This transcript was generated by whisper.ai.

(upbeat music) - Welcome to day three together of our look through Matthew
chapter 17. You might remember the last couple of days we've been talking about
this mountaintop experience that Jesus had with three of his disciples. So now
they're coming down from this mountaintop experience.

And as they come down, the first thing they face is a problem. The first thing
they face is a ministry opportunity. And if you've been a follower of Jesus for
any amount of time, you know that this is sort of the pattern of how it works.

You go on a mountaintop, you have this wonderful experience of feeling close to
God. And even before you get home, you get the phone call. Even before you get
back, you get the communication, the text that says to you, there's a problem,
things are falling apart.

And you got to deal with that. That's the reality of life. Now you can get angry
at it and think, why would they do this to me?

Or you can realize this is how life works. God prepared me on the mountain for
this. God prepared me on the mountain for this.

In verse 14, listen to what happened. 14 to 18. When they came to the crowd, a
man approached Jesus and knelt before him.

Lord, have mercy on my son, he said. He has seizures and he's suffering greatly.
He often falls into the fire or into the water.

I brought him to your disciples, but they could not heal him. Oh, unbelieving
and perverse generation, Jesus replied. How long shall I stay with you?

How long shall I put up with you? Bring the boy here to me. Jesus rebuked the
demon and it came out of the boy.

And he was healed from that moment. Now, let me just say here, it sounds like
Jesus is upset, doesn't it? Unbelieving and perverse generation.

Sounds like he's putting everybody in the crowd down. But the truth is he's not
upset. He's not angry.

He's just stating the facts from God's perspective. It is an unbelieving and
perverse generation. That's why there is a demon inhabiting a boy.

That's why they are going through these problems. And as here, when Jesus faces
these circumstances, he often quotes God's perspective from the Old Testament.
There's no faith here, he's saying.

There is evil here. And then he heals the boy. And as he heals the boy, he then
gives this amazing promise.

Verse 19, the disciples came to Jesus in private and asked, why couldn't we
drive it out? And he replied, because you have so little faith. I tell you the
truth.

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. Nothing will be impossible for you. Now, I
love the end of this story because it is one of Jesus's great promises.

If you want to build a successful life, if you want to build the kind of life that
God wants you to have, you gotta build your life on God's promises. God always
keeps his promises. God is not like us.

He makes great promises, but he also always keeps his great promises. 1
Corinthians 1:9 says, God faithfully keeps his promises. Every promise of God is
guaranteed by God's very nature.

He is perfect, he cannot lie. He keeps his promises. He's eternal, he will not
forget.

He keeps his promises. He is faithful, he will not change. He keeps his
promises.

He's all-powerful, he has the power to do it. He keeps his promises. He is
loving, he wants what's best for you.

He keeps his promises. And for the next couple of days, I want to focus on this
promise of Jesus. 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.

Nothing will be impossible to you. Because the truth is, we all face mountains
in our lives. Immovable people, impossible tasks, impenetrable problems.

We all face mountains in our lives. That person that you feel like you will
never be able to forgive. That dream that you're certain that will never become
a part of your life.

It'll never be anything more than a wish. That habit that you simply can't seem
to break. That challenge that you're not sure that you're up to.

That problem you just can't solve. In Matthew 17, here in these verses, Jesus
essentially calls his mountain-moving class into session. In this promise, he
teaches us two simple rules for trusting God to move mountains.

Rule number one, you think big. We're going to talk about rule number two tomorrow.
But rule number one is, you think big.

Nothing, Jesus says, will be impossible for you. So right now, as you're
listening to this, wherever you are, think of your personal Mount Everest. Your
mountain.

That problem that's too big to solve. That challenge that's too big to take on.
As you get that mountain in your mind, let me just ask you, is it too big for
God?

Is that problem, is that challenge too big for God? Of course not. He made the
universe.

He could handle that problem or give you the energy for that challenge in a
moment. So why not, right now, just in this moment, think big, really big. Ask
yourself the question, what is the biggest thing that God could do in your life?

What is the biggest mountain that you need to trust him to move in your life?
You say, I don't know if I can do that. It doesn't cost anything.

