is to examine a critical text in the
three versions that are given in Matthew, Mark
and Luke.
The fact that the Holy Spirit reiterates these
episodes in three Gospels is reason enough to
consider them.
It's a remarkable conjunction of the Mount of
Transfiguration and the Valley of Despair, all in
the same text.
And so we need right away to ask,
is this just an accidental conjunction or an
intentional one?
And why this conjunction?
And so there's much to draw out from
these episodes.
And I share this in every place.
If you've not heard it from me, you
need to hear it at least once.
That in my old age and the years
of the Lord, I finally have come to
the place where every episode of Jesus is
given of the Father for our last day's
consideration.
It is something in itself.
It serves purposes at that time.
And at the same time, it is calculated
for our consideration upon whom the ends of
the age have come.
So it's loaded with end time implications and
often eschatological significance, as I hope to show
you today, even in the issue of the
boy that was cast into the fire and
into the water, of who I think he
represents.
So we're called to interpret why the disciples
could not succeed in casting out that demon,
but only Jesus.
And why in this text is there the
strongest rebuke of Jesus to his disciples to
be found anywhere in all of the New
Testament.
How long must I be with you?
How long must I suffer you?
You faithless and perverse generation.
If there was no other reason to study
the text, but to find out what prompted
Jesus to so explosive a statement of that
kind, as if he's come to the end
of his tether, that he had every right
to believe that the disciples should have been
at a place of faith and were not,
that when they were tested by this demonic
expression, they completely collapsed, all of them, even
those who had been on the Mount of
Transfiguration with him.
So Lord, instruct us in the implications for
ourselves, and lest we would hear such a
rebuke in our own time as they heard
in theirs, that we would be faithless, that
we should know better and have a better
reality to confront, especially the supposed reality, the
unreality of the powers of darkness that keep
men in bondage.
So Lord, thank you for three texts, help
us to go from the one to the
other.
There are significant differences in each account that
we don't want to miss, and why one
says this, the other omits it, but to
put it together, it's like a faceted jewel
that needs to be held up to the
light and to catch the glimpse here and
the glimpse there to get the full statement
of what God is wanting us to consider
and for which reason he's given it.
So your blessing, Lord, we pray, as we
explore and teach us even how to examine
a text so that we'll take away from
this examination this morning a certain skill and
ability of how to peruse, how to draw
forth from text the meanings that are deposited
there, because our reading is altogether too casual.
This is more than reading, this is study.
So bless our study, Lord, we thank you
and give you praise in Jesus' name.
So I'm going to read from Mark 9.
Somebody turn to Matthew 17 and read the
corresponding text.
Someone turn to Luke 9 and see there,
and maybe when we come to points of
difference as I'm reading, raise your hand if
you see that in your text there's something
spoken that's not in the one that I'm
reading or that it offers a glimpse of
something that would give us a more incisive
grasp of what's being depicted.
So chapter 9 of Mark verse 2 begins
with, six days later, Jesus took with him
Peter and James and John and led them
up to a high mountain apart by themselves.
Why these three?
Because there's an inner circle.
There's three and then there's 12 and then
there's 21 and then there's 500 or 120
in the upper room.
They're like concentric circles of a radius of
influence and intimacy that Jesus had with some.
And of the three, who was the most
intimate?
John.
So even this deserves our attention, that the
Lord reserves revelation of a particular kind for
those with whom he is in the closest
communion and even there we're going to see
a failure in what is revealed.
Six days later, what's the significance of six?
Because in one of the accounts it says
eight days later and I don't know how
to explain that discrepancy.
Two of the gospel accounts say six days
later, one says eight.
Eight is a favorite number for me.
What does eight designate?
You know?
Huh?
New beginnings, resurrection.
Eight, because it's the first day of the
new week or the eighth day when Jesus
rose.
Day of new beginnings, day of resurrection.
What does the number six denote?
Six, six, six and more.
It is man, man, man.
Six is man.
He took them up on the sixth day
to a 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.
Who has a version that says something about
his face?
His face shone like the sun.
Anybody in the, what is that Matthew or
Luke?
Okay, in the Luke version does it say
anything different than what we've just read?
Okay, is that an important little tidbit?
It just went boom, he was transfigured.
As he prayed, his face shone.
As he prayed, the radiance of God came
forth.
You think that that's in any way coincidental
or significant?
Huh?
Because his prayer is communion and beyond petition
and that's the moment that the Father sees
to bring this remarkable radiance.
Someone said the remarkable thing is not the
great shining, the radiance of Jesus.
The remarkable thing is that he always shone
like that but that in every, up till
now, that radiance has been withheld or concealed.
Here's a moment when it's revealed.
It's not just that in this moment it
comes upon him.
He's always the radiant son of God but
for the sake of mankind not able to
receive that light and would not serve the
purpose of the Father so to publicly reveal
it, it was concealed until this mountaintop experience.
Okay, hey, so long as we're on this
subject of radiance, what about ours?
If radiance is becoming the son of God
and is appropriate to his person and is
continually his condition though it is concealed from
the view until now, what ought our condition
to be?
To what degree should we rightly expect certain
transfiguration in our own being, in our own
person, certain radiance, a certain glow and have
you had occasion to see it?
Not likely in yourself, of course, but in
any other?
