Sermon for St. Peter Lutheran Church in Greene, Iowa, October 2, 2016. This week’s lectionary texts are Luke 17:5-10 and 2 Timothy 1:1-14.
Thanks to David Lose’s In the Meantime blog for the idea of writing down little acts of faith! The picture is Vincent van Gogh’s “The Mulberry Tree.”
I want to start by asking you a question. How many of you would like more faith?
It seems like a trick question, right? If you don’t say you want more faith, what are you saying about yourself? Are you saying your faith is perfect? Or that faith isn’t worth having? If so, what are you doing here?
I know I would like some more faith. I think sometimes there are parts of our Christian faith that I believe more in the morning than by the afternoon. I might start off the day with devotions and reading Scripture, but twenty minutes later I’m dealing with something else, and I forget God’s involvement in the situation.
I’d love to have more faith, and I think I’m in good company. In today’s Gospel reading from Luke, the disciples ask Jesus to increase their faith. And it’s not hard to see why.
Earlier in this chapter, Jesus told them it’s better to be drowned then to cause someone else to stumble and sin, and to forgive someone else who sins, even if they keep sinning over and over. Oh, and before that, they were told to give up all their possessions. No wonder they want more faith! This is some hard stuff!
So what is Jesus’ answer? He tells them that if they had faith the size of a tiny mustard seed, they could tell a tree to be uprooted and planted in the sea, and it would obey them.
Believe it or not, I used to worry about this passage. When I was a kid, I understood this text very literally, but I wasn’t sure of my faith. I really wanted to have the kind of faith that could move a tree, but I was afraid I didn’t. I used to walk through the woods and it would be so peaceful that I’d think of God, and I’d start praying.
I’d run through the list of prayer requests I had, think of everyone I knew who was sick, and I’d name them to God and ask for healing. Sometimes, and this is true, I said I took this text really literally, I’d wonder if I had enough faith to pray for a tree to move, but I could never do it.
I was so afraid of what it might mean if the tree didn’t move that I just couldn’t pray for it to move. I could pray for things, but I never wanted to test God, so it couldn’t be something visible. Now, I don’t think Jesus meant this passage quite literally, and I have no idea what I would have done if I had prayed for a tree to be uprooted and it actually was. Probably I’d have written a book or something. This can’t be literal, because how do you measure your faith to know if it’s as big as a mustard seed, anyway?
Sometimes we get caught up in thinking that if healing doesn’t come when we pray for it, or if we pray for it to stop raining and rain keeps falling, that it might mean we don’t have enough faith. If I just had enough faith, maybe things would change.
And I think that’s Jesus’ point. Trying to measure your faith is pointless, even dangerous. More faith doesn’t mean we get to tell God what to do.
Honestly, I think Jesus is being sarcastic here. Look closer at his example. If you have faith the size of a mustard seed, you can uproot this mulberry tree and put it in the ocean. And what good would that do? This is a terrible standard! No one in history has ever told a tree to move and had it jump up and go into a lake. This is an impossible, useless standard.
It would be pretty cool to be able to do this sort of flashy miracle, but I don’t think that’s what Jesus is calling us to do. In fact, measuring faith in this kind of way can be a way of letting ourselves off the hook. The disciples are looking at what Jesus commands them to do, and saying, oh, that sounds hard. I must need another serving of faith.
But that’s not what faith is. Faith isn’t something external and measurable, something you can get another dose of.
Faith is simply trust in God. Faith is believing in the promise that God loves you no matter what, in the promise that Jesus has died for you and you are redeemed.
It’s believing in those words at the beginning of the service, that your sins are forgiven, that God has claimed you. It’s coming to the table in faith, trusting that God is present, looking to meet you here.
Faith is seeing God at work, and letting God work through you.
Jesus’ second little story seems confusing too. He asks, “Who among you would say to your slave who has just come in from plowing or tending sheep in the field.” First of all, remember who his audience is. Most of them are poor peasants, almost slaves themselves, so that’s a clue that I think he’s still being hyperbolic.
But he asks, do you thank the slaves for doing what was commanded? You also, when you’ve done what you were ordered to do, say, “We are worthless slaves; we have done only what we ought to have done.”
Having the kind of faith that can move a tree might be nice to show off, but longing for that kind of faith is missing the point. The kind of faith Jesus is looking for is simply the faith to do what needs to be done. And the disciples have that kind of faith.
It’s not some kind of scarce resource that needs to be carefully guarded or collected or added to or spent. And it’s not always heroic.
In confirmation class this week, we talked about Abraham, a man who had the faith to listen and follow when God told him to get up and move his family to a new land. He’s maybe the most famous example of extreme faith.
Do we have that kind of faith? I don’t know. But unless God is calling you to move somewhere else right now, that’s not the end of faith you need anyway. Sometimes, having the faith to ask the questions is enough. Having the faith to show up is enough.
When Paul writes to Timothy to commend him on his “sincere faith, a faith that lived first in your grandmother Lois and your mother Eunice and now, I am sure, lives in you,” that’s the kind of faith he’s talking about. I can safely say none of your grandparents literally moved trees by speaking in faith, yet many of them passed on faith to you. You’re passing on faith to your kids and grandkids, to others in this congregation.
[pass out index cards]
I want you to write down one helpful thing you did this week. One thing you did that helped someone, then pass your cards back to me. Don’t think about it too hard, just write down something you did to help someone. Praying counts too.
[Collect cards]
Imagine what the world would have been like last week if none of the things written down here had been done.
All these little acts of helping other are acts of faith. These ordinary things, these are how God works.
The good news for the disciples is that they have all the faith that’s needed. They are following Jesus. They don’t understand everything going on, but they’re willing to trust him enough to ask him to increase their faith, even if that’s entirely the wrong question.
They already have all the faith they need; they just don’t know it.
They will fail to do what they’re told, and they’ll all abandon him later when he’s arrested. They aren’t perfect people, and I think that’s so encouraging. Sometimes, I think having faith, trusting God, would be so easy if I could just walk with Jesus, talk with him, ask him what exactly he meant by these stories.
But the disciples themselves, the people who are literally living with Jesus in the flesh, they still ask him to increase their faith.
All these things you wrote down, these are ways of living out your faith. Sometimes, we fall into the trap of thinking acts of faith need to be dramatic or heroic, and that’s just not true. Having faith means trusting that God uses whatever we can give, whatever we can do. These things are evidence that you have the faith that is needed.
This week, will you continue to live out your faith? Will you continue to trust Jesus when he says you have enough faith? Will you try to serve your neighbor, not so they’ll thank you or admire your faith or so you’ll feel good about yourself, but because Jesus tells you to? That’s living faith. Will you pray for someone this week? That’s faith.
May God continue to work through you, continue to bless you, and yes, may God continue to increase your faith.
Amen.