Chapter 17

“After six days” — a literal lapse of time before the prophecy is fulfilled; “Jesus taketh Peter, James, and John his brother, and bringeth them up into an high mountain apart.” The word “apart” means by themselves, just the three of them.

Verse 2 — “And was transfigured before them.” The word “transfigured” in the Greek means to change the external form or the outward visible form. It means an outer transformation. Jesus is changed on the outside. This is still the incarnate Christ but the change is made so that the glory of Christ will appear and so that Peter, James and John will get a preview of the second advent of Christ; they will see Him as He will appear at the second advent; “and his face did shine.” The word “did shine” means to be animated, to be gloriously animated, which indicates that during the first advent the face of Jesus Christ was not unusually animated, but When He comes back again there will be this fantastic inner beauty shining forth; “as the sun, and his raiment was as white as light.” In other words, whatever He was wearing it was beautiful, translucent, glamorous.

Verse 3 — “And, behold, there appeared unto them Moses and Elijah talking with him.” Moses and Elijah are the heralds of the second advent of Jesus Christ. These are the two witnesses which are found in Revelation chapter eleven, verses three through twelve. They are Jews and they are going to be a part of the second advent picture, and they are talking with the Lord Jesus Christ.

Verse 4 — “Then answered Peter.” Notice that if there are more than two people around it is Peter who does the talking! Later on he will have something to say, in fact he learned to talk but he didn’t have any content yet. When he gets some content he will begin to give some wonderful messages as on the day of Pentecost in Acts chapters two and three. Apparently in two messages Peter led about five or six thousand people to the Lord. “Lord [he recognises always His deity], it is good for us to be here.” The word for “good” is not human good and it is not divine good, it means free from defects. So he is actually saying, “Things are very nice up here.” It connotes the idea of wonderful environment and Peter wants to stay right there. The environment is excellent, here is Moses and Elijah and the Lord and two other disciples, and it is just a nice situation all the way around. Another reason why it is pleasant to Peter: he always got along with John, they were old mates who were compatible. As far as Peter was concerned he was in good company and what he wants to do is to perpetuate this lovely environment. However, there is just one thing that Peter has forgotten: pleasant circumstances do not make happiness for the believer. The beautiful thing about the believer who has doctrine is that he can enjoy his pleasant circumstances. He can enjoy people, he can enjoy circumstances, and he can really enjoy happiness. However, the beauty of Bible doctrine is that it is designed for happiness in adversity as well. And what Peter is really saying here is, Lord let’s stick it out here, let’s forget all about all that mess down below, down in the valley! In other words, Peter wanted a superficial mountain-top experience and he wanted to perpetuate this, instead of carrying his mountain-top around in his frontal lobe. In other words, what Peter is saying is that happiness is a pleasant set of circumstances, and what the Lord is going to say to him is happiness is what you think. If you carry doctrine around in your frontal lobe you are going to be happy. But if you depend upon pleasant circumstances for happiness you will not find happiness there. We make our happiness on the inside by the use of Bible doctrine; we do not create our happiness by improving our environment.

“if thou wilt” — “if” is a first class condition; “if” and I know you intend to do this. And Peter assumes it is so

nice up here that the Lord is going to continue this thing. In other words, again Peter is almost telling the Lord. Peter is going all out for perfect environment; “let us make here three tents; one for thee, and one for Moses, and one for Elijah.” This is the bribery system. In other words, Lord if you will stay here we will make you nice homes here. The beautiful thing about the grace of God on this occasion is that the Lord just simply shut Peter up.

Verse 5 — “While he yet spake.” Peter was going to say a lot more but he didn’t get it all out; “behold a bright cloud overshadowed them: and behold a voice out of the cloud, which said.” Now God the Father is going to give Peter a lesson; “this is [this keeps on being] my beloved Son, in whom I am well pleased; hear ye him [keep on listening to him].” You listen to Him, Peter!

Verse 6 — “And when the disciples [Peter, James, and John] heard it, they fell down on their face, and were frightened.”

