For reflections of the transfiguration itself, please scroll down to earlier post Mark 9.

Here John reflects as he comes down to earth with a bump!

I don’t know which of them looked the most downcast and frustrated: my fellow disciples, the crowd gathered around, the poor boy’s father or Jesus himself.

Actually, I don’t even know what my face looked like in that moment either, but I guess it must have been a mirror image of Peter’s. His expression carried all the marks of someone who had been brought down to earth with a bump!  As we came down from the mountain, heard the shouting and began to realise what it was all about, I watched the lingering glow of excitement simply wiped from his face.  No surprise – I felt exactly the same.  What an unbelievable comedown!  From witnessing the heights of glory to …this?!

As we drew close, we could see that the others from our group were taking a harsh verbal beating from the teachers.  All as one, they were cowering before the tirade, looking utterly bewildered and totally defeated.  What was going on?

Of course, when they saw Jesus, they were delighted and ran to him in relief, like children to hide in their mother’s skirts.  But there was a certain coyness about them too.

‘Ok, lads, what’s this all about?’ Jesus demanded. But no-one got to reply before a furious member of the crowd stepped forward and loudly dobbed them in. 

Their accuser, it turned out, was the man at the very centre of the dispute.  And I’m sure you will understand his fury and frustration when I explain why.  He had come looking for Jesus, you see, bringing his son in desperate need of healing.  The boy could not talk. He also had frequent seizures; foaming at the mouth, gritting his teeth, going rigid all over as the demon inside threw him to the ground.  ‘I asked your disciples to help him,’ he cried, ‘and they could not!’

Well, now I understood the frustration all round … the despair in the father’s eyes … the bewildered defeat in the eyes of my brothers.  Instantly, I understood their confusion: Jesus had sent us out and, in his name, we had cast out demons by the score… so what went wrong today?  I joined them in wondering; why now did they hit the wall and fail?

Much to everyone’s surprise, it was now Jesus’ turn to get frustrated.  ‘How unbelieving you people are!’ he blurted out. ‘How much longer must I put up with you?!’ 

‘Bring the boy to me!’ he snapped, and as soon as they did the spirit threw the youngster into a fit. He started rolling around on the floor, frothing at the mouth as his father had described.

When Jesus enquired how long the boy had suffered like this, the father answered, ‘All his life!’ Parental agony crept into his voice as he told Jesus about the boy regularly being thrown into fires or any kind of deep water, as if the demon were trying to kill him. ‘Have pity on us and help us.’ he pleaded. ‘…if you can.’

‘What’s all this ‘’If you can’’ business?’ Jesus taunted.   Of course, the man had been disappointed once already this day, but Jesus was not going to let him give way to such self-pity. ‘I can help you – if you can help yourself.  It’s all possible – you’ve just got to believe it’

‘I do believe – but not enough’ was the man’s honest reply. ‘Help me!’ 

And Jesus did.  

He ordered the spirit to leave and out it came screaming!  The boy fell to the floor as if dead. In fact, everyone thought he must be dead – except Jesus, of course, who took him by the hand and helped him get up and stand.  And that was it.  Job done at last.

Except Jesus wasn’t finished yet.

He may have been firm with the Father, but he was so frustrated with the teachers and with us. We were the unbelieving ones he had simply had enough of.  We were the ones that caused his temper to flare.

Safely indoors and later, we finally dared ask him what had gone wrong. Why were things getting harder now?  Why, having been able to cast out all kinds of demons before, could we not do it this time?

His answer was ambiguous.  Some of the lads think that when he said ‘this kind only comes out by prayer’ he meant that this was a special type of demon – a kind we had not met before that needed special attention.  Others thought it meant they had not prayed long and hard enough, or that they didn’t use the right words when trying to deliver the boy.  I, however, suspect it was something simpler.  I believe that Jesus meant exactly what he said; you have got to pray to drive this kind out.  

Knowing my friends as I do, I have a feeling that they did not stop to pray at all.  I think that, in the flush of all their earlier success, they just assumed it would happen again.  They thought that they could do it, and so they got on and did it.  And that’s when they found out that they couldn’t do it.  These demons only come out through prayer. 

It seems to me that my brothers had taken it for granted.  They thought it was a power they had in themselves – a gift under their own control and to be exercised at their own bidding. How wrong could they be?!  Their previous success had led them to trust in themselves and forget their dependence on God.  So, they jumped to action, but failed to pray, and therefore they failed altogether.

Prayer, I would suggest, is not a pious exercise or the uttering of a few holy words.  Prayer is about living in spiritual dependence upon God.  That’s what Jesus called for from the boy’s father – and when that man admitted he didn’t have enough faith and asked for help, he was expressing this humble dependence in the simplest and most profound form of prayer.

With that tiny mustard seed of faith an immovable mountain was removed from his life, leaving no more risk of an avalanche to bury his son alive!    

So, yes, everything is possible for the one who has faith – even the driving out of terrible demons. But we can’t do it on our own.  We dare not become overconfident. This kind only comes out through prayer.  And that prayer needs only one word: Help!

Lord I do believe, but not enough. 

Help me!