And lo, a man from the crowd cried out saying, Teacher, I beseech thee look upon my son, for he is mine only child
Jesus has just come down from the mountain where His glory was shown. A crowd meets Him, and one voice rises above the rest: a father pleading for his only son. Those few words hold the whole contrast between the glory above and the misery below.
The Lord does not stay where the glory is. One writer lists what met Him below:
In what follows we find the Lord coming down into the crowd of this world, not remaining on the mountain. We may listen and enjoy, but we have to come down and pass through this world. The Lord comes down and meets three things — a crowd of men, Satan's power, and the disciples' unbelief. There was no seclusion here for Him, but He comes to a crowd. What a picture of distress this is! The son of one, possessed with a demon; and the father's heart racked more than the son's body.
The mountain showed glory. The plain shows the world as it is:
These sorrows of the plain come out in the pitiful case of the man who begs the Lord to look upon his only son. The father's heart racked with distress, his son's body torn by the devil, the crowd unconcerned, and the disciples of the Lord helpless! What a picture is this of the world in which we are! A needy but callous world around us, the devil against us, and the flesh within us. Yet, like the disciples, we have the Lord with us in all His grace, and the Lord with His coming glory before us. It is as if He said, "I have shown you on the mountain the glory to which I will bring you; I will now show you in the plain the grace that can keep you every step of the journey on the way to the glory."
The father does not just say "my son." That word "only" has appeared twice before in Luke:
A pitiable case! an earnest appeal — "my only child!" The widow of Nain had her only son raised up (7:12). Jairus had his only daughter brought back to life (8:42). Now this afflicted father makes a moving plea for his only child, whose case had until then been thought hopeless. Even the disciples could not heal him by casting out the demon. The father's appeal was not rejected. "Bring your son here," were the words of encouragement to the parent.
The father had already brought his son to the disciples. Their failure, not the demon, is the hardest part of the scene.
It was a picture, indeed, of Israel and we may say of man. Such was the power of the demon over him. The most distressing fact was that the disciples were quite unable to meet the case. They were men of God. They were His most honoured servants, already sent out with power and authority by the Lord Jesus, as we saw at the beginning of this chapter. Yet they could not cope with this aggravated form of demon possession.
They had the authority. Something else was missing:
It was for want, not of power but of faith, that they could not cast the spirit out. Faith always supposes two things. First, a sense of the weight and yoke of evil that presses on man. Second, confidence in God as always superior to evil in His gracious power and supreme. There may be failure, but never final defeat where room is left for God to come in, and the heart holds to the certainty that His glory is bound up in the matter. The lack of this was what grieved the Lord Jesus; their inability came from a lack of faith and of self-judgment.
One writer names the state of soul that such faith grows in:
Prayer is the expression, in confidence in God, of a sense of complete dependence. Fasting will mean that separated state which refuses lawful things and lawful enjoyments, so that we may be more entirely devoted to the Lord's service. It may sometimes include going without food, but to limit it to that is to miss its main point. A fasting soul is one so filled with the richness of heavenly joys that it rises above the pleasures of earth and does not depend on them. Whether in the Lord's service or in deep personal need, faith is what brings in divine power for help and deliverance. Faith looks past every difficulty and obstacle and takes hold of the arm of Almighty God.
- Descent. The Lord does not stay on the mountain. He comes down into the crowd and meets distress, Satan's power, and His own disciples' unbelief.
- Cry. One father's plea rises out of the crowd, and his own heart suffers more than his son's body.
- Only. "My only child" is Luke's third such case, after the widow of Nain's only son and Jairus' only daughter, and the Lord answers each one.
- Failure. The Lord had already given those men power and authority. What they lacked was faith and self-judgment, not equipment.
- Supply. The mountain showed the glory He will bring us to; the plain shows the grace that keeps us the whole way there.
and behold, a spirit takes him, and suddenly he cries out, and it tears him with foaming, and with difficulty departs from him after crushing him.
The day after three disciples saw His glory on the mountain, Jesus walks into a crowd. A father is describing what a spirit does to his only son. His words raise two questions. What does this suffering tell us about the world we live in? And why could the disciples, who already had authority over demons, do nothing?
The scene at the top of the hill and the scene at the bottom could not be more different.
How great the contrast when the next day they came down from the hill! Above, all had been glory, the power and glory of Christ, and with it order and peace. Below, all was under the power of Satan, with disorder and distraction. A child held by an especially vicious demon put the nine disciples at the foot of the hill to the test, and they failed. Jesus acted at once to free the child. The majestic power He showed among the disorders at the foot of the hill matched the glory shown on its top the day before.
Each phrase of the father's account names a separate act of cruelty.
This case brings out how cruel and vicious the demon was. He attacked the boy without warning, so that the boy cried out in terror. He convulsed him inside until he foamed at the mouth, and crushed him on the outside when, it seems, he was about to leave the boy for a time (vs.38-39). It looks like a case where the demon could come in and go out at his own will.
Some have argued the boy was only mentally ill, and that Jesus played along with the family's belief. The wording in Matthew, Mark and Luke says otherwise.
Some have argued that the people said to be possessed were really mentally ill, and only imagined they were possessed... But this is just an attempt to deny the power of Satan and his agents over man, and also God's power in the miracles... Scripture names the mentally ill alongside those possessed by demons, and treats the two as different. Matt. 4:24. It is true that in Matt. 17:14-16 the father of a boy possessed by a demon called him mentally ill, and said the disciples could not cure him. But in Mark 9:17 he said his son had a mute spirit, and in Luke 9:39 "a spirit seizes him." This was a case of possession: the Lord rebuked the demon, and it left him.
