When Jesus had entered Capernaum, a centurion came to him, asking for help. 6 “Lord,” he said, “my servant lies at home paralyzed, suffering terribly.” [Matthew 8]
The non-roundabout protocols of the Kingdom. This is where you start.
Imagine meeting someone the first time around and not even saying hello or hi. I would have said, "Umm, excuse me. Good morning!" and then introduce myself and ask for healing. You know, proper protocols. Some big-time preachers (even some "apostles" and "prophets" today) would probably insist on scheduling an appointment with their secretaries before you could talk to them. The centurion simply went straight to Jesus and got straight to the point. Jesus obviously liked it that way. The Father had probably already given Jesus pertinent backgrounds about the centurion's case, as genuine prophetic people should have, supernaturally.
And after all, Jesus did teach in his Beatitudes to simply, "Ask and it will be given." No need to circumvent or smooth-talk or give a well prepared intro. Flowery intros are earthly religion. You can go straight to the point because Kingdom protocol says, "Ask and it will be given, or ask and you shall receive." As simple as that. You don't need to have your approach following some winding worldly protocols. Or formula. Or program. Like what they say about ACTS; how prayer should include Adoration, Confession, Thanksgiving and Supplication. The centurion simply approached and told Jesus what he needed.
Nothing reeked of man's religion. Some ministries require you to attend all sorts of seminars and conferences to "get things done correctly" or get the "right" steps and procedures. Then they give you a certificate for learning to do things their way or according to the accepted norm, as if certificates matter in the spiritual realms. That's not Kingdom. That's earthly. That's man's empire. The Kingdom is simple, straight and direct to the point, but supernaturally POWERFUL.
Freed from man's religion. Click here.
Jesus answered immediately. He even gave the centurion a choice. "Shall I come and heal him?" You see that favor when you cut out the crap and ritual and formalities and just be simple and direct with Jesus and really believe him? It's not the words or approach or protocol but the boldness of simple faith. The bold belief in what Jesus can do. If you do it the Kingdom way, Jesus gives you a bonus favor--picking the means by which things happen. "Shall I come and heal him?"
You're given an option and your option becomes "God's will."
That's when the centurion explained himself a little bit. Because Jesus asked him something.
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. 9 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.”
That's a short thirty-second prayer. How long do you pray and how effective? Do your prayers get instant results?
But note here--he magnified how he was unworthy (opposed to what his advanced party told Jesus about his "worthiness") and his deep, authentic and simple yet radical faith in Jesus. These are two elements the Lord wants to see in us, not the grand sounding words or modulated voice we use or the drama in our prayer. The centurion really believed that a mere word was all it took to produce a miracle. Activating the supernatural with a "mere word" is what God's move in the last days is about. Click here.
A mere word!
"But just say the word..."
That's radically straight to the point! Yet, this is something most of us have difficulty learning and believing up to this day. We still believe long, roundabout prayer (or worship service) does the trick with lots of formal intros, rituals and niceties. Lots of this and that. We can't get it that the Lord's Prayer in Matthew 6 is not what we should pray but how we should pray--or "after this manner." It's not a formula of what prayer should contain but what faith prayers should have. It's faith based on a bold or daring relationship. It's why Jesus started with "Our Father."
The whole prayer is predicated on our relationship with the Father. Without that, the rest of the prayer is null and void. Imagine calling God--the Creator of all things--your Father! This is why prayer is asking, not begging. We ask and everyone who asks receives. No need to beg. Beggars get often rejected because begging does not hinge on bold relationship.
And they say prayer should be specific. It's actually what makes prayers long and religious, this talk of being specific. You have to indicate what size, shape, color, make, and whatnot. I've even heard of meal prayers explaining to God what happens to food when it goes down the esophagus. But Jesus says the Father knows what we need before we ask him (or what happens to food after we swallow it). So, what's the use of specificity? Hence, Jesus taught his disciples a short prayer which I can do in about 10 seconds. I'm not saying prayers should be short, but they should be simple and direct to the point, full of bold and daring faith.
The more the words, the less the meaning, and how does that profit anyone? [Ecclesiastes 6.11]
I don't know if the centurion was around when Jesus prayed for the loaves and fish that fed 5,000 folks, but he surely got the point. Jesus merely looked up to heaven and said "Thanks!" and the astounding miracle happened. No ACTS whatsoever. No religious niceties or protocols or programs. So when the centurion asked Jesus for a long-distance miracle, he did it in merely 9 words. "“Lord, my servant lies at home paralyzed, suffering terribly.” You see how short that prayer was?
How do we pray for the seriously ill? Sometimes we need prayer warriors who pray and worship non-stop. Sometimes we make sure our words sound very dignified (even stately), churchy and religious. With a lot of ado. And without the ado, we feel our prayers will not please God. Somehow we have made ourselves believe that this is prayer, and this is what we teach in church.
So, I train myself to often cut out the crap in what I do and be direct and simple. Especially when I'm introduced as a church speaker. I don't need to be introduced. And I don't need to have an intro for the message when I speak. I don't need to open in prayer--things Jesus never did. When he taught or preached, he just went right on with it. But we see a hint of what he did to prepare for ministry. He prayed to the Father in his special quiet times and in each moment of the day through mental prayers. He prayed in secret--and the Father who sees things done in secret rewarded him.
We see this when he resurrected Lazarus.
Then Jesus looked up and said, “Father, I thank you that you have heard me. 42 I knew that you always hear me, but I said this for the benefit of the people standing here, that they may believe that you sent me.”
He said, "I thank you that you have heard me"? This means he had prayed beforehand. But when? In the context, there was no mention of Jesus praying. So it's safe to conclude that he did it mentally while on his way to the tomb. By the way, if we were to resurrect someone from the dead, I'm sure our prayers will not be as short and simple and direct as Jesus' prayer was. We may even think of having a program with scripture reading, opening prayer, special number and all that fuss--and still to no avail.
Often, we need to also take off our grave clothes and be let loose as Lazarus. And here we need to start with the right way of surrendering to Jesus.
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