Faith That Moves Mountains, by Rev Steven R Mitchell

Faith That Moves Mountains

By Rev Steven R Mitchell

Mountain View United, Aurora, CO 3-10-2013

Based on Mark 11:11-14, 20-25

 

        One of the Lenten studies being offered this season is in the study of Jesus’ last week as told through the eyes of the writer of the Gospel of Mark and presented in the book “The Last Week” by Marcus Borg and John Crossan.  For those of us reading this book and have been attending the Wednesday evening classes are finding ourselves challenged in the way that we have been taught to understand Jesus and the basic message that he brought through his ministry.

        Over the next few weeks I will be sharing with you some of the idea’s that both Borg and Crossan present about how they understand Marks narrative of Jesus’ life and in particular his last week of life.  Just to refresh your memory, Mark is the oldest of the Gospels with the Gospels of Matthew and Luke based on his narrative. 

This morning’s scripture contains a story about a fig tree that had leaves on its branches.  Jesus see’s this fig tree in the distance and is hungry, so walks over to see if there are any figs on the tree in which he could eat.  Finding no figs on the tree because it wasn’t the time of the year to have any fruit, Jesus through a fit and curses the fig tree.  The next morning as Jesus again passes by this tree, Peter see’s that the tree has died over night and calls Jesus’ attention to it.  Jesus then seems to side step the issue by telling Peter to “have faith in God.”   Then Jesus expands on that statement by saying, “…if anyone says to this mountain, ‘Go throw yourself into the sea,’ and does not doubt in their heart but believes that what they say will happen, it will be done for them.  Therefore, whatever you ask for in prayer, believe that you have received it, and it will be yours.”  Then Jesus goes on to say, “And when you stand praying, if you hold anything against anyone, forgive them, so that your Father in heaven may forgive you your sins.”  So we have a fig tree that is cursed because it was out of season, a mountain that can be tossed into the sea if you believe hard enough, and a couple of conditions in prayer.  One condition is to “believe” enough otherwise it will not be answered and the second is to “forgive” the person that you hold something against so God “may forgive” you your sins.

Mark was a master at framing his stories in such a way as to let us understand what the main point of the story is about.   As was customary in Hebrew culture, Mark often weaved several seemingly unrelated incidents into a powerful message.  In this morning’s scriptures, I left out the story of Jesus turning over the tables of the money changers at the Temple in order to keep a tighter focus on this morning’s theme, “Faith that moves mountains.”  I will deal with the actions of Jesus in the temple at a later date, but this morning focus on the fig tree as it relates to “faith” and how that corresponds to the example of “moving mountains”.

Why would Jesus be so unreasonable and vindictive as to curse a fig tree for not having figs?  That doesn’t seem very much to be in the character of Jesus, to me.  We are given a clue by Mark that this story of the fig tree is not to be taken as a factual event, but rather more “symbolic” of something deeper with the statement, “it was not the season for figs.”  The fig tree and the lack of fruit relates to the first century Hebrews understanding of the condition of “faith practices”, or the lack there of at the Temple in Jerusalem.

  Symbolically speaking, the fig tree had foliage but it wasn’t producing any fruit.  In other words, it had the outside appearances of being a “healthy” plant, doing and being what it was designed to do, yet in reality it lacked the true substance needed to produce fruit.  This fig tree when seen as a symbolic example can be applied to almost any part of our lives.  It can be applied to us specifically, meaning we can look healthy and have “it all together” so to speak, on the outside, but lack what we need on the inside in order to produce the fruit we are capable of.  Ultimately when we are not producing this fruit we will eventually wither and die.

Our government can also be an example of the fig tree.  As long as it’s operating, it may think as if it’s doing what it’s supposed to do.  Yet the purpose of government is to serve the needs of its people.  When it ceases to protect its citizens and becomes self-serving, it no longer is doing what it was intended to do and it will eventually come to its end.  We saw this in the French revolution as the general population toppled its disconnected leaders.  We saw it through the revolutionary war between the colonies and Great Britain.  We are seeing it today within our own life time with revolts such as “occupy wall street.”  Ultimately, all corrupted governments come to a very ugly ending.  “In the morning, as they went along, they saw the fig tree withered from the roots.”

Again, the encouragement that Jesus is giving his disciples about “having faith in God and with that faith one can move mountains”, is related to the fig tree story and therefore to be taken symbolically.  One of the most powerful examples within my life time about “faith” and moving mountains is found in the life of Dr Rev Martin Luther King, Jr.  If there is any one man in America that could be compared to Jesus and his message of “justice”, it is Dr King!  Dr. King became the face and voice of a movement that demanded equality, not toleration of “separate but equal” standards.  He preached the message of God’s vision for all humanity and in doing so knew and predicted that he would be killed for speaking the truth and exposing the evil of racism in our country. 

Jesus did this same thing.  Jesus saw how a system of domination had taken over his country and the religious heart of the Temple.  Jesus was aware that to truly fight this evil he would have to go to the capitol and confront the religious leaders themselves, who had sold out and were a part of the domination system that was choking the Hebrew nation.  Jesus knew that once he was in Jerusalem that the odds of being killed were very great, but because his “faith” in “just treatment” for all was so great, he was compelled to face the injustice that the religious leadership had bought into.

We still have “mountains to through into the sea” in this country.  Our government has become so controlled by a system that feeds on the lives of our citizens that they no longer lead by are lead.  Just a few years ago the Supreme Court deemed that “Corporations” are persons, which means that these new “persons” hold the same legal rights as you and I.  The problem is that the greatest portions of our countries wealth is held by very few, who have unlimited resources in which to influence our elected officials, who buy into this powerful group in order to be able to maintain their elected status.  We are living in an age not unlike that of Jesus’ time, where we are being used, abused, and robbed by a domination system that exists only for power at the expense of those who are not a part of that system.

It’s hard for the church to voice it’s disapproval too loudly because we benefit from this system.  We receive huge tax breaks, yet if we were to start to actively speak out against this domination system, we risk losing our voice in this system, we risk losing heavily.  What would Jesus say to us today in light of this Mountain that needs to be faced?  I believe he would tell us to have faith that could move mountains, or end up like the fig tree. 

We can bring this “faith” issue and moving mountains down to our own personal lives as well.   We all face what seem to be insurmountable mountains at times in our lives.  Some of us feel that our whole life is plagued with a mountain that needs to be moved.  So what do we do when we pray with a truly deep sincerity of believing and our prayer isn’t answered?  Are we subject to reticule as Job was by friends, saying that our “faith” isn’t strong enough?  Or do we rationalize that our prayer isn’t being answered in the way that we are expecting it to be answered?  Or do we look for the “silver” lining within that mountain, once again rationalizing that our prayers are not answered in the way that we had envisioned?

I have no answer to that piece.  What I can tell you, is look at what happened to Jesus as he prayed to have his mountain casted down into the sea, or Dr King as he too prayed to cast the mountain of racism down into the sea.  These men died for their faith not seeing the answer to their prayer, yet because of their faith, we recognize these injustices and it gives us hope that as we earnestly pray things will change for the better, if not while we live, then sometime in the future.  It’s been two thousand years since Jesus lived and we are still working at casting down the mountain of injustice.  We are able to do this not just because of the faith that Jesus displayed, but with our own faith in those same principles of “justice” and “grace”.   Amen