Immediately all the crowd, when they saw him, were greatly amazed and ran up to him and greeted him. And he asked them, what are you arguing about with him? And someone from the crowd answered him, teacher, I brought my son to you for he has a spirit that makes him mute. And whenever it seizes him, it throws him down and he foams and grinds his teeth and becomes rigid. So I asked for disciples to cast it out, and they were not able. And he answered them, faithless generation. How long am I to be with you? How long am I to bear with you? Bring him to me." And they brought the boy to him, and when the Spirit saw him the father and the child cried out and said, I believe, help my unbelief. 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. After crying out and convulsing him terribly, him by the hand, lifted him up, and he arose. And when he had entered the house, his disciples asked him privately, Why could we not cast it out? And he said to them, This kind cannot be driven out by anything but a prayer. Thus concerning God's holy, inerrant, that was alive 2,000 years ago and truth that is alive today. Lord, knit our hearts to you, that we may know what it means to follow you, to love you, to have faith in you, to believe in you. The Lord, may the words of my mouth and the meditations of all our hearts be ever pleasing and acceptable in your sight. The Lord our God, amen. So let me start by saying, raise your hand if you recommended adopting Maybe you met someone with cancer, you suggested your oncologist. Maybe you just heard someone had back pain and told them to go to Travis. Yeah? Good number of you? Now, I'm willing to bet you recommended these doctors because you believed it would help the person. Because you thought they had certain skills, certain knowledge that would benefit the person. Maybe because you or someone you know experienced have to raise your hand. How many of you told someone about Jesus in the last year? Why do you think you tell people about doctors who can help them, but you don't tell people about Jesus? I'm not saying to tell people about Jesus instead of telling them about the doctor they probably need to go see. like a jeweler bringing a diamond ring out onto a black fabric for you to see the diamond in all its glory. We see faith in the backdrop of faithlessness. Our passage is full of a whole lot of faithlessness. In fact, in verse 19, Jesus calls out this faithless So far in the Book of Mark, he's primarily used this term of faithless generation to describe the religious leaders, the scribes who were there arguing. But it makes just as much sense when he's talking about the crowd or the Father. We don't know who this faithless generation is, but I think that's the point. All of it, in this passage, is a faithless generation. Jesus is telling us that the problem here in our If you read verse 19, it says, Jesus said, for faithless generation, how long am I to be with you? How long am I there with you? How long do I have to put up with all this? Bring him to me. There seems to be some connection between their faithlessness and not bringing the boy to Jesus. You see, true faith It says in verse 14, when they, likely Jesus, Peter, James, John, who were all of them, There's two primary possibilities here. One is the scribes are upset that this crowd is gathering around trying to find Jesus. They don't believe in Jesus. In fact, the scribes have been that does. These scribes can say, look, they can't do it. Maybe this whole Jesus thing is made up. They mock and deride the disciples because this whole Jesus thing has to be fake. I wonder how many people do the same kind of things today. There is an argumentative People who get upset when you even talk about Jesus. People who refuse to accept Jesus because Christians did the Crusades, or because pastors can be mean and abusive. They don't just reject that church or those people that did that, they reject Jesus. That makes just as much sense as having some student It's not Christi's fault that her student went through all that education to become a teacher just like Christi and didn't learn how to do math. So too, just because the people who follow Jesus fail to follow Him well, fail to follow His teachings and His epics, doesn't mean Jesus was wrong. But these scribes have an argumentative faithlessness. They don't want to believe in Jesus, This is an uncertain faithlessness. This is an uncertain faithlessness. In 21 and 22, he tells Jesus about the ailment of his son, about this demon that has passed him the fire and water to try to destroy him. And at the very end of verse 22, he says to Jesus, if you can do anything, help us. Quite literally, And Jesus responds to him, if you can, all things are possible for one who believes. Jesus shows us that this man's lack of certainty comes from a lack of holiness. He's not so certain that Jesus can save his son because he doesn't actually understand who Jesus is. Many will pull this verse out of context to say to you, if you just believe enough, anything is possible. Anything is possible if you just believe. But that's not really what Jesus is saying. Jesus is not telling this father, the reason your son hasn't been healed from this demon is because you didn't believe enough. He's not telling you that if you just believe more, your cancer will go away. It is not how much you believe, but rather what you believe in. You see, this guy doesn't fully understand who Jesus is, what Jesus is capable of. He says, if you can, because he doesn't realize that this Jesus is capable of everything. he is willing. He is uncertain of who Jesus is. And here's the thing that sticks out to me in this. Uncertain faith settles for something else. Uncertain faith