The boy had suffered like this since childhood. One writer reads that detail as a picture of the whole human race.
This is an all too accurate picture of our race, which fell into Satan's hands in its infancy — in the days of the garden of Eden... The suffering child was in constant danger of his life. His father said that the unclean spirit inside him had often thrown him into fire and into water to destroy him. In the same way, every sinner who has not been delivered is in danger — not only of disaster in this life, but of eternal destruction.
The suffering did not stop with the child. Christ steps down from the mountain straight into it.
The Lord comes down and meets three things — a throng of men, Satan's power, and the disciples' unbelief. What a picture of distress this is! One man's son was held by a demon (v. 39), and the father's heart was torn more than the son's body. The world will weep till they are tired of weeping, and then go on with the same thing again.
The disciples had already tried and failed. The reason lay in them, not in Christ.
They could not cast the spirit out for want of faith, not for want of power. Faith always assumes two things. First, a sense of the weight and yoke of evil that presses on man. Second, confidence in God, who in His gracious power is always supreme over evil. There may be failure, but never final defeat where there is still room for God to come in. Their inability was due to a lack of faith and of self-judgment.
Another writer points to the disciples' own hearts, and to two things missing from their practice.
Why could they not deal with it? Because the spirit of their own greatness and importance was working in them! The only power that could deal with the matter came by prayer and fasting, and these were missing... prayer brings God in, and fasting keeps the world out. Faced with the weakness and helplessness of the disciples, Christ speaks the word and routs the enemy.
- The grip. The spirit seized the boy without warning, convulsed him, and crushed him as it left. It came and went at its own will.
- The picture. A bondage that began in childhood pictures our race, which fell into Satan's hands in its infancy. Everyone not yet delivered is still in danger.
- The powerlessness. The disciples already had authority, yet they stood helpless. Christ did not lack power; they lacked faith and self-judgment.
- The presence. Christ came down from the mountain into the crowd. He met Satan's power and His disciples' unbelief, spoke a word, and routed the enemy.
- The proof. The power He showed among the disorders at the foot of the hill matched the glory shown on its top the day before.
And I besought thy disciples that they might cast him out, and they could not.
Jesus comes down from the mountain where His glory had just shone. He walks straight into a crowd, a desperate father, and a boy held by a demon. The father's complaint is not against Jesus but against His followers. These were men already sent out with authority. Why did real power sit unused in the hands of real believers?
Where this scene stands matters. The bright vision on the mountain sits right beside the misery at its foot.
The next scene throws us straight into the world as it really is. We feel it all the more sharply because of the bright vision of the coming age on the mountain of the transfiguration... Such was the power of the demon over him. Worst of all, the disciples were completely unable to meet the case. They were men of God. They were His most honoured servants. The Lord Jesus had already sent them out with power and authority, as we saw at the start of this chapter. Yet they could not cope with this severe form of demon possession.
The disciples were not short of power. They were short of the faith that lays hold of it. That failure is a second form of unbelief — unbelief inside a believer.
Here we see another form of man's unbelief, the unbelief of the believer himself. He cannot use the power that is, so to speak, at his disposal in the Lord... The disciples should have used this power. They ought to have known how to take hold, by faith, of what Jesus had shown on earth. But they were not able to do it. Yet what good was it to bring this power down here, if the disciples had no faith to use it?
If faith was the missing thing, what does faith hold? One writer names two parts, and both must be present.
They could not cast the spirit out for lack of faith, not for lack of power. Faith always involves two things. One is a sense of the weight and yoke of the evil that presses on man. The other is confidence in God, who in His gracious power is always above evil and supreme. There may be failure, but never final defeat. That is true wherever we leave room for God to come in, and the heart holds to the certainty that His glory is bound up in the matter.
The disciples' failure could have ended the father's hope. Instead it drove him one step further.
The distressed father did not despair. He turned from the failing disciples to the One who never fails. How humbling, when believers dishonour their Lord like this! ... Did He not give the twelve apostles, and more than the twelve, authority over the unclean spirits? How was it, then, that these put shame on His name by failing to draw on Him?
Another writer sets the father beside the twelve.
There was more faith in the man who brought his child than in them, for his sense of need drove him to the remedy.
Not all evil spirits are alike, and this one asked for more than the disciples brought.
There are differences among the evil spirits, and the kind in question yielded only to prayer and fasting. That lack was grievous in the Lord's eyes.
So what do prayer and fasting mean in practice?
Prayer is the expression of complete dependence on God. Fasting means the absolute refusal of ourselves and all human gratifications. In practice we set the natural man completely aside, and walk in simple dependence on God alone. This will mean death to myself as a man here in every way.
The Lord's grief went past this one case. One writer sees the same failure reaching far beyond that day.
It grieves the Lord deeply. The disciples had faith, but that faith lay asleep in the face of difficulties. It barely knew how to draw on the power of Christ on the one hand for the deep distress of man on the other... This is the very thing that will ruin Christendom. It was also the ground on which the Lord closed all His dealings with His ancient people, Israel.
- Power given. The Lord had already sent the disciples out with authority over unclean spirits. He took nothing back.
- Power unused. Their failure was not a shortage of power but an inability to draw on it — unbelief in believers, not in the world.
- Faith defined. Faith feels the full weight of the evil and still counts on God as greater. Leave room for God, and there may be failure but never final defeat.
- Condition restored. Prayer owns our dependence and fasting sets self aside. That is the state in which the power works.
- Stakes named. Sleeping faith in those who bear His name shames Him. On that same ground the Lord closed His dealings with His ancient people.