If you see it, it's rare and when
you see it, you know what I have
always observed on the very rare occasions, the
person through whom this radiance and glow is
expressed is never himself conscious of it.
The moment that he becomes conscious of it,
boom, it's gone.
It's the total unselfconsciousness in that union with
God and the natural effervescence of a spirit
-filled personality that we see that radiance.
But I would covet, I would desire that
it ought to be more visible in the
saints.
And if it's not, probably we're at fault
somewhere.
So we're allowing something into our thought, life,
speech and consideration that dulls that radiance or
even makes it to retreat.
But I think that would be a right
part of our witness unto him as it
was for Jesus.
So interesting that the whole account should begin
that way.
Could be that Jesus himself was taken by
surprise.
He never expected to come into this remarkable
glow.
And I don't know what his object was
in bringing these men up to the high
mountain, the park, whether he anticipated what would
be revealed there and has something to do
with the subsequent coming down from the mountain
to the valley.
But at any rate, there appeared to him
in verse 4, Elijah with Moses, who were
talking with Jesus.
Now one of the other accounts says why
they're talking with Jesus and what they're talking
with Jesus about.
Who's got that?
The deceased.
They are rehearsing with Jesus.
You're approaching the climax of your earthly tenure,
which is your crucifixion death.
In fact, coming down from the mountain, he
speaks of it.
I'm going to suffer and be killed and
rise again the third day.
He's been reminded by his conversation with both
Elijah and Moses, of course, who have been
come down from glory and appearing in that
radiance with him.
What's the significance of these two figures?
Why of all of the patriarchal great heroes
of the Old Testament faith, does the father
bring Elijah and Moses to converse with Jesus?
So we need not look upon Jesus as
some kind of innovation, but something coming right
out of the whole grit and content of
Old Testament prophecy and law.
He is the consummation, even the fulfillment, the
telos, the Greek word for the object and
end of everything that had preceded him.
So it's very appropriate that these two men
should appear with him.
And what are they talking about?
His decease and his departure?
I don't think that it would be improper
to see Moses as an apostle receiving a
call, the revelation of God in the burning
bush, a deliverer of Israel through the wilderness,
the establishing of the law, very foundational to
the whole of Israel.
So though the word is a New Testament
term, the reality that Moses can express in
his own conduct is an everywit apostolic, a
real father, deep and one who bears up
with the intransigence of his own people, their
terrible burden and has to intercede in their
behalf, lest God blot them out for their
idolatry and their faithlessness.
What that man bore in moral anguish, let
alone the physical demand of 40 years in
the wilderness is incalculable.
So that God, that the father would honor
him to have this pre-crucifixion time of
communion with Jesus, who himself is very God,
is altogether fitting.
Did they bring a dimension of something that
was for him a solace, a comfort, an
assurance, like go get him tiger and listen,
you're going to suffer something extraordinary, both physically
and morally.
You're going to experience the absence of the
father.
You'll cry out, my God, my God, why
hast thou forsaken me?
While here he's going to come and hover
over you in a cloud.
You would have loved to have even a
faint portion of that at the cross.
But no, it's at the mount, but not
at your time of suffering.
So hang in there, fulfill your destiny, your
calling.
This is the fulfillment of all the things
for which we have labored and suffered and
sacrificed throughout the whole history of Israel.
You are the consummation and we're upholding you
and girding you.
Even as my arms were held up in
the times of my trial, we will be
upholding you in the time of yours.
We don't know what that conversation was, but
we know this, it was more than chitchat.
So that such a conversation was necessary and
came at this time is something that we
need to assess, that in the wisdom of
the father, it was not an exaggerated or
an extravagant provision, but altogether appropriate for the
son at the threshold of his greatest suffering.
And is that an encouragement for you?
Like, what will he do for you at
the threshold of your greatest suffering?
I'm not saying you're going to get a
visitation of Moses or Elijah, but maybe myself
coming down from glory, because I would have
preceded you to give you a little pat
on the back and remind you, remember that
school in 2005?
Remember I said that, that, that, that?
Well, now you're going to face it.
I don't know, I'm joking of course, but
if the Lord will do that for this
son, what will he do for all of
his sons?
Will he not give a special provision, this
is right off the top of my head,
this is completely unpremeditated, it's not that profound,
but can we take encouragement by seeing this
provision for Jesus, that we can also surmise
that when we will face ultimate extremity and
requirement, that there will be a provision for
us that comes down from above that enables
us to bear it.
I'm encouraged by this.
And what he did for the one son,
he'll do for others.
Not identically, but in measure, because there will
be no suffering that will be required of
us that anywhere begins to approach what he
bore.
Although we're told to take up our cross,
and you can't enter the kingdom without tribulation.
Okay, so now Peter comes into the act,
and said to Jesus, Rabbi, now right away
like your alarm bells ought to be going
off, is that to say that the use
of the term Rabbi or teacher is erroneous?
No, it's an identification, but it's not an
ultimate identification.
It's lacking.
Remember what we said at the prayer time?
Every error in the church in the last
analysis is the statement of an inadequate knowledge
of God.
Well, this is what Peter himself is now
revealing.
