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Did Jesus in Mark 11:23-24 promise to give literally anything we ask in faith?
23 For verily I say unto you, That whosoever shall say unto this mountain, Be thou removed, and be thou cast into the sea; and shall not doubt in his heart, but shall believe that those things which he saith shall come to pass; he shall have whatsoever he saith. 24 Therefore I say unto you, What things soever ye desire, when ye pray, believe that ye receive them, and ye shall have them.
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Asked November 14 2021
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Jack Gutknecht
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For follow-up discussion and general commentary on the topic. Comments are sorted chronologically.
Danny Hickman
I don't think we realize how harmful it is to the gospel to say that Jesus didn't "literally" mean what He said about some things.
Did He literally mean He was going to die for the sins of the world? Did He literally mean He would be resurrected to life to live eternally with the Father? Did He literally mean He would return to earth someday?
I hope we can see the problems that kind of teaching presents for the truth. People struggle enough already to believe these fantastic ideas. I don't mean "the world." I mean the church.
Example: A mother has a wayward son who joins a gang. She prays constantly for him to come out of it. He's killed before he reaches his 21st birthday. Her sister has a son trapped in the same lifestyle. Her sister doesn't even believe there is a God. She never prays about anything. Her son gets out of the gang, turns his life around and becomes a devoted family man.
There are pastors who will say that the lady whose son was killed didn't have enough faith. That's not what the Bible teaches. Nowhere are we told that the only way to get what you want from God is to get it (here it is) by faith. We aren't told that if you have faith God is obligated to do what you want Him to do. God does as He pleases.
We're simply schooled on the potency of faith. We aren't given a faith credit account and someone else pays the charges. I believe it is the deceitfulness of our hearts that leads us in that train of thought. (Jeremiah 17:9)
Danny Hickman
Let's examine this thing called faith.
Abraham is said to be the father, or the man of faith. (Gal 3:9). In Gen 12, God approaches Abraham, seemingly out of the blue, and tells him to leave his homeland, and go to a place to which He would show him the way. He promised to give Abraham the land.
I say 'out of the blue,' but it seems to me that they must've talked before, because Abraham, unlike Moses, doesn't ask Him who it is that's telling him this. 'To whom am I in conversation with,' is what Moses asked. Abraham goes along without a question of any kind. I believe they had spoken before.
Then after waiting about 25 years just for the boy Isaac to be born, Abraham was told after the boy had gotten up some size, to take the boy to Mount Moriah and sacrifice him there as a burnt offering. And he agreed to do just that. He believed God knew what was best. He still had faith in God. God had told him the boy would be the beginning of a great nation of people and Abraham stood firmly on the promise that God had made to him.
That ain't the kind of faith Jack has asked about here. Jack is asking about us believing that God will do what we dream up, not what God comes to us and offers. God made Abraham an offer. It was God's project. What about when we think it up!
"God I want to be the father of a great nation, can You fix me up?"
Jesus says, 'Ask in faith; ' "Is that all there is to it," is what I'm hearing...
That's a mite different...