The Mountain

Psalm 125:1 NIV

Those who trust in the Lord are like Mount Zion,

which cannot be shaken but endures forever.

How Does Your Faith Look?

Imagine a mountain of any sort.  It could be snow-capped, rising above the peaks of a dozen other mountains or a hill that stands out in flat desert wasteland.  The mountain can have a city sitting upon it or be a barren rock where few plants grow.  What does that mountain signify to you?  Does it trigger memories from your past or create an image of what you would like your life to be?  What do you think of when you look at the mountain and how does it impact your senses?  Are you drawn in a mysterious way to the mountains or are they frightening because of their immensity and the danger many mountains present to those who climb them.

Many important events happened on mountains in the Bible and mountains often symbolized theological themes in the Bible.   Abraham had one lasting memory of a mountain, Moses several.  Peter, James and John never forgot what they experienced on a mountain and someday it will be a mount upon which our Lord will return.  Perhaps what makes a mountain so captivating is its great power and steadfastness.  Mountains simply are not moved.  Another quality of the greatest of mountains is their endurance.  The Psalmist has this in mind when he compares the believer who puts His faith in God to Mount Zion. Those who trust in the Lord are like Mount Zion, which cannot be shaken but endures forever. (Psalm 125:1 NIV)  The next verse gives a brilliant picture of how God protects us.  As the mountains surround Jerusalem, so the Lord surrounds his people both now and forevermore. (Psalm 125:2 NIV)

Like Mount Zion, the person who trusts in God lasts forever but just as the mountains surround Jerusalem, God guards His people and protects them.  So we have the believer being like a specific mountain, Mt. Zion and the Lord being like the range of mountains around Jerusalem which contains Mt. Zion.  We are like a mighty mountain, the Bible tells us, if we put our trust in God.  But even more importantly, it is the Lord who is a mountain of protection for His people.  We will pause here and consider these two points carefully.

Many have lost their way because they get these two declarations confused and miss the point of them altogether.  Our faith is not in our faith.  It is in Christ who saves us from all that Sin creates.  If your faith is in your faith, you will certainly be shaken because at some point your faith will be shaken.  Your faith can be knocked down and wrecked by trials too great for you but your salvation is not dependent on your faith.  It is dependent on God whose salvation it is.  Like what happens when a great wave of the ocean strikes you, you can find yourself knocked off your feet spiritually by someone who talks you out of what you believe about God and convinces you that you are naive to think Christ can save you.  A book you read might be so persuasive in its arguments against the presence of God that you can doubt His existence.  Some person you trusted who built up your faith in Christ may commit a terrible sin and suddenly you wonder if Christianity itself is true.  If your faith is in your faith, you can become like a house built upon sandy ground that falls apart when a horrific storm beats against it.  Consider these examples of faith in faith.

When the Apostle Peter boldly proclaimed that even if all the other disciples fall away from staying with Christ, he never would, Peter was showing his faith in his faith.  Peter declared, "Even if all fall away, I will not." (Mark 14:29 NIV)  We know of course that Peter did fall away and his boast comes across as pure bluster to us but at the time, Peter was supremely confident that he could and would if necessary die with Christ if Jesus’ dire prediction came to pass.  He had faith in his faith.  It is one thing to have faith in God, another altogether to have faith in one’s faith in God.

James and John angrily called for Christ to let them pray for fire to come down from heaven and destroy the Samaritans in a particular village that did not want Christ and them to stay there. And he sent messengers on ahead, who went into a Samaritan village to get things ready for him; but the people there did not welcome him, because he was heading for Jerusalem.  When the disciples James and John saw this, they asked, "Lord, do you want us to call fire down from heaven to destroy them?" (Luke 9:52-54 NIV)  Here is the terrible problem with spiritual pride.  Although it may be grounded in God-thinking, it isn’t grounded in God.  James and John had plenty of faith in their ability to pray and by praying, bring down fire from heaven.  They clearly though had not much faith in God’s ability to remake and reorder lives.  It was clearly impossible in their minds for God to do anything much with the people living in the Samaritan village.  They were too far gone to be redeemed.  Jesus however thought differently and did something about it.

Let me illustrate the difference between faith in one’s faith and faith in God from a recent experience of mine.  I was working at a school as a P.E. instructor and somewhere on the school grounds lost a bracelet I was wearing.  I had been working with the kids both on a large grassy field as well as an asphalt play yard.  I searched everywhere I had been for the bracelet to no avail. As I looked to the ground, my heart looked to the heavens and I asked God to show me where the bracelet was but I still didn’t find it.  Finally, because the children were at recess, there were staff members of the school walking about supervising the kids.  I asked one of the workers if she had seen my bracelet but she told me she hadn’t.  However she encouraged me to not give up on finding the bracelet.  She had recently lost a small, diamond studded earring and searched high and low for it but the earring was nowhere to be found.  One day she spotted it in her driveway, completely undamaged.  Somehow it had gone unscathed, despite the number of times cars were parked in the driveway.  She told me not to give up on finding the bracelet.  I must admit, that I had quit thinking God would show me where the bracelet was and just smiled and thanked the woman for her encouragement.  Less than five minutes later, a girl who had been walking with the recess duty woman came to me with my bracelet.  It was not my faith that brought that bracelet back to me but rather the God of my faith that returned it in such a miraculous way.

When Jonah was sent by God to tell the people of Assyria in Nineveh that judgment was coming, he did not want to go because he thought the Lord would be easy on them.  If they asked God for forgiveness, Jonah believed God would let them off without any punishment for all the wicked things the people of that country had done.  Jonah’s faith was in his religion of right and wrong and punishments and rewards but not in God who is really God.  He did not think God could really fix all those Assyrians in Nineveh and make them a blessing to the world.  His faith in the religion of making people pay for what they do wrong was strong but His faith in the God who is really God was weak and broken.

Our Lord’s declaration to two blind men that Jesus healed is widely misunderstood.  As Jesus went on from there, two blind men followed him, calling out, "Have mercy on us, Son of David!"   When he had gone indoors, the blind men came to him, and he asked them, "Do you believe that I am able to do this?"   "Yes, Lord," they replied. Then he touched their eyes and said, "According to your faith will it be done to you"; and their sight was restored. (Matthew 9:27-30 NIV)  Jesus was not telling the men that they were healed because they had enough faith to get a healing.  They were healed because their faith was in Christ to heal them and He did it.

God does not want you to work up our faith and try to blow it up like a balloon so that you can get the things you want.  He simply tells you to trust Him in every matter.  There is so much you try to fix and so many problems you stress over because you don’t know how to solve them and the Lord tells you to settle down and trust Him with it.  Rather than fuss over something that bothers you, first go to Christ and the Holy Spirit may put a solution in your heart that will take care of your problem.  Perhaps He will begin working in someone else who will lift the problem off your shoulders.  God could simply give you peace while you wait for a solution.  God does not care one bit how great or small your faith is.  He simply wants what faith you have to be in Him.  Here is something you can say to remind you of how great God’s love is for you and how willing He is to help you.  Make this simple statement as you face the trials before you.  “Jesus is my Savior.  I put my faith in Him.”