Rabbi, teacher, he doesn't yet understand who this
Jesus is, that God sees him as so
significant that he's bringing the two great heroes
of Old Testament faith from the law and
the prophets to come and commune with Jesus.
And so there's Peter sticking his neck out
and blurting out a typical patron statement.
Let us build for you, it's good for
us to be here, let us build for
you three booths, three tents.
Well, what's wrong with that?
Here's the man who's the first to make
this acknowledgement, and Peter, Jesus says, flesh and
blood has not revealed this to you, but
my Father which is in heaven, blessed art
thou for this revelation.
And here a short time after, it seems
that the revelation has subsided.
You know, maybe because the flesh and the
humanity of Jesus is so apparent that it
disposes you to move away from this supernatural
acknowledgement and come again to a lesser and
more respectable and acceptable kind of seeing that
is expressed and revealed here by calling him
Rabbi.
But what about what he says?
Don't you think that this is honoring?
Let us make, underline the us.
There's two uses of us.
It is good for us to be here.
Is that what your version says?
What does that say about Peter?
What is Peter's central point of consideration in
anything and everything?
Though he's the rock of the church and
the initial apostle, it is good for us.
He's still us-oriented, which is to say,
me, me, me, and everything is to be
interpreted, seen, and deciphered in terms of the
benefit one receives.
It is good for us.
And any man who still has that noxious,
egocentric view is necessarily going to say, let
us make.
He's wanting to religionize.
He's wanting to memorialize.
He's wanting to establish something that man would
make.
Let us make.
It's good for us.
Let us make.
Well, one for Elijah, one for Moses, one
for you.
What's wrong with that?
What does that betray about this rock, this
apostle, that he still has not yet got
it together?
That there's going to have to be a
real betrayal of Jesus before the cock crows
three times.
And the man is going to have to
go out and weep bitterly in such broken
hearted rejection because he's going to reject him
with oaths and with cursings.
I don't know the man.
And that's true.
You don't.
That's why you'll betray him.
You don't know the man.
But it's going to take a broken heartedness
to come to that knowledge.
And when you go up in the open
room, you're going to be pouting and licking
your wounds and counting your condition.
It'll take 10 days for you to assess
the truth of Peter.
Though you're a big hotshot, though you're loud
in your statement, though all the world deny
you, yet will we deny you never.
His was the loudest profession and his was
the most disgraceful contradiction.
Hey, listen guys.
If we're not instructed by this, then we're
going to have to go through it.
Then you'll have to suffer your own shame
and your own betrayal if you'll not vicariously
identify with Peter's.
Because we're not made of any better stuff
than he.
We're flesh and blood just like him.
And though we're saying Lord, you know what
our spirit is saying?
Teacher, Rabbi, Master.
Don't fool yourself because you're using the right
language that you have the right understanding and
the right respect.
That's why this is given us for our
instruction.
But while he was yet speaking, not knowing
it says what to say.
Do you have that in your version?
He didn't know what to say.
He was terrified.
But then why say anything if you don't
know?
What is it with us?
We have to open our mouths and blab
and we can't take the silence.
We've got to punctuate it by something from
us.
Not knowing what to say, he said.
But what he said is a dead giveaway.
What's the dead giveaway?
Three booths.
One for you, one for you, one for
you.
What's wrong with that?
Here's what's wrong with that.
In the mentality of Peter, Jesus is at
a par with both Moses and Elijah.
Is that true?
Or is he the greatest?
Is he very God and very man?
And the son of God and the very
revelation of the father.
But Peter has not yet seen that.
So he thinks he's doing him justice by
seeing him at a place of equality with
these two great foundational Hebrew saints.
But he's still missing it.
And so therefore while he's yet yapping like
that, a great cloud of glory comes down
over them and the voice of the father
rings out.
This is my beloved son.
This is not just someone at equality with
the prophets and the law.
This is my son.
This is very God, very man.
My son.
This is the epitome of all creation.
In fact, he himself has established creation.
All things were made by him and for
him.
So hear ye him.
What a response from the father that evidently
was needful and corrective for a well-meaning
apostle who's yet fallen short of the proper
acknowledgement of who it is he's to celebrate
and make known as the chief apostle of
the church.
This is my beloved son, you dum-dum.
This is not just number two, number three
with two other personalities.
This is thee.
This is very God, very man.
And you need to shut up and hear
him.
The Lord your God will raise up from
amongst your brethren one like as unto me
and will put his words in his mouth
that whosoever shall not hearken to what he
shall speak in my name it shall be
required of him.
That's Deuteronomy 18.
And here the same father who inspired that
scripture saying hear ye him.
This is that one.
Greater than Moses would come out from the
midst of the brethren.
Hear ye him.
Because the great tragedy of Israel is they
have neither heard nor considered him and have
suffered the consequence as Deuteronomy 18 warns.
Okay.
When you read this can you visualize this
phenomenon?
A bright cloud coming down over them and
the voice of the father.
There's even other implications of the father audibly
speaking that will affect the church and that
generation and all subsequent generations because Peter in
chapter 1 of the second epistle says in
verse 16 for we did not follow cleverly
devised myths when we made known to you
the power and coming of our Lord Jesus
Christ but we had been eyewitnesses of his
majesty for he received honor and glory from
God the father when that voice was conveyed
to him by the majestic glory saying this
is my son my beloved with whom I'm
well pleased we also heard this voice come
down from heaven when we were with him
on the holy mountain.
