Matthew 17:14-20, “Do You Believe?”

Today is Palm Sunday. We celebrate Jesus coming in His kingdom. While many people welcomed Jesus into Jerusalem on this day as the true King of Israel, they did not truly understand the way He uses His authority. He had not come to claim territory from the enemies with Roman faces. He came to take territory from the common enemy of Jews and Romans and all of us.

When Jesus brings the kingdom of God into our lives, He overthrows spiritual strongholds that would enslave us in fear and sin. What are the ways you or people you love are being robbed of their most fruitful life because of spiritual enslavement or oppression? What would their life be like if they had freedom to experience life in God? What could Jesus possibly do in their life? Our passage today will show us that when we bring people to Jesus and have a faith without limits, nothing is impossible.

Bring People to Jesus

Our passage today meets Jesus and His disciples as they come down the mountain on which Jesus had been transformed to His glory to teach the disciples that Jesus has the authority of God so we should listen to Him. They come down off that mountain top experience to the world in all its brokenness. It is a scene of demonic oppression and human weakness. A father has bought his son to Jesus’ other disciples to heal him. He is afflicted by a demon and the demon is trying to destroy him.

I don’t know what kind of world view you have, but the one the Bible teaches that God created a physical world inhabited by humans created in God’s image, with a spirit in a body. God also created a world that is unseen to our physical eyes called heaven, or the heavens, inhabited by spirit beings, especially the angels. Some of the angels have fallen away from God; chief among them is Satan. We call them fallen angels or demons.

These worlds interact. Our spirits can interact with God in unseen, but very real ways. And angels and demons can interact with our world in unseen but very real ways. One way the gospels indicate that they can affect us is through physical suffering. This is what we see in Matthew 17.

Not all physical problems are demonic attacks. Many afflictions come to us because the whole world has been affected by the fall of mankind into sin and rebellion against God. Our broken relationship with God broke everything. But in some cases, and in the case of this boy, we can discern something spiritually evil happening. His seizures seem to be triggered especially around fire and water. Someone is trying to destroy him.

But thank God, one of the primary ways Jesus brings the kingdom of God into someone’s life is to free them from the affliction of evil spirits. Jesus is overthrowing satan and the demons.

1 John 3:8 ESV

The reason the Son of God appeared was to destroy the works of the devil.

But what is troubling in our passage is that Jesus had given this authority to His disciples as well. And verse 16 tells us that they had not been able to cast this one out. Jesus’ response in verse 17 focuses on the faith of the people involved. He calls them a faithless and twisted generation.

Jesus came offering us new life. Healing, freedom, hope, salvation all come by God’s grace freely through Jesus Christ. The one thing He is looking for in us is faith. The faith of the people involved here, including His disciples, is lacking. It’s like they don’t have any faith at all. They are completely turned around. So, what can they do?

The last sentence of verse 17, “Bring him here to me.” The very least we can do for someone is to bring them to Jesus. The greatest thing we can do for someone is to bring them to Jesus. I know people that have done this even before they are sure they believe in Jesus for themselves. When all human aid fails, we bring people to Jesus. And Jesus can do anything.

What He does here in verse 18 is rebuke the demon. He exercises His authority and sends the demon away, and the boy was healed instantly. He may not do the things we ask Him to do. He has all the authority. We are called to trust Him no matter what He does or doesn’t do.

Satan and his demons are still at work in our world. In our day and time, we prescribe medical treatment for seizures. But I believe Jesus works through that too. If anyone is healed at all, it is because He had ordained it. And it is God the Son working through His creation to accomplish healing.

Do you believe Jesus can do anything? That’s the question. Does your faith limit Jesus to what you think is reasonable to believe He can do? Or is your faith the kind of faith that can grow with every new encounter with Christ?

Over and over throughout the gospels, we have the record of Jesus doing every imaginable miracle in the lives of people who come to Him, and even miracles we couldn’t imagine. Other people could tell you stories of what Jesus has done in their life. They could tell you about times He has healed them or delivered them from addiction or depression or a hard heart or a narrow mind. Do you believe for yourself?

You might be like Jesus’ disciples. They really aren’t sure what to believe. After Jesus cast out the demon and healed the boy, they are left questioning what they though they knew in verse 19. Jesus’ answer gives us our next lesson.

Believe in Jesus with a Faith that Grows

Jesus answers the disciples in verse 20. Jesus says they have little faith. What they need is mustard seed faith. What is that all about? If Jesus is saying instead of little faith, you need bigger faith, then He missed the mark. Mustard seeds are very small things. So, this isn’t a distinction in size. It’s a distinction in kind.

