SPIRITUAL DIARY FOR 11/2/2022 9:30 AM
My Worship Time Focus:
PT-1 “The Perversion of the Faithless”
My Worship Time Reference: Matthew
17:17-18
Message of the verses: “17 And Jesus
answered and said, "O unbelieving and perverted generation, how long shall
I be with you? How long shall I put up with you? Bring him here to Me." 18
And Jesus rebuked him, and the demon came out of him, and the boy was cured at
once.”
John MacArthur begins this section with “The
disciples’ faithless impotence (weakness) not only grieved the boy’s father but
Jesus as well. Speaking to the disciples
and to the multitude rather than to the man who had just confronted Him, Jesus
answered and said, "O unbelieving and perverted generation, how long shall
I be with you?”
We can see something in our Lord here which gives a
rare glimpse into the depts. of His divine heart and soul. Jesus was used to giving orders in eternity
past to angels and they would respond without delay, and now He is grieved at
the blindness and faithlessness of God’s people Israel, especially His
disciples, the ones He had personally chosen, and the ones who He had taught
and endowed with unique power and authority.
We
can see from the gospel readings that the entire generation of Jews was
faithless, as they represented on this occasion by the multitude, the
disciples, and the self-righteous scribes as they were there to trap and to
discredit the Lord if they had the opportunity.
They were like the liberal media today who are ready to pounce on a conservative
person either running for office or in office.
Now according to the gospel of Mark in 9:24 we read that even the father’s
faith was un-complete as he said “I do believe; help my unbelief.”
We
read that not only were the people unbelieving but perverted. MacArthur writes: Perverted is from diastrepho, which has the basic idea of
twisting or bending out of shape. The
term was frequently used to describe a piece of pottery that a careless
craftsman hand misshaped or that had somehow become distorted before being
fired in the oven.”
Jesus
was speaking here not about the fact that many of his listeners were morally
perverted, but most of them were primarily of spiritual perversion that is
inevitable in those who are unbelieving.
Any person who does not genuinely trust God cannot escape having a
distorted view of Him and His will.
Jesus
goes on to say “how long shall I be with you? How long shall I put up with you?” He is saying this perhaps as much to Himself
as to them, as no doubt He was becoming increasingly anxious to return to His
heavenly Father, with whom He had just experienced a unique time while on the
mountain. In our Lord humanness He must
have been tempted to doubt whether His soon-coming suffering and death would be
worthwhile. Perhaps Satan was tempting
Jesus by telling Him that if they don’t trust You while You are with them how
do You expect them to trust You after You have returned to heaven. Did our Lord have a low moment here? It seems that perhaps He did, for after all
He was human.
Lord
willing we will complete this section in our next day.
Spiritual
meaning for my life today: If the truth is that Jesus was a bit down in
this section then I suppose that I have the right to be down too. Life at times is pretty difficult and I think
that I need a real break from the normal and get some time alone with the Lord
in a different environment to get my perspective back on the things of the Lord
that I am missing because of not having a break for a long time.
My Steps of Faith for Today: I believe that the Lord trusted in the Holy
Spirit who was guiding Him throughout His entire ministry to get Him back on
line with the things that He knew He had to do, as perhaps the coming cross was
on His mind, something that had to be so very difficult on Him. I must trust that the Spirit of God will get
me back on track too.
11/2/2022 10:05 AM
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