Title: Only By Prayer and Fasting
Theme: Show the importance of Prayer and Fasting
Text: Mark 9:9 -29
Introduction
Mark 9:9 Now as they came down from the mountain, He commanded them that they should tell no one the things they had seen, till the Son of Man had risen from the dead. (10) So they kept this word to themselves, questioning what the rising from the dead meant. (11) And they asked Him, saying, "Why do the scribes say that Elijah must come first?" (12) Then He answered and told them, "Indeed, Elijah is coming first and restores all things. And how is it written concerning the Son of Man, that He must suffer many things and be treated with contempt? (13) But I say to you that Elijah has also come, and they did to him whatever they wished, as it is written of him."
In Mark 9 we are introduced to what we call the transfiguration. Jesus took three of his disciples to the top of a high mountain (Mt. Hermon). As they are there, probably in prayer, Jesus is transfigured. His true essence as God begins to show. Mark 9:3 His clothes became shining, exceedingly white, like snow, such as no launderer on earth can whiten them.
After this Elijah and Moses appeared and then the cloud. The glory of the Lord. All this to show them Christ’s true essence.
When we arrive at verse 14 we see that Jesus is reunited with the rest of the disciples. This is where I want to begin.
(14) And when He came to the disciples,(this was the rest of the 9) He saw a great multitude around them, and scribes disputing with them. (they were discussing, usually where the scribes are there is debating and auguring. It seems that the disciples were in a circle and being challenged by the people. In a moment we will see what the challenge is.) (15) Immediately, when they saw Him, all the people were greatly amazed, and running to Him, greeted Him. (I believe they could tell that he had been on the mountain.)
(16) And He asked the scribes, "What are you discussing with them?" (Jesus confronts the scribes, he already knew what had been going on, He is God, but this is His way of bringing up the subject)
(17) Then one of the crowd answered and said, "Teacher, I brought You my son, who has a mute spirit. (This is interesting how he says that he brought Jesus his son. Although Jesus was not there he made the direct connection. These were Jesus’ disciples, they represented His teaching and also His power.)(Notice this man’s diagnosis, “he has a mute spirit. This spirit had caused the boy not to talk. He could not answer for himself.) (18) And wherever it seizes him, it throws him down; he foams at the mouth, gnashes his teeth, and becomes rigid. (Here is some more description of the young boy. 1) it seizes him (takes control) 2) throws him down (pushes him around) 3) he foams at the mouth (spouting out useless information) 4) gnashes his teeth (frustration)
So I spoke to Your disciples, that they should cast it out, but they could not." (He brought them to the disciples and they could do nothing.)
This had to be real surprising to the disciples. They had been sent out with power earlier in Mark 6.
Disciples Sent Out
Mark 6:7-13 And He called the twelve to Himself, and began to send them out two by two, and gave them power over unclean spirits. (8) He commanded them to take nothing for the journey except a staff; no bag, no bread, no copper in their money belts; (9) but to wear sandals, and not to put on two tunics. (10) Also He said to them, "In whatever place you enter a house, stay there till you depart from that place. (11) "And whoever will not receive you nor hear you, when you depart from there, shake off the dust under your feet as a testimony against them. Assuredly, I say to you, it will be more tolerable for Sodom and Gomorrah in the day of judgment than for that city!" (12) So they went out and preached that people should repent. (13) And they cast out many demons, and anointed with oil many who were sick, and healed them.
In Mark chapter 6 we are told that Jesus gathered the 12 disciples together and sent them out 2 X 2. Jesus gave them power over unclean spirits and power to heal. This was an exciting time for the disciples. They had often seen Jesus heal and cast out demons now they were participators.
This is too much like the powerless church.
The Work of the enemy on the church.
