‘And when they had come to the multitude, a man came to Him, kneeling down to Him and saying, "Lord, have mercy on my son, for he is an epileptic and suffers severely; for he often falls into the fire and often into the water. So I brought him to Your disciples, but they could not cure him." Then Jesus answered and said, "O faithless and perverse generation, how long shall I bear with you? Bring him here to Me." And Jesus rebuked the demon, and it came out of him; and the child was cured from that very hour.'
'Then the disciples came to Jesus privately and said, "Why could we not cast it out?" So Jesus said to them, "Because of your unbelief; for assuredly, I say to you, if you have faith as 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. However, this kind goes out not but by prayer and fasting." '(Matthew 17:14-21 NKJV)
We see that individual desire to receive deliverance and the disciples’ desire to minister deliverance were unsuccessful until correction came from the Lord. It seems Jesus always dealt with the root of the problem rather than the fruit of it. We all know that if we pull the leaf of a weed, unless the root comes out with it, the weed will manifest again. The father brought his son to Jesus' disciples, hoping they could minister the cure. The disciples were unable, at that time, to awaken the father to his faithless and perverse approach; rather trying to pull off the leaves of the weed. The disciples had to be brought to maturity through the prayer declared by Jesus (Matthew 17:20) and fasting illegitimate attempts to remove leaves of weeds. 'Nothing will be impossible for you' is the promised result as faith is in Him, believing.
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