Mustard Seed Faith

“A man came up to Jesus, knelt down before him, and said, ‘Lord, have pity on my son, who is a lunatic and suffers severely; often he falls into fire, and often into water. I brought him to your disciples, but they could not cure him.’ Jesus said in reply, ‘O faithless and perverse generation, how long will I be with you? How long will I endure you? Bring the boy here to me.’ Jesus rebuked him and the demon came out of him and from that hour the boy was cured. Then the disciples approached Jesus in private and said, ‘Why could we not drive it out?’ He said to them, ‘Because of your little faith. Amen, I say to you, if you have faith the size of a mustard seed, you will say to this mountain, ‘Move from here to there’ and it will move. Nothing will be impossible for you.’” Matthew 17: 14-20

Faith in Jesus which is the size of a mustard seed is all we need! That’s what Jesus told his disciples and He is telling us too. He said, “Nothing will be impossible for you”. I want that kind of faith! Don’t you?

So why don’t we have that kind of faith? Well, we are not alone. We find Jesus telling the people around him and his disciples that they don’t have enough faith to be a recurring theme throughout the gospels.

Jesus is teaching his disciples (and us) that faith requires abandonment. Faith can move mountains, but it requires us to let go of all of the barriers that tell us “We can’t do it.” It requires us to have complete unbridled trust that God can do what we ask. Let me take a moment to acknowledge that sometimes it’s not God’s will to do what we ask but we will leave that for another reflection. The apostles eventually learned how to have the kind of faith Jesus talked about because we see them healing people throughout the book of Acts.

I don’t know about you, but often I have prayed that God gives me that kind of faith. The faith the size of a mustard seed. What I’ve learned over the years, is that God doesn’t just give me faith. God gives opportunities for me to practice having faith, which means I must practice trusting God completely. He gives me opportunities to let go of the obstacles I place in front of my faith, so I trust and just let God work.

The apostles finally got it, faith the size of a mustard seed. They persevered in learning to trust God and the fruits of their labor spread throughout the world. Let us welcome the opportunities that God places before us to practice and increase our faith. Let our faith grow like that mustard seed. Let us pray that we too persevere to become saints like the apostles.

© 2023 Kendall Berry Lasseigne