Does anybody know who this man is? If you do keep it to yourself!
Well some of you probably have supported this man’s descendants and shareholders a good part of your lives, you might even take pride in driving a car that he gave his name to or have had one at some stage. Your average petrol head will tell you that they are the only real completion to Holden. That’s right FORD, Henry Ford. No it doesn’t stand for Fix Or Repair Daily, the cars were named after this man.
The thing I like about Henry Ford apart from his indirect involvement in my first car, a red 1967 Anglia 105e with 997cc of extreme power; is that he came up with a few sayings that are worth remembering one of them being, “Whether you think that you can, or that you can’t, you are usually right.”
The reason that I’ve picked on Henry Ford’s saying is that I was thinking about something that the disciples of Jesus got stuck on and this something was a matter of faith, and they didn’t have the faith to achieve something. This was tied up with their understanding of who Jesus was and how they were to allow the power of God to work in their lives. This is about one of my favorite faith topics which is spiritual healing.
The story starts as three of the disciples Peter, James and John along with Jesus had been up on a mountain and had an amazing experience where Jesus face shone like the sun, and his clothes became as white as the light and if that wasn’t enough, wait there’s more! Moses and Elijah had appeared and talked with Jesus and a cloud had enveloped them all, they had heard the voice of God saying “This is my Son, whom I love; with him I am well pleased. Listen to him!”
This is what happened next! Read Matthew 17: 14-21.
There is a distinct difference between this account of the disciple’s lack of faith and another account of their active ministry in the book of Acts which gives us an understanding of what happened in the early church, let’s have a look at this record of what happened, Acts 5:12-16.
So what was it that happened between Jesus coming down from the mountain and giving his crew of disciples a blast about their lack of faith, and this time of miraculous signs and wonders?
As we look into Jesus words from the passage in Matthew, that first reading we see a couple of things:
1)The disciples at that time lacked faith, so what is faith? Well the definition I found in “EASTONS Bible dictionary” was pretty long winded, so I cut it down to this ‘that as we understand God’s word, we can come into a relationship with God because Jesus made this possible, we repent of our sins and we understand and experience the person of God’s Holy Spirit (his power) at work in our lives, we experience freedom from sin and we live lives that are in God’s will.’
So the disciples missed the point and they had Jesus with them, what was the problem, why so little faith? I think the answer comes in verses 22 and 23, let’s look at those verses; “When they came together in Galilee, he said to them, “The Son of Man is going to be betrayed into the hands of men. They will kill him, and on the third day he will be raised to life.” Now there’s cause for celebration Jesus tells the disciples ‘they’re going to kill me but hey hang loose, get ready guys here’s an ending to top all endings, I’m one up on them! I’m going to be raised from the dead!’
On hearing that you’d think it was time to let loose and rejoice, even party and “the disciples were filled with grief.”
What they had was a totally human response, because they lacked faith it would be like me saying “I’m going to get my old ford Anglia up to the ton, for the younger ones here that’s 100 miles an hour, crash it into a brick wall, but don’t worry I’ll walk away uninjured.” Impossible and not just because my old car could not do the ton, the laws of nature and physics tell us I’d be injured if not killed. The disciples bless them had seen Jesus miracles but had never seen anyone killed and live again, while they had seen Jesus raise people from the dead, walk on water, heal…but they still lacked faith.
So it was over to Jesus and he did what he said he would do, the demon cast out, the boy was healed. Still at this stage even after this most recent of miracles, the disciples were filled with grief due to their lack of faith.
2) The other thing that at this stage the disciples were a bit lacking in was discipled prayer and disciplined living. Jesus tells them something that points this out this in verse twenty-one which many of you may not have in your bibles and also in Marks account of this event. I’m going to read from the King James Version; one of the few times you will hear me reading it aloud; “How be it, this kind goeth not out but by the power of prayer and fasting.” (Matthew 17:21 KJV) Did you all understand that?
That is why I use a modern translation ‘yeah verily’. Or ‘the person who casts out this type of demon will have to have prayed and fasted to ensure it is cast out, it takes a spiritually disciple person to cast this demon out’ and at this stage the disciples were not spiritually disciplined.
