Faith of a Mustard Seed

We’ve all struggled at one time or another with our ability to fully trust God. I never truly realized the extent to which I wrestled with Him over both the simplest of things, and the big things, until I had children. Yet, I would always hear Him whisper to my spirit, “I will protect them. Trust me.”

As the mother of girls I may have had misplaced faith in that fact. After all, girls tend to be more cautious. But maybe you’re the mother of boys. You might hear God ask you to trust them to His care and immediately begin to think of all the dangers that could beset them. But again He says, “Trust me.”

“You don’t have enough faith,” Jesus told them. “I tell you the truth, if you had faith even as small as a mustard seed, you could say to this mountain, ‘Move from here to there,’ and it would move. Nothing would be impossible” (Matthew 17:20).

A friend once shared a story with me. As she meditated over scripture and asked for revelation of what God wanted to show her, she began to pace the floor and pray. Then she heard Him whisper to her spirit to sit down. Obeying God, she sat down in the nearest chair and that is when He dropped revelation into her spirit.

Sometimes we have more faith in a chair’s ability to sustain us than we do in God’s ability to sustain us.

We never question whether or not the chair will hold us, or if it has a flaw in it somewhere, or whether or not it has secure footing. We certainly don’t question whether or not it loves us enough to hold us up. We just sit. We simply trust. We don’t walk around and test all of the chairs to see which is the strongest or which seems better for the job. We sometimes have more faith in a random inanimate object than we do in our loving and eternal, living God.

My friend confessed that she now shakes and pushes on chairs almost every time before sitting in them just to make God laugh. God showed her that another root of not trusting or having little faith is pride. It is the pride in our own ability to make what we perceive to be better decisions than God. We think we have a faster response time than God, and more love for our children than God. Yes, she admits, she truly thought, and said it often, that nobody loves her kids like she does. She didn’t mean for that to include God, but obviously, in her heart she had.

You see, the profound part about her chair shaking escapades is that she knew clearly that she didn’t worship a chair or put more trust and faith in it than she did in God. What she began to realize was that her faith was in herself. Her trust was in her knowledge. She knew the chair would hold her because she had sat in it before. She trusted herself more and that is why she now had a problem trusting God with other areas of her life.

Pray and ask the Lord to help you put more faith and trust in Him. He is our Father and Creator. Ask Him to take your faith, even as small as a mustard seed, and use it for His glory.

RESPOND:

Dear Lord, thank You for using our small faith. Thank You for being worthy of trust. Amen.

RENEWING RESOURCES:

A Mom After God’s Own Heart: 10 Ways to Love Your Children by Elizabeth George helps you make God an everyday part of your child's life.

REFLECT:

In what areas of your life have you misplaced your faith?

REMEMBER:

We’ve all struggled at one time or another with our ability to fully trust God. But He can use even our small faith for His glory.