Verse 7 — “And Jesus came and touched them, and said, Arise, and be not afraid [literally, stop being afraid].”

Verse 8 — “And when they had lifted up their eyes.” Notice they didn’t get up, they just looked up; “they saw no man save [except] Jesus only.” And that was a lesson. What Jesus Christ has to say is important, and of you are going to learn it then you had better get your eyes on the Lord. One reason some people never learn doctrine is because they always have their eyes on people. People disillusion them.

Verse 9 — “And as they came down from the mountain, Jesus charged them.” The word “charge” means to command, it doesn’t mean that someone got on a horse and charged!; “saying, Tell the vision to no man, until the Son of Man be risen again from the dead” don’t tell anyone about this until the resurrection. This is very important.

It was a very long time after the resurrection before Peter felt like talking about it, but he finally opened up. Peter finally decided he could talk about this when he knew that he was dying — 2 Peter 1:16, “For we have not followed cunningly devise fables [myths], when we made known unto you the power and the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ, but were eyewitnesses to his majesty.” There were three people who were eyewitnesses, Peter, James and John, and he is referring to the mount of transfiguration.

2 Peter 1:17 — “For he received from [from the immediate source of] God the Father honour and glory, when there came such a voice to him from the excellent glory [describing the essence box], This is my beloved Son, in whom I am well pleased” — quotation from Matthew 17:5. So Peter says, We heard the voice of God the Father and we saw Jesus transfigured.

2 Peter 1:18 — “And this voice which came from heaven we heard, when we were with him [with Christ] in the holy mount.”

2 Peter 1:19 — “We also have a more sure word of prophecy.” “We have” is present linear aktionsart: we keep on having, we have it in the Word of God, we have it in Bible doctrine; “more sure” is literally, more reliable. What is more reliable than seeing it with your eyes and hearing it with your ears? What you have written in the Word of God today, the Word of God which liveth and abideth forever, is more real than seeing it with your eyes and hearing it with your ears. Jesus didn’t teach the whole realm of doctrine. What we now have in writing is more than Jesus taught in three years. God’s Word is in writing and we can read it.

“whereunto ye do well that ye take heed (as unto a light that shineth in a dark place, until the day dawn, and the day star arise in your hearts)” — to take heed in your hearts means to learn it. You do well to learn doctrine, it is more reliable than what you see with your eyes and hear with your ears.

In the parenthesis we have a beautiful picture of the Lord Jesus Christ and His second advent but our purpose her is not to analyse it but relate it to the transfiguration. Peter saw it; Peter heard it; but what he saw and what he heard is not as reliable as found in the Word of God.

Verse 20 — “Knowing this first, that no prophecy of the scripture [about the second advent] originates from one’s own explanation” — corrected translation. In other words, we didn’t dream this up.

Verse 21 — “For the prophecy came not in old time by the will of man: but holy men of God spake as they were carried along by the Holy Spirit.” The Bible is more reliable because it is God’s Word. If you have doctrine in the frontal lobe whatever you see in life, whatever you hear, you are able to discern whether it is God’s plan, whether it is Satanic, or man’s imagination, or man’s devices, or whatever it happens to be.

In effect Peter is saying he has finally learned the lesson of the mount of transfiguration. Doctrine was here before he came; doctrine will be here after he dies. The Word of God liveth and abideth forever.

The failure to understand doctrine.

Verse 10 — “And his disciples asked him, saying, Why then say the scribes that Elijah must first come?” Immediately they hit Him with a doctrinal question. Apparently they are confused because the scribes are teaching one thing and Jesus has been teaching something else from the mount of transfiguration. Jesus Christ came first to the world and this is what they can’t understand. On the mount of transfiguration Elijah came after Jesus had been on the earth. They can’t work this out at all because Malachi 4:5,6 make it very clear that Elijah was to come before Christ. The scribes have been teaching this. Now everything is quite different. They have seen from the mount of transfiguration that instead of coming first Christ came first, and just like so many believers they get all shook up because they do not understand everything at one time. Sometimes they can’t wait for answers on these things and often they get so upset that they simply fall apart if they can’t find an answer right now. But if people are patient and wait long enough all of the answers are forthcoming.

