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About Jesus Steve Sweetman This Section - Chapter 9 ch. 9:2-13 ch. 9:14-32 ch. 9:33-41 ch. 9:42-50
The
Transfiguration (ch.9:2-13) In
verse 2 we see Jesus take Peter, James and John up into a high mountain.
Peter, James and John seem to be the inner circle of the Twelve.
There’s three recorded incidents in the New Testament where Jesus
does something special with these three men.
When
up on the mountain, Jesus is transfigured.
What this appears to mean is that Jesus’ body is changed to be in
what appears to be a vision. Along
with Jesus is Elijah and Moses. It’s
not that Elijah and Moses returned from the dead.
They appeared in a vision and this is why Jesus was transfigured.
His normal earthly body had to change to match Elijah and Moses in
this vision. In
verse 4 we note that all three men were talking with each other.
It would have been very interesting to know what they were talking
about. We don’t know.
We can only guess. It
is quite possible that Peter, James and John did not hear what they were
saying, but only saw that they were talking. In
verse 6 we see that the three apostles were frightened.
Of course this is to be expected.
Peter once again is the spokesman for the three men and so being
afraid, and with not knowing what to say, he suggests that they build
three monuments on the spot, one for each man.
This would have been something that Old Testament people might have
done. They would have built a
memorial to worship at. Building
a memorial, a human structure, especially when we don’t know what else
to do is typical for man. W
e still do it today. We
build all orts of buildings and structures to worship or to have a place
for worship. This is the trend
of mankind, not necessarily the will of God.
This is also Old Testament thinking and not New Testament thinking.
Concerning
the shelters, or the memorials, that Peter wanted to build, we should
understand that such a thing was culturally acceptable in Jewish circles
throughout the Old Testament. When
men with the Lord, or had a heavenly vision, or, any other such things,
they built altars of worship and memorials. I say that to say this.
We should not think down on Peter for what he said here.
He was only following in the tradition of Israel. In
verse 8 we see a cloud that
envelops everyone at this point. A
voice came from God the Father that
said, “this is my beloved Son, hear Him”.
This is much like the experience at Jesus’ baptism where God the
Father spoke as a witness to His Son. The
obvious question is, “what did this all mean”?
I believe that Elijah represents the Old Testament prophet since he
was one. I also believe that
Moses represents the Law since God gave Israel
the Law through Moses. Both
the Law and the prophets gave God’s will to Israel. Even though In
verse 9 and 10 we see Jesus telling the three men not to tell anyone what
they had seen. I’m not sure
that they really understood this enough to start telling others anyways.
But the mere mention of what had happened, along with any kind of
true understanding of this would have landed these three men in prison
most likely. The idea that
Jesus replaces the Law and the prophets would have been blasphemy to the
Jewish leadership. Jesus
told them not to say anything until He rose from the dead and so they did
well to keep this secret. I
only imagine that Peter wanted to tell people.
As
they walked down the mountain they discussed what “rising from the
dead” meant. It appears that
they needed further explanation. We
saw in the last chapter that Jesus told them about it, so it is clear they
didn’t understand if they needed to discuss it further at this point. In
verse 11 we see that the disciples ask Jesus why the teachers of the Law
say that “Elijah must come first”.
We’ve mentioned this before.
The Jewish leadership believed that before the Messiah
came to earth, Elijah would first return from the dead to prepare
the way for the Messiah. Part
of the thinking of the Jewish leadership concerning Elijah coming was that
he’d “restore all things”.
So when Jesus answers this question, He in fact agrees with the
Jewish leaders by saying that “Elijah does
come first and restores all things”.
Yet even though Jesus agrees with the Jews in this statement, Jesus
differs in the understanding of this statement.
In
verse 12 Jesus asks the three men why the Scriptures say that the Messiah
must suffer and be rejected. This is the preface to Jesus’ understanding
of the Elijah issue and the coming of the Messiah.
Jesus is saying that the Scriptures teach that when the Messiah
comes, He won’t come as king. He
will come as a suffering servant, to redeem mankind by his death. This
section ends by Jesus stating very clearly that Elijah has come and the
Jewish leaders have done with him what they wanted.
It’s not recorded here but we know that John the Baptist came in
the spirit of Elijah to prepare the way for Jesus.
The restoring of all things then is interpreted to be the restoring
of the hearts of the individual Jew to make each and every heart ready to
receive the suffering Messiah when He came.
