Ready to Quit
The Pharisees came out and began to argue with Him, seeking from Him a sign from heaven, to test Him. Sighing deeply in His spirit, He said, “Why does this generation seek for a sign? Truly I say to you, no sign will be given to this generation.” Leaving them, He again embarked and went away to the other side. Mark 8:11-13 NASB
Sighing deeply – Today we need to understand Yeshua’s reaction in its context. Yesterday we encountered the same verb, stenazo, when Yeshua “groaned” over the condition of the deaf boy. Today the verb is strengthened with the addition of ana. It’s not just a groan. It’s a completely frustrated response of exasperation and irritation. In other words, Yeshua is ready to give up with these people. He is sick and tired over going over the same issues time and again. He is completely annoyed by the constant insistence for added proof. He is finished with their lack of trust.
Before we secretly gloat over his dismissal of those obtuse Pharisees, we need to ask ourselves this question: Are we looking for signs too? Are we asking for proofs; proofs that are acceptable to us? Are we demanding that Yeshua and/or the Father furnish us with certainty so that we are absolutely assured that we are correct? As Peter Enns suggests, “Are we committing the sin of certainty when God asks for trust?” Maybe Yeshua’s remark to the Pharisees fits us too. “Why does this generation seek for a sign?” Isn’t that precisely what we do? Aren’t we engaged in the exercise of “proving” our faith by rational argument, evidence investigation and theological explanation? Don’t we just wish God would write a message in the sky so that everyone would have to believe? Yeshua’s question seems as contemporary as the latest article defending creationism. Why do we so desperately want some kind of proof? Is it because we really don’t trust the supposed relationship that we claim to have? If our confident reliance on the character of God were as strong as we wish to claim it is, would we still scramble around to find evidence that the walls of Jericho really fell? Would we still have to go over and over the arguments about the present application of Torah? Would we really need to solve the problem of the end times? Is that what faith is: a collection of proof-positive arguments that demand intellectual confirmation so that we know longer have any doubts? If that’s what the Pharisees asked for, Yeshua rejected their demand. And he would do the same with us.
Notice what Yeshua does when he is confronted with this exasperating refusal to trust. He leaves! He doesn’t try another approach. He doesn’t present another “case for Christ.” He just leaves. It isn’t worth his time and energy to debate. The whole conversation is wrong-headed and will not result in true faith. Perhaps Mark’s verses reflect another statement: “when the Son of Man comes, will He find faith on the earth?” Perhaps when the Son of Man comes, he will find lots of apologetic books, lots of proof web sites, lots of clamors for certainty and not a drop of faith. And he will just leave. What else can anyone do?
Topical Index: sighing deeply, anastenazo, faith, proof, Mark 8:11-13
What happens when His “ready to quit” meets my “ready to quit” or my “wanting to quit ” or my
“having quit”? Inwardly I am continually reminded of that pithy quip: “Winners never quit; quitters never win”. Of course my “high view” of Yeshua is that He is the Ultimate Winner (and I the anti- winner). So here Yeshua is portrayed as “completely frustrated, exasperated, irritated, ready to give up, sick and tired, completely annoyed, finished”. Are you granting license for us to follow suit or simply acknowledging that we do? And where is the “I will never leave you or forsake you” Messiah? As you might discern this message for me is somewhat disconcerting, if not disenfranchising or even potentially demoralizing. All of this before my morning coffee.
Maybe He doesn’t like those who want everything their way or at least everything figured out and neatly wrapped in a pretty package. But for the sake of my theological endoskeleton
I’m complelled to try to at least sort this out, if not figure it out. As Laurita would say “I am yelping for some help” here.
Michael, this isn’t help; this is commisery (as if you needed more). The descent into faith (no, it isn’t a ‘leap’ or an epiphany or a strategic exercise) feels like free fall, and it is hell on the flesh. (It was hell on Yeshua’s flesh, too!) I think in this instance He was exasperated because those folks (oh, yeah, I have been part of that crowd) wanted to AVOID faith, as Skip is pointing out. There’s nothing to work with as long as folks even THINK they have some sort of footing. I have decided that the only time you see some sort of spontaneous evolution of faith in ‘nature’ is in an earthquake or tsunami or other horrible, paradigm-shattering experience. It just is not POSSIBLE for the flesh to choose faith! We all have to be forced into it with our backs against a wall.
