Welcome to the LSQ Podcast. Our church began in April of 2017, and our vision is to joyfully live as reflections of God's love together in the city. We hope you'll subscribe. Today's scripture reading is taken from Mark chapter 9 verses 14 to 29. When they came to the other disciples, they saw a large crowd around them and the teachers of the law arguing with them. As soon as all the people saw Jesus,
They were overwhelmed with the wonder and ran to greet him. What are you arguing with them about, he asked. A man in the crowd answered, Teacher. I brought you my son, who is possessed by a spirit that has robbed him of speech. Whenever it seizes him, it throws him to the ground, he foams at the mouth, gnashes his teeth, and becomes rigid.
I asked your disciples to drive out the Spirit, but they could not. You unbelieving generation, Jesus replied, how long shall I stay with you? How long shall I put up with you? Bring the boy to me. So they brought him. When the spirit saw Jesus, it immediately threw the boy into a convulsion. He fell to the ground and rolled around, foaming at the mouth.
Jesus asked the boy's father, How long has he been like this? From childhood, he answered. It has often thrown him into fire or water to kill him. But if you can... do anything. Take pity on us and help us. If you can, said Jesus, everything is possible for the one who believes. Immediately, the boy's father exclaimed, I do believe. Help me overcome my unbelief. When Jesus saw that a crowd was running to the scene, he rebuked.
The impure spirit. You deaf and mute spirit, he said. I command you, come out of him and never enter him again. The spirit shrieked, convulsed him violently, and came out. The boy looked so much like a corpse that many said, he's dead. But Jesus took him by the hand and lifted him to his feet, and he stood up. After Jesus had gone indoors, his disciples asked him privately, why couldn't we drive it out? He replied, this kind can come out only by prayer.
And all of God's people said, Amen. I have to adjust this a little because I'm tall. Wonderful reading, Stella. Thank you for the enthusiasm. For those of you who don't know me, my name is Graham Gerard. And for those of you who do know me, you already know what I am about to say next. And that is I am a campus minister with RUF International at NYU. And the reason why you probably know that is because I literally talk about that in every single conversation that I have.
I'm sorry, but I'm not sorry. I love my job. It is the greatest job in the world because I get to share the gospel with students who had never heard about Jesus before. And you know what it is amazing and beautiful to sort of watch them go on this journey with God and sort of come to this point where they become confronted with their own unbelief. And so this is actually a passage that I use a lot with them.
Because on the one hand, they are intrigued by Jesus. But they have tons of questions like, what do I have to do to be accepted by God? Or how do I know that I'm believing in God the right way? These can be very difficult journeys. And I think that's for really good reason. Because as one of my students said to me recently, he said, Jesus sounds so incredible, but believing is hard. And he's right.
It is really hard to believe in almost anything anymore. We either don't believe in ourselves or we don't believe in the world around us. We want to believe, but our reality, whether it is accurate or not, tells us otherwise. And you know the thing about us as humans is that we sort of know this about ourselves, don't we?
And our culture looks to remedy this with all kinds of tools like self-help books, motivational speakers, different mind hacks or techniques to help us with our positive thinking, our mental toughness, to change our belief system. Now look, all of these methods generally do have wisdom and insight, but the message is always something like this. If you can believe it, you can achieve it. Now don't get me wrong, the mind has an incredible ability to adapt and change based on new input.
But look, these are only for things in which the outcome is something that we can control. It works for those do X and get Y scenarios. And so by all means, use these techniques to your advantage. But the problem is that many of us have... We're trying to make these practices or techniques or these authors or these books. We are trying to turn these things into our everything. We're sort of trying to make them our religion.
We want these things to be what gives us that stability in life that we are looking for, that sense of certainty. We want these things to be the object of our hope, when in reality they are just helpful, but in the end flawed tools, just like everything else. But what does unbelief look like then for a Christian? Shouldn't we have a more stable and steady belief system? Now look, Christians, after all, have a unique hope and an incredible outlook on life because of Jesus.
We believe we have the greatest news that the world could ever receive, and so that should change us, right? But question for you today, how many of you have ever met an insecure, fearful, or unconfident Christian?
