A sermon preached at Covenant Presbyterian Church of Fort Smith, Arkansas on May 25, 2025.
On the next day, when they had come down from the mountain, a great crowd met him. And behold, a man from the crowd cried out, “Teacher, I beg you to look at my son, for he is my only child. And behold, a spirit seizes him, and he suddenly cries out. It convulses him so that he foams at the mouth, and shatters him, and will hardly leave him. And I begged your disciples to cast it out, but they could not.” Jesus answered, “O faithless and twisted generation, how long am I to be with you and bear with you? Bring your son here.” While he was coming, the demon threw him to the ground and convulsed him. But Jesus rebuked the unclean spirit and healed the boy, and gave him back to his father. And all were astonished at the majesty of God (Luke 9:37–43).[1]
Have you ever had an experience that could be described as a “spiritual high”? Perhaps it was one summer after church camp (or every summer after church camp). Perhaps it was after a conference or during an especially uplifting Bible study. Or, perhaps it was a seemingly inexplicable time of spiritual growth. Whatever the case, you remember it, and then it went away, as if descending from mountain high to valley low.
Surely, this is how Peter, James, and John felt, when Luke tells us, “when they had come down from the mountain, a great crowd met [Jesus]” (Luke 9:37). For, what they had descended from was surely the greatest mountaintop experience anyone has ever had. It was there Jesus was transfigured before their very eyes, from the humble Nazarene to the glorious King of kings. It was there the radiance of his eternal glory shone like the sun.[2] It was there Moses and Elijah appeared, the in-person presence of the law and the prophets, and conversed with Jesus, the living Word of God. It was there that Peter, not wanting it to end, nor giving it much thought, proposed constructing three tabernacles to enshrine the perpetual presence of that majestic moment. And it was from there, Jesus and those three disciples descended to the reality of fallen humanity, a mess of failed ministry and the embodiment of the devil’s dominion.
A Faithless and Twisted Generation
The crowd that Jesus met was likely witnessing a spectacle: the life-threatening reality of demon possession and the seemingly powerless ministry of Jesus’ disciples. We know this because of an exasperated father, pleading “Teacher, I beg you to look at my son, for he is my only child. And behold, a spirit seizes him, and he suddenly cries out. It convulses him so that he foams at the mouth, and shatters him, and will hardly leave him. And I begged your disciples to cast it out, but they could not” (9:38-40). The man’s only son was not simply suffering the seizures of a diagnosed sickness but the presence of an evil spirit, a demon determined to destroy him. According to Mark’s Gospel, since early childhood the spirit had thrown the boy into fire to burn him alive and into water to drown him, but in the providence of God the child had survived,[3] under the care of his loving father.
It’s a tragic picture of the reality of what the devil can do, but we need not leave it in its first-century Galilean context. While we do not witness the overt possession of Satan’s presence typically in our lives, his minions are no less active in his mission to steal, kill, and destroy.[4] Peter reminds us, “[Our] adversary the devil prowls around like a roaring lion, seeking someone to devour” (1 Pet. 5:8). And that “someone,” in this case was a boy.
Parents, there is a reason we include in our covenant child baptism liturgy this directive:
Do you now unreservedly dedicate your child to God, and promise, in humble reliance upon divine grace, that you will endeavor to set before him a godly example, that you will pray with and for him, that you will teach him the doctrines of our holy religion, and that you will strive, by all the means of God’s appointment, to bring him up in the nurture and admonition of the Lord?”[5]
In dedicating our children to God, we are confessing that we cannot raise them apart from God’s gracious provision. Admitting this fact is the beginning of Christian parenting. Dependently, we pray that the Lord will empower us to set a godly example before our children, to pray with and for them, to teach them the Christian faith, and to bring them up “in the nurture and admonition of the Lord.”
Yet, it is easy for us, in striving to raise our children rightly, to allow secondary and tertiary matters of importance to replace that which is primary. I am reminded of the example Jonathan Haidt gives in his book, The Anxious Generation, of a mother obsessed with making sure she provided a balanced diet with a variety of colors in her child’s dinner, while the child sat waiting, watching porn.[6] With what can seem like competing priorities for our children’s nurture, let us remember not to lose sight of what is most important. Blaise Pascal said that in every human heart there is a God-shaped hole,[7] and while we as parents, grandparents, and church family cannot save our children’s souls, we can protect them from filling up their hearts and minds with the devil’s garbage and help fill their hearts and minds with God’s Word and the truth of the gospel.
Luke does not tell us what led to this child’s miserable life, but we know that his father finally found nine of Jesus’ twelve disciples, who could do nothing to help. We don’t know the details of their attempts, but the irony of their inability is the twelve had just come off a mission trip on which they were given “power and authority over all demons and . . . diseases” (Luke 9:1). But now, since home from their mission, they could provide no help to this father’s suffering son. Why? Jesus tells us in his commentary on the entire situation, saying, “O faithless and twisted generation, how long am I to be with you and bear with you?” (Luke 9:41). If you wonder whether Jesus was speaking directly to his disciples, or referring to the child, or the father, or even the surrounding crowd, the answer is yes. Because, the entire situation is indicative of our fallen condition and our propensity to not believe and trust in God’s provision.
I am reminded of what the psalmist says about the children of Israel after they witnessed the miracles of the exodus and God’s continued provision in the wilderness: “In spite of all this, they still sinned; despite his wonders, they did not believe” (Ps. 78:32). Our fallen propensity to sin is so great that even when we personally witness God’s faithful provision, our default is to look to ourselves. Our sinful flesh says, “You can do it! You’ve got this! You’re strong enough to take care of this!” But the apostle Paul, for example, found the opposite to be true, when God told him, “My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness” (2 Cor. 12:9a). When his sinful flesh tempted him to look to himself as the source of strength and power, Paul responded, “I will boast all the more gladly of my weaknesses, so that the power of Christ may rest upon me. For the sake of Christ, then, I am content with weaknesses, insults, hardships, persecutions, and calamities. For when I am weak, then I am strong” (2 Cor. 12:9b-10).
