Great Deeds From Great Faith

Introduction

When I was a young boy, I was once walking in a valley on the remote property we lived on at that time and I came across a creek. My young mind thought about what Jesus had said; that nothing will be impossible if we have faith. I saw the water striders skimming across the surface of the creek and decided that I was going to try to walk on water by faith. I tried with all my heart to believe that when I put my foot in the water, I put out my leg with my rubber boots covering my feet, and plunged into the water. I’m sure you know what happened. The water striders scurried away as my foot plunged beneath the surface and stood firmly on the muddy bottom of the creek. I remember walking away from that creek puzzled. What went wrong? Did I not have enough faith? What did God mean by that promise anyway?

Over the years that question has never quite gone away. I’ve heard many ways in which passages like what we read in verse 21 can be interpreted which more often than not try to take away the great emphasis that Christ puts on this promise. Nothing will be impossible for us, he tells us. But is that our experience? What is going on?

In our text, these nine disciples who had stayed at the bottom of the mountain during the transfiguration were likely wondering the same thing. Back in chapter 10, Jesus had given the disciples the authority to cast out demons, and yet it wasn’t working. This prompted a debate between them and the scribes, who likely used this as an opportunity to voice their doubt in the Lord’s power. What went wrong here? In examining this text, not only do we see once again Jesus great power over evil and demonic forces, but if we read carefully we can discover the meaning of this promise of doing the impossible by faith.

The Failure of Poor-Quality Faith

The text begins with Jesus, Peter, James, and John coming down the mountain after the glorious transfiguration and the following discussion about Elijah and persecution.

Mark’s gospel helps fill out the scene. Matthew and Mark have different things they wish to emphasize, and so the story is portrayed slightly differently from each. However, their purposes are related and taking the two accounts side-by-side helps fill out what Jesus is teaching through this encounter. We will mainly follow Matthew’s account, and use Mark to fill in some of the details to flesh it out.

A Look at the Situation

When Jesus arrives he sees a crowd has gathered where they left the other nine disciples. Mark tells us that those disciples were arguing with the scribes. When Jesus inquires about the argument, the father of the possessed boy approaches Jesus.

Jesus question is never directly answered, although it is not difficult to put the content of the debate together. The man kneels in respect and humility to Jesus and we learn that he had brought his son to him to be healed.

The ESV and NIV say he has seizures and so we might think this is epilepsy. Matthew definitely does focus on the physical symptoms of the illness, but both here and in Mark and Luke this is identified as being the result of a demonic spirit. The word translated “has seizures” refers to fits that were supernatural in origin. Specifically, it was believed that the demon worked in sync with the phases of the moon for those with such fits, whether it was a demon at work or whether it was a purely medical condition. This is actually where we get the word lunatic where we see the word lunar reminding us of this belief.

The man tells Jesus about the illness and symptoms, which have brought great harm to the child and have doubtless been a constant source of burden and anxiety on his family. The father’s heart is so broken that, seeing Jesus was not there, he asked the remaining nine disciples to heal the boy. They attempt a healing with no result.

This is an important detail. Back in 10:1; 8 Jesus had given all twelve of his chosen disciples authority to cast out evil spirits and Mark 6:13 tells that they did indeed “cast out many demons”. What is going on here? Why has this power seemingly departed from them? This is a question that sits at the heart of this text, and one we will find the answer to later in the text.

Now we see that the argument with the scribes must have been about this. The scribes are eager to see a weakness or failure in Jesus ministry, and the disciple’s failure to heal this boy gives them a great opportunity and reveals their lack of any empathy for the child or his father. Jesus would not perform signs for the Pharisees on demand, now his disciples are unable to heal like they were before. Perhaps this is the proof that Jesus’ power is temporary and therefore not from God but from Beelzebub, as many had previously accused. The failure of the disciples brings shame to Jesus ministry; it paints him in a bad light and becomes an obstacle in the purpose for which he came.

The disciple’s failure is understandably annoying to Jesus. Passionately, he cries out to a faithless and twisted generation.

Jesus rebuke here is not only directed at his disciples. The word generation is tricky in the Scriptures as it can refer to different things. It often groups people living in a certain time together, however in the NT it usually refers to those living at the time who share a moral failure in common. It is a reflection of Moses’ song in Deuteronomy 32:5 where Israel is called a “crooked and twisted generation.” Jesus is showing that the people of his day are no more faithful than those who were disobedient and wayward in the days of the Exodus.

Faithless refers to their stubborn refusal to believe God and follow him, specifically their refusal to believe in the Son of God. Twisted refers to their refusal to think in a way that is straight or correct. Like Israel of old, and like all fallen men and women, a sinful nature directs them in their natural state to think in a way that is contrary to the truth God has revealed and thus have hearts that are not willing to walk in humble, submissive trust in God.

