Peter, James, John and Jesus walked back to the crowd after their transfiguration experience. A father approached Jesus and explained how His disciples could not cast a demon out of his son.
Jesus asked that the boy be brought to Him. He rebuked the demon and it came out of him. He was cured at once.
Later, the disciples asked why they were unsuccessful.
He said to them, “Because of your little faith. For truly, I say to you, if you have faith like a grain of mustard seed, you will say to this mountain, ‘Move from here to there,’ and it will move, and nothing will be impossible for you. But this kind never comes out except by prayer and fasting.” (Matthew 17:20-21 ESV)
Faith like a grain of mustard seed.
The mustard seed was the smallest seed in Israel. When germinated and under the proper growing conditions, the seed grew into a mature bush within three months’ time to an average height of seven feet tall.
Therefore, when Jesus used the mustard seed as a metaphor for His teaching here, he was talking about the seed’s one-sided genetic focus (or faith) to be the largest garden plant.
The seed never doubted or waivered in its faith to be all God called it to be. The seed could even lie dormant for over sixty years, but when the conditions were right, it would fulfill its genetic calling by growing into a mature plant.
Although the mustard seed is tiny, mustard-seed faith is not a small amount of faith. It is 100%, put-your-hand-to-the-plow-and-not-look-back, all-in faith. It is the pinnacle of faith and where we need to set our sights.
Prayer.
The word prayer, as used by Jesus, signifies the many different types of prayer, such as supplications, intercessions, thanksgivings, praises, worship and more. But no matter what type we believers use, we must draw near to God and believe He will reward our efforts.
Prayers depend upon our relationship with our Father. We must act little children and rush into His presence, knowing He loves us and desires to answer our prayers.
Fasting.
Fasting is probably the least popular of all of the spiritual disciplines. Starving for Jesus’ sake, right?
But as Paul discovered, God’s power works best in weakness. And the weakness God was referring to is our fleshly nature, especially our desire to eat and drink.
My experience on fasting is that we have to trust that God’s grace is truly sufficient, even when we don’t eat for a period of time.
So, what’s the plan of action for healing dementia?
(Continued in Part 6)
Larry Who 