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Little Faith

             If that is how God clothes the grass of the field, which is here today and tomorrow is thrown into the fire, will he not much more clothe you—you of little faith? (Matthew 6:30)

             He replied, “You of little faith, why are you so afraid?” Then he got up and rebuked the winds and the waves, and it was completely calm. (Matthew 8:26)

             Immediately Jesus reached out his hand and caught him. “You of little faith,” he said, “why did you doubt?” (Matthew 14:31)

             Aware of their discussion, Jesus asked, “You of little faith, why are you talking among yourselves about having no bread? (Matthew 16:8)

             He replied, “Because you have so little faith. Truly I tell you, if you have faith as small as a mustard seed, you can say to this mountain, ‘Move from here to there,’ and it will move. Nothing will be impossible for you.” (Mathew 17:20)

             If you read through the long list of verses above, you’ll know that the day's theme is “little faith.” Matthew quotes Jesus as using the term five times. Luke uses it once in the same account as the first of Matthew’s above. Not included here are most of the quotes in which Jesus notes that if they had faith, they could do miraculous things. Even without those, it’s clear that Jesus considered faith vitally important.

            But if you’ve read these blogs for long, you will likely recall that I have faith problems. What is it? What does it look like? How do we know if we are having faith or not having faith? To put it in a slightly different way, when it comes to faith (and words like it) God is calling me to a land I do not know, giving me promises of how it will be mine.

            This is old news. I named my truck Abraham because the story of Abram leaving the land of Ur has become a chorus in my life. I feel as if I do it whenever I head south or north. And I’ve come to trust (at least some) that He will guide me to the right exits and turns. But I’ve applied it in a “life skills” way and not spiritually. Trusting God to develop my faith sounds silly, but that’s what I need to do. And I can’t think of much that I need to do more if the disciples are any indication.  

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