How much faith is enough? This may well be the most old-timey and “churchy” opening I’ve ever had to a sermon, but it’s a question worth asking. And on this World Communion Sunday, with many Churches not only sharing communion but following the same lectionary readings, I suspect there are preachers in the Philippines, Nigeria, Brazil, the UK and the US preaching on the power of even the tiniest bit of faith.
While there are many scholarly definitions of what
faith is, I’m going to defer to the book of Hebrews 11:1 (NIV), which states “Now faith is confidence
in what we hope for and assurance about what we do not see.” To say that I am a person of faith, is to
acknowledge that there is much about life and human destiny that I do not know
and cannot know. It starts, then, with humility. But there is also within faith
a profound hope in the power of love, counting on the foundational love of God on
which all life rests, and the activated love of those who will not bend when
tempted by something other than love.
But
how much faith is enough? I recall as a
teenager being particularly worried about this, absolutely certain I didn’t have
enough to meet God’s standards. Apparently, this was a
concern for the disciples, too, as today’s gospel reading begins with a request
to Jesus to increase their faith. It is as if faith were a commodity that one
could either create or obtain.
The great protestant reformer Martin Luther coined the
term Sola Fide, or “justification by faith” as a way to steer Christians away
from the notion that they can earn their way into heaven by their actions, and
it's important to hear the fullness of what Luther was saying, and not
saying. Howard Griffith, interpreting
Luther, writes “Faith
is trust in God. Faith is not…an inward good work that takes the place of
outward good works.”
Faith, then, isn’t a commodity we construct or possess
in order to get on God’s good side, nor is it, as Howard Griffith says, an
“inward good work.” And while we’re
attempting to define it, even the most confident faith does, and indeed must, still
have questions. As Paul Tillich wrote in
mid-1950s, “Doubt isn’t the opposite of faith; it’s an element of faith” for
faith is not the same thing as certainty. There are things about life and
death, forgiveness and grace, and the nature of love itself, that are beyond
our ability to know with certainty, and part of being human is finding ways to
muddle through amidst that uncertainty. The term “faith” is one way to name
that muddling through: a God-given tool that helps me live with humility and to
trust in the power of God’s creative, invitational, forgiving love, even amidst
uncertainty.
As Howard Griffith suggests, when we see the word FAITH
in scripture we could substitute the word TRUST, and we would approach what the
New Testament means. While the word
“faith” can be treated as something fixed, an unchangeable assertion of one’s
belief in God and Jesus Christ, the word “trust” implies commitment to a relationship
with something or someone that is trustworthy. To have faith in God is
ultimately a statement of trust: first, that God exists and second, that the
God we know from reason, experience, scripture and tradition is infinitely trustworthy. In expressing my faith, I trust that God is
creative and loving, God is attentive and forgiving, God is the source and
destination of my soul. And in the year 2025
in the northern hemisphere, where religious faith is frequently mocked as
“believing in imaginary friends”, it is no small thing to say that in my
deepest being I trust in the loving, personally engaged sacred source of creativity
and love, that I know by the name, “God,” and the ongoing presence of the
living Christ.
With this, then, we turn to the parable of the mustard
seed and its description of the amount of faith that is needed. As a Canadian I am delighted Jesus used a
mustard seed as his object lesson that day, for Canadian farmers produce almost 40 per
cent of the world’s mustard crop and are the largest exporter of mustard seeds for
the manufacture of prepared mustard. But
beyond my Canuck pride, it’s a relatable
parable because most people can picture a mustard seed. It’s not as tiny as some seeds we’re familiar
with, such as a carrot seed, but when Jesus decided to tell a story about tiny
beginnings leading to great growth, a mustard seed was his object lesson of
choice.
Charles
Price, pastor emeritus at Toronto’s People’s
Church, shares a wonderful extended analogy, in which he connects one of
his life experiences with this parable.
