Help My Unbelief

Helping My Belief and My Unbelief

Jesus’ ministry to his disciples was one of instilling and deepening belief in their lives.

The Transfiguration was part of that.

The vision of transfiguration comes in the days of preparation for intensifying opposition, humiliating disgrace, and unmerited suffering.

How could it be that one, illuminated in glory and endorsed by God, the Father, could be delivered to the hands of conniving men, beaten, scorned, falsely accused, and murdered?

How could it be?

Jesus counters that one's character, calling, and nature do not prevent suffering and unjust treatment in the world, rather, they reveal the truth about ultimate reality, character, and vindication.

Three men needed this vision of what was real to carry them through the fog that was to come.

Cling to the moments when God discloses Himself in your life because there will be long days of dark haze in which those moments may be your only guiding light.

Mark 9:2-13

"Six days later, Jesus took with him Peter and James and John, and led them up a high mountain apart, by themselves. And he was transfigured before them, and his clothes became dazzling white, such as no one on earth could bleach them. And there appeared to them Elijah with Moses, who were talking with Jesus. 

Then Peter said to Jesus, "Rabbi, it is good for us to be here; let us make three dwellings, one for you, one for Moses, and one for Elijah." 

 He did not know what to say, for they were terrified. Then a cloud overshadowed them, and from the cloud there came a voice, "This is my Son, the Beloved; listen to him!" 

 Suddenly when they looked around, they saw no one with them any more, but only Jesus. 

As they were coming down the mountain, he ordered them to tell no one about what they had seen, until after the Son of Man had risen from the dead. So they kept the matter to themselves, questioning what this rising from the dead could mean. Then they asked him, "Why do the scribes say that Elijah must come first?" 

He said to them, "Elijah is indeed coming first to restore all things. How then is it written about the Son of Man, that he is to go through many sufferings and be treated with contempt? But I tell you that Elijah has come, and they did to him whatever they pleased, as it is written about him." "

"Then a cloud overshadowed them, and from the cloud there came a voice,..."

"This is my Son, the Beloved; listen to him!"

Suddenly when they looked around, they saw no one with them any more, but only Jesus. As they were coming down the mountain, he ordered them to tell no one about what they had seen, until after the Son of Man had risen from the dead.

So they kept the matter to themselves, questioning what this rising from the dead could mean.

The disciples knew Malachi's words about Elijah coming before the Messianic Age could commence.

For them it was a barrier.

For Jesus, it was just a matter of fact. There is always an Elijah. In fact, he seems to be referring to John the Baptist as having most recently fulfilled that role.

There is nothing that keeps people from turning around, turning to God, turning to their parents, their children, their loved ones, their friends, their neighbors, and their enemies in love, forgiveness and restoration.

There is nothing that keeps God's people from doing righteousness.

There is nothing that keeps the wicked from turning from sin and oppression and deeds that make them stubble to a new life.

There is nothing that any of us need to wait for before we can answer the call of Jesus to stop doing as we please to the messengers of truth and start following the one to whom the message points.

The day and age of fulfillment has come and any hesitation we have is all on us.

"I believe; help my unbelief!"

Mark 9:14-29 (NRSV) 

When they came to the disciples, they saw a great crowd around them, and some scribes arguing with them. When the whole crowd saw him, they were immediately overcome with awe, and they ran forward to greet him. He asked them, "What are you arguing about with them?" 

Someone from the crowd answered him, "Teacher, I brought you my son; he has a spirit that makes him unable to speak; and whenever it seizes him, it dashes him down; and he foams and grinds his teeth and becomes rigid; and I asked your disciples to cast it out, but they could not do so." 

He answered them, "You faithless generation, how much longer must I be among you? How much longer must I put up with you? Bring him to me." 

And they brought the boy to him. When the spirit saw him, immediately it convulsed the boy, and he fell on the ground and rolled about, foaming at the mouth. Jesus asked the father, "How long has this been happening to him?" 

And he said, "From childhood. It has often cast him into the fire and into the water, to destroy him; but if you are able to do anything, have pity on us and help us." 

Jesus said to him, "If you are able!-- All things can be done for the one who believes." 

Immediately the father of the child cried out, "I believe; help my unbelief!" 

When Jesus saw that a crowd came running together, he rebuked the unclean spirit, saying to it, "You spirit that keeps this boy from speaking and hearing, I command you, come out of him, and never enter him again!" 

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." 

But Jesus took him by the hand and lifted him up, and he was able to stand. When he had entered the house, his disciples asked him privately, "Why could we not cast it out?" 

 He said to them, "This kind can come out only through prayer."

Here is the key to the lesson Jesus is teaching His disciples when they asked why they could not help the man and his boy. After all, they believed, and Jesus had said that all things were possible to those who believed.

But the man did more than just believe.

He believed and prayed.

Jesus said that deliverance from the oppressing demon that tormented the boy required prayer. Some manuscripts include, “and fasting.”