(18) And wherever it seizes him, it throws him down; he foams at the mouth, gnashes his teeth, and becomes rigid. (Here is some more description of the young boy. 1) it seizes him (takes control) 2) throws him down (pushes him around) 3) he foams at the mouth (spouting out useless information) 4) gnashes his teeth (frustration)
The enemy wants to control the church, push it around, cause it to say things that it really doesn’t mean, and frustrate it.
What happened to the church of Matthew 16?
Matthew 16:15 He said to them, "But who do you say that I am?" (16) Simon Peter answered and said, "You are the Christ, the Son of the living God." (17) Jesus answered and said to him, "Blessed are you, Simon Bar-Jonah, for flesh and blood has not revealed this to you, but My Father who is in heaven. (18) And I also say to you that you are Peter, and on this rock I will build My church, and the gates of Hades shall not prevail against it. (19) And I will give you the keys of the kingdom of heaven, and whatever you bind on earth will be bound in heaven, and whatever you loose on earth will be loosed in heaven."
This is the church that Jesus died for. The powerful church. Yet the enemy has tried to hinder and capture the church.
Jesus’ Answer
(19) He answered him and said, "O faithless generation, how long shall I be with you? How long shall I bear with you? Bring him to Me."
Faithless – to have less faith, to not be trusted with faith.
After all they had seen you would think that they had faith.
(20) Then they brought him to Him. And when he saw Him, immediately the spirit convulsed him, and he fell on the ground and wallowed, foaming at the mouth.
This is just like the devil. To put on a show. To distract from the really cause.
(21) So He asked his father, "How long has this been happening to him?" And he said, "From childhood. (not since birth, but since childhood) (22) And often he has thrown him both into the fire and into the water to destroy him. (John 10:10 The thief does not come except to steal, and to kill, and to destroy. I have come that they may have life, and that they may have it more abundantly.) But if You can do anything, have compassion on us and help us."
“If you can” – This is a question of doubt, not sure if you can but if you can.
(23) Jesus said to him, "If you can believe, all things are possible to him who believes." (24) Immediately the father of the child cried out and said with tears, "Lord, I believe; help my unbelief!"
The boy was brought to Jesus and the spirit took over the boy. The presence of Jesus causes evil to raise its head. (Mark 1:23-26, 34, 3:11-12, 5:6-13). Jesus looks to the father for faith, in contrast to the faithlessness of the generation. The man is weak in faith, perhaps due to numerous failed visits he had made with exorcists and the inability of the disciples.
True faith is always aware how small and inadequate it is. The father becomes a believer not when he amasses a sufficient quantum of faith but when he risks everything on what little faith he has, when he yields his insufficiency to the true sufficiency of Jesus, “ ‘I do believe; help me overcome my unbelief!’ ” The risk of faith is more costly to the father than bringing his son to Jesus, for he can talk about his son but he must “cry out” (Gk. krazein) for faith.103 True faith takes no confidence in itself, nor does it judge Jesus by the weakness of his followers. It looks to the More Powerful One (1:7) who stands in the place of God, whose authoritative word restores life from chaos. True faith is unconditional openness to God, a decision in the face of all to the contrary that Jesus is able.
Edwards, James R.: The Gospel According to Mark. Grand Rapids, Mich; Leicester, England : Eerdmans; Apollos, 2002 (The Pillar New Testament Commentary), S. 278
(25) When Jesus saw that the people came running together, He rebuked the unclean spirit, saying to it, "Deaf and dumb spirit, I command you, come out of him and enter him no more!" (26) Then the spirit cried out, convulsed him greatly, and came out of him. And he became as one dead, so that many said, "He is dead." (27) But Jesus took him by the hand and lifted him up, and he arose.
Jesus Alone With His Disciples
(28) And when He had come into the house, His disciples asked Him privately, "Why could we not cast it out?" (29) So He said to them, "This kind can come out by nothing but prayer and fasting."
