the book of Mark.
in chapter 9 this evening.
So it's good to see everyone out this evening.
uh
We don't want you to leave, but just by way of reminder to the ladies, the ladies class does resume this evening in the classroom over here in the hallway.
So you are welcome to go to that if you would like to.
But you're welcome to stay here.
So all right, let's begin with a word of prayer and then we'll get into our text.
A gracious father in heaven, we bow before your throne, grateful for the day that you've blessed us with, for the life that we have.
for all that we have in this life and the ability to serve you, the ability to come before you and worship you, the ability to call upon your name when we are in need and desire
your help and know and recognize how much that you do for us each and every day.
Lord, we are grateful for the salvation that we have in Christ and we pray that as we study concerning the life of Christ and the deeds and the actions that he
participated in while he was on this earth.
We might have a greater appreciation every day of what he means to us and what we should be doing.
All this we pray and ask in Jesus' amen.
Mark chapter 9, Jesus goes up into the mountain and James, Peter, and John are brought with him into the mountain, separate and apart from the other disciples.
And verse 2 says, he was transfigured before them.
His clothes became shining, exceedingly white, like snow.
One of the things we talked about last week is the comparison between Moses when Moses came down from the mountain and Christ on this occasion.
Christ, even his garments were shining and had this appearance.
uh We read in verse four, and Elijah appeared to them with Moses and they were talking with Jesus.
Then Peter answered and said to Jesus, Rabbi, it is good for us to be here and let us make three tabernacles, one for you, one for Moses, and one for Elijah.
I want us to notice a few other things from the parallel passages, and we haven't done a lot of this uh jumping around to the other books just to read their records, but this time
I do want us to notice a couple of things from Matthew chapter 17.
Matthew chapter 17, now after six days Jesus took Peter, James and John, his brother, and led them up on a high mountain by themselves.
And he was transfigured before them, his face shone like the sun, and his clothes became as white as the light.
And behold, Moses and Elijah appeared to them, talking with him.
Then Peter answered and said to Jesus, Lord, it is good for us to be here if you wish.
Let us make here three tabernacles, one for you, one for Moses, and one for Elijah.
While he was still speaking, behold, a bright cloud overshadowed them, and suddenly a voice came out of the cloud, saying, This is my beloved Son, in whom I am well pleased.
Hear him.
And when the disciples heard it, they fell on their faces and were greatly afraid.
But Jesus came and touched them and said, Arise and do not be afraid.
When they had lifted up their eyes, they saw no one but Jesus only." You notice here in the text that Matthew records a similar concept and a similar thing to what it was that
occurred.
He describes specifically the face of Jesus and how he appeared and even his garments, as he mentions.
But as you notice in the text,
Peter is going to ask, it's good that we were here, ah should we not build three tabernacles, three tents that would honor the three who are present.
Now who were the three that were present?
Elijah, Jesus, Moses.
So, that's all right.
Elijah, Jesus, and Moses.
And we talked about last week that Elijah represented the latter prophets.
He represented the prophets in the latter portion of Israel's history.
Moses represented the prophets of the earlier period of
Israel's history because he was the lawgiver and he was the one who prophesied that a prophet like unto him God would raise up and the people were to hear that prophet.
So in verse 5 of Mark 9 Peter answered and said to them, said to Jesus, Rabbi it is good for us to be here and let us make three tabernacles, one for you, one for Moses, one for
Elijah.
because he did not know what to say for they were greatly afraid.
So Mark gives us a little bit of color that Matthew doesn't give us, uh but he also paints us a little bit of a picture of Peter because Peter, when he doesn't know what to do,
talks.
So you have an individual who he's afraid, he doesn't know what to do, so he jumps to an action and requests permission to participate in that action.
Now, he does not take it upon himself, he doesn't go out and begin building, he asks whether or not this is the right thing.
something to be commended there, but as this event is occurring, as they are witnessing this, we read verse 7, and a cloud came and overshadowed them, and a voice came out of the
cloud saying, this is my beloved son.
Hear him.
Why?
and this statement here.
You think back to the occasion when John the Baptist baptized Jesus, the statement from heaven is, this is my beloved son.
