Help My Unbelief
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Coming Down from the Mountain
When Jesus took His three closest apostles – Peter and James and John – up the mountain of Tabor, He was transfigured in Glory. And He and Moses and Elijah conversed of spiritual things and of providence. And it was so good, and so right, that Peter wanted to stay forever. To remain in the peace of God and the Glory of the holy ones. But they didn’t stay. The glory switched off. And they walked down the mountain, and they found a dad who was beside himself with anxiety about his epileptic son.
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The Peace and Glory of the Spiritual – the Urgency and Ugliness of the Temporal
What a contrast it is when we go from talking about things of God to the raw, brutal experience of the day-to-day. We have the eternal God, majestic among the angels and the saints. We have Jesus in Glory, enjoying the company of the great prophet and the great lawgiver. And then we have a poor broken down-father, who has to watch his own son suffer from seizures. He runs up to Jesus, falls on his knees, and says, “Lord, have pity on my son, for he is a lunatic and suffers severely; often he falls into fire, and often into water.”
This dad just wants what any dad would want – he wants his boy to be well. To be okay. That’s what he cares about. And that sounds like a good thing to care about. But, as it turns out, Jesus cares more about something else.
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What does Jesus care about?
While Jesus and the boy’s father are talking, the boy has a seizure. If you’ve ever seen a seizure, if you’ve ever had a kid who has had a seizure, you know it’s tough to watch. He convulsed violently, foaming at the mouth. The father, the man on his knees, begs Jesus: “If you can do anything, have compassion on us and help us!”
You might think that this would be enough, that this appeal from the broken heart of a parent who loves his child would be sufficient to move Jesus to heal the child. But it isn’t. Because Jesus doesn’t like the way the father framed his request. Jesus says, “If I can? All things are possible for those with faith.”
Picture the scene: the boy is rolling around on the ground. The father is on his knees, begging, pleading. And Jesus wants to discuss the way the dad phrased things? What is going on here? If you’re a parent, there’s almost nothing you care more about than your kids health and happiness. You’d give anything for that. You’d give everything for that. But actually, your kids’ health and happiness, as important as it is, isn’t your top priority. It isn’t what Jesus cares about most. And it’s not what we should care about most either.
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The Relationship with God
What was Christ’s mission on earth? To unite man and God in Himself. He knows that what this father ultimately needs, and what his boy ultimately needs, is not liberation from this terrible malady. What this father needs, and what this boy needs, ultimately, is Jesus. So Jesus won’t be doing the man any favors if He just grants His request and lets it go at that. Jesus tells the man that he needs faith, faith in Jesus – that is, a full personal commitment to Christ.
Do you have that? Is your commitment to Christ stronger than your commitment to any other good thing, even the health and happiness of your family? Maybe not. So then you can cry out with the voice of the boy’s father when He responded to Christ’s challenge: “I do believe. Help my unbelief.” Lord Jesus, I am committed to You – but not as much as I should be. I’m still tempted to put other things ahead of You – to see you as a vehicle for receiving the goods of this earth, instead of the other way around. Dear Jesus, please help my unbelief. Make my commitment stronger to You. Let me trust You and prioritize You above all things.
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Tabor and the Epileptic Boy
The great Renaissance painter Rafael painted a powerful picture of Mount Tabor. At the top is Jesus in glory with Moses and Elijah and Peter and James and John. At the bottom is the epileptic boy, having a gruesome seizure, while his father stands there helplessly. What do these two things have in common?
They’re both opportunities to draw closer to Christ. The sublime, beautiful, transcendent moments, where you can almost touch heaven. And the brutal, ugly, heartbreaking moments, where what you care about most seems to be falling apart. God will use both times to sanctify us, to bring us closer to Him, nearer to salvation. As long as we pray, “Lord, I am committed to You. Help me be more committed. Help my unbelief.”