It is not about your Faith, it is about your God!

Q: What is the proper interpretation of Mark 11:22-24 if the Word of Faith teachers are wrong in their interpretation?

A: Thank you for your question. The error taught by the Word of Faith teachers has led to generations of Christians believing God to be a heavenly vending machine. It is as if all we have to do is put in our quarter of faith, which is usually taught as giving of our money to a church, and God is then obligated to bless our flesh with the material blessings of health, wealth and prosperous living. Yet, rarely does anybody really experience any noteworthy blessings outside the pastors and teachers who promote this false teaching. They are not being blessed by God, but rather are simply taking all the contributions to their church and living a luxurious lifestyle they pawn off as the blessings of God in order to keep the facade that what they teach is paying off. Then they proof text the Bible in order to justify their teachings. A passage like Mark 11:22-24, is just one of many scripture references taken out of context in order to mislead the Body of Christ.

Mark 11:22-24 says, "Have faith in God,” Jesus answered. “I tell you the truth, if anyone says to this mountain, ‘Go, throw yourself into the sea,’ and does not doubt in his heart but believes that what he says will happen, it will be done for him. Therefore I tell you, whatever you ask for in prayer, believe that you have received it, and it will be yours." First of all, have any of us witnessed mountains being thrown into the sea as an act of a person's faith? Of course not. Secondly, has whatever we asked for in prayer been granted? Again, of course not. Remember, it was Jesus who said, "Because you have so little faith. I tell you the truth, 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 (Matthew 17:20)."You see, we have "little faith." What Jesus was trying to do is lead the Jews to the end of themselves so they would realize their need for God's grace and mercy and accept Jesus as their savior.

The Jews were under the Mosaic Law. And God promised many blessings of the flesh for perfect obedience to the Law. For example, take a look at Deuteronomy 28. In Deuteronomy 28:2, it says, "All these blessings will come upon you and accompany you if you obey the LORD your God." The key phrase is "if you obey." The Jews never obeyed and neither will Christians. We do not have enough faith and never will. Plus, we will never meet God's requirements in order to receive all His promised blessings. Therefore, God will never be obligated to fulfill His promises. If you keep reading in Mark 11, you will see what God expected of the Jews in order to get whatever they asked for in prayer. Mark 11:25 says, "And when you stand praying, if you hold anything against anyone, forgive him, so that your Father in heaven may forgive you your sins." There you have it. If you want anything you ask for in prayer, you must forgive everyone who has ever sinned against you. Obviously, this will never happen and anything you ask for will never be granted to you by God.

In the Sermon on the Mount, how good must we behave to meet God's requirements? Jesus said, "Be perfect, therefore, as your heavenly Father is perfect (Matthew 5:48)." In order to be blessed by God you have to be as perfect as God in everything you do. Again, this will never happen. When you subject yourself to the Law of God, there are only two possible outcomes; perfect obedience or death! Therefore, you are left with the question the disciples asked of Jesus when they realized the impossibility of entering the Kingdom of God on the basis of their own merit. They asked, "Who then can be saved (Matthew 19:25)?” Ultimately, that is what the ministry of Jesus was all about. He wanted to bring people to the end of themselves by showing them the futility of trying to be pleasing to God by their own merits so they would turn to Him in faith and be saved. Do you want to try and obtain blessings of the flesh, that you will never receive, through obedience to the Law, or do you want to experience spiritual blessings of God that only come through faith in Jesus Christ? The Christian life is not about mustering up enough faith to move mountains in order to get whatever we ask for in prayer. The Christian life is about recognizing the size of our God and Savior, Jesus Christ, who created the mountains, and placing faith in Him to live the Christian life through us. Grace and Peace.