Throw me a mountain?
19 Oct 2007
Last Sunday I had the pleasure of going back to my old church community for a dedication of a friend’s bambino. Whilst it was great seeing old friends again I confess that the teaching took me outside of my comfort zone, presenting faith in a way that made feel incomfortable…
The talk was on Matthew’s story of Jesus healing the boy with the demon in him who was trying to kill him. You may recall that the story takes place at the foot of a mountain, Jesus has just been transfigured and he comes down to a man asking him to help heal his son because the remaining disciples had been unable too. Jesus of course does it easily.
The more the talk went on the more i struggled with the end of the tale:
“Then the disciples came to Jesus in private and asked, Why couldn’t we drive it out?
He replied, Because you have so little faith. I tell you the truth, if you have faith as small as a mustard seed, you can say to this mountain, ‘Move from here to there’ and it will move. Nothing will be impossible for you.”
By the end of the talk i was convinced even if i had faith the size of a mountain i would not be able to move a mustard seed – so maybe you can help me out please?
I am recognising that being taken out of my comfort zone is actually a good thing. It stops me getting all complacent. The angle of the preacher seemed to be that we need to trust in God more and the closer we get to God the more faith we have and the more we will be able to perform miracles like kicking demon butt (the idea of moving mountains was laughed off as not being a commanded activity of the kingdom). I could express this as:
Believe in God more + pray/ask harder = kick demon butt
Which was fine as far as it went but then it through up some Qs in me:
1) Jesus doesn’t seem to be saying that believing more is the problem, faith the size of a mustard seed seems to be quite small or
tiny faith + pray/ask/tell = nothing impossible?
2) Does that mean the disciples in the story didn’t have even that amount of faith – was that why the Dad of the boy came up to Jesus rather than the disciples? Were the disciples trusting in their own abilities, using the right formula to look good rather than trusting in Jesus. Having failed and their pride bruised were they too embarrassed to ask for help?
3) I don’t see many christians throwing around mountains or even small rocks so my conclusiong is that Jesus was not literally talking about moving the mountain he was at the foot of (or any other). Unless you are part of some geographic shifting faith community – we’re landscaping for the Lord? :)
4) But if Jesus was talking figuratively what did he mean? Was Matthew just riffing on Exodus 32 story of the golden calf, and having Jesus come down the mountain to a situation of unbelief amongst the crowd? Or is this too subtle, only a peripheral point?
5) Is this one of those stories where the actual answer is if Jesus tells you to move a mountain and therefore you tell mountain to move then mountain will move? Two things with that: a) is that actually about faith if it is such a sure thing? b) Jesus had already sent the 12 out in Matthew 10 and given them authority to heal and drive out demons which they had done – so this should have been routine.
So I’m left thinking this is one of those hard statements of Jesus that are meant to take us out of our comfort zone and wrestle with the meaning – want to be on my tag team?
Help please…
So can I ask you please what the story means to you? How do you interpret it/understand it/live it/apply it?
” I tell you the truth, if you have faith as small as a mustard seed, you can say to this mountain, ‘Move from here to there’ and it will move. Nothing will be impossible for you.”
Thank you…
Paul
24 comments
Trackback
Comment by brett jordan
5.23 pm on 19 Oct 2007
A good friend of mine (and Jason’s) did a sermon touching on this… probably worth a read
http://frnick.blogspot.com/2007/10/faith-trinity-18.html
Reply to this comment
Comment by Paul
11.39 am on 23 Oct 2007
Thanks Brett, much appreciated :)
Reply to this comment
Comment by Paul
10.15 am on 26 Oct 2007
This is my fave section, it seemd to hit the spot…
“It is not the quantity of faith that is important. It is the nature of the faith, and what you have faith ‘in’, that is paramount.
By the ‘nature of faith’, I mean that it must be a belief that affects your actions? I believe that wasting energy is bad for the environment, so instead of driving to the shops, I walk.