The above sounds like free fall for you. It feels like death because it IS death, and you are being pushed over your edge so that you can FIND faith, not lose it! Our flesh is so congenial to the lies that we do not know how to recognize the necessary conditions for faith – they all look like the END of it! That is a lie!
Hit the bottom, lie there for a little, and look around. It will all (or almost all) look the opposite of what you were braced for, or what you were expecting, because, until we have checked flesh death out for ourselves, we are primed to believe a whole bunch of lies about it. For the record, I think we believe as many lies about faith, too, and avoid it like the plague to our flesh that it certainly is. We choose, over and over, the choices that clearly did not work last time just because the leaps (whoops, free falls) of faith that love requires look so, well, IMPOSSIBLE. Well, to the flesh, they are!
If we never choose the impossible stands of pure faith, we will never find our Saviour. That is a harsh statement, but I looked everywhere else for Him, and only found Him there. He had been there all along, waiting for me to fall so that He could catch me. I have to turn loose of all hope in the flesh before the hope of heaven is possible.
So, buckle your seatbelt and tell your flesh “today is a good day to die!”.
Thanks Laurita. Strangely, this does help. Looking for commissary, I find commisery; looking for light, I am enveloped in darkness; looking for a perfect heavenly god, I discover an unblemished earthy man; looking for life, I touch death; looking for order, I plum chaos; looking for myself, I lose self. Yup, this has to be the right path, if for no other reason that it feels so wrong and there are so few on it. As aways thanks for your words of discouragement, uhhh encouragement…uhhh, thanks for your words!
You remind me of the transcending act that brought on deliverance… From life into hell and all the way up. To unite all in one faith…
And here is where I find dogmas loose their logic. If all was united through one life way are all still different. Or would it mean for us to understand we need to endure the same to help others as we were helped through redemption and not through repeating teachings. To grow to the fullness as Michael said a few years ago, that desire that eludes us as we are chasing it instead of living it…
Seeker, these questions are where I find myself, too. I think I may be beginning to see that differentiation of personality (identity) is ONLY possible in unity, for only there do we get the mirroring we need to be able to grow “from glory to glory”. Separated, we are stuck in identity poverty, like lumps of poorly formed clay. I need you to be able to experience the unique gloriness of me!
I sat in Alanon and was struck by how our miseries seemed scripted; I mean, in the stories of chaos, they all seemed so alike. However, there is no one as unique as one who is well connected to others. That being said, I think we resonate with each other better in our brokenness than in our wholeness – perhaps because we all hurt much the same, but joy and happiness seem so solitary, or even an affront to others who are still miserable!
The day we turn around and decide to confront our coping mechanisms is the day we all meet the nemesis of self, and we will all be defeated there at our own Waterloos, guaranteed. We cannot chase our desire because it is chasing us, but we will never meet it unless and until we turn around and grab our own bull — by its horns (power). Unless, of course, YHVH takes pity on us and gets us into a corner we cannot get out of!
Alice, for all of us, is already on the wrong side of the looking glass. Disaster is what we have to go through to get back, because we are all running like hell in the wrong direction and nothing short of it can or will be able to convince us to stop and turn around.
Blessed are the poor peeps who are unable to ‘run no more’, as my grandmama used to say.
Thank you Laurita that was well explained in unity we can appreciate and grow from our differences. I always thought unity means similarities and here you have wiped that part of my oneness veil away. I need to seek differences to grow.
Have a wonderful day…
I started to write “This is a slap in my face…” but I know that Yeshua has compassion for me… even though I certainly don’t deserve it.. now I’m crying for being such a fool…
“And He called a child to Himself, set him in the midst of them, and said, ‘Amen, I tell you, unless you turn and become like children, you shall never enter the kingdom of heaven.;” [Mat 18:2-3]
We may question all we like, but to be in that kingdom, we must become like children and trust Messiah, even when our questions are not answered, or when we don’t get the answers we want. It’s a good bit about the attitude of the heart, isn’t it? Are we asking for understanding, with faith and trust in Him, regardless of the outcome of our questioning, or are we asking with a demand for an answer? Are we asking to argue? Are we asking in unbelief? Or are we possibly even asking in defiance? If that’s the case, I think we have a more important question to ask. Are we in the kind of position in relationship with Him to even enter the kingdom of heaven?
I actually find this “Today’s Word” to be quite refreshing…..like a good morning wake-up, put-you-in-your-place, slap in the face.