Prayer requires belief, but in this case, belief is verified and amplified through prayer. After all, the man declares, in His prayer to Jesus, that he does indeed believe, but he doubts the power of his own, weak, feeble, capacity to believe. He is honest, but he is also desperate.

His trust is like the one who believes enough to jump into the darkness even though he is still trembling with shades of uncertainty.

What took his belief beyond its own ability to believe was the declaration, “I believe,” followed by the prayer, “Help my unbelief.”

Jesus said unto him, If thou canst believe, all things are possible to him that believeth. - Mark 9:23

To this challenge, a man in need replied that he believed, but he needed help with his unbelief, those edges where belief was still developing.

In ministry, we are in the business of helping people believe—first in God, then in the possibilities of God working in and through them to accomplish His purposes.

Belief is the most powerful attitude in the universe.

It is essential for realizing God’s promises and our own potential under God.

It is the great missing component of people’s lives who are defeated, discouraged, and frustrated by the details of life.

Belief precedes reality because it is rooted in faith: “the SUBSTANCE of things hoped for, the evidence of things not seen.” (Hebrews 1:1).

Faith is substantive.

Therefore, we can build it on a shoestring. We don’t need any resources other than substantive belief to build belief.

As we share our faith, we lend our confidence and hope to people who are operating on a deficit. The wonderful story of Stone Soup illustrates the power of positive belief when it is shared and multiplied in the lives of people and in communities.

To recognize more fully the power of belief, observe the consequences of unbelief.

Take note of the despair, hopelessness, and cynicism prevalent among those who have chosen the path of the skeptic.

Observe the parade of dejected masses who travel along the highways of routine existence fearful of change and suspicious of any radical call to absolute discipleship.

Do you believe in God enough to believe in His potential for the people among whom He has called you to serve? If so, start communicating that faith and instilling it in others.

Then, step back and see what He can and will accomplish through you.

It one corner, we have the pressure to conform to the gods of this world that govern the marketplace of necessity and pleasure. On the other, we are pressured to conform to systems of religion and pseudo righteousness that have frozen grace into a form of rigid compliance that does not resemble the good news of God's grace.

Both poles require resistance and from both, Jesus offers liberation.

We are caught up in a tug of war over what it authentic discipleship and what is extra baggage that we have inherited from our culture, our desire to fit in, and our fear of standing out and being persecuted. It requires constant reexamination of the claims and call of Jesus in every fresh context as we wrestle with timeless truth and shifting concerns. It is not new to our generation. It was happening in the early church and decades later among the band of ragtag disciples who had begun to follow Jesus.

It is as if we are constantly being torn between the poles of secularism and religiosity.

Galatians 6:11-18 (NRSV)

See what large letters I make when I am writing in my own hand! It is those who want to make a good showing in the flesh that try to compel you to be circumcised-- only that they may not be persecuted for the cross of Christ. Even the circumcised do not themselves obey the law, but they want you to be circumcised so that they may boast about your flesh. May I never boast of anything except the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ, by which the world has been crucified to me, and I to the world. For neither circumcision nor uncircumcision is anything; but a new creation is everything! As for those who will follow this rule-- peace be upon them, and mercy, and upon the Israel of God. From now on, let no one make trouble for me; for I carry the marks of Jesus branded on my body. May the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ be with your spirit, brothers and sisters. Amen.

There was a brief moment in the history of the early church where a protection against Roman persecution existed. It was circumcision as a mark of one’s Judaism. The Romans had thrown up their hands in frustration and had relented in their push to introduce polytheism and emperor worship in all parts of their domain.

Every other conquered nation had complied, but the Jews would not, no matter how much pressure was applied, fall down and bow before the shrine of the imperial cult.

So, Rome made an exception. Everyone had to comply except Jews. As long as the Jesus movement was a sect of Judaism, the church was safe. Once it came out from under that protection, she was subject to harsh treatment, pressure, and even death.

As the gospel and the movement moved into the gentile (non-Jewish world), the question first came from the Jewish Christians and the church had its controversy internally. Do followers of Jesus first have to become Jews, be circumcised, and submit to the law before becoming Christians or are they exempt.

Once that was settled in favor of the latter option, the pressure came from Rome. No longer seen as a branch of Judaism either by Jews or by Rome, Christians, who held the same monotheistic convictions as their Jewish brethren, were not longer protected by affiliation. They were expected to make their sacrifices at the altar of the imperial cult, worship Caesar, and acknowledge the gods of Rome.

To declare that Jesus was Lord and not Caesar was cause for persecution. Even short of death, the state could close the doors of commerce and apply great hardship on vast numbers of believers. Some among them would go to prison and some would die.

I think this is what Paul is referring to when he refers to the pressure to submit to be circumcised as way to avoid being persecuted for the cross of Christ.

It was also being held up as a cause for boasting and pride.

“See! I am a five star believer! I have all my bases covered!”

Paul takes everyone back to the cross and obliterates any cause for boasting, pride, self-righteousness, or nationalism.

“I won’t boast about anything but the cross of the Lord Jesus Christ. Through it and Him, I have died a crucified death too everything else and it has died to me.”