When you go back through the gospel of Matthew, Jesus has used the phrase, “O you of little faith” several times. One is in chapter 8, when a storm threatens the disciples who cry out to Jesus who is sleeping in their boat.

Matthew 8:26 ESV

And he said to them, “Why are you afraid, O you of little faith?” Then he rose and rebuked the winds and the sea, and there was a great calm.

This event follows the same pattern as the healing of the demon possessed boy. Little faith in the disciples. Jesus rebukes the destructive power in our fallen world. That power obeys. Rebuke implies authority. Does Jesus have the authority to do anything He wants in our world? Do I believe He has authority over creation, including the most powerful created things I can experience, like storms and demons?

It’s not that Jesus’ disciples had no faith at all. After all, they cried out to Him in the boat. But their faith did not account for the fact that Jesus can sleep through a storm knowing that the storm has no authority over Him, and therefore could not harm Him. Their faith was not limited.

And in whatever unexplained way, this experience with this demon demonstrated a similar limitation in the faith of the disciples. Their little faith was somehow limiting their practice of the authority of Jesus over this particular demon.

The antidote to a faith with limits is mustard seed faith - faith that might start small, but has limitless growth potential.

Matthew 13:31–32 ESV

He put another parable before them, saying, “The kingdom of heaven is like a grain of mustard seed that a man took and sowed in his field. It is the smallest of all seeds, but when it has grown it is larger than all the garden plants and becomes a tree, so that the birds of the air come and make nests in its branches.”

Is my faith like this? Maybe it is small. But even small faith in the right object is enough. Maybe I haven’t seen miracles yet. But I truly believe Jesus can do anything. I believe He is the glorious Son of God and Son of Man, and He has full authority, full control, over everything and everyone in my world.

What would your life be like if you had that kind of faith? You would not fear the storms of life. You would not listen to the voice of the evil one whispering deceiving lies in your ear, like “Jesus might be very forgiving, but you can’t be forgiven that.” You would not make choices based on an orphan mentality, that God has limits on His love for you, so you had better figure out your problem by yourself. If you have this kind of faith with limitless growth potential, Jesus says, “nothing will be impossible for you.”

That doesn’t mean that you can jump over tall buildings in a single bound. God will still abide by the laws He has written for us in our world. But in the context of our gospel, there is nothing Jesus commanded us to do that will be impossible for us.

We can doubt our own adequacy, and well we should. We can confess we don’t understand how something could happen. But if we have a faith without limits, there is unlimited growth potential.

Some of us don’t know how it is possible to love your enemies and forgive those who hurt you. Some of us don’t know how we would ever have the right words to answer someone who challenges our faith. Some of us know we are not adequate to overcome the addiction or temptation that has enslaved us for years. Some of us want to avoid thinking about the commission Jesus gave us to go into all the world and make disciples for Him. How can the world that seems filled with hate really be transformed by a bunch of misfit recovering sinners sharing the good news of God’s love in Christ with their neighbors? Do you believe that even though you and I are inadequate, Jesus can do it, and He can do it through us?

Maybe we don’t see demonic attacks in every medical condition any more. But there is one way satan and the demons still work. And it works on Christians who claim faith in Jesus, but have a limiting faith. The primary weapon satan uses is fear. Jesus has already destroyed that weapon.

Hebrews 2:14–15 ESV

Since therefore the children share in flesh and blood, he himself likewise partook of the same things, that through death he might destroy the one who has the power of death, that is, the devil, and deliver all those who through fear of death were subject to lifelong slavery.

Jesus’ suffering and death at the hands of sinners, and for sinners, was His victory over Satan, who would keep every one of us enslaved to our sins through the fear of death. His resurrection was a vindication from God the Father that His death was an acceptable sacrifice and now Jesus holds the keys to death and hell and grants freedom to all who come to Him in faith to receive forgiveness and new life like His.

Jesus’ victory over Satan is ours by faith. Do we have faith that Jesus can overcome all the spiritual forces that would keep us enslaved and unfruitful? Does my life align with the faith I profess? In what ways has Jesus called me to follow Him but I am still enslaved to sin, fear, or self consciousness? What would be possible in your life if you truly believed Jesus could do anything?

Communion

Questions for Discussion

What is something you’re celebrating that God has done this week?

Who are some people in your life who exemplify limitless faith? What do you learn from them?

What do we learn about Jesus in our passage?

In what ways is Jesus demonstrating His power and grace in your life right now?

What do we learn about ourselves in our passage?

What do we learn from our passage that is helpful when we sense we are under spiritual attack?

In what way is the Lord challenging you to grow in your faith right now?

How will you respond to our passage this week?

Who is someone you can share this with this week?