Help My Unbelief

Leviticus 20:22-22:16

Mark 9:1-29

Psalm 43:1-5

Proverbs 10:18

Yesterday I talked about how cool it was that God kept saying "I'm the Lord your God" at the end of different rules like He was answering the unspoken "but why?" But today as I read I thought about how obvious to Moses it all was, he would never ask "but why?" because he's experiencing God on Mount Sinai...he knows He's the Lord. It's almost like those "I am the Lord your God" statements are there to simply remind us, remember the context...remember where we are in this story...remember who's talking here...this. is. the. Lord.

Today that's just a side comment though..what I want to talk about today is demons. Fun!

So, Jesus drives out a demon here in Mark. And it's not a pretty scene...this demon has possessed this little boy from the time he was born. The demon causes him to seize and convulse, foam at the mouth, and the demon even tries to kill him by causing him to be thrown into fire and water. This is the literal stuff of horror movies. The Bible...can be scary.

I hate scary movies, even writing about this now I'm freaked out because it's night, it's dark, I'm going to go to bed, and I hate all this stuff! Satan is the worst! He imagined horror movies, he sends demons to inhabit and harm people, he inspires evil, wars, mass shootings, genocide, rape, murder... He's the actual very worst.

When I dwell on these things that's when I become like the man in this story though who said to Jesus, "if you can do anything, take pity on us and help us."

Jesus says "'If you can?'" Like, "is this a joke?? What do you mean if?"

While Satan is the worst, Jesus is the best. He wins every single time. Jesus is not scared at all. He's confident, He knows what He's about. This demon means nothing to Him. And Jesus just tells the demon to leave and the demon leaves.

For every time in my life I felt like something or someone was too overwhelming, too awful, too hard, too impossible, I am like this man who begs Jesus to do something as I try to believe He even can do something.

Jesus can do something.

Nothing

impossible

There's that theme again I keep coming back to!

I am like this man so often. I struggle to truly in a I-live-my-day-to-day-life-like-this believe that with Jesus nothing is impossible and so my new cry to Jesus is "I do believe, help me overcome my unbelief!"

If I'm reading the Bible every day for nothing else, I hope it is to believe in Jesus, His love, power, and grace more.

Tomorrow:

Leviticus 22:17-23:44

Mark 9:30-10:12

Psalm 44:1-8

Proverbs 10:19