He
recounts his first time on an airplane. He was heading from the UK to a
newly-accepted position in Africa, and as he sat in the middle seat of a bank
of three, he was pretty apprehensive about the journey ahead of him.
In
the seat beside him was an older Scottish lady who was gripping the arm rests
with both hands. Like him, she had never
flown before, and she was terrified. If
not for the fact that her grandchildren in Africa needed her, she would have
happily gone through the rest of her life never having flown in an aircraft; but
they did need her, and here she was.
On
the other side of Charles was a businessman who had flown hundreds of times
before. He settled into his seat, put
his attaché case under the seat in front of him, lightly fastened his seatbelt,
and casually started to read the newspaper.
In
order to get on that airplane, Charles related, each of them needed to have sufficient
trust that the aircraft was sound and that the pilot’s experience and ability
would get them safely to their destination.
The terrified Scottish lady indeed only had “faith the size of a mustard
seed” – believing that there was, at best, a 51% chance that she would not die
on this flight. By comparison to her
faith the size of a mustard seed, Charles surmised that he had faith the size
of, say, a potato; and the business traveler beside him had faith the size of a
watermelon.
Then
Charles made a point I’d never even considered.
Not only did all three of these travelers arrive safely at the airport
in Kinshasa, all three of them did so at the same time; the gent with the
watermelon sized faith didn’t arrive three hours before the terrified
Scotswoman. Overlaid on the parable told
by Jesus, the tiniest amount of faith, akin to a mustard seed, was all that was
needed to safely arrive at their common destination.
What
did vary, though, according to the amount of confidence and trust each of the
travellers had, was the quality of their trip.
While the experienced traveler relaxed, enjoyed his meals, read a bit
and napped when he felt like it, young Charles got through it but never really “relaxed”;
and the poor terrified woman remained in the grip of fear the entire journey,
enjoyed none of it, and the half-of-one-meal that she attempted to eat didn’t
stay down for long. The more trust they
had – with trust and faith being more or less synonymous - the more they enjoyed
the journey.
In
response to his disciples’ desire to increase their faith, Jesus held up a
mustard seed, the tiniest seed planted in his culture, (1mm–2mm in diameter)
and said “this much faith” is all that’s needed. If, in the interplay between belief and doubt
that goes into making up our faith, doubt and worry seem to be getting the
upper hand, remember, my friends, that faith the size of a mustard seed is all
we need. If your faith is more the size
of a potato, or a watermelon, bravo! - but a tiny little seed will do. As
Charles Price related, nobody gets “more saved” by having more faith, but
chances are pretty good that if you can release whatever is blocking you from trusting
Christ’s kind, inclusive, diligent love to guide, protect, and re-shape your
life, you’re going to enjoy the ride much more. I need to remember that in
these turbulent days when so many seeds of hatred, are being sown. Seeds of
love will grow into positive change!
As
we engage the daily challenges of life, as we look into the future of this
community of faith and wonder what lies ahead, as we think of ourselves in the
context of Christian response in other lands, I invite you to faith: Faith, as
in, honestly wrestling with both belief and doubt; Faith, as in, leaning into
God’s trustworthy love, as promised and embodied by Jesus. By that faith, with that trust, may your life
and our life together truly flourish. In
Christ’s name we pray, Amen.
References
cited or consulted:
Borg, Marcus.
Speaking Christian. NYC: HarperOne, 2011.
Griffith, Howard. https://journal.rts.edu/article/luther-in-1520-justification-by-faith-alone/
Mustard 21 Canada. https://mustard21.com/research-summaries/condiment-mustard-development/
Price,
Charles. http://www.livingtruth.ca/LT/charles.asp
Revised Common Lectionary. https://lectionary.library.vanderbilt.edu/texts/?y=384&z=p&d=78
Tillich, Paul. Dynamics of Faith. NYC: Harper and Row, 1957.
© 2025 Rev Greg Wooley, Osoyoos-Oliver United Church Pastoral Charge.
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