The statement here is, this is my beloved son, hear him.
Okay, further confirmation that he is who he says he is.
Okay?
The authority that Christ has under the New Covenant, I think, is fundamental to this because this is...think about it.
In the occasion of His baptism, you have crowds of people around.
Who are the people hearing it in this occasion?
Peter, James, John.
That's the audience.
This is a direct, my mind, this is a direct statement from God to the core nucleus of the apostles saying the authority lies with him, not Moses, not Elijah.
When Peter offers to build the tabernacles, it's implied there, least it seems to be, that he's saying three equal tabernacles.
Three recognizing the greatness of Christ and the greatness of Moses and the greatness of Elijah, and the response helps to correct that these three are not on the same tier.
These three are not on the same level.
When John the Baptist came and was preaching and teaching that the Messiah was going to come, what did he say about himself in comparison to the Messiah?
He said, I'm not worthy to stoop down and loosen the buckles on his shoes.
If John, who by the way Jesus has already ascribed in character and nature as being the greatest prophet who had ever lived, if John wasn't worthy to even loosen the sandal
straps on the feet of the Messiah, then what is Moses and what is Elijah by comparison to the Messiah?
Nothing anywhere closer.
And yet what Peter had done, though perhaps not by intent, is he had laid them out on an equal plane.
He had said, this one is great, Christ.
This one is great, of Moses.
This one is great, Elijah.
Let's build a tabernacle, all three of them.
God says, no, you don't.
There's only one.
This is my beloved son.
when a parent
goes to some sort of sporting event where there's only going to be one gold medal winner.
And they're there and their child is in that Olympic race.
And they're there in the stands.
and they crossed the finish line and their child won the gold medal.
Do you think they'd be able to point out their child when they're standing there accepting the medal?
Do you think anybody else would be able to convince them that the silver-placed medal child was actually theirs instead of the one who...
No!
They know who theirs is.
And there's not any other like theirs.
God as Father of Christ is making it quite clear
that the relationship he had with Moses was important, but Moses was not his son.
And the relationship he had with Elijah in that here is a prophet who served so faithfully and was taken and didn't even see death was important, but Elijah was not his son.
Turn over the book of Hebrews.
Hebrews chapter 3.
We read in Hebrews chapter 3 verse 1, holy brethren, partakers of the heavenly calling, consider the apostle and high priest of our confession, Jesus, who was faithful to Him,
who appointed Him, as Moses also was faithful in all his house.
All right, so the Hebrew writer is saying, look at Christ, He's the apostle and high priest of our confession,
and he was faithful to what he was appointed to do.
Just like Moses was faithful in what he was appointed to do.
He says Moses was faithful in all of his house, but notice what he says.
For this one, Christ, has been counted worthy of more glory than Moses inasmuch as he built the house.
and inasmuch as he who built the house has more honor than the house.
The Hebrew writer says, you understand this.
The person who, through their resources, their excellence, their knowledge, their wisdom, builds the structure.
The structure is not greater than they are.
The structure didn't build itself.
They built the structure.
was their genius and their knowledge and their ingenuity that built it.
It's an honor to them that the structure exists.
The Hebrew writer points out that Moses has glory, but he doesn't have more glory than the one who built the house.
Notice, he says, for every house is built by someone, but he who built all things is God.
And Moses, indeed, was faithful in all his house as a servant for a testimony of those things which would be spoken afterward, but Christ as a son over his own house.
whose house we are if we hold fast the confidence and the rejoicing of the hope firm to the end.
Hebrew writer is pointing out that Moses was faithful as a servant in the house of another.
Jesus was faithful in the ruler of his own house because he was a son, not
a servant.
There's more in the book of Hebrews concerning that topic and I encourage you to spend some time studying it, but the point in the Transfiguration, the point in Mark chapter 9,
the point in Hebrews chapter 3 is that Moses and Christ are not equals.
Should be further pointed out today that Joseph Smith and Christ were never equals, that Muhammad and Christ are not and never were equals,
that there has not been nor will there ever be an individual who comes along who is equal with Christ.
And the disciples, the apostles needed to realize coming out of their Jewish mindset that Jesus and Moses weren't on the same plane.