Now, of course, every single person's hand should probably be up right now. And friends, that is because Christians are just like everyone else in the sense that unbelief is sort of built into us. And we'll explain what that looks like in just a second. But I don't want to skip over this point. If Jesus promises us something better than this world has to offer, why is it so easy for us to believe in Jesus but not believe in his promises?
We are supposed to have a peace that is beyond understanding, a joy unlike any other, that culminates in the fact that we will one day be free from the pain and the suffering of this world, which is what Michael preached on just last week. And yet we are just the same as everyone else.
So what are we supposed to do? Well, today we're going to look for answers in a passage from the Gospel of Mark. And in this passage, Jesus heals a demon-possessed boy at the request of his father who utters some of the most famous and important words. for us Christians to remember. I believe, help me with my unbelief. Now this is a passage that all of us have to confront wherever we are at in our journey with God. And it is a passage where I think we get to see the full...
scope of the gospel in just one passage. And so today we're going to look at unbelief through three different points. We're going to look at what it is, why we struggle, and finally, where we look for help. So we're going to look at what it is, why we struggle, and where we look for help.
Well, first, what unbelief is? Or we could say, what is the nature of unbelief? And so to understand this, I think it's really important that we look to the passage that immediately precedes this, which is the transfiguration of Jesus. This is one of the most important events in Jesus' life and ministry. And this is where Peter, James, and John, three of Jesus' disciples, get to see Jesus in his divine glory. They sort of see this otherworldly radiance starting to come up off of him.
Now, up until now, no one could ever see this divine glory of God. If you remember Moses in Exodus 33, he has to stand behind a rock as God's glory passes because if he sees the face of God, he will die. Yet Peter, James, and John can now somehow see this. They see that Jesus is a human being, but he is also God.
And now look, we don't have a ton of information about what this event actually looked like, other than that the text says his face shone like the sun and his clothes were brilliantly white. But I bet you it was a lot more remarkable than that. And if this is not enough, Jesus is also talking to Elijah, who symbolized the prophetic tradition and the fulfillment of the prophets, the prophecies that told of this Messiah that was to come to save the world.
And then he's talking to Moses as well, which shows us the fulfillment of the Old Testament law, the rules and the requirements that Israel had to follow in order to be in God's presence. God speaks from a cloud and says, this is my beloved son. And so I ask that you keep this image of Jesus in your mind as we go through this passage today. But when Jesus comes down this mountain with Peter, James, and John, the contrast of what's happening below cannot be more different.
Because they arrive at the bottom of this mountain to see the other nine disciples, along with some teachers of the law, engaged in great unbelief. These seemingly faithful disciples are trying and failing to heal a demon-possessed boy. And when they see Jesus, they are overcome with emotion. They are so excited to see him. And so it would seem like they really believe and understand who he is and that maybe they could heal this boy after all.
But Jesus pushes back very hard here, and he sort of flips out a little bit. And he says this, you unbelieving generation, how long shall I put up with you? Bring the boy to me. So hold on a second. Why is Jesus so angry? Did we miss something here? And here is where we get to see what unbelief really is. And I think it primarily manifests in three forms. Two bad forms that we should avoid and one good form that we should follow. And so we're going to talk about the bad forms first.
And you know, this is really actually pretty cool. The first form we actually get a clue about in the very last line of the passage. And I didn't even realize this until fairly recently. The disciples ask at the end of this, once the dust has settled and the boy is healed, why they could not cast the demon out of the boy.
And Jesus said, this kind can only be drawn out through prayer. Now wait, you might say. If you've read the Gospel of Mark, you know in Mark chapter 6, Jesus gave them the ability to cast out these demons. And so why isn't it working now? Well, first, this was only a temporary gift, sort of a one-time thing. And so maybe the disciples just didn't understand. But Jesus just doesn't correct them and say, my bad, I didn't mention it. It was just a one-time thing.
He wouldn't be so angry for a simple misunderstanding. Something significant is happening here with the disciples, and he wants to prepare them for the work that they are going to have to do when he leaves. Something is missing. And Jesus says that the issue is prayer. So what's happening here is the disciples are trying to heal demons without even trying to pray. They are trying to do something without asking God for help first because they thought they could do it without him.