The
Healing Of A Boy With An Evil Spirit (ch.9:14-32) In
verses 13 and 14 we see that Jesus, along with Peter, James and John
returns to the other disciples and finds a big crowd.
Among the crowd were teachers of the Law that were arguing with the
other disciples. That might
not have been much of a debate. The
disciples might have been arguing from the emotion of their hearts wile
the teachers of the Law argued from an intellectual approach. The teachers
of the Law were very learned men, while the disciples were most likely not
so educated. While
the teachers of the Law were trying to argue with some disciples, in verse
15 the crowd saw Jesus coming and were overwhelmed and so they ran to
them, leaving the teachers behind. The
mere presence of Jesus ends the argument and the teachers are left behind.
In
verse 16 Jesus asks what the argument was all about.
One man in the crowd replied by telling Jesus that he had brought
his son who was possessed by a demon here to be healed.
The man explained that the demon caused the boy not to speak, made
him foam at the mouth, threw him to the ground and made him rigid.
Once again we see the power of demons. So
by this man’s explanation we can safely say that the argument had
something to do with casting demons out of people.
Since
Jesus was not there but with Peter, James and John, this man asked the
other disciples to cast out the demon.
Many scholars believe the other disciples were the other 9
apostles, which is most likely the case. Jesus separated Himself, along
with Peter, James and John from the Twelve and went up the mountain. The
question now arises, “why couldn’t these other 9 apostles cast the
demon out, especially if they had such power on other occasions when Jesus
sent them out two by two to preach? In
verse 19 Jesus expresses his displeasure, disappointment and further
frustration by saying, “O unbelieving generation.
How long shall I stay with you?
How long shall I put up with you”?
The
word “generation” is a general word.
It applies generally to all people who lived in those days.
The generation at large were an unbelieving, untrusting group of
people. Jesus was upset with
all these people. Jesus
asks, “how long will I stay with you’?
He knew that He wouldn’t stay too much longer.
He also asks, “how long shall I put up with you”?
The answer is, “not long”. One
thing we should note is that though Jesus was upset with His generation as
a whole, it was not this generation who could not cast this demon out of
the boy. It was these 9
disciples that failed in their attempt.
What Jesus appears to be doing is lumping these 9 apostles in with
the rest of the crowd, with the rest of the faithless generation.
If this is so, we see one of the biggest problems that the Twelve
had was a failure to really put their full trust in Jesus. In
verse 20, after the demon saw Jesus he threw the boy to the ground causing
him to convulse and foam at the mouth.
Just at the very presence of Jesus demons automatically react.
No words need to be said, only His presence is enough to scare a
demon. In
verses 21 and 22 Jesus asks the father how long the boy has been so
distressed. We learn that from
an early age the demon was trying to kill the boy by either fire or water.
Thus we see the end result of any demon’s activity and that is to kill
and destroy. They merely take
after their leader satan whom Jesus says in John 10 has come to kill and
destroy. The
father begs Jesus to have
mercy. He says, “if you can do anything, take pity on us”.
Jesus responds by saying in verse 23, “if you can, everything is
possible for him who believes”.
The
words “if you can” places the emphasis back on to the father.
It is clear that Jesus can cast the demon out.
The question is, “does this man believe that Jesus can cast the
demon out”? This is why
Jesus puts the question back to the father.
The
words “everything is possible for him who believes” has generated lots
of discussion and is the basis for the Prosperity Teaching.
The question should be asked, “does everything actually mean
everything, or is there certain qualifications to everything”?
If
you take Jesus’ words simply as they stand here without understanding
anything else He says, then everything would mean everything.
There’s no exceptions. Faith
can produce everything we ask for. But
this form of reasoning is bad Biblical interpretation.
It’s bad hermeneutics. We
never take one phrase or sentence that someone might say or write and
conclude this is the extent of what the person believes and understands
about a subject. We need to
hear everything a person says about a certain subject, not just one
phrase. In this case Jesus
says a lot about this subject, and one thing is clear and that is our
trust is in Jesus and that trust needs to be exercised according to what
Jesus wants, not according to what we want.
His will is the issue, not ours.
So in my thinking “everything” means “everything that is
according to the will of Jesus”. In
verse 24 the boy’s father “exclaimed”, (in the Greek means “cried
out”), “I believe, help me overcome my unbelief”.