So evidently God is inserting something into the
apostolic testimony as Peter is the apostle to
the circumcision that he's not just talking out
of his hat and making compilations from a
logic out of scripture and prophecy but we
were witnesses to the voice of the father
confirming the son on the holy mount of
transfiguration and therefore that experience was necessary for
you to hear to validate our testimony to
you that you might receive this as being
very God.
God knowing the intransigence and the reluctance of
his Jewish kinsmen gave Peter an experience of
a kind that would serve his apostolic purposes
in good stead.
So it's an important visitation and he expresses
it beautifully in his second epistle.
How about the word majestic in that out
of the majestic glory.
I turned to my dictionary this morning to
see what the word majestic means.
What would you say it means?
Or do you think that it's not really
that important?
It's just a nice word to be thrown
in in the effulgence of all those nice
words.
Or is there any word that comes out
of the mouth of God that is not
calculated with divine intention?
Well you don't read the word majesty very
often.
You might have talked about the glory the
brightness but it was the majesty of the
cloud the majesty of the father and you
might have assumed the majesty of the son.
What does majesty imply that is unique to
that word that is not expressed in other
complementary words like glory or beauty there's something
in majesty that's unique to majesty and it
behooves us to consider it.
Majesty, what do they say in the courts
of kings and queens your majesty majesty is
invariably used in conjunction with royalty so it's
a term of recognition of highest office and
the aura and the grandeur that accompanies that
person who resides in it.
So they caught a glimpse of the majesty
of the father they saw the lord in
his governmental calling that's when you say lord
that's in fact what it means having divine
authority and what's the first thing that Jesus
says to his disciples after his resurrection all
authority is given unto me both in heaven
and on earth go ye therefore he's already
commanding he's already directing in this authority that
has come to him in his exaltation out
from suffering but Peter glimpsed it in advance
and we need to glimpse it and what
is it that Stephen sees in the moments
before his martyrdom that precipitates his martyrdom and
when his auditors hear that remark they gnash
their teeth and fall upon him and stone
him to death they couldn't bear to hear
it what did he say I see the
heavens opened and Jesus the man standing at
the right hand of power I see him
in the place of authority I see him
in his governmental position as king because who
else can say the kingdom of heaven is
at hand except him whose kingdom it is
he's a king and a king is majestic
and nowhere is that majesty more displayed than
in his suffering if you have an eye
to see it so this is a very
significant vision in the cloud and the voice
and what other occasions does the father speak
out over Jesus that he's audibly heard where
he honors his son every one of these
utterances ought to be rightly chronicled because how
often do you hear God speak out of
heaven when God speaks out of heaven it
has got to be an awesome event just
by virtue of that speaking and there's got
to be reason for it that should not
evade us we're here because the same God
who spoke to Moses out of heaven over
Jesus spoke to me at the head of
the camp road 31 years ago when I
just dropped by this property for curiosity having
no attention living in a 17 room house
in New Jersey but the moment I came
out of that car and stepped over the
chain across the road that said no trespassing
and my foot came down on this piece
of earth the same God that spoke over
Moses said to me who had called me
by name in Jerusalem earlier dominion, end time
teaching center community, refuge those were the words
and those words have set in motion remarkable
things not the least of which is your
presence here in this building on this grounds
so when God speaks dear saints we need
to be on tippy toe and our ear
opened to hang on to every word that
comes down to us from the celestial heights
because these are rare occasions and if the
father thinks that it's appropriate in his wisdom
so to express himself we need to be
extremely mindful and heeding so I'm appreciating when
the father has bestirred himself so to speak
the word chosen is used in one of
the three expressions of this text two of
them is this is my son my beloved
son hear ye him and one of them
this is my chosen hear ye him so
we need to ask how is it that
in one gospel the word chosen is employed
and the other two the word beloved is
employed and is this is Luke is Luke
taking the liberty to insert what the father
had not spoken and the others were in
error in hearing the word beloved is this
a light question because this has got to
do with veracity and the credibility of scripture
because the critics will say well look at
the contradictions look it says in one place
this it says in one place that how
can you have any confidence that that is
the real testimony it's subjective, it's interpretive these
are men just writing out of their own
savvy this is not an authoritative statement from
God in which you can invest a complete
confidence and I don't have an answer for
the question but I think we need to
consider it even if there's one departure from
the other two and the choice of a
word how do we understand it and I
think it probably occurs other places in scripture
in fact Paul himself takes the liberty of
using the the Septuagint and the Greek version
in making quotes in some of his statements
and he even conflates scripture he'll take something
out of one text and something out of
another and put it together as an apostolic
statement and not once does God reprimand him
so I don't think that the Lord's offended
that of the three accounts one takes the
pains to say the chosen son he's beloved
and he's chosen he's beloved because he's chosen
and he has chosen to be chosen so
I'm glad that in one of the three
accounts it exists, how to explain it, I
don't know but can God say something with
one speaking that is more than one statement
I didn't mean dwell on that for us
we say one thing at one time but
can God speak in such a way that
is like an echo of one thing even
as he says the other and that both
are compatible I wouldn't limit the Holy One
of Israel that because we're limited to one
statement out of one mouth at one time
that he's limited that he could say something
that has a resonance of the truth of
both things at the same time and that