They were probably high on their own power and ability and saying not look at the amazing gifts that God has blessed me with, but look at the amazing things that I can do. You see the difference? And so the first issue here is that we take our faith for granted and we mistake God's grace for our own glory. Does this sound familiar to anybody? Have you ever tried to do something without praying first?
Have you ever tried to rely on yourself when you are faced with difficulty or adversity? Do you see the gifts God has given you as gifts, or do you see them as your own achievements? How often is praying an afterthought in our lives? I think a lot of times we only start to really pray when our initial plan goes awry. And so that is the first form of unbelief, believing in God but relying on yourself.
But that is not all, because who else is there with the disciples as they're trying to heal this boy? The scribes, of course, the teachers of the law, the smart ones, the ones who know God's law best and are undoubtedly saying, nope, you have to do it like this, then like this, then like this, and then and only then will you get the result that you're looking for.
Now, I don't know about you, but it kind of begs the question to me why they aren't trying to heal the boy themselves. They have all the rules and the process right there. And you know, I hate to say it, but I'm going to have to say it. This should remind us of some Christians today. who know the Bible all too well and love to point out when other people are wrong, but their lives do not reflect the words that they recite.
And so if we're keeping score here, Jesus is fed up with those who think they don't need God and those who think they know God all too well. These are both forms of unbelief because they are both relying on themselves. And look, all of us, at least at times, fall into one or probably both of these categories. So who is Jesus talking to? He's talking to the scribes. He's talking to the disciples. He is talking to me, and he is talking to you.
But he's also talking to someone else, and we're going to get to him in just a moment. But next, we want to look at why do we struggle like this when we know better? We have all the cautionary tales in the Bible to help us with our unbelief. But why do we still struggle with our doubt? Because we believe that unbelief is something that is built into us. It is the root cause of what we would say is our sin. Or we could say unbelief is the very reason that we turn away from God in the first place.
Now, a major theme in the Bible is this concept of idolatry. And if you've been at Redeemer with any regularity over the years or months, then you know we talk about this literally every single week. And we do that for very good reason. Because we need to be reminded of the danger of idolatry every single day of our lives. This concept pops up at the very beginning of the Bible with Adam and Eve being so tempted to be like God that they do the one thing God has instructed them not to do.
So they blatantly disobey him. We also see Israel building a tower to the sky in Genesis 11, this Tower of Babel. And they say they're doing it to impress God, but they're really doing it to impress themselves. God has required nothing of the sort from them. And then we see it again when the Israelites build a golden calf and start worshiping it because they grow impatient with God. And so now they just completely put their faith in something else altogether.
And so we could say our idolatry and our unbelief manifests in that we either want to be God, we want to impress God, or we just don't trust him. We want to be him, we want to impress him, or we don't trust him. And you know, the entire Bible lays this out over and over and over again.
And when we inevitably fall into one of these traps, we start to malfunction as people. Our lives become miscentered. We long to find comfort, completeness, love, peace, approval from others, from anything and everything other than Jesus. And you know what this leads to is what we would commonly refer to as sin, all those actions that we do that we all understand. And if you don't believe me, just look at the way the Ten Commandments are structured.
Those first four commandments just sort of sound like rules that we have to follow just to kind of make God happy, right? That we put God first, that we don't make other idols, that we don't use his name in vain, that we keep the Sabbath holy. These are all about acknowledging and loving God for all that he is and giving him that rightful place in our lives that he deserves.
And then when these four get screwed up, what happens is our lives start to fall apart. We are trying to fit a square peg in a round hole. We start hurting others, which leads us to those last six commandments that we're all very familiar with. We dishonor our families. We hurt each other in all kinds of ways. We aren't faithful to our loved ones. We steal, we lie, we covet. Because we are trying to get what only God can give us. And we've turned our backs on God.
It causes us, in some cases, as the Bible shows us, to go headfirst into self-destruction, like the prodigal son who squanders his father's inheritance and turns his back on him. Or it leads us to be that bitter, angry moralist like the elder brother in that same story who resents his father because he's followed all the rules and now is not getting the full reward that he deserves.