This man is not any different than the rest of us who have a
measure of faith. We do trust
Jesus, but we’ve got more to trust Him with.
When we first come to Jesus and give our lives to Him, we actually
only tell Him that we are His. Each
and every day after first coming to Jesus we learn how to give more of
ourselves to Him. Giving of
one’s self to Jesus is what trust or faith is all about. In
verses 25 to 28, after seeing the crowd rushing over to Him, Jesus casts
the demon out of the boy and as usual, upon leaving the boy the demon puts
up a big fuss. He makes the
boy convulse to such a degree that once he leaves, the boy looks like he
is dead. Jesus then helps the
boy up onto his feet. The
disciples saw what Jesus had done, and after they had gone indoors with
Jesus, away from the crowd, they ask him why they couldn’t cast this
demon out of this boy. Of
course this is a natural question. They
couldn’t do what Jesus effortlessly did. In
verse 29 Jesus answers the disciples question by saying that “this kind
can only come out by prayer”. Some
manuscripts add the word “fasting”.
Still, prayer is the important issue here.
When Jesus says “this kind”, He’s saying that there are
different kinds of demons. It
is evident throughout Scripture that not all demons have the same
authority or strength. Some
demons have more authority than others, and it seems like this demon was
one with a higher authority and therefore was harder to cast out. At least
it was harder for the disciples, not for Jesus.
This tells us that what is easy for Jesus is not necessarily easy
for us and thus it is clear that we can’t do all that Jesus did. Prayer,
and possible fasting is required to cast certain demons out of people.
This is something that these 9 men had not done, and really
couldn’t prior to Pentecost. In
verse 30 we see that Jesus and the disciples were passing through Once
again we see what Jesus wanted to tell His followers in verse 31.
He tells them again that He will be delivered into the
hands of men and killed but will rise from the dead in three days.
It is clear that these things are weighing heavily on Jesus’ heart and
mind. This is not the first
time in the last short period of time that He has told His disciples this.
Yet
in verse 32 as elsewhere the disciples just didn’t understand what Jesus
was telling them. Peter had
already tried to rebuke Jesus for such words and failed, so there wasn’t
any use trying that again. So
Mark tells us that the disciples were simply silent. Who
Is The Greatest (ch. 9:33-41) In
verse 33 we see that Jesus and the Twelve return back to Apparently
the Twelve were arguing on the road to Capernaum
so Jesus asked them what they were arguing about.
They did not respond to Jesus but remained silent. Maybe their
silence was based on embarrassment due to what they were arguing about. We’ve
noticed on a few occasions of late that the Twelve did not respond to some
of Jesus’ questions or comment. They
simply remained silent. They
might well have been too
afraid to respond. At times
Jesus was somewhat upset with their responses so choosing to be silent
might have been better than saying something. In
verse 35 Jesus sits down with the Twelve and starts teaching them
concerning the things they were arguing over, because all along Jesus knew
what they’d been discussing on the road to Capernaum.
Jesus
says, “if anyone wants to be first, he must be the very last, and
servant of all”. The use of
the words “very last” emphasis the point that Jesus doesn’t mean
somewhere near the last, or end of the line, but the very last person in
the line. The worldly concept
of being first is important to those in the world.
To be first one must promote himself over and above everyone else,
so they are first in the line. This
is not the case in the In
verse 36 we see Jesus taking a little child and using him as an
illustration. Obviously
someone’s children must have been in the home at that time.
This would normally be the case because homes in those days would
have been occupied by an extended family, not just one nuclear family. Jesus
then says that anyone who welcomes one of these little children welcomes
me and he who welcomes me, welcomes my Father.
Especially back in those days, women and children were not as
important as men. If one
wanted to be seen as important they’d be seen with important men, not
unimportant children. But Jesus is saying that if anyone receives a child
and thinks of him as important, then you’ll be welcomed by me.
Once again Jesus is emphasizing
the importance of true humility.
Whoever
Is Not Against Us Is For Us (ch. 9:38-40) In
verse 38 we see the sectarian and exclusive nature of humanity coming out
of the Twelve. They were quite
taken back by someone else casting a demon out of someone who weren’t
part of their group. The same
mentality shows up frequently among Christians today. The
amazing thing here is that someone who Jesus hadn’t given the authority
to cast demons out of people was actually doing it.
One might say that this man might have been attempting to cast
demons out of someone, but the text seems to imply that he actually did.