one of the gospel writers picks up the
one statement and the other two pick up
the other but that it's all out from
the same source I've never said that before
I've never seen that before and I'm not
saying thus saith the Lord I'm just offering
a possible way to understand the richness of
scripture and why it seems on some instances
to be variable but not contradictory okay let's
not dwell too long on that so when
they looked around in verse 8 they saw
no man no one with them anymore but
only Jesus I like that and I quoted
that in the morning prayer time I think
they saw no man they saw only Jesus
I think it means technically Moses and Elijah
are gone now but the spiritual meaning of
that statement needs to be pondered they saw
no man but Jesus himself only they saw
a true seeing they saw the central figure
and to see that figure is to see
all and what did one writer say they
did not even see their own seeing they
were so taken up with this beloved chosen
son that it even abolishes their own subjectivity
because when we bring ourselves into seeing we
are going unnecessarily to mar it or confuse
it or adulterate it isn't that true who
of us sees any one of each other
objectively as we in fact are I mean
you see me with horns right at least
Inga does so we bring something our seeing
is not objective we don't see the thing
as it in fact is, we see it
through the prism of our subjectivity the way
we've been colored so that half my struggle
in the history of Ben Israel is dealing
with immature sons who have had lousy fathering
and have come with such a biased notion
of all the men in a place of
authority that they can't see you objectively they
bring their unhappy histories onto you and you
gotta bear the result of what they have
passed through until somehow it works out but
here's a seeing that is pure they saw
no man, they did not even see themselves,
they saw Jesus only, so I love that
statement it's something that we ought to desire
for ourselves and seek so what can we
say about the phenomenon of a cloud why
does God when he comes comes in or
as a cloud, why doesn't he just come
in himself, what's the cloud the cloud each
time in the significant expression of himself, his
voice comes out of a cloud, they're overshadowed
it's a cloud of glory, there's a brightness
in the cloud it's not what you see,
the cotton stuff floating around in the blue
sky it's a cloud of deity so how
do we understand that and why is it
necessary and when the Lord comes at the
end of the age, does he not come
out of a cloud, or comes with a
cloud of, and the phrase cloud of witnesses
so the phenomenon of clouds deserves some examination
some consideration, I'm not a cloud man myself
but now that the Lord is showing that
it's repeated in significant places, I want to
understand that, and Chambers has a remark to
make about clouds even dark clouds that somehow
God the identity of the deity by necessity
must accompany any revelation and extension of himself
how would you like a cloud of glory
over us today, what would your reaction be
would you be shouting amen, or would you
get down on your faces would you be
terrified or glad huh, a little terror never
hurt anybody it won't be cotton, it will
be clouds of saints who have gone to
glory because when he appears to be coming
to us out from the clouds, and the
implication is, clouds of the saints will come
to glory you know that just to consider
that, God deserves an entourage you like that
word I mean it's hard to think of
him coming nakedly in his own person without
being royal and being majestic without a company
of those who are around the throne so
likely that was the cloud out of which
the father spoke and that they were privileged
to accompany God and to hear that great
utterance and to look upon Jesus so this
is an event of world class significance and
we mustn't just dismiss it as some airy
little spiritualizing or poetic allusion, this is remarkably
actual graphic and significant and we could probably
spend the rest of the morning just doting
on these aspects and we often pray for
the cloud of witnesses overhead and pray that
my Jewish mother is there with other of
the saints whom we have known in earlier
years, who are identified with us and what
we are about and are now quelling that's
a Jewish word that you need to learn
to quell is to like a cat purring
with satisfaction inwardly Jewish mother quells when her
son gets his diploma or becomes a doctor
or a lawyer, or when he marries a
shiksa, they stop quelling so cloud of witnesses
overhead is more than just a little airy
visitation they exert something they bring something with
them in their coming that's celestial and likely
that was part of the event on that
mount so it's the mount of transfiguration it's
a glorious episode on the sixth day so
we need to consider that this chapter includes
both the mount of transfiguration and the valley
of what do you want to call it
the challenge, despair, confrontation the ugliness of what
took place in that valley it's a demonic
event a young man foaming at the mouth
an epileptic, one of the most horrible expressions
of stunted, deformed humanity and continually ravaged by
demonic spirit what a punctuation, what a a
way to end to follow the mount of
transfiguration, you would have thought that the lord
would have given them a weekend off and
let them bask in the effulgence of the
glory of what they had experienced but no,
right from the mount down into the valley
to see this ugly exhibition of satan at
his worst so we need to ask the
question is this accidental conjunction or deliberate and
what's these if it's deliberate, what is god
saying to us, what is going to follow
our cherished high moments with god, our mountaintop
experiences and are they given in advance of
a trial and demand that will be made
of us that if we had not had
that preliminary we would have collapsed in the
thing that has now come so we mustn't
doubt on the high mountain experiences as a
thing in itself as if we are, what's
the word like gourmets or esthetes but we
can almost sense with an ominous what's the
word, foreshadowing an ominous pre-sentiment thanks lord
for the great blessing but what follows, somebody
said what's the evidence of the baptism of
the holy spirit and the answer was trouble
so whenever there's market blessing steal yourself and
gird yourself what follows, something is coming for
which this is a preparation and not a
thing to be enjoyed in itself or to
be sought for in itself in fact those
things are delightful when they come of god
unsuspectingly at moments that we would never have
thought okay let's look at the valley experience
