THINK TOGETHER.
What’s your worst day ever? What happened?
READ TOGETHER.
Matthew 17:14-18. 14And when they came to the crowd, a man came up to him and, kneeling before him, 15said, “Lord, have mercy on my son, for he has seizures and he suffers terribly. For often he falls into the fire, and often into the water. 16And I brought him to your disciples, and they could not heal him.” 17And Jesus answered, “O faithless and twisted generation, how long am I to be with you? How long am I to bear with you? Bring him here to me.” 18And Jesus rebuked the demon, and it came out of him, and the boy was healed instantly.
Probably your worst day ever doesn’t come close to what this boy was experiencing. The Bible says that he had a demon living inside of him. This demon would cause the boy to have seizures (terrible shaking) that would make him fall into fire and water. Literally the demon was trying to kill him.
Worse yet, no one was able to help the boy and his dad. Even the disciples couldn’t heal the boy, which seems to make Jesus angry. O faithless and twisted generation, how long am I to be with you? He said. Maybe they were trying to heal the boy without actually trusting in Jesus.
If we have Jesus living in our hearts (our inside part), we don’t have to be afraid of a demon living there too. But we can still have some pretty bad days, months, or even years. We can go through some very difficult times. And when we do go through hard times, what do we need?
Faith?
That’s why Jesus got upset and at his disciples, because they didn’t have faith. Do you have faith? Do you know what faith is? Faith is trusting in something or someone to help you or even save you.
More important than having faith is having faith in the right person. Faith in someone who can’t save you is worthless faith, isn’t it? Would you rather trust a five-year-old to get you out of a burning building or a trained firefighter? Would you trust a 15-year-old to do surgery on you, or a trained surgeon?
This is exactly why we must learn to trust Jesus to help us and save us. Only he can help us fight against Satan, his lies and temptations. Only Jesus should be trusted to take away our sins. Only Jesus can be trusted to get us to Heaven with God.
Remember, no matter how bad things get or how bad you think you’ve been, you can and should trust in Jesus. He will never let you down.
Because of Jesus we can always trust God.
With Jesus we can face any bad thing that might come our way.
DO SOMETHING TOGETHER
Make Ephesians 2:8 a family memory verse. Talk about what it means to be saved by faith, and faith in who?
PRAY TOGETHER
Jesus, I trust in you. Help me to not be faithless but faithful to you. Amen.
TLICfamily 