“Verily I say unto you, [that] Whosoever shall say unto this mountain, Be thou taken up and cast into the sea; and shall not doubt in his heart, but shall believe that what he saith cometh to pass; he shall have it.” (RV with added “that” from KJV).
Dealing these days with Mark 11:23 is a delicate matter since there has been all kinds of controversy in the Body of Christ about its meaning and its application. Proper exposition of this verse will take quite a bit more than a post or two so bear with me.
First off is the idea or doctrine of the intrinsic power of words. Many Word preachers have used Mark 11:23 to support the premise that words in and of themselves have some kind of intrinsic power for “good” or for “destruction.” For instance, here are some quotes about the power of words by a few popular ministers you’d know by name:
“We are to believe in the power of our words.”
“It is important to consider words and their creative power. Words are spiritual containers that carry either faith or fear.”
“Words are containers of power. They carry positive power or negative power.”
“The spirit of man is not of this world, it is of the spirit world. The creative ability of man comes through his spirit. He speaks spirit words that work in the world of the spirit. They will also dominate the physical world. He breathes spirit life into God’s Word and it becomes a living substance, working for him as it worked for God in the beginning. These spirit words dominate the natural world.”
While a Christian should positively confess what the Word says about him and his position in Christ, today that scriptural doctrine has been subsumed into a kind of metaphysical word-play. Construing Mark 11:23, some Word ministers have preached that all people need to do is “speak over” certain problems or issues and the “power” of their words will “work” to dissolve them. The emphasis is on the efficacy of the words spoken. The book of Matthew demonstrates the error of this kind of teaching.
“And he called unto him his twelve disciples, and gave them authority over unclean spirits, to cast them out, and to heal all manner of disease and all manner of sickness.” Matthew 10:1 (RV)
In this verse, Jesus gives authority to his disciples to minister the power of God to folks outside of His presence. (see Matthew 11:1 - when he finished commanding them, he departed to teach and preach). In effect, the disciples were supposed to go from city to city to preach the kingdom and conduct healing meetings.
“Lord, have mercy on my son: for he is epileptic, and suffereth grievously: for oft-times he falleth into the fire, and oft-times into the water. And I brought him to thy disciples, and they could not cure him.” Matthew 17:5, 6 (RV)
In Matthew 17, Jesus comes down from the Mount of Transfiguration and is met by a father who has an epileptic boy. As he says in the verse above, Jesus’s disciples, those who had been authorized to cast out devils and heal all manner of the diseased, could not cure him. Apparently, the disciples had tried to cast the devil out of the boy, but it didn’t happen.
Here we see where the idea that words have some kind of inherent power breaks down. According to the current “power of words” teaching, the disciples’ commands and rebukes should have had great results. After all, they had been expressly authorized by Jesus to cast out devils and heal all manner of sickness. The disciples’ commands and rebukes, however, were completely ineffectual in casting the demon out of the boy. Apparently, their words did not contain any inherent power. The boy’s father had enough sense to see that so he turned to Jesus for help. Jesus cast the devil out in a flash.
“Then came the disciples to Jesus apart, and said, ‘Why could not we cast it out?’ And he saith to them, Because of your little faith: for verily I say unto you, If ye have faith as a grain of mustard seed, ye shall say unto this mountain, Remove hence to yonder place; and it shall remove; and nothing shall be impossible to you.” Matthew 17:19, 20 (RV)
In answering the disciples, Jesus did not say, “If you kept on speaking words, it would have eventually have worked,” or “You needed to say it this way.” As a matter of fact, He took them back to Mark 11:22 and 23. He said to them that if they had possessed just a grain (a smidgen) of the God-kind of faith, the devil would have been cast out easily. (Notice how He combined Mark 11:22 and 23 here - “have faith … ye shall say.”).
The story of the fig tree and Jesus’s teaching is one pericope. Words do not create faith, they release faith. One cannot exercise the saying (Mark 11:23) without first having the faith (Mark 11:22). And as I pointed out in the first post, the God-kind of faith is that faith that is inseparable from God that only He imparts.
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