You know, it also brings us to desperation. It brings it to God's doorstep on our knees, just like Naaman in 2 Kings 5, who had everything in this life, but he could not accept that his healing from his disease would only come about not by his wealth and power and might.
but by dipping his head into a disgusting river. We refuse to accept his grace because we either don't want it, don't think we need it, or we still want to earn it. We don't want it, don't think we need it, or we still want to earn it. In all these cases, we say God's love cannot be that easy. At Redeemer Lincoln Square, we value questions and the people who ask them, which is why we hold a time of question and response, or Q&R, after worship on Sundays.
It's an opportunity for anyone to text in questions and then process responses alongside our pastoral team and other members of our church community. If you have a question, feel free to email us at lsq at redeemer.com or join us at Q&R on a Sunday morning. And now, back to this week's sermon.
And yet again, friends, in a passage where you have the smartest people in the world and God's chosen disciples, who is the one who shows the most faith in God? Which brings us to that third example of unbelief. The man whose son is dying in his arms. He is suffering from unbelief too, but the difference is he knows it.
And while he knows so little about Jesus, he is the one who shows the most faith. And here is why. And, you know, to drive this home, I have to go back to a line from the Transfiguration passage because I want you to see how stinking cool the Bible can be and how it all just sort of... fits and flows together. Now on this mountain, we said Jesus is with Moses and Elijah, right? And Elijah represents the prophets and Moses represents the Old Testament law.
God comes down, says, this is my beloved son. And then after this happens, Elijah and Moses disappear. And Peter, James, and John can now only see Jesus. They only saw Jesus. Elijah and Moses disappeared because the law was no longer needed for righteousness. There would be no more promises to come because the Savior of the world was here. And then friends, what happens at the bottom of this mountain? The disciples are doing what?
They're prophesying, but they're relying on themselves. The scribes are reciting Moses' law to absolute perfection, but they are not willing to get their hands dirty at all. And yet this man, whose son Jesus chooses to heal, only sees Jesus in that crowd. He knew the scribes and the disciples ultimately couldn't give him what his son needed. He saw Jesus as the only viable option. Okay.
So if I ended the sermon here, I would just simply say that you need to believe in Jesus and get all that other stuff out of the way, which of course would be the right answer. But which Jesus are we talking about? And that leads us to our third point, where we look for help. Or I think maybe more accurately, we could say, who do we really think our help is? And so the question for you is this.
In the chapter immediately preceding this passage today, Jesus asks his disciples, who do the people say the Son of Man is? And they reply to him. They say, some say John the Baptist, others say Elijah, and still others, Jeremiah or one of the prophets. And so there's a lot of ideas about who Jesus is. But then Jesus gets very direct. He says, what about you?
Who do you say I am? And this is the question that I have for each and every one of you sitting here today. Who do you say Jesus is? No, really. Who do you really say he is? Because how you answer that question will change the entire trajectory of your life. Is he a great teacher? Is he a man with special powers to heal? Is he a fictional character who offers you a good moral framework?
Or is he that transfigured Jesus that we saw up on that mountain? Is he, as Simon Peter answered, the Messiah, the son of the living God, the radiance of God's glory and the exact representation of his being, sustaining all things by his powerful word? More to the point, did he take your sin and pay the price for that sin on the cross or not? And did he rise from the dead, defeating death and sin once and for all?
Because if he didn't do any of those things, we should ask for our money back and we should find something else to do on Sunday mornings. But of course we believe that he did do all of that. And look, many of you know this and you believe this. And you know this because you've studied it and you've learned about Jesus. And you speak the truth about him to others. And let me give LSQ a compliment here. You guys are very, very good about speaking the truth of Jesus to others.
But look, if we're being honest with ourselves, sometimes it isn't really real to us, right? Something is missing. You know, one of my favorite things that our Catholic brothers and sisters do before the gospel is read is that they make the sign of the cross in three places on their body. They do it on their foreheads, they do it on their lips, and they do it on their heart.
