Having come down from their “mountain top experience,” Jesus, along with Peter, James and John, re-entered a trouble-filled, business-as-usual, fallen world. What the other nine disciples were occupied with in the meanwhile we do not know for sure, but possibly they were the disciples who had been unsuccessful at exorcism, which precipitated this present story.

A man comes pleading to Jesus about his son being mentally deranged, asking for mercy. We note some pertinent insights. First, the call for mercy reveals again the faulty belief that bad things happen to people because of their sin and God’s judgment. Such was the premise of Job’s “friends.” The story of Job, however, argues that not all suffering can be traced back to that.

Second, nothing can be more heart-wrenching than a man pleading for his son. What parent hasn’t repeatedly begged the Lord for his children as they go through pains of living in a fallen world. Third, all other issues of Jesus’ identity aside, the father’s hope that Christ could heal was all that mattered.

Fourth, the father was undeterred by the limitation of Christ’s followers. He was not like some people today who slow down or abandon their quest of seeking and following Christ because of the shortcomings of other Christ-followers. This man’s need drove him to the “top,” nothing would stop him.

Despite all this, Jesus’ response is one of exasperation. Keeping in mind that Jesus did in the end heal the boy, He sees this as an example of people coming to Him only for the miracles and not following the evidence to where it leads, namely that Jesus is “the Christ, the Son of the Living God.” That kind of faith was absent in this man. Jesus’ response was under­standable when we put this fellow’s action alongside the disciples’ confession of faith. Yet, the Lord’s care for people despite their ignorance or lack of faith trumped His exasperation—this was later exemplified on the cross when He pleaded, “Father, forgive them, they don’t know what they are doing.”