Luke 9:37-43a — The time when Jesus was over it

READ THIS: Luke 9:37-43a

37 The next day, when they came down from the mountain, a large crowd met him. 38 A man in the crowd called out, “Teacher, I beg you to look at my son, for he is my only child. 39 A spirit seizes him and he suddenly screams; it throws him into convulsions so that he foams at the mouth. It scarcely ever leaves him and is destroying him. 40 I begged your disciples to drive it out, but they could not.”

41 “You unbelieving and perverse generation,” Jesus replied, “how long shall I stay with you and put up with you? Bring your son here.” 42 Even while the boy was coming, the demon threw him to the ground in a convulsion. But Jesus rebuked the impure spirit, healed the boy and gave him back to his father. 43a And they were all amazed at the greatness of God.

WHAT’S THIS MEAN, ANYWAY?

Jesus had just hit a spiritual high. He was up on a mountain with Elijah and Moses, and there was all this lightning and "power of God"-ness going on. Then, He comes down and is confronted by a demon that His own disciples can't get out. Hello, spiritual low...

Jesus gets a little frustrated, but He sends the demon away, and gives the formerly demon-possessed boy back to his father. 

And that right there is why Jesus left His spiritual high-- so that He could return people back to their Father!!! For us, it can be hard to come down from our mountains, but if we keep in mind that we want to show other people the greatness of God, then we need to step into places where people don't believe and where people do perverse/not okay things. What can encourage us, is that it's okay to feel the frustration of being in a broken world while also feeling Heaven so close and so far. When we feel Heaven the most is usually when the brokenness and sickness of the world becomes so obvious. We need to be able to call the world broken, but also to keep being kind and showing what healing looks like to the world. That's what Jesus did!

THINK ABOUT IT:

1. When was a time that you went from a spiritual high to a spiritual low? What was that like?

2. What keeps you going when you hit a spiritual low?

TRY THIS:

In Revelation, Jesus tells a group of people who were at a spiritual low to "do the things they did at first." If we're in spiritual lows, we stop doing the things that we do when we're tight with Jesus (like praying or journaling or telling people about Him). So if you're at a spiritual low...think about something you used to do with Jesus when you were at a high and DO it! For me, it's worshipping on my own, so I'll try to worship on my own to this song: YouTube link OR Spotify link

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