Life Project Blog

When they came to the crowd, a man approached Jesus and knelt before him. “Lord, have mercy on my son,” he said. “He has seizures and is suffering greatly. He often falls into the fire or into the water. I brought him to your disciples, but they could not heal him.”

“You unbelieving and perverse generation,” Jesus replied, “how long shall I stay with you? How long shall I put up with you? Bring the boy here to me.” Jesus rebuked the demon, and it came out of the boy, and he was healed at that moment.

Then the disciples came to Jesus in private and asked, “Why couldn’t we drive it out?”

He replied, “Because you have so little faith. Truly I tell you, if you have faith as small as a mustard seed, you can say to this mountain, ‘Move from here to there,’ and it will move. Nothing will be impossible for you.”

Matthew 17:14-21

There are many parallels between Matthew’s account of the transfiguration and Moses’ account of his encounter with God on Mt. Sinai, and this scene following the return of Jesus and the three disciples from their mountaintop experience is one of them that may remind us of what Moses found after his return to the camp when he came down from Sinai in Exodus 32. Moses found a rebellious and idolatrous people; Jesus found an “unbelieving and perverse generation”.

He was approached by a man who was begging for deliverance for his poor son who, as it turns out, was possessed by a demon. The disciples had attempted to deal with the demon, possibly the nine who did not accompany Jesus up the mountain, Matthew doesn’t make this clear, but in any case, they had been unable to deal with it.

Jesus drove out the demon immediately.

Previously I’ve pointed out that in this section, the disciples are the ones who Jesus is teaching, certainly they are His primary focus, and we see that clearly in this passage. In verse 11 He addressed the people around Him in general terms, maybe even showing a slight amount of frustration, but the real lesson isn’t His rebuke of the demon or of His generalized remarks in verse 11, but what follows in private with His disciples beginning in verse 20. That scene is set by the disciples’ question in 17:19: Why couldn’t they drive that demon out?

Fair question, they’ve been handling demons for some time now.

Jesus responds in very simple terms: “because you have so little faith.”

He goes on to add that if they have faith as small as a mustard seed, they can order a mountain to move, and it will move, for with a little faith, nothing will be impossible. You know what everyone says at this point: Mustard seeds are the smallest of seeds and they produce the largest of plants, so if you only have a little faith, you can do great things; Jesus has made that point earlier in Matthew’s narrative, and yet, here we are again; can the disciples be so dull, or is there something we have missed?

This is the point where we must make a shift in our focus, a shift from systematic theology into applied theology. Are you ready?

First, here’s a question: Are you a follower of Jesus Christ?

If your answer is “yes” then here’s the next question: Are you His disciple?           

(Hint: if you answered “yes” to the first question, then your answer to the second needs to be “yes” as well.)

So, if you are His follower, then you are His disciple, and like the original 12, you (and I) are in training, “at the feet of the Master” so to speak. Take verse 20 out of the abstract and historical (i.e. Jesus once said this to the Twelve) and think of it as Jesus sitting there with you saying this same thing to YOU. So, let’s look at the verse again: Here we are you, me and Jesus sitting around the kitchen table. We ask the question (verse 19) and He says:

“Don and (your name), it’s because you have so little faith. Truly I tell you, if you have faith as small as a mustard seed, you can say to this mountain, ‘Move from here to there,’ and it will move. Nothing will be impossible for you.”

Does it look different now?

Have you ever prayed for someone’s healing, for example, and had a little voice in the back of your mind saying something like “he’s not going to be healed”? If so, may I be the one to point that that isn’t “little faith”, that is NO faith at all.

You, and I right along with you, may well wonder how we get past that little voice of doubt in the back of our minds….

Well, stay tuned, because we are now in school with Matthew, Andrew, Thomas and the whole gang, as Jesus teaches us how to follow Him and truly become His disciple, and from this point on, we are in the crucial part of that instruction.

Matthew 17:1-13

Just a few days after Peter’s confession that Jesus is “the Messiah, the Son of the living God” and Jesus’ prediction of His death, we have a scene that is unusual to say the least, when Jesus takes three disciples, Peter, James and John, up a “high mountain” where a conference of sorts is about to take place. I think I’ll let others argue about why Jesus only took these three with Him that day, and I’ll let others speculate on which mountain they ascended; I’ll assume that since Matthew didn’t tell us, that it probably doesn’t matter. What Matthew did tell us is quite enough to keep us busy…

There they were at the top of the mountain when suddenly Jesus was revealed in His transcendent glory, and was joined by two other figures that Matthew identifies as Moses and Elijah. As the three of them spoke, Peter offers to build shelters for each of them, a sign of high respect. In a sense, this would seem to equate them as equals, but note that he said “if you wish” which would seem to indicate Peter’s recognition that of the three, Jesus was the greatest.

