A Mountain Moving God

Matthew 17:14–20 (ESV)

And when they came to the crowd, a man came up to him and, kneeling before him, 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.” And Jesus answered, “O faithless and twisted generation, how long am I to be with you? How long am I to bear with you? Bring him here to me.” And Jesus rebuked the demon, and it came out of him, and the boy was healed instantly. Then the disciples came to Jesus privately and said, “Why could we not cast it out?” He said to them, “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.”

Introduction

I want to remind you today that we serve a mountain moving God.

Miracle Story

A number of years ago I had a ministry friend whos name was CJ..

He came and preach here early in our pastorate actually..

and He has sense gone on to be with the Lord..

Great Faith

But Cj was a man of great faith..

He had been through the vietnam war..

and come out working for some pretty bad characters..

eventually God radically saved him..

He got married, had a family..

and became a powerful witness for the Lord

and served God with all he had until the very end.

Wife

A one point in his life, his wife was diagnosed with cancer..

and the cancer was in the throat or thyroid one..

its was a lump that could be felt in the neck

and it continued to grow..

From the begining..

Cj told the doctor..

Gods going to heal her.

And of course the doctor didnt really beleive that..

and so they did what doctors did.. prescribed thier cure.. which was surgery..

in the appointments and scans leading up to the surgery CJ was consistent..

each time he told the doctor..

Gods going to heal her..

because he sincerely believed it..

surgery

Finally the day of the surgery came..

The surgion came in and was prepping his wife..

and Cj, as usual was telling his wife..

baby, gods going to heal you..

Finally the surgeon had enough..

and in a agitated voice he looked at cj and said..

Sir.. Today I am going to heal your wife by removing this mass and thats whats going to happen..

Gone

A short time later the team came to take her back..

Cj something in his told him to check her neck one more time as they were taking her out of the room..

so he reached up under her neck..

and he said.. it was gone..

And he looked at his wife and told her.. your healed..

sure enough..

They took his wife back..

found no trace of the cancer..

and had no medical excuse as to why it was gone..

But CJ would always tell you what happened..

God moved a mountain..

Ive come to tell you this morning that we serve a mountain moving God..

The story

The story we find in Matthew 17:14-21 is a mountain moving story..

Its the account of Jesus literally healing a boy who have been suffering from seizures..

no one

like many through the gospels who come to Jesus with mountains of their own..

no one had been able to help this boy with his condition..

including jesus own disicples..

us

Have you ever felt that way about a situation before in you life?

maybe you do today..

something was happening or going on..

you had a struggle..

illness..

condition..

an unmovable mountain in your life..

and it didnt seem like anyone could help you with your issue?

Not even the church people.. could help you with your issue..

not even the people who were supposed to have faith.. .

Thats whats going on in this story..

the mans son has some serious health problems..

and he is desperate to see him healed..

so he brings the boy to the disicples thinking they can help because they follow Jesus..

but the disicples are not able to do anything about it because of thier lack of faith..

Jesus

But when they bring the boy to Jesus..

Jesus first chastised the disicples and points out the problem..

their lack of faith..

and then cast out the demonic spirit causing the issue and the boy is instantly healed..

Private

Afterwards the disicples come to Jesus privatly and ask him..

Why werent we able to do that?

and look what he says..

Matthew 17:20 (ESV)

He said to them, “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 says your problem is your little faith..

Its lacking..

Microscopic..

understand the disicples faith was not just little..

it had to be microscpic little..

almost non existent little..

because Jesus tells them..

if you will have faith the size of a mustard seed size..

nothing will be impossible for you..

Small

in other passages of the gospels Jesus toughts the mustard seed as the smallest of seeds..

and he tells the disicples here..

If you just have that size faith nothings impossible..

so we can imply the true problem here is not a complete lack of faith..

but incomplete faith..

Follow

You see the disicples had some faith..

they left it all to follow Jesus..

but even after all he had done they had serious doubts till of what was possible..

and so we can imply that when they prayed for this boy..

they knew with their mind Jesus was the anwers and deliverence was possible..

but they didnt believe in their faith God was Going to heal him..

or deep down didnt believe he could heal him..

they had iincomplete faith..

miscroscopic faith..

and because this they could not help the boy..

Jesus

but Jesus says.. listen.. if you will have mustard seed size faith..

anything will be possible..

for just a few minutes I want to talk about what does it look like to see mountains move..

