A Nugget from New Life Network
Scripture for the Day (March 20, 2017)
And 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. (Matthew 17:20)
In our last devotional we talked about abiding (or living) in the Word. We gave you an example of how a great character actor does in-depth research on a character so they can get to a point where they sound like the character and can mimic their mannerisms. Their goal is to literally get to a point where they get so into the skin of the character that they look, sound, and think like the character. This devotional will give you a brief example of how we as believers can do the same thing when studying the Word of God.
There is an account in Matthew 8, Mark 4, and Luke 8 of Jesus telling His disciples to get into a boat and go to the other side of the lake. In the midst of this journey a fierce storm arose and filled the boat with water. The disciples were in fear for their lives. They thought they were all going to drown. Jesus was asleep in the back of the boat during this violent storm.
This is what I want you to do. Put yourself in the skin of these disciples. These men were no different than us. They weren’t some great Holy men. They were fishermen and common everyday working folks. What would you think in that situation? Here is what a normal carnal thinking person would probably start thinking. How did we get into this mess in the first place? Jesus told us to get into this boat and He is the one that told us to go to the other side. It’s His fault. He must have known this storm was coming. Look at Him. He’s asleep in the back of the boat while we are all about to perish. He doesn’t even care!
Can you see how your mind can run crazy if you bow to fear? Fear and faith cannot coexist together.
Now, let’s look at a few things that transpired before this event. Even though these were just common folks they were disciples of Jesus and they had all been in training by Jesus himself. In Mark 8:3 the leper was healed; Mark 8:13 the Centurion’s servant was healed; in Mark 8:15 Peter’s mother was healed; in Mark 8:16 demons were cast out of the multitudes and many were healed. The disciples had seen miracle after miracle to help build their faith.
In fear for their lives, the disciples woke Jesus and accused Him of not caring if they all perished. What was His response in Mark 4:40? And he said unto them, Why are ye so fearful? how is it that ye have no faith? In Luke 8:25 Jesus asked them, “Where is your faith?” Jesus was expecting His disciples to take care of this situation. He had already told them to go to the other side plus He was in the boat with them.
Jesus then rebuked the storm and it ceased.
There are a lot of lessons we can learn from this. We are disciples just like the ones in this episode and we can learn from what they went through. For example, where is our faith when a storm arises? Do we speak to the storm or do we rely solely on our weather reports, radar, and warning mechanisms? Do we still look at everything in the natural or can we see it through the eyes of the Spirit? God did not give us a Spirit of fear! He wants us to use our faith. Where is our faith???
When we read the Word of God do we spend enough time in meditating and researching a particular scripture to the point where we can start feeling and thinking like the characters involved? You have to realize that the disciples of Jesus, and even the Old Testament characters, were all in training. They did not have the benefit of the Old and New Testaments like we do. Many of them did not understand spiritual warfare like we do and therefore attributed certain things to God that were actually from Satan.
The fact is this. Even though we too are in training, our faith should be even stronger today than the faith of the original disciples. We actually have no excuse!!! Speak to your storms!!!!
Nevertheless when the Son of man cometh, shall he find faith on the earth? (Luke 18:8)
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