Mustard Seed Faith

Hi and welcome to In Search of God, I'm your host Deloris Johnson. The title of today's cast is "Faith As a Grain of Mustard Seed Part 1."

Here we'll cover the following topics:

• What is Faith?
• What is Belief?

This isn't the topic I intend to do for this segment, I originally wrote something much different. But recent events lead me to think it's time to talk about Faith; Faith like the grain of a mustard seed. Also, I've had to break it into two parts. During the first part, we'll define faith and belief. During the second, we'll look at these two words in practice.

Jesus said, a mustard seed is the least amongst the grains, but it will become one of the most magnificent trees, and other animals will lodge in it. He goes on to say if you have faith like the grain of a mustard seed, you can say to a mountain: "move," and it will obey you. Here's a little secret, today when we read this passage we think of the mountain as a metaphor for some big problem that's standing in our way. But actually, He meant this literally.

To get a visual of this mustard seed concept, take a look at the poster image for this cast. The left half shows a real mustard seed preserved in silicone silver trimmed pendant on a necklace I bought in a Christian Book store, years ago. The other half of the image is the tree that such a seed will become based on God's blueprint for its life.

Jesus's analogy can be taken two ways as far as I can see. It could mean you only need a small amount of faith or the analogy could indicate you need a mustard seed kind of faith.

The first concept is straightforward. The mustard seed is very very tiny, smaller than a peppercorn. So if we look at it that way, you only need the most minuscule amount of faith to move the mountain.

The second concept is a little tricky, again the mustard seed is very very tiny, but it grows to be a ginormous tree. That's a whole lot of growing to ask for someone or something. But as reasonability small as the mustard seed is, as long as it does its part, it will become something big and strong and able, as Jesus describes it, to support other life.

That's the blueprint for the mustard seed's as it is written by its creator, God.

As we talk about belief and faith, during this cast, I want you to think about faith and what it means to have faith like a grain of mustard seed. What's your understanding of faith and belief. I encourage you to take a moment, pause the cast, and write it down. You can be as detailed or short as you like.

I understood faith to be my belief in God and the act of doing what the Bible says even if I can't see the prescribed results right now. Bible seems to back this up:

Hebrews 11 (which is aptly called the faith chapter) starts out this way:
"Now, faith is the substance of things hoped for, the evidence of things not seen."

This chapter goes down through the ages, delineating events where God was able to move mankind forward to salvation, through the faith of a few people. I won't read the rest of it here. If you're interested, read Hebrews chapters 11 in the Bible.

So what is Faith? A belief in something. What is "belief?" I think the way we define these words has more to do with our feelings about them, then an accurate definition. Since our understanding of the words faith and belief are wrapped up in our emotions and experiences, they can be hard to explain. Talking about my faith in God can be off-putting because maybe you, the person listening, simply can't relate. If you are searching for God, you may feel like you don't have an experience or thought about faith that will tie my explanation to something in your life.

If I use the words "belief" or "believe" to explaining something to you, that's a personal truth rather then an ultimate truth. Think about these two phrases: I believe in God... God is. Do you perceive the difference between them? It's quite literally the difference between saying, "I believe so..." and "Yes!.."

Another interesting thing of note. Saying "I believe" something has watered down feeling to it. And it's due to the way we use the word. We say things like "I believe so..." or "that is my belief." "I believe" might be definitive truth to me, but for you, you don't have to hold it as truth at all. "Yes..." or "God is..." stands as truth, whether you think so or not.

While preparing this cast, I discussed this topic with my husband. He does the messages for Sharing the Word of God Ministries. Anyway, during that discussion, something occurred to me that adds another layer to what I'm saying here, "belief," "believe," and "believer" can feel like exclusionary words.

We Christians, call ourselves believers. We say things like "we believers, do this or that." But if you're in search of God, or you're not sure if you believe or that you can give yourself the title "believer," you can feel like an outer. Listen, there's nothing wrong with a Christian calling themselves a Believer. But I'll just say this for you, the devil loves to make you feel like you don't belong somewhere you want to be, somewhere you should be.

Faith is even harder to conceptualize. Generally, faith is thought of as a belief in something or someone. When I first thought about faith and attempted to articulate what it is to me, I would say:
"I believe that God is and that He loves me and that He's working things out on my behalf even though I don't see Him."

That's a great statement, and it's a true statement, but it only scratches the surface. Besides, where do you fit into that statement? How do you begin to actualize faith for yourself?

So let's look up the word faith. The Bible sayings:
Study to show yourself approved; A workman rightly dividing the word of. truth...."

So what I want to do during this cast is define Faith and Belief for you. I also want to show you a few things about studying or searching for Truth. Namely, there is a lot of subtle misinformation out there, and if you're not studious, it can leave you at the very least, right where you start. But at the worst, it can leave you worst-off then your before. So stay with me as I attempt to define faith and belief with you and also show you why it's essential to take time and dig a little deeper when you're studying God.

We'll start with Google.
Google definition #1 says: Faith is a complete trust or confidence in someone or something.
According to Google, some synonyms are:

• Trust
• Belief
• Confidence
• Conviction
• Credence
• Reliance
• Dependence

Example Sentence: "...this restores one's faith in politicians."