and they were coming down he ordered them
to tell no one 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
did the scribe say Elijah must come first
he said Elijah is indeed coming 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 so
that's a little insertion as they're coming down
the mount this allusion to Elijah whose presence
they had just seen and that John the
Baptist is evidently the in figuring the the
statement of the Elijah that must come that
precedes that of the messiah and that he
has come and that he has been rudely
treated but not as badly as the messiah
himself now is going to be treated that
will require his death and a resurrection on
the third day which they didn't understand okay
in verse 14 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 I wonder why maybe something is
still lingering of the glory that he had
on the mount and they ran forward to
greet him and he asked them what are
you arguing about with them and 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 you disciples to cast it out
but they could not do so he answered
them so he's not answering the father he
answered them you faithless generation how much longer
must I be among you and how much
longer must I put up with you bring
him to me so we've got to ponder
this this is so unlike Jesus it is
so what's the word rude and cutting that
doesn't seem to be compatible with the nature
of the son and why is he brought
to such a pitch of exasperation at the
failure of disciples to cast out this demon
that delivered his son evidently it's a deliverance
he could rightly have expected but they were
unable to perform it that the lord himself
is down in the valley something like Elijah
after the great success at Carmel has to
run into the wilderness and go through a
bout of depression and say I'm not better
than my father's take my life already is
this true after Jesus is exalted by being
transfigured in the company of the two great
Old Testament figures that he has got to
come down and suffer some kind of after
play what do you call it backlash where
he's going to be depressed and in fact
he's so depressed that he speaks in a
way that is totally unbecoming to him that's
how much he's this valley thing has affected
him as a man so we mustn't forget
we're not talking about some pristine spiritual entity
that is unmoved and untouched in his emotion
and in his humanity by the sufferings to
which he passes in fact he's taking one
shot after another one jolt after another not
only from those that oppose him the Pharisees
and Scribes but even in the disappointment of
the failure of his own disciples and that
failure and betrayal is going to be marked
right up to the time of his death
so he's absorbing remarkable shocks and trauma all
the more in his perfect humanity and deity
a son who is holy, holy, holy as
the father is down in the valley with
the grit and the reality of life as
it in fact is and in fact as
it is at its demonic worst and he's
not spared from that he's required to go
into that from the mountaintop and if he's
required to go from that into the mountaintop
what shall we say?
do they deserve that rebuke?
and if they deserve the rebuke for what?
and if they deserve it what do we
deserve?
what did they do or fail to do
that would call them not only faithless but
perverse hey that's strong language you guys and
are they faithless because they're perverse or perverse
because they're faithless and he says the whole
generation lock, stock and barrel there's not an
exception every one of you reflect Israel in
its condition, you're human all to human Jewish
all to Jewish, Israeli all to Israeli and
you're perverse and faithless when you have every
reason to be other than that because you
were in continual presence with me day and
night for the years that have preceded this
and yet it does not seem to have
had any lasting and enduring effect upon you,
it's as if you had not the benefit
of my fellowship watching the miracles, hearing my
speaking, seeing my character in life and being
up on the mount with me and seeing
how I'm honored of the father by the
voice that rings out of glory and attended
by the greatest figures of Old Testament and
having seen all that and having been privileged
for all that you face one trial and
you collapse completely, you're deflated the air is
out of you because you see one expression
of demonic power do you think that he's
justified in his reprimand to whom much is
given, much is required much was given in
personal fellowship with Jesus day and night that
they might see who he is and if
they missed it they heard it from the
father who he is, beloved and chosen and
majestic meaning royal and kingly and now they
come down to that scummy level and their
one sight of the visible evil and the
air is out from them he's not talking
about you missed faith for believing for Cadillacs
and faith for prosperity he's meaning you have
missed the object of faith, namely the recognition
of who I am as sent of the
father and being very god and very man,
you have your faith was not sufficient and
adequate to perceive me and that's why you
cannot bring that knowledge into confrontation with evil
you don't know it well enough though you
were exposed in a privileged way, so what's
with you that there's a faith that should
rightly have been expected of you and you
don't have it and your failure to cast
out the demons is the evidence because you're
perverse, what is it you're still calling me
rabbi, you're still calling me master, you're still
calling me teacher it's an inadequate recognition of
who I am and the failure to recognize
me as who I really am is revealed
in that moment when you need to express
that reality, that authority and the casting out
of a defeated foe so we are all
indicted, we are faithless and how will that
be determined and revealed, by taking a test
at the end of the class and filling
in the right questions and true and false
or shining at some coffee table conversation or
are we going to be tested about the
truth of our knowledge of him and the
measure of our faith in the same way
that they were by confrontation with evil at
its most vicious and vile form, in its
ugliest expression, where the victim is cast into
the fire and into the water in epileptic
fits and foams at the mouth you know
how you could pray for somebody with a
sniffle and your faith is adequate to pray
for their healing, of course it doesn't have
to happen right then so you have to
look but when someone comes in with a
wheelchair or somebody has palsy and you're praying
for them and they continue in that condition
after your prayer you want to go back
to square one, you want to go back
