Series on Luke
III The Initiation
D The Activities of His Ministry Revealing that the Kingdom Is:
16 Flawed with Folly
Text:9:37-45
Introduction
And so Jesus came down from the mountain. The only begotten son of God, and at the bottom of the mountain he found a father who also had an only begotten son, possessed by a demon and in need of deliverance. We read in verses 37-40, The next day, when they came down from the mountain, a large crowd met him. A man in the crowd called out, “Teacher, I beg you to look at my son, for he is my only child. A spirit seizes him and he suddenly screams; it throws him into convulsions so that he foams at the mouth. It scarcely ever leaves him and is destroying him. I begged your disciples to drive it out, but they could not.” As he came down to die he came down to help and he did in verse 42, Even while the boy was coming, the demon threw him to the ground in a convulsion. But Jesus rebuked the evil spirit, healed the boy and gave him back to his father. Verse 43 says, They were amazed at the mighty power of God, And they were all amazed at the greatness of God. The exact translation is that they were astounded by his majesty. When Peter recalls the transfiguration in the mount in II Peter 1 he says we were eyewitnesses of his majesty. So what Peter and James and John saw in the mount, everyone saw in the valley, but they may not have recognized that it was the same thing. It seems perfectly clear to me that this is what we need, that is, to see in the valley what they saw on the mountain. We can, if we see where the power is! So consider with me first of all the perversity of the crowd, and secondly, the power of the cross.
I The Perversity of the Crowd
The crowd here was not homogeneous but was made up of at least three parts. Let me describe them as determined, deluded and discouraged.
A Determined
Luke doesn’t tell us this, but Mark’s account is fuller and it tells us that when Jesus and Peter and James and John came to the other disciples, the teachers of the law were arguing with them. We would not hesitate to describe these men as faithless. They displayed a determined unbelief. At every stage of Jesus’ ministry they opposed him. The scribes and Pharisees were here on this day and they saw the pitiful and powerless effort of the disciples to deal with the demon possessed boy. You can be sure that they did not pass up this opportunity. Surely Jesus includes these when he describes all those present as a faithless and perverse generation in verse 41, “O unbelieving and perverse generation,” Jesus replied, “how long shall I stay with you and put up with you? Bring your son here.” That is, literally, a generation without faith and misshapen. The word perverse means literally a vessel on the potter’s wheel becoming misshapen.
B Deluded
We don’t like to think of the disciples being described as faithless and perverse, but they were. They could not do anything about the demon possessed boy because they had no faith. They were deluded. You probably don’t like that description, but let me point out something to you. The Holy Spirit uses the word “faithless” in Luke, but in Matthew 17:20 in the story of the transfiguration Jesus says to them that they have little faith. We like to think that that means we have little faith and our faith is weak. That is not what Jesus means by little faith. In the gospel of Matthew he describes them as having little faith when they don’t look to the Lord for their needs in 6:30, and when they were fearful on the stormy sea of Galilee in 8:26, and when Peter failed to stand on the water and sank in 14:31, and when they were worried how to feed the 4000 in 16:8. He was not referring to the quantity of their faith but to the quality. In Matthew’s account of this same story Jesus says if you have faith as a grain of mustard seed you can say to this mountain remove from here to there and it will move. They did not even have that much faith. Little faith means no faith. Are we in this situation? i think we are and as long as we keep thinking that our problem is a weak faith instead of no faith we will keep failing.
C Discouraged
There was a third category present that day: the father who mistakenly brought his son to Jesus’ disciples thinking they would help. I see him as being the closest to the truth. The disciples did not even recognize that they were powerless because they had no faith. Earlier in this very chapter Luke tells us how Jesus sent out the 12 to preach the kingdom and heal the sick and they did. Matthew and Mark remind us that they also had power to cast out demons, but they did not see this was strictly His power. In fact they were so dimwitted on this point that immediately after Jesus rebukes them here we read in verse 46 about an argument which started among them as to which of them would be the greatest. They were deluded but the father of this boy was discouraged. Luke doesn’t tell us everything. This is the man who said, “if you can help,” and Jesus said, “if i can?” “All things are possible to him who believes,” and the man said, “i believe, help my unbelief.” At least he perceived somewhat what the problem was, but notice that Jesus acted which meant that this father believed and it was not necessary to have more faith only faith. In the King James Version in Mark 9 Jesus says to his disciples, “This kind of demon comes out only by prayer and fasting,” But the New International translates it correctly as “only by prayer.” The old wording which lacks good manuscript evidence implied that it was due to weak faith, but I believe that the truth is the disciples didn’t pray at all. The faith principle was lacking. This about sums up the perversity of the crowd that day. for various reasons they were faithless. This is our problem too if we are honest. Our self assessment is too kind. We’re not just weak we’re empty, and so, what shall we do?
II The Power of the Cross
Jesus’ approach to this matter is not to belabor either their faithlessness or some procedure for prayer. instead we read in verses 43-45, While everyone was marveling at all that Jesus did, he said to his disciples, “Listen carefully to what I am about to tell you: The Son of Man is going to be betrayed into the hands of men.” But they did not understand what this meant. It was hidden from them, so that they did not grasp it, and they were afraid to ask him about it. Jesus says listen carefully to what I am about to tell you, let it sink in. Later they would understand. it is in this statement that Jesus gives them the real source of power. A week earlier at Caesarea Philippi He had announced to them, The son of man must suffer many things and be rejected by the elders, chief priests and teachers of the law, and he must be killed and on the third day be raised to life. As He points them to the cross so He points us to the cross. We suppose that the cross is the means of our salvation and it is, but we miss the fact that the cross is the means to abundant life here and now. God gives us everything in the cross but we dutifully submerge it in our search for a reputation. In Philippians Paul says Jesus made himself of no reputation. When you meet Him at the cross, you have given up your reputation. Now that is faith. All that matters is Jesus and the power that comes out of his atoning death and resurrection. Many of us are chained to a moral yardstick trying to be better at praying and giving and we can’t see the victory of the cross. We keep trying to establish a reputation for efficiency, or leadership, or service, or preaching, or housekeeping. This is exactly what the disciples were like before they understood the cross. They were building castles in the sand, instead of resting in the finished work of Christ. They end up defending themselves and vying for position in the kingdom. Later they would know the truth of Ephesians 1:18-21, I pray also that the eyes of your heart may be enlightened in order that you may know the hope to which he has called you, the riches of his glorious inheritance in the saints, and his incomparably great power for us who believe. That power is like the working of his mighty strength, which he exerted in Christ when he raised him from the dead and seated him at his right hand in the heavenly realms, far above all rule and authority, power and dominion, and every title that can be given, not only in the present age but also in the one to come. Are our eyes open to where the power is found? In Romans 10 Paul says, Christ is the end of the law for righteousness. J.B.Phillips brilliantly paraphrases this as, Christ means the end of the struggle for righteousness. It’s when I give up that I have faith. There is nothing to struggle about. A brief poem says, “Cast your deadly doing down, down at Jesus’ feet, stand in him, in him alone, gloriously complete.” i may not know and I cannot see how God is going to solve my particular problem but the cross tells me that I am His child, an heir of God and a joint heir with Christ, so I can pray thy will be done and mean it. The scribes refused to do this. The disciples were not ready to do this, and the father of the demon possessed boy finally did it. What about you? How far down have you come? Can you say I can’t even believe right but Christ died for me and that’s enough. God who spared not his only son but delivered him up for us all will surely give me with him all things. Then you will see the majesty of God in the valley along with the father of the demon possessed boy.
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