Mix Faith with the Word
ICS Daily Devotions
Mark 11:21-24 (NKJV) And Peter, remembering, said to Him, “Rabbi, look! The fig tree which You cursed has withered away.”So Jesus answered and said to them, “Have faith in God”. For assuredly, I say to you, whoever says to this mountain, ‘Be removed and be cast into the sea,’ and does not doubt in his heart, but believes that those things he says will be done, he will have whatever he says. Therefore I say to you, whatever things you ask when you pray, believe that you receive them, and you will have them.
The above passage contains a powerful teaching from Jesus that exhorts us to speak to the mountain. It highlights the importance of speaking directly to the mountain that stands in our way. Here, Jesus does not instruct us to simply pray about the problem or ask Jesus to intervene, but instead to exercise our authority by speaking directly to the obstacle.
As believers, we have been given the authority to run our own lives. Therefore, it is crucial that we ourselves want to have the problem removed from our lives, and by speaking to the mountain, we release it to God to act on our behalf.
In verse 22 above, Jesus emphasised the importance of having faith in God after speaking to the mountain. We must agree with God’s Word to have mountain moving faith. In the parable of the sower, Jesus cautioned us against being those who receive the word with gladness but have no roots. When tribulation or persecution arises, they stumble and lose faith. Therefore, we must believe that the mountains in our lives are not from God but from the devil (and we must ensure that they are not a result of our own actions).
Mark 4:16-17 (NKJV) These likewise are the ones sown on stony ground who, when they hear the word, immediately receive it with gladness; and they have no root in themselves, and so endure only for a time. Afterward, when tribulation or persecution arises for the word’s sake, immediately they stumble.
The tribulations and persecutions that come our way are the devil’s schemes to try and steal the word sown in our hearts by causing doubts and even deceiving us into believing that God is the source of our problems. Speaking to the mountain is our act of defense against the schemes of the enemy.
Matthew 8:5-10 records the centurion asking Jesus to speak the Word and his servant would be healed. He was convinced that Jesus’ Word carries power because He is the Son of God. Jesus marvelled at his faith and called it “great faith” because the centurion believed in the power of the word. There is power in the spoken Word of Jesus, but there is also power in the written Word when we mix faith with it!
Sermon Series: Cell Group Campaign (23 Session 2)
