In Matthew 17:17 Jesus calls his disciples faithless and corrupt. His own disciples that have given everything up to follow him. They are the most committed to Jesus ways. I'm inclined to think that Jesus was not hurling insults like it sounds, but rather stating a sad fact.
The setting is set as a father comes to Jesus with his son that suffers from seizures. The father tells Jesus that he brought his son to Jesus disciples and they couldn't heal him.
Instead of Jesus explaining that it is not the disciples that heal but the power of God, Jesus calls those listening a "faithless and corrupt people" Jesus seemed frustrated that they were not "getting it" yet. He told his disciples that they did not have enough faith.
This is hard to wrap my modern-day thinking head around. We live in a time where we are not saying, "you didn't get your miracle because you don't have enough faith". No, that hurts to much and is confusing. Instead we say, "God is sovereign, he could heal you, but he just must not want to right now. His ways are higher than ours. He is a good God." Like that is any better.
I have to extract this truth from the story, If I don't see people get healed when I try to heal them, then I must lack faith and be corrupt.
Jesus was saying that our way of thinking is corrupted. It is not Kingdom centered. When we live by the worlds economy and natural physics as our point of view, that is corrupt.
Jesus saw a world, where he brought healing to all that wanted his healing touch. He looked at a lake of water, and saw a good place to go for a walk. He cursed a tree and it shriveled up and died. He told Peter to go fishing and the first fish Peter caught would have a silver coin inside to pay his taxes, and it was so. Jesus saw the world in a different way than I see. His common sense is not rooted in worldly physics and nature. Jesus' common sense was coming from a Kingdom perspective. The Kingdom that He brought to the earth.
A Kingdom that we cannot see unless we are born again. (John 3:3) A Kingdom that is built with Jesus as the cornerstone. (Ephesians 2:19-20) A place where the Lord will be king over the whole earth. (Zechariah 14:9) Jesus said to "repent and believe the good news, that the kingdom of God is near" (Mark 1:15) Jesus said, "heal the sick, and tell them that the kingdom of God has come near to you". (Luke 10:9) Jesus gave us the keys to the kingdom, he said "whatever you bind on earth will be bound in heaven and whatever you loose on earth will be loosed in heaven" (Matt. 16:19) And finally (Matt. 6:9-10) We enter the Kingdom when we do the will of the Father.
If we don't think like Jesus thought, then we think through a corrupted world-view, and therefor have no faith in his ways.
Jesus, help me think like you think and see like you see and love like you love. It's our only hope. Heal my faithless and corrupt mind, Holy Spirit, help us, as your church, find our way.
Comments