In your current situations and circumstances, how much faith do you have in God to help you overcome them? Do you have full and complete faith that you will overcome or do you hesitate and have just a little faith? Do you have a very small amount of faith or no faith at all?
I learned this morning that even having just a little bit of faith is enough. You probably noticed that I titled this post "A Mustard Seed & your Mountain." Why? How could a little itty bitty mustard seed and a mountain relate?
My hope with this post is that you can understand how faith the size of a mustard seed makes everything possible.
In Matthew chapter 17, Jesus heals a boy with a demon. In a very busy setting, a man brought his boy to Jesus and said: "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. And I brought him to your disciples, and they could not heal him." The first thing I want you to notice here is that the father of the boy has faith. It took faith for him to approach Jesus in the busy crowd. Heck, we can learn from this father too! He didn't care what others thought, what fueled him was his faith in Jesus to heal his son. How often do we hesitate to do things because we might be worried about what others think? Even if we feel deep down that this is what needs to be done, we still easily hesitate so often.
After the father of the boy approached Jesus, he answered: "O faithless and twisted generation, how long am I to be with you? How long am I to bear with you? Bring him to me." It seems like Jesus is thinking here, all you have to do is have a little faith and you can't do that. It seems like he is thinking that we should be able to be on our own now. Unfortunately we cannot, because of the little faith we have. Jesus rebuked the demon and the boy was healed instantly. After this had happened the disciples approached Jesus in private and asked why they could not cast the demon out.
Being me, and being a human, I sit here thinking, how could these disciples cast out a demon. I would've been in their shoes as well. Casting out a demon? Seems like a job only for Jesus not for me. I am sure there are more of you who could agree with that as well. But you shouldn't. That is something someone with little faith would say. So I sit here, writing this, feeling convicted of having no faith. Which is tough. I know I have faith. Then when I think about it, Jesus tells the disciples that all they needed was a little faith. So what does a little faith to them look like? Is their little faith no faith to me? Is there little faith different then the amount of faith I have? I am not sure, it gets me thinking though.
Here is Jesus's response to the disciples: "Because of your little faith. For truly, I say to you, if you have faith like a grain of mustard seed, you will say to this mountain, 'Move from here to there,' and it will move, and nothing will be impossible for you." Jesus is telling them that because of their little faith, they couldn't cast the demon out of the boy. Then he tells them that if they have faith like a grain of a mustard seed they can move mountains, and that nothing will be impossible. Do you know how small a mustard seed is? I believe it's one of the smallest seeds in the world and if we have little faith we can have mountains. I find that so encouraging! All we need to have is a little bit of faith. I want to know what mountains are in the way for your right now? I want you to have faith so that you can overcome these things. All you need is a little bit. The amount of power in a little bit of faith is unimaginable.
Did you catch the end of what Jesus said? "... and nothing will be impossible for you." We hear all the time that we can do all things through Christ who strengthens us. It's like everybody's favorite bible verse! Heres the catch, I really didn't know that if we have faith, that nothing will be impossible. Seriously think about that...nothing is impossible when you have faith in Jesus Christ.
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