BELIEVE AND FORGIVE
20 In the morning, as they went along, they saw the fig tree withered from the roots. 21 Peter remembered and said to Jesus, “Rabbi, look! The fig tree you cursed has withered!”
22 “Have faith in God,” Jesus answered. 23 “Truly I tell you, if anyone says to this mountain, ‘Go, throw yourself into the sea,’ and does not doubt in their heart but believes that what they say will happen, it will be done for them. 24 Therefore I tell you, whatever you ask for in prayer, believe that you have received it, and it will be yours. 25 And when you stand praying, if you hold anything against anyone, forgive them, so that your Father in heaven may forgive you your sins.” Mark 11:20-25
Were the disciples surprised to find the fig tree dead after Jesus’ words the day before? Of course, they were! As usual, Peter was the first one to open his mouth. “Look, Rabbi,” he burst out, “the tree you cursed is dead.” Jesus’ response is typical. “What did you expect, Peter? When I speak, stuff happens. Now you can anticipate the same. Your words have just as much power as mine if you have confidence in God.”
He touched on the nerve centre of His life of the kingdom – a God-awareness so strong that the whole of life is lived in a faith-union with Him. Absolutely everything must flow out of this God-awareness so that even our words are energised by the power that flows out of this union. That was the secret of Jesus’ life as the Son of God which He was painstakingly trying to build into His disciples
God-awareness links us with the overriding characteristic of God’s nature in dealing with human beings – His generosity. This quality is the outflow of God’s love and is manifested primarily in the way He treats us as sons. God-awareness opens us to all of His resources. He freely releases whatever we need as we set our hearts on valuing and appreciating who He is. These resources are released through the spoken word just as He released power to bring the visible universe into being out of the invisible through His word.
The second evidence of His generosity is the way He deals with our sin – He freely forgives because He can. Jesus Himself saw to that. He took on Himself our un-payable debt, paid it in full, released us from its penalty and power and said, “Now go and do the same.” Operating from the same principle and in the same power we, as God’s sons, can expect the same results. It all flows from a God-awareness that allows us to live in the environment of God’s presence, bringing everything His presence embodies in the heavenly realm down here into the very domain of the enemy, allowing His people to exhibit the disposition of our Messiah in occupied territory.