that they were completely cured—or “clean.”

This man took a risk by approaching Jesus. He said that he knew if Jesus willed it, he could be clean. Jesus was not afraid of the man’s presence and did not send him away. He simply said, “I will; be clean.” Notice that He did not just say “healed”; He said “clean.” For the man to reenter society, he had to be clean. Jesus knew that and used the word very intentionally. He recognizes our exact needs and acts on them specifically. He does not apply a one-size-fits-all solution to our problems. He sees our individual needs and works specifically. Notice also that the man asked to be clean. When we approach God, we should be specific in our prayers. Tell Him exactly what we want. It never hurts to go into detail with God.

We see briefly that this miracle only earned Jesus more fame, and that as we saw earlier in Luke, Jesus regularly went to be by Himself to pray and recuperate from these times of healing.

Then, the passage moves forward to a new scenario. Jesus was teaching in a house, and it seems a great crowd had gathered. There were even Pharisees there. Most likely these religious leaders were suspicious of Jesus and His growing fame, and they wanted to see if His teachings lined up with theirs. They had come from all around because they wanted to judge Him and see if His growing fame was a threat to them.

As He taught, four men lowered their paralyzed friend through the roof of the house. They could not get to Him through the door, but they knew their friend needed Jesus and they had faith that He could meet their needs, so they acted. They went to extreme measures to reach Jesus. We, on the other hand, only need to speak. There’s an old song that says, “He’s just a whisper away.” But the truth is, He’s just a thought away. If you have put your faith in Him, you have the Holy Spirit within you. You don’t even need to speak. If you just think your prayers, He hears.

When Jesus saw their faith, He told the man his sins were forgiven. This wasn’t what the men had come for, though, was it? They wanted their friend to be healed. Jesus obviously knew that, but He instead chose to say, “Your sins are forgiven.” He saw the man’s greatest need—spiritual cleansing in addition to physical healing. This angered the Pharisees, who felt He was blaspheming (cursing God). Jesus perceived their thoughts (proof that He can hear what we think), and He asked them, “Which is easier to say? Your sins are forgiven, or rise up and walk?”

Obviously, the answer is that it’s easier to say “Your sins are forgiven,” because there is no external proof. But to prove His point, that He (the Son of Man) had the authority to forgive sins, He told the paralyzed man, “Rise up and walk.” And he did. In doing so, Jesus proved that He had authority to heal and to forgive sins. This amazed everyone who saw it.

This shows us that Jesus cares about all our needs, both big and small. What matters most to Him is our spiritual well-being (salvation), but that doesn’t mean He doesn’t care about our other needs as well. He knows what we’re going through. He sees our sorrows, anxieties, and struggles, and He wants us to come to Him in faith and present those needs to Him.