But belief that affects actions is not enough. Young children who believe in Santa Claus can behave in significantly different ways for at least a few days before Christmas. But there is no Santa Claus.
More tragically, suicide bombers sincerely believe they will go straight to heaven. It is a defiant act of faith.
No, it is not just the nature, or sincerity, or depth of our faith that is critical. It is also what we have faith ‘in’ that is crucial.
My uncle had great faith in number 7 running in the 2.30 at Doncaster; and in many other horses throughout his long life. It was nearly always misplaced faith.
;So before faith leads to actions, we need to be assured that the content of our faith is sound and will not lead to foolish actions.
This is why Christian theology, which down through the centuries has tried to wrestle with what the Bible teaches us, is so important. In Anselm’s phrase, it is faith seeking understanding. Othodoxy leads to orthopraxis. Right belief leads to right actions.
Many of the struggles of the Anglican communion at the moment are centred on this very thing.
As we use Richard Hooker’s three-legged stool of Scripture, Tradition & Reason, we come up with different answers to the question: how should I act in response to my faith?
We have a guide in conscience, and in the peace of Christ, which is supposed to rule in our hearts and minds. But Scripture warns us that the human conscience can be seared, and that selfish desire can lull our heart into a false sense of peace.
This is why Christianity is essentially a communal faith. We need each other to save us from ourselves, as we try to act out our faith.
So the lives of the saints, and of our brothers and sisters around us and around the world, help to form the content of our faith and encourage us to act on that faith, to ‘taste and see that the Lord is good.’
Reply to this comment
Comment by Tom Allen
8.54 pm on 19 Oct 2007
While it is divinely true that there is no limit to “faith” nevertheless we are human and our faith is never enough in that sense. I love this passage cos it suggests to me that God gives me enough faith to do what he wants me to do at this moment – the faithful bit is working out what God wants me to do and doing it in faith. The astonishing about Mother Teresa which has emerged over the past year is just how little faith she had – and yet she managed great things in love and faith. God granted her and me enough faith to do what he wants me to do – and he does the same for you!
Reply to this comment
Comment by Paul
11.42 am on 23 Oct 2007
Thanks Tom, so Jesus critique of the disciples would be that they had the faith but did not use it? They saw their faith draining away and the problem becoming the size of a mountain and decided not to get help?
That’s a great point about Mother Teresa and the crisis of faith that we experience – it reminds me a little of St Paul who said if we have the faith to move mountains but do not have love then we have nothing – clearly she had the love even when her faith was not that big…
Reply to this comment
Comment by Steve
12.07 pm on 20 Oct 2007
I’m reminded of Adrian Plass attermpting (in his sacred diary) to move a paperclip by faith, and finally getting so fed up that it won’t move he starts abusing it.
I wonder why Jesus abuses the father who brings his son (it seesm to be directed at him), and so I wonder if there is something about the man coming to the disciples but really wanting to see Jesus and casting doubt on the disciples ability?
I note as well that it comes between two predictions of his death, and wonder if the writer is empahsising Jesus saying he won’t be atround much longer, asnd they need to learn to live without him – an exasperated cry of ‘for crying out loud, you can manage without me’. An echo of Peter offering to build tents for moses, Jesus and Elijah.
Is there something about the disciples expecting more great figures, more power from jesus, while all the while jesus is encouraging to reach out their hands (and grab hold of the kingdom) themselves.
I hadn’t thought before about what you say about the disciples surely having the faith of a musturd seed in Jesus. Perhaps the faith they don’t have is in themselves, or rather, that God will work through them. Do I have that the wrong way around – believing in God through them not themselves. Perhaps the prayer and fasting is about trusting in God not themselves, and so not needing to have faith in themselves.
Lots of questions and ponderign with no answers, I know.
One more occurs: Perhaps Jesus is saying faith the size of a musturd seed is good, becasue that little faith in themselves leaves God more rom to work. No – probably not!
