The story is told of a woman who had a large tree in her back yard that she wanted removed. Remembering a sermon in which the preacher quoted Matthew 17:20, "If you have faith as small as a mustard seed, you can say to this mountain, 'Move from here to there,' and it will move," she decided to try moving it by faith.
So, that night she prayed to God for the tree to be moved out of her backyard. The next morning, she looked out the back window to see the tree right where she left it. As she turned away to get her morning coffee, she exclaimed, "Yep, it's still there, just like I thought it would be."
The problem? Where does one begin? She lacked even mustard seed size faith as she didn't really think the tree would be gone. Her prayer was more of a "Hail Mary Pass" than a strategic request of faith. James says that those "who doubt should not think they will receive anything from the Lord" (Js 1:6-7).
She also lacked the patience to wait upon the Lord further displaying a lack of trust, for when we truly hope in the Lord for "what we do not yet have, we wait for it patiently" (Rom 8:25). God's timing is not our timing. We can ask of the Lord but we cannot demand of the Lord, let alone dictate the schedule He must keep.
Faith in God means to trust in Him to act on our behalf in the right way and in the right time. Faith inherently requires patience as we expectantly wait for the Lord to provide. "And so after waiting patiently, Abraham received what was promised" (Heb 6:15). Jus' Say'n.
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