Like someone recently told me, “My God is not user-friendly”. In my mind, He’s not even “seeker-friendly”, at least for those who have not received a love of the truth so as to be saved.
“They perish because they did not accept the love of the truth so as to be saved. For this reason God sends them a delusional force, to lead them to believe what is false, so that they may be judged—all those who did not believe the truth but delighted in wickedness.” [2Th 2:11-12]
“Thomas said to Him, ‘Master, we don’t know where You are going. How can we know the way?’ Yeshua said to him, ‘I am the way, the truth, and the life! No one comes to the Father except through Me. If you have come to know Me, you will know My Father also. From now on, you do know Him and have seen Him.’ Philip said to Him, ‘Master, show us the Father, and it is enough for us.’ Yeshua said to him, ‘Have I been with you for so long a time, and you haven’t come to know Me, Philip? He who has seen Me has seen the Father. How can you say, “Show us the Father”? Don’t you believe that I am in the Father and the Father is in Me? The words I say to you, I do not speak on My own; but the Father dwelling in Me does His works. Believe Me that I am in the Father and the Father is in Me—or at least believe because of the works themselves.'” [Joh 14:5-11]
Knowing, trusting and obeying Him should be sought more than answers to our questions. If we do not have enough answers to our questions for that, then quite possibly we are either asking the wrong questions or asking the right questions but with the wrong attitude of heart.
“Yeshua spoke these things; then, lifting up His eyes to heaven, He said, ‘Father, the hour has come. Glorify Your Son, so the Son may glorify You. Even as You gave Him authority over all flesh, so may He give eternal life to all those You have given Him. And this is eternal life, that they may know You, the only true God, and Yeshua the Messiah, the One You sent. [Joh 17:1-3]
How do we feel when we have done our best to make ourselves known to those for whom we are longing to know, trust, and love us, and then they fail to see all the evidence we have provided and demand more proof before they will trust and love us? I can tell you how I feel…..but the words I would use here would not be appropriate.
Faith…
Faith is a funny thing. This scripture talks about needing continual proof and that this constant need to prove is frustrating. I think it is perfect that the Bible speaks of Jesus’ second coming as like a woman travailing in labor. I work with women in pregnancy and labor with relation to breastfeeding.
Oxytocin or in the Greek, quick birth, is the hormone of love, touch, orgasm, pregnancy, childbirth, and breastfeeding even the hearing of your first name.
There are many times that a woman who is pregnant keeps worrying if everything is ok and the funny thing is the worry is what can complicate the pregnancy. You are still pregnant. Oxytocin is helping progress the pregnancy.
During delivery oxytocin is helping to cause your contractions. Stress about wondering if the baby will ever come, or if it will be painful, etc can cause a dip in oxytocin and a tightening in the uterus in the vagina which can lead to a delay in delivery, not to mention more pain.
It’s not that you are not pregnant anymore the baby is still in there trying to come out but your worry or stress or one might say lack of faith is delaying what just is.
Breathing like nothing is happening and everything is normal actually quickens everything, but doubt, just delays.
Imagine needing proof every second that your lungs or heart are working. This will cause stress which will make something that is natural difficult.
Faith without needing proof is the easiest way to experience that love he has for us in its purest form. In essence, we are each trying to birth him in our lives everyday. We shouldn’t need an ultrasound every second to prove he is coming. Once we birth him, we can become doulas, or the Bible uses the word doulos-free servant. You become the midwife tht helps other people birth Jesus for themselves. We are essentially the What to Expect When You are Expecting book for people we encounter that want to birth Jesus in their lives.
Faith and belief birth babies easier. Doubt, fear, and worry and needing proof every step cn be frustrating because he is in each one of us patiently waiting to be birthed.
Janel; as an old mother of four, eight grands, and now 13 great-grands; you did a fantastic description bringing memories floating up to all mothers that read this! A real “LABOR” OF LOVE SO TO SPEAK. THANK YOU FOR TAKING THE TIME TO WRITE IT. SINCERELY, LaVaye Billings 84 years old.
I was raised in a household of the faithful. It was in my first semester of college I entertained four days of doubt. I chose to return to by beliefs. These have varied as I have grown but I do not chose to doubt the veracity, presence or power of YHVH. I have entertained and seen so many verieties of religious and sincere beliefs that I have now chosen to no longer struggle with how I belive but to simply trust in whom I Belive. It has been said of me that I have a gift of faith if that is so my faith is in the giver and not the gift.