to the workshop, you had not the faith
your faith was tested but it was not
adequate to the crisis your faith is okay
for sniffles but it's not okay for palsy
it's not okay for those that are in
wheelchairs who have never walked as your faith
is, so be it unto you so what
the Lord is implying is you have every
reason to have had faith adequate to that
challenge but you did not exhibit it and
is that an indictment that could be made
against us and how are we tested for
faith where are we tested and is the
constitution of our church life such that the
test is never required that our life is
so timid and so predictable, tame and religious
that there's never a real requirement to go
from faith to faith and to grow in
faith and therefore we can settle on our
lease and have a faith that subscribes to
the correctness of doctrines but we don't have
a faith that can cast out demons or
deliver the oppressed as discouraging as it was
for those disciples and we can share in
that indictment as being faithless or not having
the faith that we ought for our history
I appreciate that the scriptures do not polish
Jesus up and give us a little shiny
version that he never misses it, he's got
it all together at all times and he's
perfectly circumspect and it's one thing to lash
out at the pharisees, you whiten sepulchers but
with the disciples he would be much more
gentle and fatherly I like it that his
full humanity is being shown though I don't
understand it, I still like it that we're
reminded this is man, he can be disappointed,
he's depressed his disciples have failed him even
after the glorious visitation on the Mount of
Transfiguration, all the more for that glorious visitation
that the very first appearance of evil and
boom, they collapse like the sack of potatoes
so what is your appetite for valley experiences
what is your tolerance because the very word
valley is a depression and are you willing
for the valleys of the faith or you
want only the mountain tops because Jesus asked
the father how long has this been going
on and the answer is since childhood right
away you begin to get a sense, this
is more than just a boy, this is
a representative allegorical figure that has been harassed
from his very inception not by powers of
darkness that don't want just to molest but
to destroy and they've come close because he's
been thrown into fire he's been thrown into
water and even now when Jesus commands the
spirit to come out the demon takes this
boy and rattles him like a rag dog
and a doll in the mouth of a
mad dog and okay, he'll come oh here
he is, boom, as dead they said he's
dead, he's not just thrown down, he's dead,
he's finished so the ventilation, the hatred of
the demonic powers against his son is uncanny,
this is more than just a chance victim
for us, this is clearly that the son
is Israel that has been tormented and opposed
and cast into fires of persecution and suffering
throughout its entire history because the powers of
darkness are out not just to torment but
to abolish and to annihilate, so the issue
of the deliverance here is not just a
little mercy for an individual and to gratify
a father, it's to gratify the father for
this son because this son has a destiny
not just to recover but to commit to
the fullness of God's intention or there'll be
no kingdom, it's a messianic, it's a davidic
thing, it's with this Israel it's with this
son, that's why the powers are out to
destroy him but we'll talk more on that,
but let me ask why does Jesus single
out the issue of faith, oh you have
little faith, why are you afraid oh you
faithless generation, how long must I serve you,
how is the issue of deliverance, the issue
of faith don't you know the formula in
the name of Jesus I command you come
out of him, didn't they know the formula,
isn't that faith, isn't that the way we've
been practicing but you know what, we've not
seen powers of this magnitude, that's why later
they asked why could we not cast him
out, they said because this kind, this kind
cometh not out but by fasting and prayer
the word this kind implies you're not just
dealing with your everyday demon here, this is
the heart of the satanic demonic world, these
are the powers of darkness, this is the
ancient foe, both of God and of Israel
and this is not going to come out
just by some formula this is going to
take something of a kind that they are
themselves compelled to recognize, how is it that
Jesus could affect the deliverance but the disciples
could not so here we come to the
issue of incarnation what is being exercised here
by Jesus that the disciples lacked is it
because he had deity they recognize his deity
you remember in another episode where the demons
went into a herd of swine and they
begged Jesus have you come to torment us
before the time and they begged him if
we have to come out of this demon
ridden man, let us go into this herd
of swine and he allowed them does that
show that this is deity now that is
being exercised but if that's true then why
does he reprimand disciples who could not exercise
deity understand he has a special prerogative that
they can't enjoy, so why is he blasting
them, he's blasting them because evidently they should
have been able to perform the act of
deliverance as much as he not because he
was exercising his deity he was exercising his
faith he had the faith that they lacked
and faith is more than just the ability
to recite a little formula in the name
of Jesus get out of him faith is,
well what do you tell me what is
the faith that delivers why is that deliverance
the issue of faith, how is faith the
issue of deliverance we have a charismatic sense
of faith that is much less than other
than what is being pointed to here our
charismatic faith is something other than what Jesus
was reprimanding the disciples for the lack of
we might well be reprimanded if the Lord
were here to speak that what we call
faith today is not at all the New
Testament apostolic kind that affects deliverance for Israel
your charismatic faith is ok for a cadillac,
it's ok for boyfriend girlfriend and health but
it's not adequate to the extremity of demand
of the last days as it will touch
Israel's deliverance and restoration got that, and the
longer you cling to the facsimile thereof and
the inadequate counterpart the longer you will delay
the coming in to the true thing you
need to recognize that that to which you
have subscribed is specious, questionable and less than
the reality that you ought to have and
must have in the last days to be
Israel's savior in deliverance well we have to
ask the question why is it one of
the two things that Jesus said this kind
comes not out except by fasting and prayer
what is fasting?
