Faith and Failure | Mark 9:14–29

¹⁴ And when they came to the disciples, they saw a great crowd around them, and scribes arguing with them. ¹⁵ And immediately all the crowd, when they saw him, were greatly amazed and ran up to him and greeted him. ¹⁶ And he asked them, “What are you arguing about with them?” ¹⁷ And someone from the crowd answered him, “Teacher, I brought my son to you, for he has a spirit that makes him mute. ¹⁸ And whenever it seizes him, it throws him down, and he foams and grinds his teeth and becomes rigid. So I asked your disciples to cast it out, and they were not able.” ¹⁹ And he answered them, “O faithless generation, how long am I to be with you? How long am I to bear with you? Bring him to me.” ²⁰ And they brought the boy to him. And when the spirit saw him, immediately it convulsed the boy, and he fell on the ground and rolled about, foaming at the mouth. ²¹ And Jesus asked his father, “How long has this been happening to him?” And he said, “From childhood. ²² And it has often cast him into fire and into water, to destroy him. But if you can do anything, have compassion on us and help us.” ²³ And Jesus said to him, “ ‘If you can’! All things are possible for one who believes.” ²⁴ Immediately the father of the child cried out and said, “I believe; help my unbelief!” ²⁵ And when Jesus saw that a crowd came running together, he rebuked the unclean spirit, saying to it, “You mute and deaf spirit, I command you, come out of him and never enter him again.” ²⁶ And after crying out and convulsing him terribly, it came out, and the boy was like a corpse, so that most of them said, “He is dead.” ²⁷ But Jesus took him by the hand and lifted him up, and he arose. ²⁸ And when he had entered the house, his disciples asked him privately, “Why could we not cast it out?” ²⁹ And he said to them, “This kind cannot be driven out by anything but prayer.”

What a scene Christ finds as He comes off the Mount of Transfiguration!  Like Moses finding the people in riotous false worship, Jesus finds that His disciples in failure and everyone else in disarray.  As such, we have two, big thoughts in this passage: failure in ministry and the need for faith.  Faith in Christ is essential for avoiding similar failure in your Christian walk.

Faithlessness results in failure (vv. 14–18).  The scribes were wrangling with the disciples, likely using this failure as a proof of their preconceived notions of Christ.  Yet, when Jesus arrives, they’re silent, unwilling to launch the same accusations at Jesus as they had moments ago.  Perhaps the disciples were also too ashamed at their failure to answer (vv. 28–29), so the father of the boy explains everything (vv. 17–18).  Jesus response is to denounce everyone—“O faithless generation!”

Christ turns around failure (vv. 19–27).  We learn from this lad’s father just how hopeless a situation stood before them.  The demon caused the boy to experience fits identical to catalepsy (v. 18), and it would seek to kill him whenever possible (v. 22).  Yet, the mere presence of Christ was enough to produce a response in the spirit (v. 20), and Jesus was able to cast it out permanently with a simple command (vv. 25–26).  Even though the boy would have been traumatized and exhausted by the whole ordeal, Jesus even delivers him even from the lingering effects of the possession by taking his hand (v. 27).

Depend upon Him to avoid failure (vv. 28–29).  Jesus implies that they hadn’t even prayed about the problem!  All things are possible for Him (v. 23), but He was dealing with a faithless generation (vv. 18–19).  Their faith was lacking (e.g., Mt 17:20; Lk 17:6), so they trusted in themselves (“Why could we not cast it out?” v. 29). 

Instead, they (and we) should echo the father’s humble prayer for grace: “I believe; help my unbelief!” (v. 24).