But something changed so that the account of the book of Acts happened. God was to do awesome things – and then miraculous things through these men, let’s have another look at Acts 5:16 “Crowds gathered also from the towns of Jerusalem, bringing their sick and those tormented by evil spirits, and all of them were healed.”
What happened was that these ordinary blokes, fishermen, rebels, tax collectors and the like - these now holy saints saw something and they experienced something that broke their doubt and ensured their smallest seed of faith, something that was to alter the paths of countless lives. Something occurred that broke their understanding their own abilities and introduced to an understanding of what God could do through them.
3) They saw Jesus physically broken, killed, gruesomely killed and laid in a tomb, they wept and mourned, they hid themselves away for fear of what the powerful people who killed Jesus might do to them. (Slowly) Then behind closed doors, tucked away from sight, grieving Jesus loss – something amazing occurred. Jesus stood among them and said “peace be with you”, he showed them the damage the authorities had done, and he said “Peace be with you! As the Father has sent me I am sending you” (John 20:21). He breathed on them and said, “Receive the Holy Spirit. If you forgive anyone his sins, they are forgiven; if you do not forgive them they are not forgiven” (John 20:22).
Jesus gave the disciples his authority, God’, God with them through the person of the Holy Spirit and the authority to forgive sins.
Then there was more!
At the festival of Pentecost, 50 days after Jesus appearing to the disciples came a violent wind from heaven, the Spirit of God came upon them and they knew the power of God at work in their lives. The power of God was working through these once scared men. Did they have faith, were they to become disciplined prayers, disciplined disciples? Yes!
So how does that relate to us?
Do you struggle day to day with anything? Do you face an uphill walk both directions in your journey? Do you wonder if God is there, if He cares, if He is at all interested in you?
I know people who have convinced themselves of their lack of worth, because of something that happened to them, because of something that they themselves did.
At this time in history spiritual damage is rampant, lack of faith and unbelief holds people back from living fulfilling lives. The two readings we have looked at today point to one thing and that is this, The Power of God overcomes! Jesus defeated the demon, later his disciples did the same because the Spirit of God was with them. Having confessed Jesus as saviour and with the power of the Holy Spirit at work in our lives we have authority over spiritual authority.
Jesus gave his disciples the power to forgive sins, what is it that spiritually binds people, what is it that convinces people of their lack of worth, sin!
Jesus has the power over sin and death and he gave that authority to us, some may say “But when I was such and such age I did so and so, I’m suffering bad karma!”
If it’s alright for the only born Son of God to die for you on the cross, it’s alright to live in the forgiveness that he died for. We believe that the Lord Jesus Christ has by His suffering and death made atonement for the whole world so that whosoever will may be saved.
The power of Christ overcomes (SBI). Living in that forgiveness you may have to put something right with someone – but God will journey with you in that situation.
Some may say “But I was told I would never be any good, never amount to anything, I was treated so badly, I have little self-worth, why would God want anything to do with me?” Jesus came so that we could have abundant life. We believe that we are justified by grace through faith in our Lord Jesus Christ and that he that believes hath the witness in himself. The Holy Spirit builds us up as he allows his fruit to grow in our lives and as we are gifted to carry out tasks in the church the power of God overcomes!
Others may say, I have demons in my life, things happen in my head you would not imagine, I see things, I hear things, I think things. We believe that it is the privilege of all believers to be wholly sanctified, and that their whole spirit and soul and body may be preserved blameless unto the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ. The power of God overcomes! Demons are overcome by the blood and the name of Jesus.
Today you might be bound by something, wanting release from a long held fear or grudge, another one of Henry Ford’s quotable quotes is this “One of the greatest discoveries a man makes, one of his great surprises, is to find he can do what he was afraid he couldn’t do.”
Many live in fear of approaching God, many live in fear of the change he will make if they surrender to him! The power of God overcomes our fears and sets us free, free from our fears and free from demons!
If you are already a disciple of Jesus live in that power be a discipled disciple, continually growing in your understanding of the word of God, praying and living a discipled life for his names sake!
If there are people here who want prayer, prayer for the power of God to be active in their lives as bold soldiers for the Kingdom of God, or prayer that they, through the power of God may overcome and be overcomers please come to this place the mercy seat etc.
