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Matthew 21:21

马太福音 21:21

The Passage

Jesus answered them, 'Most certainly I tell you, if you have faith, and don't doubt, you will not only do what was done to the fig tree, but even if you told this mountain, 'Be taken up and cast into the sea,' it would be done.

In the other language

耶稣回答说:我实在告诉你们,你们若有信心,不疑惑,不但能行无花果树上所行的事,就是对这座山说:你挪开此地,投在海里!也必成就。

Theme

Faith without doubt

Bring a question to this passage

Many readers arrive here from a real question. These are reflections for how this passage speaks to the questions people bring most often — not an answer about what will happen, but an invitation to sit with it slowly.

How do I face this season of pressure at work?

Jesus speaks of faith with an image large enough to unsettle your sense of what is possible: a mountain moved into the sea. This verse does not give you a strategy for workplace pressure, but it invites trust that is not confined to your own resources. You need not turn its words into a test of whether you can make a difficult deadline or change another person. Nor must you pretend that uncertainty is absent. You can bring the weight of this season into prayer without making yourself responsible for producing a miracle. Who might you turn toward under pressure, knowing this verse gives no workplace strategy but invites you to trust beyond your own resources?

Carry thisFaith is trust, not a measure of your performance.

Other passages for this questionGenesis 1:26-28 · Isaiah 41:10 · 2 Corinthians 10:2-6

I want to learn to love better in this relationship.

A mountain cast into the sea gives vivid shape to the confidence in God that Jesus describes. This verse does not directly explain how to love someone, but it places trust in God before the apparent size of an obstacle. In a relationship, you may feel caught between wanting closeness and fearing another disappointment. Faith is not a way to control the other person, and this passage is not a forecast of reconciliation. It invites you to bring your difficulty before God without treating your own strength as the only resource. What would it mean to trust God while remaining honest about what this relationship asks of you?

Carry thisTrust in God is different from control over another.

Other passages for this questionGenesis 1:26-28 · Isaiah 41:10 · 2 Corinthians 10:2-6

What do I need to let go of in the coming weeks?

Jesus uses the startling image of a mountain cast into the sea to speak about faith without doubt. The verse does not give you a list of things to let go of, but it does bring trust into view. Perhaps you have been treating your own estimate of what is possible as the final word. Letting go of that position is different from pretending you have no questions, or expecting every difficulty to disappear. These words invite you to take God's power seriously without making your desired outcome the measure of faith. Where have you allowed your sense of what is possible to become a limit on trust?

Carry thisYour estimate of what is possible is not the measure.

Other passages for this questionGenesis 1:26-28 · Isaiah 41:10 · 2 Corinthians 10:2-6

How can I find stillness in a busy life?

Rather than offering a schedule for stillness, this passage speaks about faith and doubt. Jesus uses the startling image of a mountain thrown into the sea. You can linger with that image without making it a promise that your crowded day will become easy. Perhaps the mountain before you is the feeling that everything depends on your constant effort. A quiet pause can become a way of bringing that burden to God. You do not have to pretend your doubts are absent in order to be honest with him. Jesus speaks of faith before what seems immovable—what burden could you bring into a moment of stillness today?

Carry thisTrust leaves room for concerns that remain unresolved.

Other passages for this questionGenesis 1:26-28 · Isaiah 41:10 · 2 Corinthians 10:2-6

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Matthew 21 — in context

15But when the chief priests and the scribes saw the wonderful things that he did, and the children who were crying in the temple and saying, “Hosanna to the son of David!” they were indignant,

16and said to him, “Do you hear what these are saying?” Jesus said to them, “Yes. Did you never read, ‘Out of the mouth of babes and nursing babies you have perfected praise?’”

17He left them, and went out of the city to Bethany, and lodged there.

18Now in the morning, as he returned to the city, he was hungry.

19Seeing a fig tree by the road, he came to it, and found nothing on it but leaves. He said to it, “Let there be no fruit from you forever!” Immediately the fig tree withered away.

20When the disciples saw it, they marveled, saying, “How did the fig tree immediately wither away?”

21Jesus answered them, “Most certainly I tell you, if you have faith, and don’t doubt, you will not only do what was done to the fig tree, but even if you told this mountain, ‘Be taken up and cast into the sea,’ it would be done.

22All things, whatever you ask in prayer, believing, you will receive.”

23When he had come into the temple, the chief priests and the elders of the people came to him as he was teaching, and said, “By what authority do you do these things? Who gave you this authority?”

24Jesus answered them, “I also will ask you one question, which if you tell me, I likewise will tell you by what authority I do these things.

25The baptism of John, where was it from? From heaven or from men?” They reasoned with themselves, saying, “If we say, ‘From heaven,’ he will ask us, ‘Why then did you not believe him?’

26But if we say, ‘From men,’ we fear the multitude, for all hold John as a prophet.”

27They answered Jesus, and said, “We don’t know.” He also said to them, “Neither will I tell you by what authority I do these things.

More from Matthew

Related topics

Faith and Trust

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