Daily Devotional • June 17
A Reading from Matthew 17:14-21
14 When they came to the crowd, a man came to him, knelt before him, 15 and said, “Lord, have mercy on my son, for he has epilepsy and suffers terribly; he often falls into the fire and often into the water. 16 And I brought him to your disciples, but they could not cure him.” 17 Jesus answered, “You faithless and perverse generation, how much longer must I be with you? How much longer must I put up with you? Bring him here to me.” 18 And Jesus rebuked the demon, and it came out of him, and the boy was cured from that moment. 19 Then the disciples came to Jesus privately and said, “Why could we not cast it out?” 20 He said to them, “Because of your little faith. For truly I tell you, if you have faith the size of a mustard seed, you will say to this mountain, ‘Move from here to there,’ and it will move, and nothing will be impossible for you.”
Meditation
Christ and his close friend were just on the mountain experiencing the Transfiguration. Peter, James, and John saw Moses and Elijah and Christ’s glory and heard the voice of the Father. They came down from the mountain and were quickly faced with a problem. The disciples left behind could not heal a child, and the father was desperate. You can hear the weariness in Christ’s lament, “How much longer?”
I was a nurse for twenty-eight years before my ordination. Routine things like diabetic complications or removing a catheter are impossible challenges for the average person to face alone. However, for a seasoned ER nurse, this is routine. Christ was used to healing people and a child with epilepsy was trivial. No wonder he asked, “How much longer?”
A desperate father came to see Jesus for his son. It was a tough case. The disciples could not heal the boy, because of their little faith. We can all raise our hands that we are the “ye of little faith” also. But we only need a smidgen of faith. Then we can make mountains move, and nothing is impossible.
How quickly things can change. It is like whiplash. Most of us do not exorcize demons on a routine basis or even deal with fathers who are panicking for their child’s life. But we are called to move mountains. The mountains may seem like impossible obstacles in our families, churches, workplaces, and the world. Christ reminds us today that nothing is impossible with God. We only need a little speck of faith. Our faith may be small, but Christ is powerful and can make miracles.
Jesus Christ is still divine. He did not lose it when he walked down the mountain. He hears our desperate pleas in our prayers and our moans when we have no words. For nothing is impossible with God!
The Rev. Sara Oxley is the rector of The Episcopal Church of the Good Shepherd in Maitland, Florida.
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Daily Devotional Cycle of Prayer
Today we pray for:
The Episcopal Diocese of Upper South Carolina
The Diocese of Gahini – Eglise Anglicane du Rwanda