Steve
Reply to this comment
Comment by Paul
11.47 am on 23 Oct 2007
thanks Steve, great thoughts and great Plass flashback mo :)
What you have written makes me think that rather than a rebuke maybe Jesus was trying to jump start their faith – to encourage them that even a little belief can lead to big shifts – afterall the event of Jesus death was a faith shatter but his resurrection led something so small as faith in him to move the mountain of the Roman empire and to see the God of Ceaser be cast into the sea…
Which makes me wonder what a little bit of faith in Jesus today, in people still going to church, praying, sharing life, trying to follow Him – what mountains in our own cultural world will be shifted as a result. Not by force, not by being bigger and stronger, by being able to exert willm but taking the little faith that we have and putting it in Jesus?
Reply to this comment
Comment by Marilyn
4.49 am on 21 Oct 2007
How funny that I should come across this blog when I am considering that problem. Is our faith ever as large as a mustard seed? It beings so many questions to mind. If its not as large as a mustard seed, how big is it? What if our faith is as large as that, but its given to the wrong thing. When we try to move the mountain, do we fail because we are really looking for evidence of Gods power, or is there, within us, a seed of doubt. We can believe, we can say we believe, but does trying to convince ourselves we believe mean we don’t? Maybe we blink when the mountain moved. Or how about this – if your faith does not move the mountain, become the mountain. I know that I have seen many miracles. I’ve seen God at work through the prayer and faith of his people. So I also wonder this, if the mountain doesn’t jump into the sea, maybe God doesn’t want it to. Or maybe we’re trying to move the wrong mountain.
Reply to this comment
Comment by Paul
11.54 am on 23 Oct 2007
Thanks Marilyn – in some ways this passage reassures me, that it’s not about have huge confident, boastful faith. It makes feel that it is ok to be hanging on by my finger tips to my faith because even that little faith, can be seismic [in fact maybe having that faith in something other than myself is the seismic event in our culture?]. I wonder if Jesus would today have said, “if you have faith the size of a quark?”
The passage also challenges me that even my little faith in Jesus should be more than passive. It should lead to some form of action, outworking, external change in the world around me. Maybe not shifting a literal mountain but a figurative one?
I also am glad that this is something that i live out in a community – that when my faith is weak maybe others is strong and be encouraged to keep hanging on for a little while longer. That it is not about trying harder because i can’t make my faith grow but i can struggle/fight/hope/be encouraged to keep the little i have…
Reply to this comment
Comment by Jonathan Brink
5.29 pm on 21 Oct 2007
Paul,
I would suggest Jesus is invited us to discover how much authority we really do have over the enemy. Part of the problem we encounter in following Jesus is the question, “Can I really do that? If I’m made in God’s image, is this possible?”
To a great extent I don’t really want to move rock and dirt. I want to remove the big obstacles that hinder my own growth into maturity. So moving a mountain only becomes necessary when it is something in my own life or the life of someone who needs it.
What if Jesus is saying, “You really can move this mountain. But if you don’t believe you can, you won’t. But if you do, you will.” So the question for me becomes how to I begin to see myself the way He sees me. It’s kind of like seeing my son. I can see what he is capable of, even when He can’t. So I encourage him to try and discover that.
Reply to this comment
Comment by Paul
11.59 am on 23 Oct 2007
Thanks Jonathan, that is a great analogy, God wanting the best for us and how often we settle for good, or better rather than for the best. Is that I wonder because we often don’t have the faith either in ourselves or God – i guess we all carry around baggage from the past, which can be about not being good enough, pretty enough, clever enough, fun enough etc – if we move a mountain it can be that we compare it to others and condem ourselves, it wasn’t a mountain, more of a small hill, well actually a bump in the ground etc…
So we have our little faith and who are the people in our life that are going to fulfill the role of the dad in the analogy, to have faith for us and faith in us?
Reply to this comment
Comment by Jonathan Brink
4.51 pm on 23 Oct 2007
This is why I believe in discipleship and the role of a mentor. We need people reminded us of what is possible in our lives.
