Chapter # 9 Paragraph # 3 Study # 5
April 11, 2023
Moss Bluff, Louisiana
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Thesis: "Impatience" is a deadly disease of the soul.
Introduction: In our studies of
Mark 9:14-29 we have considered Mark's use of this record as a reinforcement of his most fundamental argument concerning Jesus as "The Mighty One" immediately after the experience of The Three on the mountain where Jesus is indisputably identified by God as His "Messiah". We also considered how the failure of The Nine threatened to completely upset the "faith" of the crowd. And, we considered the biblical principle of "faith" as the attitude of the heart in respect to a specific element of divine Truth.
This evening we are going to consider another aspect of Mark's presentation: the erosion of "faith" as it happens because of "impatience" as well as the "assumption" that "delegated authority" somehow becomes "personal authority" as time and success develop.
- I. Mark's Focus Upon The Time Factor In The Erosion Of Faith.
- A. In 9:20 there is an introductory description of the magnitude of the spirit's power as demonstrated by its action.
- 1. The details of the spirit's actions include two parts.
- a. The first verb: "sunesparaxen"; Aorist Indicative Active 3rd Person Singular.
- 1) Used only twice in the New Testament (Mark 9:20 and Luke 9:42); and both uses are in records of the same event.
- 2) This verb is a compound word designed to indicate a kind of thoroughness of the action; a massive convulsion.
- a) The basic verb (sparasso) is used by Mark in 1:26 and 9:26 and by Luke in 9:39.
- b) Mark's use in 1:26 is in Mark's initial (first details beyond his introduction of his Gospel) record of Jesus' active ministry actions and involves an unclean spirit's interruption of Jesus' teaching in the synagogue where the issue of "powerful authority" is the point.
- i. Thus, the use in 9:26 is a deliberate "link" to that issue of "powerful authority".
- ii. This "link", then, provides us with the first hint that Mark is recording the "erosion" factor often involved in the passing of time (Note: 2 Peter 1:9).
- c) In Mark's use in 9:26, this non-emphatic basic verb is connected to "polla", which the translators translate as "terrible" so that the outcome is that the boy appears to be dead. [Thus, in 9:42, Luke maintained the thrust of "a terrible convulsion" by switching to the compound "sunesparaxen"].
- 3) This verb is Mark's choice of a word to indicate the power of the unclean spirit (as if the authority of Jesus, given to the disciples in 6:7, is "limited" to the power of lesser spirits).
- a) This signals two issues: the passing of time while the disciples are using the delegated authority to cast out unclean spirits; and the growing level of opposition by the demonic world to this authority.
- b) Clearly, it is a failure of faith to disregard the growth of opposition while, at the same time, turning "delegated authority" into a kind of "personal authority".
- i. Opposition increases, but "faith" is turned into "unbelief" by reason of complacency and past successes.
- ii. Ideally, "faith" will increase over time and successes, but Mark's "POINT" is that it very well may not.
- 4) This verb follows the participle (idon), which indicates that the "spirit, having seen Him" goes into his most virulent actions to attempt to intimidate.
- b. The second verb is "ekulieto" (Imperfect Indicative 3rd Person Singular) and it means "he was rolling".
- 1) It was also preceded by a participle ("peson") which means "having fallen" (upon the ground).
- 2) But it is also followed by another participle ("apfrizon") which means "foaming" (at the mouth).
- 2. These details are more fully informed when the father of the boy describes the spirit's actions for Jesus.
- B. With Jesus' question to the father of "how long has this been happening to him?" Mark introduces the "time factor".
- 1. The spirit's power has been in place since the boy was a mere child, and this makes any hope of "deliverance" die bit by bit over the length of time so that the father, though hoping the disciples can exorcise the spirit, was probably not surprised that they failed: "settled circumstances" tend to be "hopeless".
- 2. Though the experiences of "delayed divine responses" are often used to blunt and degrade the ability of man to "believe", they have an actual reality of "divine timing for greater impact". (Note the man healed after many years of being blind from his mother's womb [John 9] and the woman with an issue of blood for twelve years [Mark 5] and Jesus' deliberate wait after being summoned by Martha and Mary [John 11] and the 4,000 years between the promise of the Deliverer and the "fulness of the time" [Galatians 4] and the long wait for Zacharias and Elizabeth [Luke 1] as well as Abraham and Isaac [Genesis] as well as the scoffers' use of "delay" to deny the validity of the Promise of His Coming in 2 Peter).
- C. The man's linking of the terrible actions of the spirit to the question of Jesus' "ability to help" reveals how the indisputable power of Jesus is diminished by the passing of time in 9:22.
- D. Jesus' chastisement of the "unbelief" with His absolute rejection of any/all excuses indicates that this "process" is required and not subject to human impatience (both in 9:19 and 9:23). This is a legitimate process and is declared in words in Hebrews 10:36.