Why not, just for this moment, take the risk to think big. What if God could
move that mountain? What if God could do that?

Now, thinking big, it's not as easy as it sounds. I'm asking you to do this
right now, and it's a struggle sometimes. And even as you try to work through
this, when we try to think big, there are three things that usually get in the
way.

One is our ego. A lot of times when I say think big, the first thing we do is we
think selfish. A lot of people who think they're thinking big, they're really
not, because their big thinking is limited to their lives.

More money, a bigger house, a better job, become famous. Hello, there is
something bigger than your life in your life. There are seven billion people in
this world, and the biggest thing you can think about is you?

That is not thinking big. God wants to use you to make an impact on this world,
on another life, dozens of lives, hundreds, thousands of lives. So sometimes our
ego gets in the way.

We think just about ourselves. A second thing that gets in our way is our fears.
We don't want to be disappointed.

If I think big and it doesn't happen, I'm going to be disappointed one more time.
And so we stay in our comfort zone, and we live with the disappointment of being
in our comfort zone the rest of our lives. Why not take the risk?

I know it's scary. Why not take the risk to think big? What could God do?

Our ego can get in the way, our fears can get in the way, and then thirdly, our
failures. Our failures can get in the way. You think I can't do that.

I've tried to do things like that before and been a failure. I want to remind you
that it was in the midst of a failure that Jesus taught his disciples about
moving mountains. They had not been able to heal that boy.

And in the midst of that failure, Jesus teaches them, if you had faith, small as
a mustard seed, you can move a mountain. Their failure was a great opportunity
to learn about faith. Their failure was the place that Jesus invited them to
place faith in God.

Now these barriers, our failures, our fears, our ego, there's one answer to all
these barriers, and it's God's promises. You don't base your big thinking on
your abilities or your experiences. You don't base your big thinking on your
ability to conjure up big thinking.

You base it on God's promises. And God can move mountains. So right now, think
big.

What is the biggest thing that you could imagine God doing with your life?
What's the biggest mountain that you can imagine him moving? Think big.

God wants to do big things, not to build your ego, but to show the world what he
is like, to glorify himself. And so he gives us bigger things to do than we
could do on our own so that we have to trust him, so that it's obvious that he
is the one who is doing it, something greater than we could have done on our own
strength. Think big.

Now when I say this, as I say this, I know according to our personality, it's
easy for some to do this, it's difficult for most to do this. Some of you, when
I say think big, you are thrilled by this. You're like a guy named Joseph in the
Bible, in the Old Testament, the big dreamer, the one who saw all those dreams
fulfilled, it became second leading ruler of Egypt.

But you gotta check your heart. You gotta make sure that it's about God and not
about you. You gotta make sure that it's about glorifying God and not about what
people think of you.

Some of you are thrilled by this, so you think big. Some of you, this is way out
of your comfort zone. I have great hope for you, by the way, because history
shows that God much more often takes someone who has a hard time thinking big,
causes them to think big, and does great things through their life.

He much more often works that way than starting with a Joseph. Abraham had a
hard time thinking big, but God moved him to the promised land. Moses had a hard
time thinking big, but God used him to set the people free.

Gideon had a hard time thinking big, but God used him to defeat the enemy. Mary
had a hard time thinking big. Peter here has a hard time thinking big.

They didn't have big dreams, but they said yes to God. God, I'm willing to do
whatever you want. God caused them to see a vision of something they could not
do on their own strength.

Everything in them didn't want to follow that vision, but they did because they
knew it was God's direction and not their own. Rule number one for mountain
moving is you think big. Let's take a moment in prayer to do that right now.

And just to say in prayer, God, I want to think like you think. I don't want to
think selfishly. I don't want to think fearfully.

I want to think about the things you want to do in my life and through my life.
So God, right now, I just imagine, I just think about what it would be like if
you moved that mountain, that mountain that's in me or that mountain that's in
my circumstances, that mountain that's in a relationship. I think about what it
would be like if you moved that mountain and you caused me to be able to get
involved in that kind of a ministry or to make a difference in this kind of a
way.

I think about what you could do, God. In Jesus' name, I pray, amen. Tomorrow,
we're going to look together at Jesus' second rule for anyone who wants to move
a mountain.