Mark 9:25 And Jesus, seeing that a crowd was running together toward them, rebuked the unclean spirit, saying to it, Dumb and deaf spirit, I order you, come out of him and enter into him no more. 26 And after crying out and convulsing him terribly, it came out. And he became as though he were dead so that many said that he died. 27 But Jesus took hold of his hand and raised him, and he stood up. 28 And when He entered into the house, His disciples questioned Him privately, Why were we not able to cast it out? 29 And He said to them, This kind cannot come out by any means except prayer.
[Part 2 of 3] The father of the child had asked the Lord's disciples to cast out the demon, but they were not able to do so. Because they were not able to do it, there was a serious dispute. When the Lord came down from the mountain of transfiguration, He came into that situation. He then proceeded to cast out the dumb and deaf spirit. In verse 28, the disciples seemed to be saying to the Lord, "We have been following You and learning of You for a long period of time. It was easy for You to cast out the demon. But why were we not able to do it?" In verse 29, the Lord's word here indicates that the disciples failed to pray, and that was the reason they could not cast out the demon. Do you know what it means to pray? To pray means that we realize that we are nothing and that we can do nothing. This implies that prayer is the real denial of the self. To pray, therefore, is to deny ourselves, knowing that we are nothing and are not able to do anything. Furthermore, to pray is actually to declare, "Not I, but Christ." Instead of praying, the disciples tried to cast out the demon. But although they attempted to cast out the demon, they were not successful. We may say that they tried to cast out the demon without the necessary power, energy, divine electricity. I wish to emphasize the fact that the word "prayer" in 9:29 actually indicates "no longer I, but Christ." Concerning this matter, we need to understand why this case immediately follows the revelation of Christ as our replacement and the Lord's word about denying ourselves. We need to deny ourselves so that Christ may be our replacement and become everything to us. Although the disciples saw this revelation, they did not practice it or live according to it. [Continued tomorrow] (c) Living Stream Ministry.
Bible verses are taken from the Recovery Version of the Bible and Words of Ministry from Witness Lee, Life-study of Mark, pp. 238-239. Both are published by Living Stream Ministry, Anaheim, CA. Please visit us at www.emanna.com. Send comments to: [email protected].
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