“Looking for Unanswerable Answers”
“What Do You Want Me To Do For You?” – Part Three
Mark 9:2-29
February 22, 2004
Purpose: God can still work in the unanswerable answer – those answers that seem to be illusive to us, but totally understandable to Him. (Focused on Mark 9:29). He works when we realize that we don’t have all the answers, when we stop looking for formulas and start strengthening our relationship and when we are open to let His power work through us,
Introduction –
A lot of things have been unanswered lately…
…war and unrest (Iraq, Afghanistan, Haiti and around the globe)
…the debate over homosexual marriage (courts, politicians, religious leaders)
…gas prices sky high
…rain…snow…rain…snow...
…uproar over The Passion movie from all sides
In these situations and more, we look to God and ask what are we to do with all of this…but yet we often receive no clear cut answer.
Unanswerable answers are those answers that seem to be illusive to us, but totally understandable to God.
And when we stumble into one of these unanswerable answers, it’s then we need to remember three things:
1) We don’t have all the answers.
2) It’s not about formulas its about relationships.
3) God’s power works through us.
These three are illustrated in our Scripture passage today.
I. We don’t have all the answers.
Can you imagine being the disciples?
They had seen Jesus do miracles before. In previous times, they had been sent out to heal the sick and set the captive free. The knew they could do this. They fully expected it to happen. They wanted to heal the boy. They thought they had the faith. But they couldn’t get the job done.
Peter, James, and John had just come off the mountain with Jesus. Can you imagine the Spiritual high that they were on. They had just seen Elijah. They had just see Moses. They had just heard the voice of God.
So when this father came with his son to be healed, the disciples knew that this was nothing new nor anything impossible. That had seen it done. Some of them may have already been apart of a healing, so they just stepped forward to make it happen…but it didn’t.
In fact, it didn’t so bad, that a crowd began to form. In the midst of their inability to get the job done, with all the embarrassment and shame that came along with it, the scribes showed up and began to pick a fight…can you hear them?
“We told you it couldn’t be done.”
“Can’t perform the trick when the magician is away, can you?”
But then, just in the nick of time, Jesus walked into the midst of crowd and takes over.
And although Scripture doesn’t tell us, I’m sure there was a collective sigh of relief when Jesus said, “Bring him to me.”
I would be willing to guess that we’ve all experienced defeat and frustration in our Christian walk. We may have labored with the best of them, fought evil against the worst of them, prayed with the rest.
We all know what it’s like to still have growing to do.
(ILL)
Jeanne Olsen, a mother of five from Illinois, took her daughter Kirsten, age 9, out for a mother-daughter breakfast. During their meal, Jeanne courageously asked her daughter, "How do you think I could be a better mom?"
Kirsten thought for a moment. "Well, you do yell a lot. I know you’ve been praying about that, but it isn’t really working yet." [Mother’s Unanswered Prayer for Self-Improvement, Citation: Kevin A. Miller, Wheaton, Illinois]
We may be gifted, prepared, or ordained, but the truth is we will never know as much as God knows until we get there and worship Christ in all his glory.
The point here is that we don’t have the answers 100% of the time.
And the more we take for granted, the more we assume that things are going to be the way they’ve always been, the more we assume that we have all the right answers and no one else, the more we set ourselves up for a fall.
The disciples learned, and so can we.
II. We need to stop looking for formulas and start strengthening our relationship.
When the disciples realized what had happened, they pulled Jesus aside and asked for the right formula.
Weren’t they given adequate power?
When Jesus first chose the twelve and sent them out to the world, He didn’t send them empty handed because in Matthew 10:1 it says; “And when He had called unto Him His twelve disciples, He gave them power against unclean spirits, to cast them out, and to heal ALL manner of sickness and ALL manner of disease.”....... And in Luke 10:19 Jesus tells them; “Behold, I give unto you power to tread on serpents and scorpions, and over all the power of the enemy.....”
So they asked “Lord, how do we do this again…what is the right recipe….what is the right flow chart…give us the step-by-step again?”
Jesus responds with one of those “unanswerable answers” – “This kind can come out by nothing but prayer and fasting.”
Oh really…I am sure that that was not quite the answer the disciples were looking for…Amen?
Can you imagine what they were thinking…“That’s it…prayer and fasting…prayer and fasting…prayer and fasting….”
And what’s even more interesting is that I still hear preachers using that line today as if it’s some magical formula that unlocks all the mysteries of healing.
You’ve probably heard it before, “If you just pray hard enough, if you just fast long enough….the strength of your conviction, will determine whether your prayer is answered or not.”
In this line of thinking, what do you end up with….
Families who watch as loved ones die, feeling it’s there fault because they didn’t have enough
faith to make healing happen.