a technique?
a methodology?
why does he cite that as being the
companion piece with prayer we'll come to that
but now we're on the subject of faith
faith in the last analysis is the knowledge
of God as he in fact is faith
is a trust in God because of his
character because you know it because it has
been tested in your experience because you know
that he's majestic, because you know that he's
enthroned because you know that he's the creator
of the heaven and earth that he has
all power and that with him all things
are possible faith in the scripture is spoken
of under the emblem of all the senses
it is sight look unto me and be
you saved, it is hearing here in your
soul shall live faith is smelling, all thy
garments smell of myrrh and aloes and cassia
thy name is an ointment poured forth, faith
is spiritual touch by this faith the woman
came behind and touched the hem of Christ's
garment faith is equally the spirit's taste, how
sweet are thy words to my taste so
the taste is faith, is one of the
highest operations, one of the performances of faith
is hearing so to hear Christ's voice as
the sure voice of God in the soul
will save us but that which gives true
enjoyment in the aspect of faith where Christ
by holy taste is received into us and
made inward and spiritual apprehension of the sweetness
as food for our souls, then we sit
under his shadow with great delight and find
his fruit sweet to our taste so here's
a really poetic statement of how all inclusive
faith is, because it requires the categories of
hearing sight, taste and every aspect of our
senses our spiritual senses brings a greater appropriation
of God as he is which is in
keeping with what I'm suggesting faith is the
knowledge of God as he is the trust
in God because you know what he is
in his character unbelief raises questions about God's
veracity and his integrity and that's why in
the garden the serpent says to the woman,
has God said even if he has said
it, does he really mean it?
and what did he mean by saying that?
and you're not under obligation really to go
along with that whole thing because God is
jealously keeping you from the things that you
should enjoy with him.
Has God said?
is an aspersion a castigation upon the character
of God who speaks that his word is
not to be trusted and that is questionable
so the attack of Satan is always against
the character of God, but to have a
sublime confidence in that character at a time
when you least see the evidence for it
is faith faith that, like the peace that
passes understanding how do you come to it?
is this automatic?
are we all in the same place of
faith?
or is as your faith is, so be
it unto you faith is relative and proportionate
and in each believer the dimension, the quotient
and the measure of it is different how
come?
why do some have greater faith than others
and can believe and trust God in things
that you would be terrified to consider they
would go where angels fear to tread you
yourself would be terrified to consider such a
requirement how is it they have the faith
and actually do it and you hold back
because you cannot believe God for that remember
that statement in Romans 1, I'm not ashamed
that the gospel is the power of God
and the salvation of everyone who believes to
the Jew first and also to the Greek,
from faith to faith even as it is
written that just shall live by their faith
right at the first statement Paul brings in
the necessary issue of faith and again in
Ephesians he said and it's a gift lest
any man boast, it's not your own, it's
given and yet we can grow in it
but if you balk at any point because
you want to stay now at the place
and level the plateau that you're enjoying you'll
not grow in faith so we've got to
go on from faith to faith and being
fitted for the ultimate confrontation when the issue
of faith will be tested as it was
here by the ultimate statement of the powers
of darkness that are out to destroy Israel
where if your faith fails they perish and
if they perish God's consummate and eschatological intention
of the kingdom and through their restoration is
finished much is at stake and it rests
with us because Jesus won't be there in
his person to catch up where we fail,
we ourselves have got to succeed where those
disciples failed and right now we're in preparation
for that climax so Lord who is sufficient
for these things and we need my God
grace mercy and that we need to recognize
the trials through which we pass are not
accidental they're calculated that we might grow thereby
and be fitted for the next trial and
the next and the next Lord because this
is growth and we suspect that Jesus went
through the same thing he didn't come full
blown he was a son who learned obedience
by that through which he suffered and here
he suffered disappointment and so he himself was
brought to the final issue of faith to
trust the father for his own resurrection after
his cruel death so Lord we're called to
be the sons and daughters of faith and
we will be tested and the issues will
be great the stakes will be ultimate and
we're far from that readiness now but we're
asking whatever we need to be fitted and
to grow into it that you'll provide it
and we'll not walk Lord we'll be terrified
our hearts will be in our mouths we've
not been this way here before we've not
crossed this Jordan we don't know about the
security how we're going to live with our
families and how will this be made up
and that made up but we trust you
that if it's your call you'll give every
enablement and every provision that as despairing as
the church presently is however forlorn however lamentable
that there will be a church that glorifies
God there will be a church unto whom
will be glory you will have a people
for your name and you will succeed in
this even with the kind of raw material
that we ourselves are because our confidence is
in you so bless us Lord give us
grace to dwell on these things and receive
the value of these things even vicariously we
need to be staggered and suffer the reproach
that you gave those disciples because we're made
of exactly the same stuff and we're guilty
of exactly the same failure thank you Lord
and we're shrinking from either fasting or prayer
so come Lord and give us the whole
balance of this this morning as an insertion
that will sustain us in all of the
days to come and we thank you and
give you praise in Jesus name Amen