Reply to this comment
Comment by Paul
10.17 am on 26 Oct 2007
yes, i agree, it is certainly why I think we need to be part of a faith community, to share in our collective faith rather than whether i am having a good time, bad time or just an ordinary one…
Reply to this comment
Comment by ruth
9.43 pm on 21 Oct 2007
Funny, a few days before reading this blog i just put up a photo of a few mustard seeds to ponder over. I ponder better with a visual aid!
I have recently been thinking of that other passage about the Kingdom of God being like a mustard seed that gets planed and grown into a big tree. I wonder if there is a connection. Why Jesus used mustard seed for both illustrations.
Reply to this comment
Comment by Paul
12.00 pm on 23 Oct 2007
Thanks Ruth, maybe there is? Faith that is small and the kingdom which is small. Both can grow. Both are planted. Both take time and can make a difference to their environment… What similiarities did it trigger for you?
Reply to this comment
Comment by Ben
12.31 am on 18 Feb 2009
Actually, just a small comment for Ruth. The mustard seed passage that you are speaking about is actually not about personal faith but about the faith of the future church. You will notice that in that particular chapter in Matthew that Jesus is speaking of weeds and such which are grown in together with the good seed. You will then notice that Jesus speaks of the mustard seed growing into a very large tree where the birds of the air come and perch on its branches. The birds are actually a representation of those who will defile the church (a.k.a. the weeds) that grow within the church. Jesus is using this particular passage to show us that the church will grow very large but there will be those who will be within its community that don’t actually belong. I hope this helps.
Ben
Reply to this comment
Comment by Bryan Riley
8.30 pm on 24 Oct 2007
Perhaps it simply points us back to Jesus. He is telling us that it isn’t about the faith we muster or the work we do; it is the object of our faith that matters. And, if Jesus is the object of our faith, then we will follow Him and His commands. If He commands us to move the mountain, we will do it, knowing that He is the source of the ability to make the mountain move and knowing that He is faithful to accomplish His purpose even through crackpots like us.
Reply to this comment
Comment by Paul
10.19 am on 26 Oct 2007
crackpots ;) – yes much better than cracked pots!
I think that is an important point you make, thank you, it is not about the size of our faith but what, or in this case, who we have our faith in. It’s not believing things about Jesus it is believing in Jesus…
Reply to this comment
Comment by benjamin ady
5.37 am on 25 Oct 2007
Hi all. I always took this whole thing to be about small changes over time. Mustard seeds don’t grow into full grown plants (trees?) in a day, do they? they just multiply, and mulitply, and multiply–just like a zygote becomes a fetus. Same deal with moving mountains. You don’t move a mountain in a day. You just start on a day, and shift rocks. and the next day. and one day, the whole mountain is moved.
I think he’s talking about coming to understand the way I am wired well enough that i can find the big thing that needs doing that I was designed to do, and then gradually working toward seeing it done.
BICBW
Reply to this comment
Comment by Paul
10.21 am on 26 Oct 2007
Thanks benjamin, yes that is good point. It makes me think of process and staying in a process can sometimes take a lot more faith than a quick miracle. After all, we can look around the world, see a mountain of injustice and decide it’s too much for any of us to do anything and so do precisely nothing. We may ask: where are you God? And I wonder if God replies, i was going to ask you the same Q..?
Reply to this comment
Comment by John
5.26 am on 27 Nov 2007
The bible is filled with symbolism for seed, plants and trees, fruits and crops, in relation to spiritual life….now add one more…. even mountains are used to illustrate spiritual matters. It is difficult to believe you can move mountains with your faith.
You must be talking about Matthew 17:20. Compare that to the verses in Mark 11:22-25. I read Mark 11 after going to church last weekend. The pastor had just been to Jerusalem and he had some insight about the symbolic nature of mountains. Mt. Sinai was the mountain of God’s law where he handed Moses the ten commandments(and we could add, our condemnation under this law). You could interpret the Mount of Olives to be the Mountain of God’s sacrifice for us, or more accurately the Mountain of Our Sins. Jesus was on the Mount of Olives in Mark 11….(I read the Paraphrased Living Bible) It was the same Mountain in Matthew 26:38 Then Jesus told them, “My soul is crushed with horror and sadness to the point of death….stay here….stay awake with me.” I think this is the point where our lives flash before Jesus’ eyes.