They weren't equal with one another.
One of them was a servant in God's house.
The other is God.
So notice
We read in verse 8, suddenly, when they had looked around, they saw no one anymore, but only Jesus with themselves.
As they observe this, as they witness these things, they hear the voice and they're greatly afraid.
They see the events and they're greatly afraid.
They're bowed down with their face to the ground.
They look up and everything's back to normal.
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."
Did they understand what he was telling them about his resurrection when he tells them, tell anyone until after I've risen from the dead?
No.
As a matter of fact, it's pointed out after the resurrection that they recalled all of these things that they had been taught.
That it dawned on them.
and they realized all of these things that he had been telling them all along, but they did not understand.
We read then in verse 10, so they kept this word to themselves, questioning what the rising from the dead meant.
Was it unusual for Jesus to use figures of speech?
No.
Was it unusual for Jesus to use parables?
No.
Matter of fact, Jesus would answer the Jews when they asked for a sign, and Jesus said, you'll not receive any sign except for the sign of Jonah.
What's the sign of Jonah?
Well, Jonah was swallowed by a fish and was in the belly of a fish for three days, but Jesus didn't explain the sign.
He didn't explain what he meant.
He didn't give them a full explanation of all the things that it pertained.
Jesus would use the statement that in three days I will tear down this temple and build it again.
They even used that by way of accusation to be able to crucify him, that he had claimed that he would do violence to the temple.
But was he talking about the physical structure of the Golden Temple?
No.
He was talking about his death, his burial, and his resurrection.
So, they're familiar with a teacher that uses figures of speech, and they're wondering amongst themselves, what's this figure mean?
What figure of speech is he using here?
What event is he referencing?
They don't understand it.
They asked him, saying, why do the scribes say that Elijah must come first?
Now, as you look at this text, this comes out of Malachi chapter 4.
So take your Bibles and open them back to the very last book of the Old Testament, to the very last chapter of the Old Testament, as it is in our English Bibles at least.
And in Malachi chapter 4, we read, "'For behold, the day is coming, burning like an oven, and all the proud, yes, all who do wickedly will be stubble.
And the day which is coming shall burn them up,' says the Lord of hosts, "'that they,' or that, excuse me, "'that will leave them neither root nor branch.
But to you who fear my name, the Son of Righteousness shall arise.'"
with healing in his wings, and you shall go out and grow fat like stall-fed calves.
You shall trample the wicked, for they shall be ashes under the soles of your feet on the day that I do this, says the Lord of Hosts.
Remember the law of Moses, my servant, which I commanded him in Horeb for all Israel with the statutes and judgments.
Behold, I will send you Elijah the prophet before the coming of the great and dreadful day of the Lord, and he will turn the hearts of the fathers to the children and the hearts of
the children to their fathers, lest I come and strike the earth with a curse." Out of this text, the Jews had concluded that Elijah was going to come back.
before the Messiah came.
It is of note when Jesus asks in Matthew chapter 16 and over in Mark, who do men say that I am?
What's one of the answers?
Elijah.
The Jews were conscious of this prophecy and they were aware of it and they were telling people, you gotta be on the lookout for Elijah.
And so the disciples ask, why do the scribes say that Elijah must come first?
All right, they've just witnessed who in the transfiguration?
Elijah.
Yet they hadn't witnessed Elijah up until this point.
Now they're asking, well, wait a minute.
Malachi talks about the sun coming.
And yet here we are witnessing Elijah present with you and God saying that you're the son.
Why then do the scribes say that Elijah should come first?
Notice they don't believe that the prophets wrong.
They don't assume that the prophets wrong.
They're questioning why the scribes are wrong.
That's a good practice, by the way.
If there's ever a point at which you're wondering if the teacher's wrong or the Bible's right,
The answer is the Bible's right.
So they didn't assume that the prophet was wrong.
They assumed that scribes misunderstood the prophet.
They just wanted to know why.
So notice verse 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?
But I say to you that Elijah has
also come.
And they did to him whatever they wished, as it is written of him."
Jesus responds to them, they're correct.
And he's already come.