Jesus then shows the great burden it is on him to bear, or be patient with, such stubborn people. Our failure to think and walk in faith is a burden to Jesus and a grief to the Holy Spirit. He deserves great praise for the patience he has even with his disciples in their unbelief.

Surprisingly, Mark does highlight one figure here with faith: the father. Despite the disciples’ failure to heal, he declares his belief and asks for help with unbelief. This again is an important detail that we will look at in a moment.

Jesus then heals the boy, doubtless to the disappointment of the scribes. Mark goes into more detail about this, but for our purposes we will go with Matthew directly into the private conversation with his disciples afterwards.

The Power of Good-Quality Faith

Jesus’ Explanation

Here, things are made plain for us. The disciples ask why they were unable to cast out the demon when they had cast out so many before, what went wrong?

The answer is their little faith. This simple answer demands some explanation, as it has caused much confusion and error regarding faith in the life of the believer.

These misunderstandings stem from the nature of faith and what Jesus means by little here. Many of those false teachers who teach what is sometimes called the prosperity gospel, that with enough faith you will be always healthy and always wealthy, they capitalize on this confusion. This is one of their favourite passages, but only because they do not understand it.

Power to Move Mountains: Quality Vs. Quantity

Jesus tells his disciples that faith equal in size to a tiny mustard seek can move a mountain. Oh the anguish so many have felt when they’ve gone to a rally with one of these false prosperity teachers, are not healed, and are told that it is because of their lack of faith and to show this faith they must give sacrificially to the teacher’s specific ministry.

But what those teachers teach is not faith but magic, which is exactly the opposite of what Jesus is teaching. In the book of Acts 8:18-24 a magician had tried to buy the power of the Holy Spirit and had been sharply rebuked; Peter tells him that he is in danger of hell because of what he asked. Why is it that Peter was so harsh in what seemed like a simple misunderstanding? And why is Jesus so harsh with his disciples here?

The disciples did not lack confidence in their ability to cast out demons. Surely, your confidence in doing anything is much greater the 50th time you’ve done it than it was the 1st time. The problem is not their confidence, but their faith. That is, its not that they don’t believe hard enough that the thing will happen. What likely happened is that these disciples became too self-confident, and rather than humbly relying on faith cultivated through prayer, they rely on their own abilities. They are acting as if Jesus gave them magical powers, just like the magician in Acts 8. But that is not how powerful things are done for the Kingdom of God

Faith is a submissive trust in God. It is a willingness to listen to him when he speaks and follow him into his will to do it. It was God’s will to heal this boy, but faith was not what the disciples were relying on. They were relying on their perception of their own abilities, and as a result were powerless.

This leads us to understanding what Jesus means by little. If you think about it, this text is confusing because right after Jesus says their failure was due to their little faith, he tells them that a little faith can move mountains. We can only reconcile this by recognizing that Jesus is measuring faith in two different ways: little quality and little quantity.

Low quality faith is what the disciples have. Their confidence is great, but it is of poor quality. A hundred dollar store watches are not even close to being worth one genuine Rolex watch. The disciples have a lot of confidence, but no quality in it. This is because their confidence is in themselves rather than in God. How often great success makes people forget the God who gives it. The Israelites turned away from God in the OT when they were successful, and the disciples are falling into the same trap. But the power of the Spirit of God for the Kingdom is not conducted through poor-quality conductors. The person who does great things for the Kingdom must be humble in prayer, as Mark says, because only in that state is genuine faith produced.

The mustard seed, however, is a little bit of good quality faith. We’ve already seen some examples of this, the Canaanite woman and the Centurion who both had great faith. They did not know as much about Jesus as the disciples did, nor did they know the Scriptures as well. But what they did know they know in humble faith. The little divine revelation that they had was enough to cultivate a mustard seed into a great tree and move mountains. There are many Christians in the world who know so very little about the Bible, but they know that Jesus died for them and on that they become mountain movers that the greatest theologians could only imagine. What good is poor-quality faith with a lot to believe in next to good-quality faith with only the bare bones of saving truth?

Wisdom and Power

So what does Jesus mean by moving mountains? This was a well-known metaphor among the Jews meaning to do something next to impossible, but that should not lower its force. I don’t believe this is an exagerration. However, we need to understand that Jesus is here speaking only of the power of faith, and not what faith will actually accomplish.

This goes back to understanding the difference between God’s power and magic. The main difference is who is in control. In Harry Potter or Star Wars the characters are in control of the magic (or the force) and it can be used for whatever purpose the person with the magical abilities has. The power of God, however, is subject only to God and his will. By faith, the disciple is given the power to do literally anything. Nothing is impossible for them! However, he is not the one in control of how that power is to be used, God is. Spirit-given wisdom and knowledge of the Scriptures is necessary to know God’s will and for the power of faith to be used.