At this point the disciples have been told of the importance of Bible doctrine and now they have a problem because they can’t understand a point, and this has them in panic palace. So Jesus immediately clarifies the situation.

Verse 11 — “And Jesus answered and said.” This phrase “answered and said” is very common in the New Testament. What makes it unusual here is not the way we have it in the English but the fact that the word “answered” is always an aorist passive participle, whereas the word “said” is always aorist active indicative. The problem here is, why the passive voice? It is always translated like an active voice but actually it is a passive voice and the passive voice receives the action of the verb. The passive voice has a purpose, it indicates thought. In other words, thinking before you answer. It should be translated, “And Jesus received an answer and said.” In other words, He thought it over and then He answered. This is an idiom in the Greek which indicates the answer is given as a result of thought. The thought is always based on a statement of the Word or becomes the Word of God itself, as in this case. “Elijah truly shall first come, and restore all things.” The word “first” does not occur in the original and what Jesus actually said was: “Elijah shall come and restore all things.” What He is saying is that there are two advents instead of one, and in each advent Jesus Christ is the King. The King must be preceded by His herald. He is going to amplify this now and show them that for the first advent John the Baptist is the herald and for the second advent the heralds are Elijah and Moses. Elijah and Moses are going to come at the proper time. The scribes were theologians and as theologians their system of theology was not biblically oriented because they only believed in one advent. They were further disoriented in their theology and in their thinking by the fact that the last two verses in the Old Testament talk about Elijah coming. Now, Elijah does not come first. He comes at the second advent as a herald and his counterpart is John the Baptist for the first advent. This is developed very quickly in the rest of this particular paragraph.

Verse 12 — “But I say unto you, That Elijah is come already and they knew him not.” Elijah in this case is John the Baptist; “but have done unto him whatsoever they listed.” The word “listed” means to do something based on emotion. Emotionally they got so worked up that they killed him, which indicates what happens when emotions get out of line. Emotions should be your slave and not your master.

“Likewise shall also the Son of Man suffer of them.” He is indicating that when the Jews team up with the Romans to put Jesus on the cross the basis for doing so will be emotionalism, the same kind of emotionalism that you find in the tongues movement. Principle: Emotions as a slave are wonderful; emotions as your master distort everything in life and lead to misery in every field. When emotion is teamed up with religion it becomes a monster. It is the monster of religion that destroys not only Jesus Christ but before Him John the Baptist.

Verse 13 — the disciples finally got it. “Then the disciples understood that he spake unto them of John the Baptist.”

Verse 14 — we are going to see failure to apply doctrine, failure in the faith-rest technique. “And when they were come to the multitude, there came to him [to Jesus] a certain man, kneeling down to him, and saying.” Here is a man in distress. This man has previously been in contact with nine of the disciples. Judas Iscariot is excluded. Up on the mount of transfiguration there were three of the disciples. Down below there were nine disciples who couldn’t handle a case of demon possession (demon-induced illness) and we now are going to discover why. The three disciples up on the mountain had a lot to learn and Peter expressed their fallacy, they wanted to stay up there because it was pleasant. It can be pleasant wherever you are under any conditions, under any circumstances. Now notice what happened down below when they were up on the mountain top. Beginning is this verse 14 down to verse 21, we have the failure of the disciples, their failure to apply doctrine.

Verse 15 — “Lord.” He recognises that Jesus Christ is God and being God He can do something about the situation; “have mercy.” His approach is correct because it is based on grace. He doesn’t earn or deserve anything from God so when he says, “have mercy” he is on the right track. Mercy means that this man is oriented to grace. Two things about this man: he is a believer because he calls Jesus Christ “Lord”; he has been out of line and yet he has the good sense to come to the Lord Jesus Christ, he has enough doctrine to know that you can always come to God on the basis of grace.

