Perhaps one of the most dramatic accounts relating to Jesus' healing ministry is that of the occasion when an epileptic boy, whom Jesus' disciples could not heal, was brought by his father to the Master. We read that "Jesus rebuked the devil; and he departed out of him: and the child was cured from that very hour" (Matt. 17:18).
The account then goes on to relate that the disciples went privately to Jesus and inquired why they could not cast out the devil. Jesus replied: "Because of your unbelief: for verily I say unto you, If ye have faith as a grain of mustard seed, ye shall say unto this mountain, Remove hence to yonder place; and it shall remove; and nothing shall be impossible unto you. Howbeit this kind goeth not out but by prayer and fasting."
We see in this passage that Jesus pointed out two requisites for the healing of this case; but actually, when understood, they combine as one. The first requisite is for faith, even though it be no larger than a grain of mustard seed. The second is for prayer and fasting. Why do they combine as one? Because the healing faith that Jesus referred to comes only through the kind of prayer and fasting that awakens the spiritual sense of the one who prays. It awakens that sense sufficiently so that one comprehends something of the omnipotence of spiritual power and the total unreality of the sensuous belief that there is power in matter or that there is life, substance, intelligence, or pleasure in it.
