The small mustard seed
The Lord spoke of having faith "as a grain of mustard seed". This article deals with the spiritual meaning behind the "smallness" of the mustard seed. It is important to understand this so that our faith may in fact manifest the qualities of a "mustard seed".
In the book of Matthew, the Spirit declares the following:
"14And when they were come to the multitude, there came to him a certain man, kneeling down to him, and saying, 15Lord, have mercy on my son: for he is lunatick, and sore vexed: for ofttimes he falleth into the fire, and oft into the water. 16And I brought him to thy disciples, and they could not cure him. 17Then Jesus answered and said, O faithless and perverse generation, how long shall I be with you? how long shall I suffer you? bring him hither to me. 18And Jesus rebuked the devil; and he departed out of him: and the child was cured from that very hour. 19Then came the disciples to Jesus apart, and said, Why could not we cast him out? 20And Jesus said unto them, Because of your unbelief: for verily I say unto you, If ye have faith as a grain of mustard seed, ye shall say unto this mountain, Remove hence to yonder place; and it shall remove; and nothing shall be impossible unto you. 21Howbeit this kind goeth not out but by prayer and fasting." (Matthew 17:14-21)...
The last verse in this passage is one of the most misunderstood verses in Scripture. For years, I had accepted the teaching that verse 21 was saying that the kind of evil spirit inside the child could only be cast out through prayer and fasting. Over the last few years, however, the Lord made me feel very uncomfortable about this interpretation of verse 21. As I read this passage over and over again, I would wonder why the Lord said "because of your unbelief" when the disciples asked him why they could not cast out the evil spirit. If the type of evil spirit inside the child was so special that it required special prayer and fasting, why didn't Jesus say, "because you haven't prayed and fasted enough". Jesus simply referred to their "unbelief", i.e.- their lack of faith, and then proceeded to say that they needed to have faith "as a grain of mustard seed". Last week, I was speaking with a sister in Christ concerning this passage, and, when our conversation ended, I was compelled to study this passage once again. I asked the Lord, "What does verse 21 really mean?", and as I did so, the Lord made me see something I had never seen in all the times I had tried to understand this verse...
By Antonio Inocencio Toriaga
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