Over in the book of Matthew, in Matthew's record of it, you'll find that Jesus will say plainly to them,
that this was John the Baptist.
um go down to verse 10, and his disciples asked him, Why then do the scribes say that Elijah must come first?
Jesus answered and said to them, Indeed, Elijah is coming first, and will restore all things.
But I say to you that Elijah has come already, and they did not know him, but did to him whatever they wished.
Likewise, the Son of Man is also about to suffer at their hands.
Then the disciples understood that he spoke to them of
John the Baptist.
They realized from what he had said that John was the answer to the question of Elijah coming.
That it was the figure of Elijah coming in the form of John the Baptist.
So all these events transpire.
They transpire in the mountain as they go up into the mountain, as they come back down.
So he comes back down, verse 14, and when he came to the disciples, he saw a great multitude around them and scribes disputing with them.
Immediately when he saw him, or when they saw him, all the people were greatly amazed and running to him, greeted him, and he asked the scribes, what are you discussing with them?
Then one of the crowd answered and said, Teacher, I brought you my son who has a mute spirit.
And wherever it seizes him, it throws him down, he foams at the mouth, gnashes his teeth, and becomes rigid.
So I spoke to your disciples that they should cast it out.
But they could not.
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."
Why do you think Jesus responds this way?
You think he's frustrated because the man has a son that has a demon?
The expression, I believe mutually in a couple of areas, is partly the disciples.
This is something that they, the idea is they should have been able to deal with this.
They should have known how to deal with this.
but the second is the scribes.
those who are stirring up the crowd, those who are looking for an occasion as they always have been of Jesus and His disciples failing in something.
They're looking for an excuse to be able to dismiss their actions, to call them charlatans, to call them those who are
are not really who they claim to be and their message is certainly not what it claims to be.
when you have an event that doesn't go well.
You have some people who go, I'm really sorry that that didn't go well.
And they mean it.
But if you're popular enough, you also have people going, I'm so glad it didn't go well.
Well, time you got taken down a few notches.
And you can imagine that amongst the crowd of people and amongst the scribes, there were those who had no concern for the child.
They were only interested in the disciples and Jesus having been brought down a level.
uh I think there can be something to that, but I think there's also a point, as we'll see here in the text, that there's also a process to things, and that what quite often was the
issue was not the Apostles' lack of faith in Him, it was the lack of humility in themselves.
their lack of recognition that it is God who does this and not them.
But notice the phrase, faithless generation.
It's worth pointing out, number one, not the only occasion where this type of language is used by Jesus concerning the people and the Jews in his day.
Second thing.
is that he didn't call them a irreligious generation.
He didn't say they weren't religious.
He said they were faithless.
There is too often a confusion because of the observation of the outward person.
There is a confusion that sometimes even those within the body of Christ make because they look at people and say, that person is a very religious person.
But so were these Jews.
Paul will say of the Jews as a nation that they had a zeal for God.
but not according to knowledge.
for going about to establish their own righteousness.
they denied the righteousness of God.
We must not be confused and we must not begin to be those who assume that religiousness is equal with faithfulness.
because you could be religious.
and worship the crickets in the morning.
And you can be real devout about it too.
and you can worship the stars up in heaven that you've never seen or come near near.
You have nothing to recognize their character or their nature except for a pinprick of light in the sky?
And yet, generation after generation of people in human history worship the stars.
being religious is not the same as being faithful.
Jesus did not accuse the Jews of a lack of be of religious attitude or religious action.
He accused them of being faithless.
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.
So he asked his father, Jesus asked the father, How long has this been happening to him?
And the father said, From childhood.
And often he has thrown himself both into the fire and into the water to destroy him.
But if you can do anything, have compassion on us and help us.
The request of the Father was, show mercy, have compassion.
Father was not interested in a grand demonstration of God's power or a good test of Jesus's authority.
He was interested in having His child alive and well.
And so he says, if you can do anything.
Your disciples weren't able to do anything.
But if you can, have compassion on us.
Jesus said to him, if you can believe, all things are possible to him who believes.
This is uh not magic pixie dust.
Okay?
That's not what Jesus is talking about.