And this is, of course, asking God to keep the truth of his word and the gospel in their thoughts throughout the day, in the words that they speak to others. But more importantly, it is that the truth of Jesus live in their hearts and basically become sort of their operating system, their default mode.
for everything that they do. And you know, a lot of times the problem that we have is that we have this information in our head, just like the scribes. We recite these truths about Jesus with our lips, but we still rely on ourselves like the disciples. The real Jesus is not living in our hearts the way he should. Well, how do we find this real Jesus? Well, let's go back to this father in the passage.
Now look, this poor father, he does not have the answers. How could he? He wasn't at the transfiguration. The cross and the resurrection hadn't happened yet. But he knows something is different about Jesus. And so he does the most simple thing that he can think of. And it's something, frankly, that we are not too keen on doing ourselves. He just asks for help. He asks Jesus for help.
Yet it gets a little tense here for a minute, as Stella so wonderfully told us, that Jesus kind of pushes back and seems like he's going to kind of go at him for a minute. You know, this man explains what's happened to his son. He's had this demon since birth that's tried to kill him. And some people think in this text the son actually dies momentarily. But he just goes to Jesus and says, if you can do anything, take pity on us and help us.
which honestly I think is a pretty reasonable request given the circumstances. But Jesus is like, if, excuse me, as if to say, do you even realize who I am if? And then Jesus utters one of the most remarkable verses in Scripture, in my opinion. He says, everything is possible for those who believe.
Okay, so I want you all to cherish this verse. Make this a verse that you truly believe in and that brings you comfort. But there's another quote that says this, I can do all things with a verse out of context. Okay, so we cannot make that mistake here. Look, you have to believe that our God can do anything that you are asking him because he is God. That is what he does. But Jesus said something specific here. He said, everything is possible for those who believe.
Possible, not probable, not guaranteed. All things are still under God's dominion and sovereignty as creator and Lord of our lives. And so look, if it is according to his will, he will do it. But we can't just think that God is going to give you everything that you want, because if you've tried that, you know how soul-crushing that could be. But if you start to see Jesus as the one who paid your debt...
who is God incarnate, who is God on that mountain, who is everything that he claims to be, slowly what happens is your perspective starts to change. Then you start accepting that he is in control and you are not.
And look, let me tell you, that can be absolutely horrifying. But I can tell you, and I think other people in this room can tell you too, that the more you trust in Jesus, the more comfort you end up drawing from him, especially in the difficult moments. As strange as maybe that sounds to your ears right now. But make no mistake, you have to believe and you have to go into prayer expectantly and believe that he absolutely can do what you are asking. Because look, if not, what are we even doing?
Has that ever happened to you when you are praying for something and you realize that maybe you don't even believe that God can do what you're asking him to do? I've definitely been there. Let's be honest about that. And if we fall into this trap, it is because we are not seeing Jesus for who he really is. We are putting his truth on par with the self-help books, the motivational speakers. We are seeing him as a helper in our kingdoms. We are not seeing him as Lord of our lives.
Okay, how do we start to see him as Lord? Well, here's the verse that helps us. I do believe, help me with my unbelief. Now look, I get it. On the surface, it is a... contradictory statement. I've been trying to struggle with it all week. But a couple things to say here. Faith is not the absence of doubt. Abraham is credited, and rightly so, as a man of great faith and a man who believed and followed God that he was so willing to offer his own son as a sacrifice in Genesis 22.
Yet you know what? A lot of us forget that he doubted God so much that he had a child out of wedlock because he was impatient about God's promise to have a child of his own. We see Thomas, Jesus' own disciple, who saw everything Jesus did, doubt Jesus' resurrection. And so he could see and touch the wounds for himself. And we see in many, many psalms, King David crying out in moments of doubt, fear, and feeling abandoned by the God that he loves. All of these men had doubts.
Yet God was faithful to them all. And you know, the problem that we have is a lot of us keep saying, God, if you just show me something, give me a sign, a miracle, then it will all make sense. The dots will connect. Then I will believe. No, you actually won't. Look at all the miracles that Jesus had done up until this point. The disciples saw it all, and they still didn't understand who Jesus was. Yet what this poor father shows us is that faith is not about ability, but it is about humility.