All the commentaries agree that the verse is a difficult one because it implies that some demons are so strongly entrenched that no one (except Jesus) can drive them out except after a period of prayer and fasting. This either means there is a special class of super demons or that the demon was initially invited in and somehow encouraged to stay. This may be the reason Paul said, “Don’t give the devil a foothold” (Ephesians 4:27). Footholds can become strongholds. Paul also said we have weapons at our command with divine power to demolish strongholds (2 Cor. 10:3-5). Maybe he was thinking of prayer and fasting. From Gracethrufaith.com
Matthew 17:19 Then the disciples came to Jesus privately and said, "Why could we not cast it out?" (20) So Jesus said to them, "Because of your unbelief; [82] for assuredly, I say to you, if you have faith as a mustard seed, you will say to this mountain, 'Move from here to there,' and it will move; and nothing will be impossible for you. (21) However, this kind does not go out except by prayer and fasting." [83]
Matthew 17:20 So Jesus said to them, "Because of your unbelief; [82] for assuredly, I say to you, if you have faith as a mustard seed, you will say to this mountain, 'Move from here to there,' and it will move; and nothing will be impossible for you.
Though the text does not say so. But I feel there must also be the anointing. Isaiah 10:27 “ The yoke shall be destroyed because of the anointing.” Luke 4:18 “The Spirit of the Lord, is upon me, because he hath anointed me to preach the gospel to the poor; he hath sent me to heal the brokenhearted, to preach deliverance to the captives, and recovering of sight to the blind, to set at liberty them that are bruised.” Jesus was quoting from Isaiah 61:1-2.
I love the way Andrew Murray in ‘Prayer and fasting;’ Or, The Cure of Unbelief puts it.
http://www.ccel.org/ccel/murray/prayer.XIII.html
Christ’s answer was direct and plain: ‘Because of your unbelief.’ The cause of His success and their failure, was not owing to His having a special power to which they had no access. No; the reason was not far to seek. He had so often taught them that there is one power, that of faith, to which, in the kingdom of darkness, as in the kingdom of God, everything must bow; in the spiritual world failure has but one cause, the want of faith. Faith is the one condition on which all Divine power can enter into man and work through him. It is the susceptibility of the unseen: man’s will yielded up to, and moulded by, the will of God. The power they had received to cast out devils, they did not hold in themselves as a permanent gift or possession; the power was in Christ, to be received, and held, and used by faith alone, living faith in Himself. Had they been full of faith in Him as Lord and Conqueror in the spirit-world, had they been full of faith in Him as having given them authority to cast out in His name, this faith would have given them the victory. ‘Because of your unbelief’ was, for all time, the Master’s explanation and reproof of impotence and failure in His Church.
The one, that faith needs a life of prayer in which to grow and keep strong. The other, that prayer needs fasting for its full and perfect development.
Faith needs a life of prayer for its full growth. In all the different parts of the spiritual life, there is such close union, such unceasing action and re-action, that each may be both cause and effect. Thus it is with faith. There can be no true prayer without faith; some measure of faith must precede prayer. And yet prayer is also the way to more faith; there can be no higher degrees of faith except through much prayer. This is the lesson Jesus teaches here. There is nothing needs so much to grow 97as our faith. ‘Your faith groweth exceedingly,’ is said of one Church. When Jesus spoke the words, ‘According to your faith be it unto you,’ He announced the law of the kingdom, which tells us that all have not equal degrees of faith, that the same person has not always the same degree, and that the measure of faith must always determine the measure of power and of blessing. If we want to know where and how our faith is to grow, the Master points us to the throne of God. It is in prayer, in the exercise of the faith I have, in fellowship with the living God, that faith can increase. Faith can only live by feeding on what is Divine, on God Himself.
Many Christians cannot understand what is meant by the much prayer they sometimes hear spoken of: they can form no conception, nor do they feel the need, of spending hours with God. But what the Master says, the 98experience of His people has confirmed: men of strong faith are men of much prayer.