Thankfully, Jesus took his rhetorical question, “how long am I to be with you and bear with you?” to the cross. The term of his earthly life was barely a generation, and his ministry a short three years, but he came not only to bear with us but to die for us. And bearing with us pales in comparison to what he bore for us on the cross, the wrath of God satisfied in his atoning death. It is in Christ alone that we believe and trust in God’s provision for us.
A Gracious and Glorious Savior
In the Gospel of Mark, we learn of an extended dialogue between Jesus and the boy’s father, in which we hear the father’s discouraged yet desperate plea, “if you can do anything, have compassion on us and help us” (Mark 9:22). To which Jesus replies, “‘If you can’! All things are possible for one who believes” (9:23). Despite the beautiful picture of the father’s love for and solidarity with his son, Jesus will not acquiesce to his doubt, because unbelief is at the heart of this entire despicable debacle. Instead, Jesus mercifully teaches him, and us through him, the grace of God’s provision through faith in Jesus, leading the boy’s father to cry, “I believe; help my unbelief!” (9:24).
It’s one of the most beautiful confessions in the Gospels, humble, dependent, and real. It’s the cry of all of us, when God reveals to us our depravity and Christ’s perfect salvation. It is a faith not simply that God can do it, but that he will only do it through Christ alone. It is a faith not simply for salvation’s sake but salvation for Christ’s sake. In other words, this miracle recorded in Luke’s Gospel is not here for the sake of the demon exorcism but that we may see Christ as our gracious and glorious Savior.
Of course, not everyone sees Jesus as gracious or glorious or as their savior. The demon certainly didn’t, throwing the boy to the ground in convulsions. Such is the response of the demonic in the presence of Christ, but also a perfect depiction of our sinful flesh to the gospel. Paul reminds us,
And you were dead in the trespasses and sins in which you once walked, following the course of this world, following the prince of the power of the air, the spirit that is now at work in the sons of disobedience—among whom we all once lived in the passions of our flesh, carrying out the desires of the flesh and the mind, and were by nature children of wrath, like the rest of mankind (Eph. 2:1-3).
You may not have fallen to the ground and convulsed the first time you heard the gospel, but you can be sure your sinful flesh wanted to. Such was the state of even the sweetest covenant child among us, because the propensity of sinful flesh is self-righteousness that leads not to our salvation but eventually self-destruction.
In his mercy and grace, Jesus did not leave that boy convulsing on the ground, but Luke tells us, “Jesus rebuked the unclean spirit and healed the boy, and gave him back to his father” (Luke 9:42b). And he does the same for us. He does not leave us convulsing in sin under “the prince of the power of the air.” “But,” the apostle explains, “God, being rich in mercy, because of the great love with which he loved us, even when we were dead in our trespasses, made us alive together with Christ—by grace you have been saved” (Eph. 2:4-5). In mercy, we were rescued from the devil’s dominion; in love, we were brought from death to life, by grace we have been saved by our gracious and glorious Savior and restored to our Father forever.
An Astonished and Worshiping Gathering
In Ephesians, Paul explains that God has saved us from the devil’s dominion and the eternal punishment we were due by his grace through faith in Christ, and then, lest we think we brought anything to our salvation other than our sin, he adds, “And this is not your own doing; it is the gift of God, not a result of works, so that no one may boast” (Eph. 2:8-9). Elsewhere Paul says, “Let the one who boasts, boast in the Lord” (2 Cor. 10:17). In other words, when we consider all that God has done for us in Christ, boasting in ourselves, what we have contributed to or cooperated in our salvation, is misplaced, disrespectful, and just plain wrong. As the remake of the revivalist hymn, “I Have Decided to Follow Jesus,” sings, “I never wanted to follow Jesus; he rescued me.”[8] Such is our confession, leading us to boast only in the Lord.
When Jesus “rebuked the unclean spirit and healed the boy,” Luke includes the crowd’s response: “And all were astonished at the majesty of God” (Luke 9:42-43a). To say they were “astonished” is expected; they had witnessed the miraculous. But Luke adds to this a very important prepositional phrase, “at the majesty of God.” In their astonishment, what they had witnessed, they rightly attributed to God, leading to worship. Such is the majesty of God demonstrated in the work of Christ.
Likewise, we have gathered on this Christian Sabbath, the Lord’s Day, “astonished at the majesty of God.” We are astonished, because we don’t deserve it. We are astonished, because he has done it. And so, we gather in worship, not waiting for mountaintop experiences nor wallowing in the low valleys of life’s circumstances but praising our majestic God who “has delivered us from the domain of darkness and transferred us to the kingdom of his beloved Son, in whom we have redemption, the forgiveness of sins” (Col. 1:13-14). Amen.
[1] Unless referenced otherwise, all Scripture quotations are from The Holy Bible, English Standard Version (Wheaton: Crossway Bibles, 2001).
[2] Matt. 17:2
[3] Mark 9:22
[4] John 10:10
[5] The Book of Church Order of the Presbyterian Church in America (Lawrenceville: The Office of the Stated Clerk of the General Assembly of the Presbyterian Church in America, 2023), 56-5.
[6] Jonathan Haidt, The Anxious Generation (New York: Penguin Press, 2024).
[7] Blaise Pascal, Pensees (New York: Penguin Books, 1966), 75.
[8] “He Rescued Me,” Depth of Mercy (Birmingham: Red Mountain Music, 2003).
Planter, Pastor, Preacher 