Let us learn from these words of our Lord Jesus Christ, the immense importance of faith.
This is a lesson which our Lord teaches first by a proverbial saying. Faith shall enable a man to accom- plish works, and overcome difficulties, as great and formidable as the "removing of a mountain, and casting it into the sea."* Afterwards the lesson is impressed upon us still further, by a general exhortation to exercise faith when we pray. " What things soever ye desire, when ye pray, believe that ye receive them, and ye shall have them." This promise must of course be taken with a reasonable qualification. It assumes that a believer will ask things which are not sinful, and which are in accordance with the will of G-od. When He asks such things, he may confidently believe that his prayer will be answered. To use the words of St. James, " Let him ask in faith, nothing wavering." (James i. 6.)
The faith here commended must be distinguished from
* It is clear that a promise like this of " removing mountains" must be taken in a figurative sense. It appears to be a proverbial expression, and to be used as such by St. Paul, 2 Cor. xiii. 11. More- over it is a promise that must be interpreted with sober and reasona- ble limitations. We have no right to expect that whatever we take it into our heads to ask of God shall at once be done for us, whether it be for His glory and our sanctification or not. We have no war- rant for presuming that in every difficulty and trouble, God will at once work a miracle and deliver us from our anxiety as soon as we make it a subject of prayer. The things about which we pray, must be things having special reference to our own vocation and providen- tial position. Moses at the head of the twelve tribes of Israel — Eli- jah on Mount Carmel — Paul in the Philippian prison, might confi- dently expect miraculous interpositions in answer to prayer, in a way that private individuals may not expect in our days. Above all, we must not think to prescribe to God the time and way in which He shall " remove mountains" for us.