Jesus is talking about the fact that, as has been stated in other passages, all things are possible with God.
but God does not act on behalf of those who will not believe.
that God's care and concern and actions toward His children is different from His actions towards those who are rejecting of Him.
Jesus places this man's belief, this man's faith in God.
as the barrier to whether or not this will be accomplished.
Immediately the father of the child cried out and said with tears, Lord, I believe.
Help my unbelief.
out of his great love and concern and actions on behalf of his child.
he cries out that he does believe.
He calls Jesus Master, Lord.
But what else does he do?
He calls upon Christ.
to look at where his faith is.
and get it the rest of the way it needs to be.
not just to look at where it is and judge it, but look at where it is, look at where it needs to be, and move it.
There are so many occasions that anyone who's raised kids have witnessed.
You got a really heavy object that you're carrying.
Depending on the age of the child, that could just be two bags of gallons of milk in from the store.
You got those two heavy objects and here comes the little toddler.
He wants to help.
He starts pulling on the bags.
And as much as he pulls, doesn't matter.
They're not getting off the ground.
And the parent reaches down and with just a couple of fingers lifts the object easily that the child couldn't move no matter how hard they tried.
the expression of the Father was...
the humility that Israel lacked.
It was the recognition that He was insufficient, but God wasn't.
that if the barrier was his faith, God could do something about that.
that if the thing holding back Christ being able to heal his child was him, God could still do something about that.
when Jesus challenged him by saying, if you can believe.
He is challenging someone who most likely had spent their entire life schooled in the law, going to synagogue, going to the temple to worship, offering sacrifices, praying to God,
striving to live a life of a faithful Jew, doing the works of the law.
living in a land of his inheritance, part of the covenant.
all these things he's already been doing.
and it would have been very easy for him to have questioned why Jesus had the audacity to question his faith.
But that's not what he did.
Rather, he humbled himself.
and ask for Christ's help.
I I prayed this prayer.
No.
sometimes when you know God's hearing, it's not happening.
quickly.
you say, please help my unbelief, it's not that you're not believing, like him, he believes you wouldn't come to him.
help me get through this, help my unbelief, help me to understand why it's not happening on my kind of...
Sure.
And there's two things that are interesting here.
One of them is his confidence in his faith.
Lord, I believe.
This is not a statement that is...
I could get there, uh give me some convincing, uh help me, give me some more facts, some more, no, it's not, no, I believe.
but it's a recognition.
I don't have to believe enough to pass my judgment, I have to believe enough to pass his.
And it is the challenge that exists multiple times in the psalmist writer where the psalmist writer will write, Lord, try me.
Test me to see whether or not there's anything within me that is not in accordance with your will.
that we are not the standard.
And if there was anything that was going to stop his child from being healed, it was not going to be him.
Now before we leave this, I want to leave it here.
What if all parents...
were as concerned about their children's spiritual condition as this man was his child's physical condition.
That's correct.
We wouldn't be where we're at today.
All too often because we're faced with the physical, we're faced with the difficulties, we're faced with the struggles, we're faced with the desperate nature of the physical
condition of a child in this state.
There was no limit too far for this Father to go to get His child what the child needed.
but all too often.
for most children.
their unbelief and their lost state is a reflection of the unbelief of their parents.
and the lack of faith and the lack of humbleness and the lack of willing, being willing to submit to God.
And it's hard.
It's hard to recognize that.
It's hard to admit to that.
It's hard to deal with that.
And it's hard to challenge people to realize there is no price too high.
if it means getting your child to heaven.
too many times.
parents sadly will say in their actions if not in their words, well surely I'm good enough.
Surely the Lord will be satisfied with what I've done.
And sadly, in too many occasions, when their child isn't faithful, they'll come to the church and say, the church should have done more.
this man would never have accepted that.
This man would never have said, if the synagogue had been more what they ought to be, my child would have been healed.
He wouldn't even have accepted if the disciples had been more of what they ought to be, then my child would be healed.
There's no indignation from it.
It was a full recognition, He was the one who had to take the action.
And that there would be nothing
that would be too far for him to go to humble himself to get his child what he needed.
That's a lesson we need to carry with us.
Thank you for your attention.