To put Mark 11:22-25 in context Jesus had just finished cursing a fig tree(full of leaves) for not providing fruit. Then he went into the Jewish Temple and drove out the merchants and moneychangers. When he left the Temple the disciples commented that the fig tree had withered from the roots.
Obviously there was some symbolism with the fig tree. The people in the Jewish Temple were not living off of right kind of tree. They were rotten from the roots and were trying to make money from the Jewish religion. The Jewish religion had become unfruitful and by the standards of Jesus, not producing spiritual fruit. Jesus was from a different tree altogether. A tree providing a “fruit of forgiveness” and spiritual life. Most likely he would like us to compare him to the olive tree, because he was on the Mount of Olives.
If you read through the 1st 4 books of the New Testament it will bring you to tears. Although Jesus saw God’s plan unwinding before his eyes and he was performing miracles beyond belief, the disciples did not really get it. He told them he was going to be crucified and he would rise again, but they just did not get it. Peter would say things like, “Don’t say that.” Of course this was the wisdom of men.
It was in reply to the disciples’ observation about the fig tree being withered to the roots. Jesus made this statement in Mark 11:22-25 and made the faith testing claim about moving mountains with faith. Who can even imagine moving a mountain into the Mediterranean sea?
In Mark 11 Jesus says “…you can say to this Mount of Olives, ‘Rise up and fall into the Mediterranean,’ and your command will be obeyed. All that’s required is that you really believe and have no doubt! Listen to me you can pray for ANYTHING, and if you believe, you have it, it’s yours! But when you are praying, first forgive anyone you are holding a grudge against, so that your Father in heaven will forgive you your sins too.”
Jesus is giving the formula for forgiveness. Forgive others and you will be forgiven. The mountain of your sins will be thrown to the bottom of the sea. We just get focused on the ability to have the ANYTHING we can imagine, and our brains turn off. There is the claim about believing in moving mountains and praying for ANYTHING. Those seeking non spiritual results will surely be confused. Jesus spoke in riddles and parables and it is a wonder that we understand anything he said.
Does this make sense? The mountains are symbolic of the old system of God’s judgment under the law, compared to the new system of God’s forgiveness by believing in Jesus.
I would say, when you have faith in Jesus Christ to move your mountains, you won’t be praying for just ANYTHING, but EVERYTHING. The disciples needed this illustration to prepare them for the Holy Spirit that was poured out on the new church in the book of Acts. I think we need it too. We are just like the disciples. We don’t really believe until we see Jesus alive!
Reply to this comment
Comment by Cherise
3.09 am on 22 Mar 2008
I think what people often think is that, faith AS a mustard seed means its size. I researched mustard and learned that mustard grows wild and can overtake a mountain side. Mustard, beginning as something very small, almost undetectable, as the potential to grow to a very large tree. Wild mustard is something herders and farmers detest because of its ability to overcome all that is in its path.
When we have faith AS a mustard seed we have to ability to overcome, overwhelm and frustrate what once appeared as a mountain.
Reply to this comment
Comment by Paul
3.30 pm on 25 Mar 2008
Thanks Cherise, that is a great thought :)
Reply to this comment
Comment by Paul Udouj
1.52 am on 6 Dec 2008
Jesus was planting a subcontious message with that statement. Mountains are “problems” or “osticles”. In those days it took many days to cross a mountian so they were seen as powerful. So powerful that they often set the boundries for countries…and still do to this day. So with that in mind Jesus was saying “If you have faith then you can conquer all and nothing will stop you.” How cool is that! Jesus was amazing because he taugh to us on level we didn’t even know.
Reply to this comment