The Power of Faith (Mark 11:20-25)

The Power of Faith (Mark 11:20-25)

A boy named Steve went to church for the first time. The preacher talked about Matthew 17:20. That is, "If you have faith the size of a mustard seed, you will say to the mountain, 'Move from here to there,' and it will move; and nothing will be impossible for you."
Hearing the sermon, Steve decided to pray about the mountain in back of his house which caused a avalanche every winter. He prayed God that He should move the mountain to somewhere else.
The pastor who preached the sermon heard Steve's prayer of moving the mountain. He was afraid of Steve's prayer being not answered. Although he delivered the sermon as it was written in the Bible, he never heard of that kind of prayer having been answered. He never heard that a mountain moved from one place to another place as a result of anybody's prayer.
To the pastor, it seemed to be very certain that Steve's prayer would not be answered and that he would be very much disappointed at it. Thus, he prayed God that He should comfort Steve after his prayer being not answered. Yet, Steve did not give up his prayer about the mountain ten days later, and even twenty days later. He kept praying God to remove the mountain.
The pastor was so uneasy as he anticipated Steve's great disappointment. On the fortieth day since he started to pray, Steve came by the pastor's office with a big smile and said to the pastor: "Pastor, nowadays God moves a mountain not with His hand but with trucks. As the city authority needed the soil for the new construction of a highway, people dug up the mountain soil and moved them with trucks."

Many people just never seem to grasp what faith is and without faith we can receive nothing from the Lord. So faith is the most important thing that we can have. We all want our prayers answered. Let us look at Jesus as He tells us what it is and how to use it.

Mark 11:24 Jesus said, "Therefore I tell you, whatever you ask for in prayer, believe that you have received it, and it will be yours."

For your prayer to be answered you need to know a prayer's ABC:

First, Ask!
The first step for your prayer to be answered, you should ask.
You must ask for it.
Not think about it. Or write a letter. You must ask!
Romans 10:8: "The word is near you; it is in your mouth and in your heart, that is the word of faith we are proclaiming."

Without asking, your prayer can never be answered.
Ask as hard as you can.
Ask as many as you can.
Ask as loud as you can.
God promises us through Jeremiah 33:3: "Call to me and I will answer you, and will tell you great and hidden things that you have not known."
Jesus tells us: "Ask, and it will be given you; search, and you will find; knock, and the door will be opened for you."

Second, Believe!
When you ask God for something, then you have to believe that God will surely answer for your prayer.
How can we believe it? It's because that is God's promise.
Jesus in John 15:16 tells us: "The Father will give you whatever you ask Him in my name."
Ans Jesus in Matthew 21:22: "Whatever you ask for in prayer with faith, you will receive."
This is the promise of our Lord. So we surely can believe it.

Believe that you have received it.
Not going to believe it ... No! Believe it now. When you pray is NOW!
But, how do you believe something that you do not have? With faith.
Hebrew 11:1: "For faith is the substance of things hoped for the evidence of things not seen."

So you must believe in God? word. God's word becomes the evidence of things hoped for. You can grab hold of your Bible and say this is the substance of my healing or whatever you prayed for. It is the same as a contract. Only this one is with God. And it is impossible for God to lie.

Numbers 23:19 says that "God is not a human being, that He should lie, or a mortal, that He should change His mind. Has He promised, and will he not do it? Has He spoken, and will He not fulfill it?"

The worldly saying is that seeing is believing. By seeing you may be able to believe.
But, the Christian saying is different. Our saying should be "Believing is seeing." That is, by believing you may be able to see.

Third, Claim or Contend!
Ask; Believe; and then Claim or Contend.
As God is faithful and never breaks His promise, you can claim that your prayer has been answered.
Although salvation is a future event that we can get when enter into the kingdom of God, yet we claim that "I was saved."
How? Because I know that my salvation will be so certain because God promised me so.
So, claim that you have received God's answer for your prayer.
Then, as Jesus tells us in v. 24, "it will be yours."
That is when your prayer will be manifested to you in this physical world. That might be a few minutes or days or even a months. But it was yours the moment you prayed. So at that moment you should start thanking God.

Mark 11:24 says "Whatever you desire ..." That sounds like anything. It is. It is anything that God has promised to give you. Which covers everything that you will                                                       

need here in this life that is good and is not evil. There are 32,000 promises that God has given us in the Bible. If you are a child of God, then they are yours. But He is only going to give them to you if you ask ... And if you receive them in faith. Then, you need to claim that they are yours, giving many thanks to God.