settles for something else. If you look back in verse 7, that was arguing, the father says, teacher, I brought my son to you. Now let me ask you a legitimate question. Did the father really bring his son to I can't help but think back to Mark chapter 2 while reading this. If you remember the story of the paralytic man whose friends carried him onto the roof and dug a hole in the roof above Jesus who believed so much that Jesus could heal the paralytic man, that they brought him through the crowd to Jesus. They weren't willing to let anything get in the way of getting their friend And he settles for that instead of saying, no, I will wait for Jesus, bring me to Jesus, take me to Jesus. I wonder how many of us end up doing the same thing today. When you need Jesus, when you're in pain, when you're struggling, when you're in the hospital or sick, you call a pastor. You call clergy. And are you just okay with them sitting there? Or are you fine settling with their presence? Or do you beg them to bring you back? I understand my job, when you call me and you're sick or in the hospital, is to be there, and I want to be there. But my job is not to just sit there and be your friend and be a comfort. My job is to bring you Jesus. To use prayer and scripture to bring you to the presence of the only one that can actually help you. Because I can't heal you. And quite frankly, Are we really crying out for Jesus? The third thing that fits right here, the third picture of faithlessness is the faithlessness of the disciples. This is a prayerless faithlessness. You see, we saw in verse 18 that the disciples couldn't cast out this demon. After Jesus cast him out, the disciples asked Him privately, why couldn't we cast it out? In verse 29, Jesus says, This time cannot be driven out by anything but prayer. Prayer hasn't come up in this passage. Prayerlessness comes from a heart of faithlessness. You see, these disciples somehow thought they could heal this on their own. That they could cast out the demon in their own power. Perhaps worse, they thought they had to. You see, in Mark 6, These disciples get to this man and they say, let us help you, but they don't turn to God. They're prayerless in their faith. You see, prayer isn't just having a conversation with God. It is relying your dependence on God alone. It is asking God to step in and lift us up when we can't. These disciples think they have to make it on their own, and they are prayerless. And a faithlessness that is prayerless is a faithlessness that does not need other people. is the opposite of the faithlessness we see in this passage. If faithlessness involves prayerlessness, then true faith goes to God in prayer. If you really believe that God is powerful enough and hears you enough and that you are entirely dependent upon Him, about who Jesus is and does not settle for anything less than the real of Jesus. If you are willing to let Cheers. but we all feel that way. Like, we know that Jesus saves, Because true faith believes in Jesus. But here's the thing, you can't believe something you don't understand to be true. You can't believe anything you don't understand to be true. I don't care how many times you tell yourself 2 plus 2 equals 5, you will not convince yourself 2 plus 2 equals 5. It doesn't make sense. How can you truly believe in a Jesus you do not know or understand? because he was uncertain of who Jesus was. So let me close by showing us from this passage what Jesus does. What is the thing we believe Jesus can do? We believe Jesus brings resurrection. where the father says, I believe, help my unbelief, and Jesus does just that. He goes on to help his unbelief by healing his son. It says in verses 26 and 27, after crying out and compulsing him terribly, it came out, the demon came out, and the boy was like a corpse, so that most of them said, he is dead. But Jesus took him by the hand and lifted him up, and he arose. what Jesus did. This is the gospel, that Jesus died for our sins and rose from the grave. This boy is having a gospel experience in real life. He is dead and rises again. This is exactly what we should expect to see when people truly come to Jesus. they will stop doing the things they once did, they will die, and they will rise again to the face of Christ. Jesus brings resurrection to us, just like he brought resurrection to himself in his death and resurrection. Christians believe that this is what Jesus does because this is who Jesus is. Remember, he says, and he goes on to raise Lazarus from the grave. Jesus brings resurrection life, not just a physical resurrection, which is promised and absolutely will come to those united in Christ. Romans 6, verse 4 says, We are very therefore with him in baptism, and to his death, in order that we, just as Christ was raised by the glory of the Father, We too might walk in newness of life. Resurrected life isn't just a future hope, it is a current reality. We don't just look forward to a day when we will rise again. We would live out resurrection life in its fullness. We would stop doing the evil, wicked things of our sinful flesh and start to live in the glories of grace. Start to live a new life, a resurrection life. Then why wouldn't we tell everyone? True faith brings people to Jesus, like this father bringing his son, trusting his son to Jesus for a new life. Do you believe that? I know I stretch. Help my unbelief. Help all of our unbelief. Help us, O God, to see you more fully and more completely than we ever have before. To believe that you, O Christ, can change lives. To believe it so much that we wouldn't let anyone go unchanged. To know that you can raise us from the dead. That you bring newness of life. Thank you and we praise you in Jesus' name.