Journey Through The Bible
     Old Testament Reading: Ester 8-10
     New Testament Reading: Matthew 17

Then the disciples approached Jesus privately and said, “Why couldn’t we drive it out?” “Because of your little faith,” he told them. “For truly I tell you, if you have faith the size of a mustard seed, you will tell this mountain, ‘Move from here to there,’ and it will move. Nothing will be impossible for you” (Matthew 17:19-20).

After Jesus was transfigured on the mountain, a man with a son who was demon-possessed told Him, I brought him to your disciples, but they couldn’t heal him (v16).Then Jesus rebuked the demon, and it came out of him (v18).

When Christ sent the disciples out (Matt 10:6–8), He explicitly commissioned them to do these kinds of miracles. Less than a year later, they failed where they had once succeeded. Puzzled by their powerlessness, the disciples privately asked the Lord for an explanation. His answer was straightforward: Because of your little faith (v20).

Throughout the Gospels, Jesus often rebuked the disciples for their little faith. They seemed to be the original members of the O Ye of Little Faith Association.

Little faith is the kind of faith that believes in God when you have something in your hand that God has provided. Great faith says, “I believe God with nothing in my hand. I believe God is in the middle of the storm. I believe God when I don’t see any way out.” That’s great faith.

Jesus told them, “Because of your little faith. For truly I tell you, if you have faith the size of a mustard seed, you will tell this mountain, ‘Move from here to there,’ and it will move (v20).

I can just imagine the disciples thought, “Now, wait a minute. You just said we had little faith, and that’s why we couldn’t do it. And then you tell us if we had a little faith as little as a grain of mustard seed (the littlest seed that was known in that part of the world), we could do it.”

Earlier in chapter 13, Jesus had taught the disciples the principle of the mustard seed, and they were still learning the lesson. He presented another parable to them: “The kingdom of heaven is like a mustard seed that a man took and sowed in his field. It’s the smallest of all the seeds, but when grown, it’s taller than the garden plants and becomes a tree, so that the birds of the sky come and nest in its branches (Matt 13:31-32).

The principle of the mustard seed is that it is little, and it grows. What you have in the mustard seed is something that starts very small and grows very large. What Jesus is telling us is that if you have the faith that is illustrated in a mustard seed, you will start out small, but your faith will grow and increase. And that was the indictment against them. They started out with a little bit of faith, and it did not grow.

There are many things that God desires for you to experience in your life, things that God desires to accomplish in your life that are available to you through the exercise of His divine power. But that power will never be used until you have the faith that starts small at salvation, and as you go through the struggles and trials of life with Christ at your side, your faith doesn’t die, but it gets larger and larger. And you can tell this mountain, ‘Move from here to there,’ and it will move.

Jesus is not talking about literal mountains; He is talking about mountains of difficulty. It’s figurative. When the Jews talked about removing mountains, they used it to refer to the ability to get past difficulties or to remove difficulties. Jesus never meant this to be taken physically and literally. After all, the ordinary man seldom finds any necessity to remove a mountain. What He meant was, if you have a mature faith, all difficulties in life can be solved, and even the hardest task can be accomplished. And then He concludes by saying, Nothing will be impossible for you. (v20)