He reaffirms his love and blessing for Israel and shakes off the criticism of the self-righteous church folks.

In so doing, he raises a banner of defiance and embrace.

He defies all fear of persecution from the world and embraces the possibility of suffering from Christ. He will not hide who he is and what his core commitments are. The easy way out is not an option.

He defies the internal pressures of the church to conform to anything but what God has called the followers of Jesus to do and to be. He rejects any cultural, racial, nationalistic, or ritualistic identification of what it means to be a Jesus follower and goes for the essential commitment of the gospel – Jesus Himself, crucified and resurrected.

He backs up everything he says with the credibility of his own life, even his own body, marked with the scars inflicted upon him by the whips of his persecutors. What he says is verified by his life and his own suffering. Even as a circumcised Jew, he refused to call upon his affiliation as a way of denying his faith. He took the blows and he gloried in them.

Today, we are still pressured from outside and inside of the church to conform to some standard other than the call of Jesus. On one hand, we are pressured to deny Him. On the other, we are shamed into squeezing into boxes not of His making.

What Jesus is calling us to do, is to lose ourselves in Him, be who he has made us to be, and follow Him in total identification, sold out to His kingdom, and relying only on His grace. It is a dangerous adventure, but it is an adventure indeed.

Now, look back to a scene from Jesus’ ministry.

Rather than looking back on the cross as a defining moment, He is looking ahead with his original disciples. He is warning them of suffering. He is preparing them for its inevitability. He would go first and He would die at the hands of men.

Mark 9:30-41 (NRSV)

They went on from there and passed through Galilee. He did not want anyone to know it; for he was teaching his disciples, saying to them, "The Son of Man is to be betrayed into human hands, and they will kill him, and three days after being killed, he will rise again." 

But they did not understand what he was saying and were afraid to ask him. Then they came to Capernaum; and when he was in the house he asked them, "What were you arguing about on the way?" 

 But they were silent, for on the way they had argued with one another who was the greatest. He sat down, called the twelve, and said to them, "Whoever wants to be first must be last of all and servant of all." 

Then he took a little child and put it among them; and taking it in his arms, he said to them, "Whoever welcomes one such child in my name welcomes me, and whoever welcomes me welcomes not me but the one who sent me." 

John said to him, "Teacher, we saw someone casting out demons in your name, and we tried to stop him, because he was not following us." 

 But Jesus said, "Do not stop him; for no one who does a deed of power in my name will be able soon afterward to speak evil of me. Whoever is not against us is for us. For truly I tell you, whoever gives you a cup of water to drink because you bear the name of Christ will by no means lose the reward.”

Even as He is seeking to engage their hearts in this radical teaching, whenever they had the chance, they began to engage in petty disputes over trivial concerns.

One of those concerns was which of them would be the greatest!

Pride, competition, boasting, power. None of these ever have been compatible with the Jesus walk, but they are the way of the world.

What Paul dealt with was just another manifestation of what Jesus encountered. It was a clash of cultures and values. The culture of power and human greatness was coming face to face with the gospel of peace, of love, and of service.

The suffering servant as king of the kingdom flew in the face of the prevailing view of the culture. It was an insult to the sensibilities of godless Romans and godly Jews. All had been drinking from the same well of grandiosity.

“You have to be more like children,” Jesus admonishes them. “You have to be more like slaves.”

“You have to give up this notion that you can be great by putting others down or dominating them. The greatest among you will be the one perceived, by the world’s standards, to be the least.”

And if you want to really serve me and identify with me, start handing out water.

In a simple rebuke and encouragement, He turns the tables on everything and rights the course of our thinking.

But that thinking must be renewed often. It had to be renewed with every new context such as Paul’s circumcision controversy in Galatia and it has to be renewed today as we confront our gods of materialism, safety, comfort, American exceptionalism, and parochial bigotry.

We are always having to shake loose extra baggage we accumulate along the grace highway. Some of it has become deeply embedded in our psyches, our rituals, and our conversation. It has become intertwined with our way of speaking truth so that it is not easy to extract from the truth. It has permeated our culture and defined our false boundaries, but it is not the gospel and it never will be.

Like Paul, we must be daily crucified with Christ to the world and to that, which is of the world, but disguised as Christianity.

It was costly then and it is likely to be costly today.

Instilling Belief 

Let’s go back a moment to recap a central idea. 

Jesus said unto him, If thou canst believe, all things are possible to him that believeth. (Mark 9:23)

In ministry, we are in the business of helping people believe—first in God, then in the possibilities of God working in and through them to accomplish His purposes. Belief is the most powerful attitude in the universe. It is absolutely essential for realizing God’s promises and our own potential under God. It is the great missing component of people’s lives who are defeated, discouraged, and frustrated by the details of life. Belief precedes reality because it is rooted in faith: “the SUBTANCE of things hoped for, the evidence of things not seen.” (Hebrews 1:1).

Do you believe in God enough to believe in His potential for the people among whom He has called you to serve? If so, start communicating that faith and instilling it in others. Then, step back and see what He can and will accomplish through you.