What does it look like to see mountains move

Jesus tells us a lot here in Matthew 17:20 alone..

and I want to break it down and look at the pieces

and I believe we can make a change in our lives this morning that helps us see our own mountains move..

The Question

remember the disciples ask JEsus..

why couldnt we cast it out.

and lets looks Jesus response once again..

Matthew 17:20 ESV

He said to them, “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 says..

If you have faith..

the size of a mustard seed..

You can see mountains move and nothing will be impossible..

If were going to see mountains move we first have too.. have faith..

If we Have faith

What does it mean to have faith..

Have

to have is possessive..

It means I am in poscession of something..

but its also an action..

to have faith means to hold up your faith..

to use you faith..

to activate you faith..

Have faith

you ever had someone tell you that?

just have alittle faith?

that means to activate you faith…

Mountians..

When we encounter mountains we have to active our faith..

thats why paul called the sheild in the armor of god the shield of faith..

because when we are facing mountains we hold it up and our faith shields us from the attacks..

we activate it..

So what is faith?

What is Faith

faith could be defined by many things..

its very complex.

But the definition I want to use today in context to our mountain probelm is this..

Faith is the confident belief in the power, ability, and willingness of god to move mountains..

Faith is knowing with my heart.. not just my head..

its trusting with all my heart, my soul, my strength..

its believing..

that God not only can..

but it able..

and willing..

to move mountains..

EX

so when we encounter problems in our lives..

we raise our shield of faith..

we activate our faith..

and put our full trust in God to move those mountains..

its doesnt require a lot of faith..

Mustard seed sized faith

and it doesnt require a lot of faith..

Jesus said mustard seed size faith..

you know what size a mustard seed is?

Pass our mustard seeds

thats how much faith.. you need..

that small amount..

but it has to be sincere and true faith..

not just saying you believe..

not just acting like you believe and going through the motions..

real faith..

Soil

you see its not the size of the faith thats most important..

its the soil you plant it in..

Matthew 13:31–32 ESV

He put another parable before them, saying, “The kingdom of heaven is like a grain of mustard seed that a man took and sowed in his field. It is the smallest of all seeds, but when it has grown it is larger than all the garden plants and becomes a tree, so that the birds of the air come and make nests in its branches.”

You see when you plant the mustard seed..

it becomes a large plant..

… how loarge..

faith

the same is true with our faith..

when we plant it in the good soil of Jesus..

the all powerfull.. all able.. soil of Jesus..

its produces something in our lives we would never imagine..

we just need a little faith..

So what is possible with faith?

We can see mountains moved

anthything..

Jewish literature..

the idea of a mountain being moved was a common metaphor in jewish lilterature for doing what seemed impossible..

Jesus reiterates this here..

and says nothing wil be impossble with God..

Ending

You maybe saying today..

Pastor.. Ive put my faith in god and things havnt come out the way I thought they would..

the mountain is still there..

caution

Sometimes god answers faith in different ways

Answers to your pray but not your plan…

please hear me today..

im not saying everytime the mountain doesnt move is because we dont have enough faith..

Certainly that would be a very shortsighted view of god..

the honest story of scripture is that sometimes God anwsers our prayers in different ways..

sometimes he says yes..

sometimes, for reason he may only know he says no,

and sometimes he says grow..

but understand me today..

No matter what Gods anwser is..

We have to put our faith in him..

If

if our faith is in god when he says yes..

Then maybe we will see the mountain move..

if our faith is in him when he says grow

then hopefully we willl grow as he intends from our situations..

and If our faith is in god when he says no..

then its our faith in him and his divine plan for our lives that will sustain us through it..

No matter what gods anwers.. our postion is to put ouor faith in god..

Faith and trust

Dr. terry cross, the dean of the school of religon at lee univeristy wrote this one time in his wrote something that has stuck with me because I beleive is a great ballance..

he said, in our prayers we are to pray and have faith as if God will heal, because god is a healer..

but we should also trust him in such a way that if he decides not too thier is a divine reason..

in other words..

God heals..

He does miracle today..

But god also does so much more than miracles..

sometimes instead of moving a mountain he helps us to climb it..

sometime instead of moving a mountain he uses it to humble and focus us..

sometimes instead of moving a mountain he shows us a way around it..

And sometimes he moves the mountain..

Regardless of the anwser it is our faith in god that will help us wallk forward..

Have you put your faith in him for your mountains?