Uche Aligwekwe And the apostles said unto the Lord, increase our faith. And the Lord said, If ye had faith as a grain of mustard seed, ye might say unto this sycamine tree, Be thou plucked up by the root, and be thou planted in the sea; and it should obey you. But which of you, having a servant plowing or feeding cattle, will say unto him by and by, when he is come from the field, Go and sit down to meat? And will not rather say unto him, Make ready wherewith I may sup, and gird thyself, and serve me, till I have eaten and drunken; and afterward thou shalt eat and drink? Doth he thank that servant because he did the things that were commanded him? I trow not. So likewise ye, when ye shall have done all those things which are commanded you, say, We are unprofitable servants: we have done that which was our duty to do.
Luke 17:5 – 10 (NKJV)
Faith works! Don’t be surprised when your faith works! Expect your faith to work! Your faith will work! Put your faith to work! You don’t need more faith, just use what you have already! Faith is a servant!
Faith is there to serve you; faith exists to serve you.
A servant serves their master. The master doesn’t give their servant special laurels or thanks because each time he serves you or does what you tell him to do; that is just his job, it’s what you employ him to do. Your employer doesn’t necessarily reward you specially each time you come to work. There is no huge deal to be made about a servant just doing what he is supposed to do anyway, what he’s been employed to do; it’s simply expected of him. It’s his function! Faith is expected to work! Have faith in your faith! Use the faith you have, don’t wait for more!
According to this passage of scripture, the master doesn’t even let the servant rest, even after he has already worked so hard out in the field, he just immediately puts him to even more work, serving, completing his job. The work of faith is never ending! Faith is never ending in capability; it can even uproot deep rotted trees, according to Jesus and that’s a big job, believe me.
That is the way it ought to be too with your faith. It shouldn’t surprise you that your faith works, it should surprise you if it didn’t!
It is not a question of how big your faith is; rather it is simply one of the fact that you do have faith. Faith works, period! If your faith does not work it is because you have not put it to work in the same way that if your servant doesn’t work it is because you have not put him to work, you’ve not given him any instructions.
Don’t have a wrong relationship with your faith; this is a master-servant relationship; nothing more and nothing less. Don’t ever make it anything else, or more. Give your faith orders and expect it to obey. It is no more a question of you not having a big enough faith than it is in this story of you not having a servant. In the story you do have a servant… You do have faith! Work him. Expect him to work. Expect your faith to work.
It is not a question of how much faith you have but rather it is a question of how much faith you have in your faith, how much confidence you have in your faith, how established is your faith, how much unbelief is mixed in with your faith. While you’re busy agonizing over the size of the sycamine tree and whether your faith is commensurate to it you are not busy using your faith, putting your faith to work, releasing your faith by speakingto the sycamine tree. The size of your faith does not matter. Mustard seed sized faith can move a sycamine tree or even a mountain.
It’s not the size of the faith that gets the job done. This is the faith of God remember; it’s exactly the same faith that God has and uses, not a substitute or a counterfeit but the original. What gets the job done is the faith itself and the command. Even God has to speak in order to get His faith to work. If God has to obey this law of speaking His faith how do we think we can escape it? The sycamine tree, the mountain, the situation or circumstance, whatever, they all respond to faith. All of creation responds to spoken faith because faith is the parent substance of all of these things. You must believe in your heart and confess with your mouth even to be saved.
The tree, the mountain, the problem whatever, they don’t respond to the size of your faith but rather they obey your faith, whatever its size, period! Don’t let your faith sit down and rest, that’s laziness. Make him work. That’s what he’s there for. Expect your faith to work, but only when you put him to work. And don’t let your faith be lazy. Faith can only obey what you say or command it to.