God’s will that I am speaking of here is not his sovereign will, which he accomplishes without us, but rather his will in how we are commanded to live. This distinction is important.

Something may be in God’s will and not be done because of our lack of good-quality faith. In Mark’s account, Jesus says these only come out by prayer. It is not that the disciples forgot to pray in that instant, as if prayer was a magic spell that needed to be uttered. Rather, the disciples had neglected their own prayer lives. They were not close to God in personal prayer, and as a result their actions as disciples had no effect. You may be a Christian justified by grace through faith, but unless that faith is nurtured and grown it will never produce fruit and you will be cut down like an unfruitful tree. Faith is not something that you just get and keep in your pocket for the rest of your life, it is a quality that must be grown and fertilized in spiritual discipline or it will be powerless and eventually die.

Cultivating Good-quality Faith

Recognizing all this, how can we today ensure that our faith is growing into something that is strong and of good quality?

The Word, but with a warning.

First, perhaps predictably, is our study of the Scriptures. Deep study of God’s Word is essential for a growing faith. However, we must understand that Bible study alone may increase the quantity of our faith, but not necessarily the quality of it. What I mean is, reading the Bible will give you more knowledge and understanding of God’s revelation. There is more to believe in, and the average Christian will accept what they read with a sort of casual faith. They read it, they believe it, and that settles it! This reading and study is important because if we develop a faith in what is not true, or we become ignorant of truths that we ought to be focusing on in our growth, we will fall into the danger which Proverbs 19:2 warns us of.

Proverbs 19:2 NET

It is dangerous to have zeal without knowledge, and the one who acts hastily makes poor choices.

The Apostle Paul in Romans 10:1-3 accuses the unbelieving Jews of this, since they knew the Scriptures but did not interpret them by faith. So, they had a great amount of confidence, but it was misplaced in what wasn’t really true.

If we are focusing our faith on what is not true, it is not true faith in God but rather faith in our own ideas. If my interpretation of the Bible is off, my faith may be compromised depending on how serious my misinterpretation is.

Also, if we only know a very few things about God, our faith will be severely limited. If you are planting a garden and want to get as big a crop as you can, you are going to devote as much space as possible to growing your plants. If I am content in my ignorance of biblical truth, the fruit of my faith will be severely limited and perhaps even destroyed entirely.

Prayer - However, no matter how big that garden is, if the quality of the soil is no good the produce will still be very limited. Remember the parable of the two builders back in Matthew 7:24-27. Both builders heard the truth, but only one benefited. God’s power in us will be more limited in a lot of low-quality faith than if we have only a little knowledge but a real, good quality faith in the truth we do have. This is where Mark’s version of the story helps supplement Matthew’s account. He says that their lack of prayer was the reason the disciples could not cast out the evil spirit. That is, although the disciples had heard much and experienced much in terms of revelation given through Jesus’ ministry, the quality of that faith did not match that of the father pleading for the healing of his boy. They had a large quantity of faith, since they had seen and heard so much from Jesus, but the quality of that faith was limited since they were not nurturing it in prayer.

The Puritans thought of prayer as the breath of the Christian. Without it, our faith withers and dies. With it, we are renewed and strengthened. Jesus’ was not saying that the disciples forgot to pray in that specific instant; he was saying that their lives in general were not filled with faith-building prayer. Therefore, their faith, though large in a way due to knowledge, was weak in its quality and had no power.

Receiving the power of faith through prayer is essential for our walk as Christians. The Church Father Augustine writes, and I’ve updated the language to be more understandable:

“If a person must pray to cast out demons from another person, how much more to cast out his own covetousness? how much more to cast out his own drunkenness? how much more to cast out his own love of comfort and wealth? how much more to cast out his own uncleanness? How many evil things exist in a person, which if they (continue), disqualify him from entering kingdom of heaven!”

Without prayer our faith withers, our sins persevere, and our race to heaven ends in eternal failure. Our time in prayer is the battleground on which faith is won or lost.

Prayer is much more than a ritual for the believer: it is a living, breathing communion with our Creator and Father. We confess his authority over us as we say, “our Father in heaven.” We submit ourselves to his holiness as we pray, “hallowed be thy Name”, we humble ourselves before his will as we say, “thy Kingdom come, thy will be done on earth as it is in heaven.” We humbly recognize our human neediness in saying, “give us this day our daily bread.” We acknowledge need for forgiveness in confessing our sin, as well as our responsibility to show that same forgiveness to others. We humbly ask for help in our weakness to not be led into temptation.

In all this we see that prayer is meant to be an experience of humility and confidence. It humbles us before God as we acknowledge our weakness, and it gives us confidence in Christ as we ask according to his will. Humility is the rain which brings us low, and confidence is the sunshine that lifts us up; both are necessary for the seed of our faith to germinate and produce the power of God.

