Sermon Tone Analysis

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When cars made the transition from carbureted to fuel injected, a lot of technicians got out of the business.
When I was a technician, I worked on a lot of cars that belonged to former technicians.
In almost every case, I heard the same story.
Rather than having to go through the process of relearning how the fuel system worked, they chose to simply find something else to do, because they felt that learning to work on fuel injection would be just too difficult.
I first related to these guys when I was given the opportunity to work on a 1956 Willy’s Jeep from the Korean War Jeep.
I was nervous, because it was way out of my comfort zone.
I had never encountered a system like it before, and I had no manuals to tell me where to start.
However, when I finally got over my nervousness and committed to doing the job, I soon discovered that even though the parts were a little different, the system essentially worked the same.
I just had to rely on what I knew about how it worked.
I had to stick with the basic fundamentals of the system.
Explanation of the Passage
Setting
In this passage, while Jesus was up on the mountain with His three disciples that made up His inner circle, the other nine disciples were at the base of the mountain where the a crowd had gathered.
Apparently, a father had heard about the miracles that Jesus and His disciples were doing, healing the sick, the lame, the blind and deaf, and casting out demons, so brought his son to Jesus to be healed.
To get the complete picture of the situation, you have to read through this passage, as well as and .
The Apostles had already been performing miracles sine Jesus commissioned them in .
He had sent them throughout the region performing miracles and sharing the good news of the Kingdom.
So, since Jesus is still up on the mountain when the father arrived, and no one knew for certain when He will be back, they decided to give it a try.
However, their attempts met with total failure.
There was something different about this situation.
The Bible does not tell us what exactly was differently, but even Jesus points out that there was something different about this case.
No matter how hard they tried, they could not help the young man.
No matter how hard they tried, they could not help the young man.
I can’t imagine how this must have impacted this father, but it is clear that his expectations were shattered.
He had come expecting a miracle, but instead received disappointment.
So, when Jesus comes down the mountain, and is made aware of the situation, the father asks Jesus to help his son if He can.
Jesus’ response comes across almost as a form of incredulous humor: “If I can?”
The father was experiencing the same problem the disciples had, and it provided an excellent teaching opportunity for the disciples.
So, Jesus responds, “Everything is possible to the one who believes.”
So, the father responds, “I believe!
Help my unbelief.”
After Jesus cures the young man, the disciples approached Jesus and ask the question every one of us would be asking, “Why couldn’t we drive it out?”
Jesus’ response is very simple, and it is essential to the question that is at hand today.
They had no faith.
The disciples encountered a situation that was different than the ones they had previously encountered.
Apparently, this difference was enough to make them doubt whether they could accomplish the tasks that was before them.
When they failed, I suspect they probably tried again and again to cast out the demon, but each failure fed their doubt, essentially leaving them completely devoid of any faith that they could succeed in this task.
The point that we gain from examining Mark in
However, as Jesus pointed out in in His discussion with the boy’s father, it’s not a matter of quantity; its a matter of quality.
It’s about where your faith is directed.
The disciples evidently could not understand why they could not cast out the demon, but that is the heart of the problem.
They were working in their strength, not God’s.
The Current Application of the Problem
Today, the Church is facing a similar struggle.
We live in a culture today that is vastly different than the one most people grew up in.
Doing ministry in such a culture is very difficult when compared to the past.
In previous times, a person could go door to door, or walk up to someone in the mall or the grocery store, and if they were not a Christian, they would usually have some understanding about Jesus.
Many times, you could take just a few minutes sharing what the Bible says about sin and salvation, and people would give their life to Christ.
What is more, they were much more willing to talk to you about Christ.
Today, many people have a completely mindset and a completely different background.
When many people attempt to do the same thing today, they are often met with derision and disbelief.
Rather than winning someone to Christ, many found that instead they were verbally assaulted for their beliefs.
I’ll never forget my first attempt at witnessing to a stranger.
It was early December, and I had just completed a Way of the Master training program, and as our final meeting, we went to Birkdale Village to walk around and talk to people about what they believed happens when you die.
As I was sitting in the Starbucks there waiting for the rest of the group to arrive, a fellow came over to the area where I was sitting, and sat down to drink his coffee.
Shortly afterwards, we began to engage in idle conversation, and after a few minutes of chatting, he asked me what I was doing there that night, so I told him.
He got very excited.
Immediately, he began to ask me all sorts of questions aimed at showing me how off-base I was in my beliefs.
By the time the conversation was over, I had no idea how to respond to the things he brought up, because most of them involved things I had never encountered or learned.
I was at a loss for words.
Lets just say it was not the best start for the night I had looked forward to.
Many times, the culture we live in today can be very discouraging to ministry, because when we meet with failure, we are tempted to give up and stop trying.
We feel like we are not cut out for it, that we will never succeed.
Many of us have had some sort of experience in the past that has led us to a point that we end up as the proverbial doubting Thomas.
We often don’t want to try anything, because we are often so certain before we even try that it will eventually fail.
That’s because we have the same problem the disciples did…not enough faith.
The Essence of the Problem
When the disciples failed to cure the boy, they basically gave up.
The problem that prevent us from reaching the culture is not about what is wrong with the culture; it’s what is wrong with the Church.
We don’t need a cultural make-over in this country; we need a make-over in the work of the Church in this country
The problem that prevent us from reaching the culture is not about what is wrong with the culture; it’s what is wrong with the Church.
We don’t need a cultural make-over in this country; we need a make-over in the work of the Church in this country
When the disciples failed to cure the boy, they basically gave up.
Notice in verse 14, the one that brought the problem to Jesus wasn’t the disciples; it was the father.
The father held onto a sliver of hope, even though the disciples had failed over and over again.
However, not one of the disciples approached Jesus about the problem.
What this tells us is that the father was still counting on Jesus to save his son.
The disciples were not.
They were so convinced that the task was impossible that they had given up, because it was beyond their power.
The Church has a similar problem.
We have become so convinced that the culture won’t change, that people are not interested in hearing the Gospel, that people in the Church won’t change, that we have effectively given up trying.
We give up, in large part, because we feel that we don’t have the resources necessary to accomplish the work of the Church.
We don’t have a message they want to hear; we don’t have the finances for big programs or large scale missions; and we don’t have enough volunteers to do the work of the Church.
So, many times, we concede defeat even before we really give it a try.
The problem that prevents us from reaching the culture is not about what is wrong with the culture; it’s what is wrong with the Church.
We don’t need a make-over in the cultural in this country; we need a make-over in the work of the Church in this country.
The Effective Solution
Jesus tells the father that all he had to do is believe.
The father boy said, “I believe, but help my unbelief.”
Essentially, he was saying that he believed to a certain extent that Jesus could save his son, but he had his doubts.
Jesus’ ability to heal the young man was not dependent on the father’s faith.
However, Jesus used it as an opportunity to teach the disciples.
Jesus knew that one of their biggest obstacles once He would be gone would be their faith, and He was right.
When Jesus was arrested, the disciples scattered, even though He told them well ahead of time that it would happen exactly as it did.
So, what lessons can we learn from this situation?
The answer is to have faith.
It doesn’t matter how much faith you have, as long as you have some.
If you trust Jesus in just a little, He will give you reason to trust Him a lot.
Faith is essential to the work of the Church.
In this passage, we see several essentials of faith in the work of the Church that are necessary for the success of that work.
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