Google definition #2 says "Strong belief in God or in the doctrines of a religion, based on spiritual apprehension rather than proof."
Among the synonyms, you'll find words like:

• Religion
• Sect
• Denomination
• Persuasion
• Ideology
• Teaching
• Doctrine

Example Sentence: "She gave her life for her faith."

Notice how Google separated the definition it deems suitable for something or someone from the definition suited to God; they used the words "complete trust" and "confidence" to define faith in someone or something, while Faith in God is defined as "strong belief" and is "based on apprehension rather than proof".

Trust and confidence are words that everyone can understand. We build trust and confidence in people and things every day through the experience and interactions we have with them. We trust that a bridge will hold as we and thousands of people transverse it. We have confidence in our ability to do our jobs, or else most of us wouldn't show up. We even know what not trusting and not having confidence in something looks like.

Strong belief, on the other hand, is a little tricky. What does belief look like? This definition also has a clause: "based on apprehension (fear) rather than proof." According to this definition, this kind of faith, faith in God, is built on fear and is not based on anything you can prove.

Now let's look at the supporting sentences. For the first definition, complete trust or confidence in someone or something, we've restored the faith in a politician. It says:
"...this restores one's faith in politicians."

For the second, strong belief, the person apparently has died for it. It says:
"She gave her life for her faith."
In the sentence, one word makes the difference between a depiction of life-long service and death.

Dying for one's convictions can be considered noble and brave, but again, that is a fearful notion. But honestly, if you're in search of God, you might say to yourself, I'm just not there yet and think that your belief is not there. Then you think I just don't belong. Then maybe this is not for me. Get it?

The funny thing is, you may read over those definitions, and think nothing of them. You'll file them away in your brain as truths you've associated with the word faith. They will simply become a part of your feeling about the word concerning these two concepts: someone or something and then God. Considering how it's used here, you may subconsciously begin to look at Faith in God as something fearful and shaky and faith in anything else as something with trust and confidence and you'll never remember why.

Since Google used the word belief to define Faith in God, and we're not sure about belief either, let's look that one up too. Google says that belief is an acceptance that a statement is true or that something exists. Trust, faith, or confidence in someone or something. Okay.

Okay so: acceptance, trust, confidence; to me, these words add clarity. Here we don't even mention God. That's interesting. But now we can have confidence in God, like we do have in the politician because we can take confidence as a synonym for belief.

Friends these are unacceptable definitions for words we use to talking about our experiences with God. I took you through this exercise because our perception and feelings about the words are influenced by how we use and define them and sometimes the usages and definitions are incomplete, inaccurate, or designed to give you a particular perception of them when used in a specific context.

Also remember, English is a living language, it shifts and shapes to how we use its words.
Hot and cold are synonymous when used to describe how we feel about somethings. Bad its good. Being down means your up to doing something.

Also, it gets harder and harder to contextualize something because we need to keep our statements Twitter and text message short. Many times, the context is omitted from the definition only because it takes too many words to convey that concept. And guys this is not all Google, Twitter, the internet's fault. Our attention spans, especially when it comes to reading, are getting shorter and shorter. God, I wish I could go into the effect this has on your brain. Maybe another time.

What I'm trying to say is, that the way we use and understand words today is not the way we use and understood them yesterday. Our God (I include you), our God is the Ancient of Day, and the Bible was compiled way before our time. So to get the full meaning and clear understanding of what we're reading, we need to seek out old definitions to define the words written in an old book.

Webster's 1828 Dictionary has several definitions for the word Faith: The very first one:

• 1a: allegiance to duty or a person: LOYALTY
• b1): fidelity to one's promises
• (2) : sincerity of intentions
• 2a(1): belief and trust in and loyalty to God
• (2) : belief in the traditional doctrines of a religion
• b(1): firm belief in something for which there is no proof
• (2): complete trust
• 3: something that is believed especially with strong conviction: without question

Webster's 1828 defines belief like this:

1. a state or habit of mind in which trust or confidence is placed in some person or thing.
2. something that is accepted, considered to be true, or held as an opinion.
3. conviction of the truth of some statement or the reality of some being or phenomenon, especially when based on examination of evidence.

These definitions provide a lot of context to the words, which gives you a clearer understanding of the word faith. We can see from the first two definitions that they are describing being faithful: sincerity of intentions, loyalty, fidelity. Next, we see faith as a feeling, with all-encompassing qualifiers; not or but and. Belief, and trust in and loyalty to specifically God.

Now I didn't say that Google's definitions are wrong, I am merely saying they don't give enough context to add clarity to what we are trying to define. Now I do think they are morally wrong for how they tried to contextual the words.

Looking at belief in Webster's 1828, you come to understand that belief is a habit or state. We know from life that you have to arrive at a state and formulate a habit; belief now becoming actionable.

Given the definitions provided by Marriam Webster, I can say that my faith is my sincerest intentions toward, trust in, fidelity and loyalty to God because of my I have come to have or have built confidence and conviction for His truth about my life.

Is mustard seed faith relative to the size of the seed or the kind of faith it takes for the seed to go the distance to actualize its destiny?

I hope you've gotten something valuable from this cast. If so, I'd love to hear about it. Send an email to insearchofgod@stwog.org. That's insearchofgod@stwog.org. We'll pick this topic up again next time with some faith-building examples.