Effective prayer requires two ingredients. In this text, the ingredient of faith is what is in focus. The disciples were correct in assuming that God would have this boy healed, but there simply was no power in them due to their low-quality faith. In other cases, one might have a lot of confidence in something they are praying for, but it does not come to pass because of a lack of the second ingredient: wisdom.

Wisdom in the Bible is simply an attitude of submission to the will of God that comes from knowledge of that will. Wisdom both shows us what God’s will is and humbly submitting to that will. Faith is like the engine and wisdom the steering wheel. Without faith, our knowledge of God’s will has not power to get us there. Without wisdom, our confidence will fail us to accomplish God’s will. Together, faith pushes us forward with power while wisdom guides us along the Spirit’s direction. While faith makes our prayers effective, wisdom tells us what we should pray for.

Thankfully, if you have faith, wisdom is easy to obtain. James 1:5-8 promises us that God gives wisdom to those who ask without doubting. If you have the power of faith, but don’t know what to pray for, pray for wisdom! In doing this, God will freely give you the knowledge to know what to pray for. As a result, you will see your prayers answered and your faith will grow even more.

Fasting (if time allows)

Some manuscripts add and fasting to Mark’s account. Although it is unlikely this is in the original text, it is in line with the point of the text and so there is no reason to ignore it. Fasting is the holy exercise of denying our body its own desire for food in order to learn to rely on God’s provision. Fasting is difficult, and I won’t promise you that it will feel like a great holy experience. It is exhausting and discouraging. The lack of food will impact your mood and energy, and praying will become harder. However, like a brutal workout, this exercise produces faith over time as we learn to deny our flesh; to live not by bread alone but by every Word that proceeds from the mouth of God.

Conclusion

So we see that for powerful faith we need a knowledge of the truth supplemented with a depth of faith that is developed in humble-yet-confident prayer. With such faith, nothing is impossible. However, we need the wisdom of God to know how this power is to be used according to God’s will. All this may seem good and tidy, but in reality we see that these things are very great and distant. Faith to accomplish the impossible and wisdom to know God’s will so as to see those prayers answered in impossible ways seems far from the experience of most Christians. What hope is there for us? As Augustine exhorted us before, let us read his comfort for us now:

“Yet the mercy of the Lord did not disdain the disciples in their unbelief; but corrected, nourished, perfected, and crowned them. For they themselves, as mindful of their own weakness, said to Him in another place, “Lord, increase our faith. Lord,” they say, “increase our faith.” Knowing that they had a deficiency was their great advantage. Additionally they had a greater happiness still, to know who it was they were asking. “Lord,” they say, “increase our faith.” See, how they brought their hearts as it were to the fountain, and knocked that that might be opened to them, out of which they might be filled. For He desires that men should knock at His door, not that He might repel those that knock, but that He might test those who long for greater faith.”

So in closing I speak to two kinds of Christians here.

First, there are those of you who have a low-quality faith and are ignorant or unconcerned about it. You live a decent Christian life, you go to church, you believe what you read in the Bible, what more do you need? To you I urge you to see the danger of your weakness. God cuts down unfruitful trees, he throws out the servant who hid his talent, he judges those among his sheep who eat the same grass but are not truly of his flock. I point you to your lifestyle, is the way you live characterized by Christ-like service and obedience? and specifically I point you to your prayer life. What is it? Old and stale? Does it exist at all? Is it simply words you say as part of a ritual, no different from the way Muslims pray? Do you labour in prayer? Is prayer a chore to you, or does it release your burdens? If you would be useful in the Kingdom, you must repent of you careless and unfruitful life before the judge comes and trims you off because you are a useless branch. Don’t mistake my frankness for lovelessness, I speak harshly to you in compassion so that you may wake from your slumber of weak faith. How long must Christ bear with you? Are you sure that Christ will even recognize you on the day of judgement?

But to those who, like the poor father, cry out from the bottom of your heart “I believe, help my unbelief”, to you I have nothing to say but words of encouragement. That desperate, helpless, poor spirit is the fertile ground in which true faith grows. Christ invites you to come and drink of his promises and glory; get on your knees in prayer and drink! Pray with your eyes focused on Christ, his work, his promises, and his love. Be filled with true faith with which you will move mountains. The more that faith is nurtured, the more you will see your prayers answered, your sins put to death, your heart bent down in service to Christ’s body, the church, and your works rewarded. Who knows, you may even be used to do miraculous things! Pray for wisdom, pray for more faith, these are both things God is ready to give with generosity if you seek them with all of your heart. The Kingdom belongs to the poor in spirit, the meek, and those who weep. Humble yourself before him, as weak as you are, for his service. In this, you will do great things in great power from a Great God!