This just brings us back again to the lesson we learned when Jesus, before telling us to believe that we receive what we ask, first said, ‘Have faith in God.’ It is God, the living God, into whom our faith must strike its roots deep and broad; then it will be strong to remove mountains and cast out devils. ‘If ye have faith, nothing shall be impossible to you.’ Oh! if we do but give ourselves up to the work God has for us in the world, coming into contact with the mountains and the devils there are to be cast away and cast out, we should soon comprehend the need there is of much faith, and of much prayer, as the soil in which alone faith can be cultivated. Christ Jesus is our life, the life of our faith too. It is His life in us that makes us strong, and makes us simple to believe. It is in the dying to self which much prayer implies, in closer union to Jesus, that the spirit of faith will come in power. Faith needs prayer for its full growth.
And prayer needs fasting for its full growth: this is the second lesson. Prayer is the one hand with which we grasp the invisible; fasting, the other, with which we let loose and cast away the visible. In nothing is man more closely connected with the world of sense than in his need of food, and his enjoyment of it. It was the fruit, good for food, with which man was tempted and fell in Paradise. It was with bread to be made of stones that Jesus, when an hungered, was tempted in the wilderness, and in fasting that He triumphed. The body has been redeemed to be a temple of the Holy Spirit; it is in body as well as spirit, it is very specially, Scripture says, in eating and drinking, we are to glorify God. It is to be feared that there are many Christians to whom this eating to the glory of God has not yet become a spiritual reality. And the first thought suggested by Jesus’ words in regard to fasting and prayer, is, that it is only in a life of moderation and temperance and self-denial that there will be the heart or the strength to pray much.
But then there is also its more literal meaning. Sorrow and anxiety cannot eat: joy celebrates its feasts with eating and drinking. There may come times of intense desire, when it is strongly felt how the body, with its appetites, lawful though they be, still hinder the spirit in its battle with the powers of darkness, and the need is felt of keeping it under. We are creatures of the senses: our mind is helped by what comes to us embodied in concrete form; fasting helps to express, to deepen, and to confirm the resolution that we are ready to sacrifice anything, to sacrifice ourselves, to attain what we seek for the kingdom of God. And He who accepted the fasting and sacrifice of the Son, knows to value and accept and reward with spiritual power the soul that is thus ready to give up all for Christ and His kingdom.
And then follows a still wider application. Prayer is the reaching out after God and the unseen; fasting, the100 letting go of all that is of the seen and temporal. While ordinary Christians imagine that all that is not positively forbidden and sinful is lawful to them, and seek to retain as much as possible of this world, with its property, its literature, its enjoyments, the truly consecrated soul is as the soldier who carries only what he needs for the warfare. Laying aside every weight, as well as the easily besetting sin, afraid of entangling himself with the affairs of this life, he seeks to lead a Nazarite life, as one specially set apart for the Lord and His service. Without such voluntary separation, even from what is lawful, no one will attain power in prayer: this kind goeth not out but by fasting and prayer.
Disciples of Jesus! who have asked the Master to teach you to pray, come now and accept His lessons. He tells you that prayer is the path to faith, strong faith, that can cast out devils. He tells you: ‘If ye have faith, nothing shall be impossible to you;’ let this glorious promise encourage you to pray much. Is the prize not worth the price? Shall we not give up all to follow Jesus in the path He opens to us here; shall we not, if need be, fast? Shall we not do anything that neither the body nor the world around hinder us in our great life-work,—having intercourse with our God in prayer, that we may become men of faith, whom He can use in His work of saving the world.
Conclusion
Is this what you want for your life? Yes I agree that the devil is amping it up. I believe that he knows that his time is short. He must now work harder than ever before to take as many as possible. I also believe the church has gotten preoccupied with the things around them. The enemy has taken more territory. It is time we take some back.
It won’t be just by being in a great service any more. It will be by fighting. Fighting on our knees, fighting in the prayer closest, fighting by faith, and fighting by doing.
