PLEASE READ THIS FIRST: Mark 11:20-26
What do you sense the Lord saying to you in this passage?
“Have faith in God.” (Mark 11:22)
These words are not just about ‘how to pray to get what you want’.
In the broader context, it is about what life is like in fellowship with God.
God’s house (v.17) represented where the Creator God lives with God’s family.
Loved by God, humans are authorized and commissioned to be and do great things for love!
Jesus uses hyperbole (extreme statements) to demonstrate these great things.
Moving mountains, asking for anything, forgiving everyone – these are huge.
This is what it means to know and receive God’s love… to have confidence in God’s love.
The problem with Israel is that they turned this into privilege for themselves.
They did not produce the greatest of gifts: love (1 Corinthians 13:1-13).
Confident in the love of God, we are empowered to be great servants of God’s love.
Not doing great things for ourselves, but great things for God and others.
We become living embodiments of God’s gracious greatness and goodness on earth.
This is what God wants for all nations, and what he calls the church to do in the world.
We are graced to grace the world in amazing ways; will be be fruitful fig trees?
PRAYER
Lord, help me to see that I have this superpower of God’s love for me and through me. Help me to use this superpower for God and for good, and not just to get what I want.
I’ve got to leave it behind – forgive them! Jesus is teaching us of the power we have as believers: Matt. 6:14 For if you forgive men when they sin against you, your heavenly Father will also forgive you.” That is a key blessing I can give as a believer/follower of Jesus. Jesus said: “if you hold anything against anyone, forgive them, so that your Father in heaven may forgive you your sins.” Lord, sometimes I don’t want to forgive when someone takes advantage of me or cheats me. Help me to forgive and want to forgive!
Bearing fruit is expected of the fig tree. It is also expected of us. The focus in the temple where Jesus overturned the tables showed its focus had changed – economic and not spiritual. Selfish gains.
My focus also needs to be on the love of God and doing His will. This can only be done in prayer keeping my focus on Jesus. I need to focus on His will and the building of His kingdom. I need to be an instrument of His peace which can only be done when I am in tune with Christ which can only happen in prayer. Each day I need to prayer walk doing His will and only then I am able to produce good fruit.
1 Make me a channel of your peace:
Where there is hatred, let me bring your love;
where there is injury, your healing power,
and where there’s doubt, true faith in you.
2 Make me a channel of your peace:
where there’s despair in life let me bring hope;
Where there is darkness, only light,
and where there’s sadness, ever joy.
3 O, Spirit, grant that I may never seek
so much to be consoled as to console,
to be understood as to understand,
to be loved as to love with all my soul.
4 Make me a channel of your peace:
it is in pardoning that we are pardoned,
in giving to all that we receive,
and in dying that we’re born to eternal life.