Just why and how this happened is somewhat of a mystery to me,
although the general consensus is the man’s faith caused this to happen,
even though Jesus didn’t specifically authorize this as He had with the
Twelve. In
verse 39 Jesus responds by saying that
no one doing a miracle in my name can say anything bad about me.
The important words are “in my name”.
“In my name” means, “by the authority of”, that is Jesus
has given us authority to represent Him.
If He has really given us the authority to represent Him, then a
miracle that we may do is because He has given us the power.
If this is so, we certainly wouldn’t say anything bad about Him.
If we did say something bad, then we’d fail to do it in His name.
In
verse 40 Jesus says that “anyone who is not against
us is for us”. That’s
pretty simple. They’ve
certainly experienced those who were against Jesus.
Jesus
closes this section by saying that if anyone gives you a cup of water in
my name because you follow me he will not lose his reward.
A few things are learnt here. One
thing is that we will receive rewards for doing things as Jesus’
representatives. If we do the
job that Jesus gives us to do in the way He wants, we will receive a
reward, even if that job is something as small as giving someone a cup of
water. Once again Jesus majors
on something that the world would call insignificant.
The Pharisees liked doing the big things and doing them in public
for all to see. Jesus says
that if you quietly give someone a cup of water, you’ll receive a
reward. Another
thing to note is that the cup of water given must be given in “Jesus”
name. Many people do nice
things for others but they are not done in the name of Jesus or as
Jesus’ representatives. As
Paul speaks about these things in Romans 14, anything done outside of
faith is sin and will not be rewarded for.
A
study of the end of this age
and the coming White Throne Judgment shows us that Christians are not
saved by works, but once saved by faith, they will be rewarded for their
works that are truly done in the name of Jesus by faith.
In
verse 42 we see how Jesus feels about people causing other people to sin.
He uses a little child in His analogy again, probably because
they’re seen as not real important by the men of that generation.
If anyone causes a little child to sin, it would be better for him
to drown in the sea. There’s no room for anything better for this man,
other than death. I
really don’t think Jesus is simply speaking about causing a child to
sin. The child is the analogy.
The child is seen as unimportant.
So if you case a child to sin and you should die for that, what
should happen if you cause an adult to sin?
This
mentality follows the thinking of Jesus that we must be servants to all.
If you serve others in the name of Jesus, as His representative,
then you will not cause them to sin. Causing
someone to sin can be something as simple as women not dressing
appropriately in front of men. Or
it can be as simple as irritating someone that causes them to respond
negatively to you. In
verse 43 Jesus says a pretty drastic statement.
He says that if your hand is causing you to sin, you should cut it
off, because it’s better to go into life with one hand than into hell
with two hands. I
believe Jesus is speaking here from the Old Testament perspective that He
lived in. This kind of
thinking is something that could be seen in the Law, an eye for an eye.
The Law set forth drastic penalties.
It often said that someone should die when found committing any
sin, many of which we’d consider pretty small sins. Jesus
is also trying to make a point here and by over-emphasizing it hopes to
get the point across to the Twelve. He’s basically saying “do whatever
is necessary to stop sinning, even if it seems drastic”.
We
see Jesus saying in verse 44 that the “fire never goes out” in hell,
or what Revelation calls the Lake
of In
verse 47 we see that Jesus says it is better to enter “the Verse
48 is Hebrew poetry and describes the place of Eternal Judgment, that
Jesus must agree to or else He would not be using these words.
Jesus says “their worms do not die, and the fire is not
quenched”. The word
“‘worms” refer to
maggots that eat the sinner from within, while the fire burns him from
without. This is how Jesus
views the place of Eternal Judgment. Verses
49 and 50 have been debated over the years.
Jesus says that “everyone needs to be salted with fire”.
Salt is what preserves food and makes it tasty.
So Jesus has in mind preserving His followers and making them what
Paul would call a “sweet smell” before the Lord.
The fire might well refer to the Holy Spirit and His work in our
lives. We need to be sprinkled with the effective salt of the Holy Spirit
to be preserved for God’s future Kingdom on earth.
To
paraphrase verse 50 is to say that if salt loses its saltiness, then
it’s no good. So make sure
the salt of the Holy Spirit stays fresh and effective in your life.
This will bring about peace with one another, and peace with one
another comes back to the beginning of this chapter where the Twelve were
arguing with each other.
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