The Faith Of A Child - The One Year Women's Friendship Devotional

The Faith of a Child

“You don’t have enough faith,” Jesus told them. “I tell you the truth, if you had faith even as small as a mustard seed, you could say to this mountain, ‘Move from here to there,’ and it would move. Nothing would be impossible.” Matthew 17:20-21

The little half-European, half-Japanese girl looked out the window of the orphanage, distressed that the mountain blocked the view of her beloved Sea of Japan. Ill and bedridden, her greatest desire was to see the sea, but she couldn’t walk and had no transportation to get over the mountain.

One day the minister read Matthew 17:20-21, and the little girl’s faith was sparked. Believing God’s Word, she asked the other girls to join her that night in praying that God would move the mountain so she could see the sea. The English missionary-houseparent heard the prayers and told her, “Don’t get your hopes up, dear. This verse refers to God’s removing spiritual obstacles, not real mountains.”

But every evening the girl and her friends looked out the window and in faith asked, “Lord, please move the mountain and cast it into the sea!” The missionary left for a year of furlough, and when she returned, the little girls were huddled by the sick child’s bed looking out the window with great joy. “Look! We can see the sea!” they called to her. Astounded, she went to the local authorities to ask what had happened. Due to erosion of the coast, bulldozers had gone up and down the mountain with great mounds of earth. They had actually moved the mountain and cast it into the sea. Before long, the little girl who loved the sea died, but the orphanage is still there, and because of her faith, generations of children have been able to look out the window at her beloved sea.

Jesus said this kind of faith—childlike faith—is necessary, or we will never get into the Kingdom of Heaven. Is your faith in God weak? Pray for the faith of a child that believes in a big God for whom nothing is impossible. —CHERI

Lord, I believe. Help my unbelief. Restore my faith in you and your words so that your awesome ability and power might be manifested in my life and the world.

Faith goes up the stairs that love has built and looks out of the window which hope has opened. —CHARLES HADDON SPURGEON (1834–1892), BRITISH PREACHER