Television evangelists who say if they pray on a piece of cloth, whoever touches that cloth will find healing. (Of course, a donation for the cloth is expected.)
Healthy Christians struggle, when like the disciples, we want so much to help, but find ourselves unable.
God does not need our strength, our conviction, our anything…to perform the miracles he wants to perform. “Not by strength, not by power, but by the Spirit of the Lord…” our Bibles tell us.
So what was Jesus saying about prayer and fasting?
Simply this, don’t put faith in your abilities, but put faith in your relationship with the father.
That’s why we hear Jesus saying in John 15:5, “Apart from me, you can do nothing.” and later in this story when Jesus told them that “with men it is impossible, but not with God, for with God all things are possible” (Mark 10:27).
It’s not a formula, but a relationship.
And it’s in that relationship that we realize God always wants the best for us.
It’s in that relationship that faith becomes more than just a bunch of beliefs we believe or how we’re feeling toward God in that particular moment. It becomes the vehicle for which God’s power can move through us.
It’s in that relationship with Him , we begin to make all the difference, through His mercy and grace working through us.
III. We have to let his power work through us. (prayer and fasting)
Which leads us to our last point this morning…
If we realize we don’t have all the answers, but God does.
If we are willing to work on our relationship with Him more than relying on any given formula,
Then and only then, can God’s power work through those “unanswerable answers” of life.
(ILL)
In his book Why Prayers are Unanswered, John Lavender retells a story about Norman Vincent Peal. When Peale was a boy, he found a big, black cigar, slipped into an alley, and lit up. It didn’t taste good, but it made him feel very grown up…until he saw his father coming.
Quickly he put the cigar behind his back and tried to be casual. Desperate to divert his father’s attention, Norman pointed to a billboard advertising the circus. "Can I go, Dad? Please, let’s go when it comes to town."
His father’s reply taught Norman a lesson he never forgot. "Son, he answered quietly but firmly, "never make a petition while at the same time trying to hide a smoldering disobedience."
It can’t be our power (or lack of it). It can only be God’s power working through us.
(ILL) In John Wesley’s means of grace…those things that draw us closer to a better understanding God’s grace…it is not a fluke that both prayer and fasting appear on the list in many different forms.
When we pray, we connect to One who creates, redeems, and sustains.
When we fast, we demonstrate our desire to put aside those things of this world, in order to benefit
spiritually.
In short, praying and fasting allows God’s power to work through us because we’ve made the room for God to work within us, to be there without any distraction.
When Jesus told his disciples that “This kind requires…,” he was giving them the opportunity to make that room within themselves, so that God could dwell there.
Dwight Davis writes that “…throughout their discipleship, Jesus had been teaching them the importance of a very close communion with the Father. Through prayer, fasting, study of the word, and meditation; this close communion was made possible.
But in order to have this kind of connection with God, the mind and heart has to be free of anything else that would get in the way. When these feelings of hatred, the harboring of other sin, the busyness of our existence, and the like are allowed to reign within us, these things build a wall of sorts that separate us from the full relationship of God.” (“A Matter of Power” – Dwight Davis,www.sermoncentrral.com)
What Jesus is telling the disciples, and indeed us gathered here, is that when we humble ourselves in prayer and fasting, then the walls come down and God is able to work through us.
Closing
Where do you see yourself this morning?
If Jesus were standing right in front of you asking, “What Do You Want Me To Do For You?” and after you told him, he merely gave you one of the unanswerable answers of life…
…would you be willing to admit that you don’t know it all,
…would you will willing to give up searching for a formula in exchange for a relationship,
…and would you be you willing to have God work through you?
Matthew 6:33 tells us in Jesus’ words, “Seek first the kingdom of God and His righteousness, then all these things shall be added…”
God does have answers even to the unanswerable, if we “seek first” our relationship with Him.
Will you join me in prayer?
Closing Prayer
Heavenly Father,
There is so much happening around us at such break-neck speeds that we are often overwhelmed by it all.
In your word, you tell us that we have the power to deal with such things. You’ve told us that if we only call out Your name, You will never leave us or forsake us.
Help us, O Father, in these days…to remember that only you have all the answers, that only you can move us from formula thinking to relationship thinking, and that only you can work through us to make the unanswerable answerable.
We thank you for the opportunity to be your disciples, and to learn and grow in you.
In Jesus’ name, Amen.
Closing Song - #405 – Seek Ye First
Benediction
Grant us, O Lord, that what has been said with our lips we may believe in our hearts,
and that what we believe in our hearts, we may practice in our lives;
in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit, Amen.
Note: If for any reason you did not find this sermon helpful or would like to make a comment or ask a question, please feel free to contact me at gb@clergy.net. Your input will help me personally and my congregation as I learn Spiritually and professionally.