“on my son: for he is lunatick.” The Greek word for lunatic means to be moonstruck, and it is actually a Greek word for mental illness. This man was demon-possessed and it resulted in mental illness.

Demon-induced illness

Basically there are three sources of illness. One of them is physiologically-induced illness, one is psychologically induced-illness, psychosomatics, and the third is demon-induced illness.

1. Satan produced illness in Job — Job 2:6-8; God permitted it but Satan produced it.

2. A woman who had a disease for eighteen years had it through demon possession — Luke 13:11-16.

3. Satan uses demons to produce disease — Matthew 12:22; Acts 10:38.

4. Abnormal behaviour and psychotics (certain types) is caused by demon possession, as in Mark chapter five.

5. There are certain kinds, not all, of diseases such as deafness, dumbness, paralysis, which are caused by demon possession. This does not mean that everyone who is deaf and everyone who is dumb is demon possessed, it just simply means that there are some cases which are caused by demon possession, as per Matthew 9:32,33; 12:22; Mark 9:5, 17, 18, and many other passages.

6. When demon possession causes illness the removal of the demon causes healing. Who can remove demons? Satan can remove his own demons. God often removes the demons. Satan will always pull his demon out when one of his own crowd is handling the healing meeting. We are talking about demon-induced illness.

“sore vexed” — simply means he has it bad; “for oftentimes he falls in the fire, and oft into the water.”

Verse 16 — in the absence of Jesus this man had brought his son to the nine disciples, and they of course fell flat on their faces. “And I brought him to thy disciples” — it by means of faith-rest.

Verse 17 — the first rebuke. “Then Jesus answered and said, O faithless [lack of the faith-rest] and perverse.” The word “perverse” means corrupted. It is a perfect passive participle and it means corrupted or distorted. The perfect tense indicates that while there was doctrine there it had been distorted, it had been corrupted. It suggests that perhaps this doctrine had stayed in the frontal lobe but they did not think about it they did not meditate they did not study, they did not concentrate, and so this doctrine had been distorted until it was neutralised; “generation” [these Jews who are disciples], how long shall I be with you [how long shall I suffer you]?” He has been with them now for about two years and they haven’t learned a thing. He has taught them the faith-rest technique many times and yet they have completely failed; “bring him hither to me,” present active imperative, which means bring him now.

Verse 18 — the second rebuke. “And Jesus rebuked [told him to get out] the devil [demon]; and he [the demon] departed out of him: and the child was cured from that very hour.” The removal of the demon, the source of the illness, removes the illness.

Verse 19 — “Then came the disciples to Jesus apart, and said, Why could not we cast him out?

Verse 20 — “And Jesus said unto them [the disciples], Because of your unbelief.” Actually the word is not unbelief but “because of your little bit of faith.” They had a little faith but they didn’t have enough faith to be operational in this case; “for verily.” Every time we find the word “verily” when Jesus uses it, it means He is now going to give a point of doctrine. It is the same as “Thus saith the Lord” in the Old Testament; “I say unto you, If [third class condition: maybe yes, maybe no] you have faith as a grain of mustard seed, ye shall say to this mountain.” Now He takes a situation which is difficult compared to the demon-induced illness; “Remove [go away].” There is an analogy here. There was the demon and now there is the mountain. They could have said to the demon, Go away, or you could say to the mountain, Go away. Jesus said to the demon, Go away. The disciples could say to the mountain if they have enough faith, Go away. But it must be done under the operation of the faith-rest technique. So the mountain is an analogy to the demon.

“to yonder place; and it shall remove,” the demon will get up and go; “and nothing shall be impossible for you.” Nothing is impossible for a mature and well-developed faith-rest technique. To illustrate, let’s start with something which is impossible for the human race — happiness in time. Happiness eludes us. It is impossible for people to be happy on this earth but it becomes very possible under the use of the faith-rest technique. In fact any believer can have happiness anywhere, any time, under any circumstances.

