The tiniest seed

mustard seed

Have you ever had one of those weeks, or months, where you keep seeing the same message over, and over again?
Usually when that happens to me it’s because God is trying to get a message across. And for the last several weeks it’s been all about a seed.
A mustard seed, to be exact.
How many of you have seen a mustard seed? It’s pretty small, right? Smaller than a 1 carat diamond, tinier than a grain of rice. But did you know it can grow into a tree that is between 6 – 20 feet tall, with a 20-foot spread of branches?!
I only know this because God has put this verse in front of me so many times over the past month that it instigated my need to understand more.
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.” – Matthew 17:14-20
One moment Jesus tells his disciples that they are lacking faith and that’s why they could not heal this little boy. But then in the same breath he says all you need is the tiniest amount of faith — just the size of the smallest seed you can imagine — and it is enough to overcome seemingly impossible obstacles. At first, I could only gather that Jesus is telling the disciples that their faith is seriously lacking and doesn’t even amount to a tiny seed.
But as I continued read and research more about the mustard seed, and the other times Jesus had used that analogy, I began to understand that it was less a rebuke of the disciples lacking faith, and more a picture of just how big God’s part is compared to ours.
I think what Jesus is really saying is that all you need is a little bit of faith, and God will provide the rest. He will provide the sunshine and rain, and fertilize the soil so our mustard seed size faith can grow and expand to be a 20 foot tall tree.
We bring just a little to the table in comparison to what He brings.
I don’t know about you, but this is such a comfort to me because sometimes I feel like I have just the tiniest bit of faith. When I’m filled with fear, doubt, and anxiety my bold Sunday-morning, tree-sized faith starts to crumble and crack.
When things get really, really bad I let the words from the enemy consume me and my faith shrinks even more.
And then, just when I think I’ve been through every kind of hard there is, when I think my faith can’t possibly be stretched any further, I find myself on my knees sobbing, and crying out, “Lord I don’t think I can do this, I don’t know that I have enough faith to get up off the floor and move forward.”
And He whispers back, “I will pick you up and be your crutch. Lean on me.”
When I think that I’ve done everything God has asked of me, and I’ve trusted him with my future, my marriage, my children. But then my husband is in the hospital, or my child is suffering and scared, I find myself driving down the highway saying, “God, I don’t think I can do this. I don’t know that I have enough faith to trust you to heal them.”
And He says, “I am the divine healer.”
When I’ve said, “Yes, Lord, I want to obey your calling in my life, I am prepared to be your follower, your disciple, I’ll lead small group Bible studies and women’s retreats.” And then right in the middle of a really bad day, when my son is melting down and my husband and I are fighting and 8 friends are about to walk through our front door for Bible study, I think, “God, I am not equipped for this, my faith is too small to offer hope and encouragement to others.”
He says: “It is my hope they seek, not yours.”
This verse reminds me that God does the heavy lifting, not us. We don’t need a huge, mountainous supply of faith because we have a God who more than makes up for our shortcomings. He knows that I will struggle and sometimes my faith will feel really, really small. He knows there are times I won’t feel bold and brave, but scared and broken.
His promise is that as long as I cling to Him with just the thinnest thread of faith, HE will do the rest. He will give me power to move mountains. Because my strength comes from Him, and not from me.
 
 
Matthew 17:20

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