Doubting and Differing
For verily I say unto you, That whosoever shall say unto this mountain, Be thou removed, and be thou cast into the sea; and shall not doubt in his heart, but shall believe that those things which he saith shall come to pass; he shall have whatsoever he saith. Mark 11:23 (KJV) emphasis mine
How many times have we read this verse and assumed that the word doubt means what the dictionary says it does? Dictionary.com defines doubt as to be uncertain about something; be undecided in opinion or belief. Being undecided and uncertain will definitely hinder our faith from operating, but my resources show that the word doubt in this passage, diakrino in the Greek, could actually better be defined as to differ, to oppose, or to separate from. Plug any one of those into the verse above in place of doubt and see how much clearer it becomes.
Shall not differ in his heart…
Shall not oppose in his heart…
Shall not separate from in his heart…
What this tells us is that the words we are saying must match with what is in our hearts. That is what separates faith from just hoping something will come to pass because we’ve said it repeatedly. What is in our mouths cannot differ from what is in our hearts. If it does, we won’t receive what we say.
We get our hearts full of faith by feeding them the Word of God (Romans 10:17). When we do this, we can speak the Word and our hearts will not oppose our words. When the heart and mouth match each other and match the Word of God, nothing is impossible.
