Matthew 17:14-20

Matthew 17:14-20 NIV

When they came to the crowd, a man approached Jesus and knelt before him. “Lord, have mercy on my son,” he said. “He has seizures and is suffering greatly. He often falls into the fire or into the water. I brought him to your disciples, but they could not heal him.” 
“You unbelieving and perverse generation,” Jesus replied, “how long shall I stay with you? How long shall I put up with you? Bring the boy here to me.” Jesus rebuked the demon, and it came out of the boy, and he was healed at that moment.
Then the disciples came to Jesus in private and asked, “Why couldnʼt we drive it out?”
He replied, “Because you have so little faith. Truly I tell you, if you have faith as small as a mustard seed, you can say to this mountain, ‘Move from here to there,’ and it will move. Nothing will be impossible for you.”

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I'm going to offer an interpretation of this passage that is unique to what I've usually thought when reading this story. I've usually read this story from the perspective of Jesus and His disciples. He has just come down from an amazing foretaste of the kingdom of heaven on the Mount of Transfiguration, but now Jesus is faced with a demon possessed young man whose father pleads for his healing. Jesus is clearly frustrated by the way He responds. "How much longer will I have to put up with you", He exclaims in the face of perversity and unbelief. Is it the demon that frustrated Jesus, the young man or the disciples? Is it all of them?

But today I'm reading this passage from the perspective of the father who intercedes for his son. The Greek literally says that his son is moon struck, which is a way of saying his son is crazy. Older translations like the King James Version use the word lunatic to describe the young man's condition. The NIV uses the word "seizures" to describe the result of the young man's moon struck condition. Others call it epilepsy. I appreciate the translators' attempt at making this ancient phrase apply to what we know of epilepsy, but it's reading ourselves into the text. Nobody in the first century knew of a condition called epilepsy and it certainly is not related to demonic possession. The Greek phrase literally means to fall prostate. It's the same word used to describe the apostles' behavior when they heard the voice of God from the cloud the surrounding them on the Mount of Transfiguration.

When the disciples heard this, they fell facedown to the ground, terrified.
Matthew 17:6 NIV

The similarities in the Greek phrases are there, but they are also distinct from one another. The apostles literally fall prostate to their faces. The Greek phrase is "ἔπεσαν ἐπὶ πρόσωπον". The young man falls prostate towards the fire and water. The Greek phrase is "πίπτει εἰς". The Greek preposition eis can be translated to mean to, into, towards, unto, for and among.

I haven't studied Greek, so I'm only going on the interlinear dictionaries and their definitions for Greek words. I may be making more out of this than I should. I ought to follow traditional interpretations, but here's what I'm thinking. The young man worships fire and water. He falls down before them in worship. Pagan worship often involves venerating the powers within nature. The pentagram symbolizes the worship of the five elements, earth, wind, fire, water and spirit. The ancients were known to worship elements like fire and water, or astrological bodies like the sun and moon. Might Matthew be speaking metaphorically using the young man as a representative of the entire perverse and unbelieving generation?

At face value the young man falls into the fire and into the water. Why an epileptic would fall into fire and water is beyond me. Why would the father provide this detail? Why wouldn't he say that his son falls rigidly to the ground? That's how I'd describe epilepsy. I suppose that if the young man is out on a boat fishing he might fall into water during a seizure. If cooking around an open fire he might fall into it. But the detail is too specific and Jesus' frustration is too overblown, at least from my perspective.

What if the father is interceding for his son who's turned to pagan worship? The bible claims that those who worship idols worship demons. The apostle Paul wrote, "...the sacrifices of pagans are offered to demons, not to God, and I do not want you to be participants with demons."
1 Corinthians 10:20 NIV

If Jesus is responding to the fact that this young man has fallen under the influence of demons through his worship of the powers within nature, then Jesus' response makes more sense to me.

“You unbelieving and perverse generation,” Jesus replied, “how long shall I stay with you? How long shall I put up with you? Bring the boy here to me.”
Matthew 17:17 NIV

Regardless of whether I'm correct I'm my interpretation or not, what happens next is the point of the story. The disciples could not drive out this demon and help the young man. Jesus told them that they could not drive the demon out because they lacked faith. The disciples are part of this unbelieving generation. Jesus told them if their faith was like a mustard seed, starting out tiny but growing into the largest of all the plants in the garden, then they could move mountains. "Nothing will be impossible for you."

I can't help but think of Yoda training Luke Skywalker on Dantooine. Luke's x-wing fighter is sunk in the swamp. The Jedi master raises the spacecraft from the bog with the power of the force and the young Skywalker exclaims in amazement, "I don't believe it!" Yoda flatly replies, "That is why you fail." Luke could not lift his fighter from the swamp with the force because He thought it was impossible.

How often have I thought it was impossible to reach someone who's turned away from God and turned toward New Age religions or atheism? Rather than intercede with a love like the father in Matthew's story, I gave up on them. The word of God calls me out of unbelief and into growing my faith by embracing the impossible.

Jesus had just descended from the Mount of Transfiguration down into the perverse and unbelieving. He told His disciples if they had faith they could tell this mountain to move from here to there. Did Jesus mean the mountain upon which He just experienced the transforming presence of God? If we have faith we can send the transforming power of God into any perverse and unbelieving city, neighborhood or person. And we can cast the demon out and replace it with God's love. That is if we believe that with God nothing is impossible.

The father's compassion for his wayward son was rewarded. Jesus healed the young man and cast the demon out. Do you have compassion for those in your life who are into things that enslave them? Do you feel inadequate to help them? Perhaps they don't want your help or your God. That needn't stop you from praying in faith for God to free them from their suffering. All you need is a desire to grow like a mustard seed in your faith in God's ability to do the impossible.