Monday, June 12, 2017

Of Mountains and Mustard Seeds

Matthew 17:14 And when they were come to the multitude, there came to him a certain man, kneeling down to him, and saying, 15 Lord, have mercy on my son: for he is lunatick, and sore vexed: for ofttimes he falleth into the fire, and oft into the water.16 And I brought him to thy disciples, and they could not cure (therapuo) him.
17 Then Jesus answered and said, O faithless and perverse (diastrepho - twisting what is right) generation, how long shall I be with you? how long shall I suffer you? bring him hither to me. 

Mark 9:23-24 fits in here: 23 Jesus said unto him, If thou canst believe, all things are possible to him that believeth. 24 And straightway the father of the child cried out, and said with tears, Lord, I believe; help thou mine unbelief.
18 And Jesus rebuked the devil; and he departed out of him: and the child was cured from that very hour.
19 Then came the disciples to Jesus apart, and said, Why could not we cast him out? 20 And Jesus said unto them, Because of your unbelief (apistia: littleness of  faith) 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. 21 Howbeit this kind goeth not out but by prayer and fasting.
Mustard seeds are pretty small and mountains are pretty big. Hebrews use hyperbolic (exaggeration) language to make a noteworthy point. The hyperbole is used throughout the Bible! It is a literary (not literal) form to draw your attention to the significance of what is being said. Another well-known example of this is: “And if your right eye offend you, pluck it out," Matthew 5:29. God loves us! Do you really think he'd want us to do this? The scripture used in this kind of a figure is to make us look at what is being said and how serious it is.

Clearly Jesus believed that his disciples should have been able to help this father. Why couldn't they?Their small believing held them back. Perhaps it was the situation, perhaps it was the culture, both religious and social.  The same thing is true of today.

This whole point with the mustard seed is such a loving encouragement from Jesus.We don't have to have faith the size of a watermelon to take care of a molehill either!  God's love is simple and his word is really simple (except when we try and twist it with perfecting our own performance). God's love has been proven over and over. We just need to start with honest prayer and talk any difficulty over with God and then let him answer (I guess that is the hard part).

This record is fascinating and has so much in it. The father of this child was humble and respected Jesus.  His statement "I believe, help thou mine unbelief" is revealing. We may have believing in some areas and not in other areas.  This man was asking for help in his believing. There is nothing wrong with that. In the church (God's people not buildings) of today, the called out  have been given holy spirit to have a connected relationship with the God through the faith of Jesus Christ. We have the right to ask for help in our believing as we continue to get to know how much God loves us. There 'ain't no mountain high enough' to stop God's love from reaching each of us.




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