And as long as we are human beings on this earth, we are going to struggle with unbelief. Yet the beauty of this passage is that it shows us that at any time, we can go to him just like this father. He tried it the disciples way. He tried it the scribes way. This father didn't have money or status or prestige or influence. He didn't even have an eloquent prayer. He only had two things. He had a need and a savior standing in front of him.
And we can go to God in the exact same way. Now, if you're exploring Christianity today or you're not sure if Jesus is real to you, and this is something I tell my students all the time, this is an amazing first prayer to offer up. And what I hope you see in it is that it can be so simple. God does not want a big production. He doesn't want you to rely on yourself or the beauty of your words, especially in the beginning. He's not evaluating your performance because he knows your heart.
But what about for the Christian? You believe in who Jesus is and who he says he is. But do you live your life as if he is the Messiah, the resurrected Son of God, in all aspects of your life? Or could you too ask Jesus to help with your unbelief too? And how you answer that question is by asking yourself, do you trust Jesus with your life, with everything in your life, with your family, with your health, with your bank account? And if you don't, why?
Why is Jesus not trustworthy to handle that? What is the thing that you have in place of Jesus in that area of your life? Why won't you trust him? Just look for a second at the people in your life that you trust. Maybe you're sitting next to them now.
Why do you trust the people that you do? Probably because they know you, they accept you, and you would say they're people of good character. And the people you don't trust, well, they're people who don't know you, who maybe have hurt you or done bad things or are not people of good character.
All right, well, how does Jesus stack up to that sort of criteria? Does Jesus know you? He created you and he loved you into existence as God. Is he trustworthy? He went to the cross to die for your sins. I would say that makes him pretty trustworthy. And is he a person of good character? Jesus Christ is the only perfect person who ever lived, and he lived that way so that you and I don't have to. That is the object of our hope as Christians. That is the real Jesus.
Okay, so how do we respond to this? Let's just sneak back to verse 19 for a moment. So simple, we almost miss it. After Jesus rebukes these disciples and the scribes, he just says, enough, bring this boy to me. So friends, go to him like a sick, broken child in need of healing, like a father who is at his wits end, desperate to save his son. Go to him with all the brokenness within you and say, Lord, I can't, but you can.
Go to him with humility. Put aside your pride. Put away whatever you think you know about what God can do. Believe the Apostle Paul when he says his grace is sufficient for you. His power is made perfect in your weakness. In your weakness, not your strength. For when you are weak, Jesus Christ will become strong in your life.
And that is what this father discovers in this passage. You know, if you've been around Redeemer, Tim used to say this all the time, and so do many of the other pastors, it is not the strength of your faith, but the object of your faith that counts.
And I think we made a pretty good case for what the object of our faith is. But if your faith is weak, that is okay too, because the object of our faith does not need a lot from us. And to demonstrate that, I'm going to do something that most Presbyterian ministers would never do. And that is use a little prop here. This is a really special thing to me. It's a key chain that my mom got me. And what's inside of it is a single mustard seed. Okay, and this mustard seed...
If you're not familiar with the passage, it comes from Matthew 13. And what this reminds me is, is that whatever I think or whatever I'm believing in that day, that I believe in something that can provide me so much more. Let me read you this passage as we prepare to close.
The kingdom of heaven is like a mustard seed, which a man took and planted in his field. Though it is the smallest of seeds, yet when it grows, it is the largest of garden plants and becomes a tree, so that the birds come and perch in its branches. The journey of a thousand miles, my friends, starts with a single step. And I don't know what your story is or what your barriers are to belief, but I'd be willing to bet my life that if you take that step, God will be there to meet you. Let's pray.
Father, thank you for being a God who allows us to come to you with our weakness and with our doubt. Thank you for not holding us to a ridiculous standard because your son Jesus, we leave today. We ask that you help us all with our unbelief too.
Help us not to look to others for what only you can give us. And help us know and see you for who you really are, because that is more than enough. Lord, bless all of us as we leave today and let this word penetrate our hearts. We pray all this in Jesus' name. Amen. We pray that it's a helpful resource as you process aspects of Christianity and grow in your faith. To learn more about our church, including details about Sunday worship,