But Jesus was not the one who responded, for suddenly there was a “bright cloud” that covered them and the voice of Almighty God spoke:

“This is my Son, whom I love; with him I am well pleased. Listen to him!” (17:5)

Later, Jesus would say that the Law and the Prophets speak of Him, and here we have Jesus alongside Moses, the lawgiver, the author of the books of the Law with Elijah, the great prophet of God… and the voice of God Himself telling the disciples to listen to Jesus.

The message is hard to miss: There would be no need for shelters for Moses and Elijah, for Jesus was the fulfillment of all the Law and Prophets; their time was coming to a close, and Jesus would make all things new− the disciples were justifiably terrified.

Jesus came and touched them saying “Get up” and “don’t be afraid”. Moses and Elijah were gone.

On their way back down the mountain, Jesus instructed them not to tell anyone what they had seen until after the resurrection, and then they asked Him a question: “Why then do the teachers of the law say that Elijah must come first?” (17:10). He gives them an interesting reply in 17:11-12 that came down to one thing: Elijah had come, and the teachers of the law simply had not chosen to believe him, and he had been murdered in Herod’s jail.

I really don’t see what I can add to Matthew’s account of this scene, except to say that being a disciple of Jesus in those days would have been a very interesting job!

From that time on Jesus began to explain to his disciples that he must go to Jerusalem and suffer many things at the hands of the elders, the chief priests and the teachers of the law, and that he must be killed and on the third day be raised to life.

Matthew 16:21

We begin the long road to Jerusalem with these words of Jesus; from here on, the mission of the Messiah is the focus as Jesus tries to make His disciples understand what it means for Him to complete His messianic mission. He has not come to save Israel from the Romans and to restore it to its glory days as a great nation; He has come to save Mankind and establish an entirely different kind of kingdom.

Peter, after his mountaintop moment of divine revelation comes crashing back to earth, for he does not yet see what the mission is:  “Never, Lord!” he said. “This shall never happen to you!” (16:22b). Jesus’ response is swift and sure: “Get behind me Satan” (16:23). Peter’s expression of love was based upon purely human concerns; he didn’t want Jesus to have to suffer and die at the hands of the authorities, which is natural enough, but if his wishes were to come to pass, they would thwart entirely the eternal purposes of God.

This section will prove to be a lesson in counter-intuitive though processes, and thus we need to pay special attention, for our thought processes, like those of Peter, tend toward human understanding and desires.

Then Jesus said to his disciples, “Whoever wants to be my disciple must deny themselves and take up their cross and follow me. For whoever wants to save their life will lose it, but whoever loses their life for me will find it. What good will it be for someone to gain the whole world, yet forfeit their soul? Or what can anyone give in exchange for their soul? For the Son of Man is going to come in his Father’s glory with his angels, and then he will reward each person according to what they have done. (16:24-27)

This paragraph is marked by a contrast between the human will and perception, and the divine will and perception, much as in Paul’s “flesh versus spirit” passages. We must deny ourselves, take up our crosses and follow Jesus, much as Paul would say that we must put the “old man” aside and live according to the Spirit. We may “find” our lives, and thus lose them by finding our human, earthly selves and live according to the ways of this world, or we may lose that life, and find eternal life with Christ; which will it be? To follow Jesus is to set aside the purely human and physical and take up a higher, heavenly calling based upon our hope for that which is unseen, and is thus counter-intuitive. Yet, Jesus had one more point to offer in this regard:

“Truly I tell you, some who are standing here will not taste death before they see the Son of Man coming in his kingdom.” (16:28)

It is my rather peculiar duty to point out that this verse is actually a controversial one in many quarters, for there are commentators who actually say that this verse is intended for our time, and refers to the Second Coming. Obviously, if one actually reads it, there is no way to assert anything other than the fact that Jesus was speaking of the Twelve who were right there listening to Him. Eleven of them would see the coming of the Kingdom at Pentecost― in fact they would participate in the coming of the Kingdom on that day, and so the Kingdom has been with us ever since.

As Matthew continues with his narrative, he uses several times, the phrase, “From that time on Jesus began…” You may recall that in 4:17 the phrase marked the beginning of Jesus’ ministry in Galilee, but here in Matthew 16:21, it signals the beginning of Hs journey to Jerusalem and eventual sacrifice on the cross. In fact, we are entering a new phase in which Jesus moves on from educating His disciples concerning His identity to educating them concerning His messianic mission (16:21- 20:34). In this new section, Jesus will be showing His disciples that He must suffer and die in humble submission to God’s will.

Prior to this time, it would appear, that Jesus has withdrawn from danger (cf. 12:15; 14:13; 15:21; 16:4). As we continue, we will see Jesus moving inexorably toward the cross. As in the previous section, the disciples will be in every scene, and they will be the primary focus of His teaching, as He teaches them that they must set self aside and live in humble submission to the will of God, even unto death; in all things, they will learn to trust God and God alone.

We will pick up in verses 21-28, as Jesus predicts His death, when we get back together next time; see you then.