Verse 21 — this verse is not found in the original text at all. The King James version was finished in the early part of the seventeenth century. It was taken from series of manuscripts that go back to the 10th century AD, and this series of manuscripts was called Textus Receptus. Textus Receptus had been terribly corrupted but today we have over 5000 manuscripts that go back to the second, third, fourth, and fifth centuries, and in none of these do we find this verse. This verse was a corruption.

Verses 22-27, doctrine is the only way to happiness.

Verse 22 — “And while they abode in Galilee, Jesus said unto them, The Son of Man shall be betrayed into the hands of men.”

Verse 23 — “And they shall kill him, and on the third day he shall be raised again.” He has been teaching and teaching and teaching this, and yet … “And they were exceeding sorry.” If you want to be miserable in this life just let your emotions run your life. The words “exceeding sorry” means they were emotionally sincere. They didn’t want Jesus to go to the cross, it affected their maudlin sentimentalism. They didn’t want anything to happen to Him, they really revered Him. If they had had their way we wouldn’t have had the blood of the cross by which we are saved. This comes from sincerity combined with emotionalism and when you have the two it adds up to something that is very simple: stupidity. [Emotion + sincerity = stupidity] Emotions are a lot of fun as long as you make them your slave, but when they rule you then you get into trouble and you couldn’t be further from happiness. Here they are on the verge of learning something great about doctrine and yet what do they do with it? As soon as the disciples get a little doctrine they go all to pieces, they are terribly sorry about the whole thing. Last time it was Peter who said, “Let this not be unto thee.” Now they all get on the same bandwagon, even though Jesus said to Peter: Get thee behind me Satan. They were “exceeding sorry,” and the word “exceeding” is the adverb, it expresses strong emotion. “They were sorry” is an aorist passive indicative, and the passive voice indicates that they received this emotion, and they allowed it to control them instead of being controlled by doctrine. Jesus has been firing doctrine at them but down in their souls was emotion and instead of responding, building doctrine on doctrine, they just allowed emotion to grow up and choke out doctrine. When that happens emotion becomes the master and you are minus happiness, and the only way to get plus happiness is for doctrine to be the reality and then you have +H (happiness). If you are going to have happiness it has to come through doctrine. The Bible must be more real than what you see, what you feel, what you touch, and so on. Doctrine has to be the reality.

Verse 23 — Jesus gets an indirect visit from the “Internal Revenue Department.” Capernaum was the headquarters. “And when they were come to Capernaum, they that received tribute [the tax collectors] came to Peter, and said, Doth not your master pay tribute [taxes]?”

Verse 25 — “He saith, Yes. And when he [Peter] was come into the house, Jesus prevented [stopped] him, saying, What thinkest thou, Simon? of whom do the kings of the earth take custom or tribute? [two kinds of taxes] of their own children, or of strangers?” Note: This cannot be understood from the English.

The word “children” refers to children of the royal family, and the word “stranger” refers to citizens. So Jesus stops Peter at the door and asks: “Of whom do they collect taxes? Do they collect taxes from the children, which is the royal family, or do they collect from the citizens of the country?”

What is the answer? The citizens. You tax the citizens, the royal family is exempt. And Jesus is in the royal family, He is the son of David. Jesus is actually exempt from taxation. He is going to pay His taxes anyway and He is going to pay Simon’s too. Why? He does not want Simon to be worried, He wants Simon to be strong. You can’t have doctrine in the frontal lobe and be worried at the same time, and Simon is about to fall apart. Simon has this income tax on his mind, it has come to haunt him.

Verse 26 — “Peter saith unto him, Of strangers. Jesus saith unto him, Then are the children [of the royal family] free [exempt].”

Verse 27 — “Notwithstanding, lest we should offend them, go thou to the sea, and cast an hook, and take up the fish that first cometh up; and when thou hast opened his mouth, thou shalt find a piece of money: that take, and give unto them for me and for thee.”