The Cure for Unbelief

By Brother R. Michel Lankford
 
I was on Facebook recently, (I know, hard to believe, right?), when a member of a group to which I belong, wrote this comment:
“The only thing that Yeshua couldn’t heal was the condition of unbelief! ....just saying....”

I understand that there are many Scriptures one could use to validate this point, but I honestly take a different point of view, based on a different view of the Scriptures. I post my reply in this blog, because sooner or later every believer would be confronted with a lack of faith, and the effective disciple must know how to respond correctly, or it can devastate them. So in the interest of taking advantage of a teachable moment, here was my reply to this sister in the faith:
“Actually... He even heals unbelief too! (Mark 9:14-29; John 20:25-28).
When you think about it, it makes sense. Yeshua the Messiah is the author and finisher of our faith (Hebrews 12:1-2).
Now when an author begins to write a masterpiece, by necessity, does he begin to write on a full page or an empty page? Of course, the author begins his masterpiece on an empty page.
Therefore I contend that since Yeshua is the author of our faith, the only thing that one needs to do is to admit their lack of faith and ask the Divine Author, Messiah, to write faith into our hearts for our current situation. No, I believe rather that we deal with lack of faith in exactly the same manner that you would confront any other sin (Romans 14:23; 1 John 1:8-9). The difficulty is that many times we attribute our difficulties to something else.
Oftentimes we do not recognize that we are suffering from lack of faith when we truly are, so our problems go unresolved.”
I believe a good physical parallel to this would be a heart attack. Many people die when it could be prevented because they attribute their symptoms and discomfort to something other than what it is, and so the symptoms of a heart attack overtakes them because they did not seek medical attention if they did not realize that they were in fact having a heart attack.
I believe the same general principle applies with the problem of unbelief. Oftentimes people do not call on The Great Physician to heal their unbelief, because they do not truly see that this in fact is their problem. They attribute it to something else. The problem is we cannot confess what we do not recognize.
Thomas the disciple is often criticized for his lack of faith, but in reality he is to be congratulated for being so self aware, and so honest. Can you imagine for a moment what Yahweh might have done if when Israel was in the wilderness they actually recognized their own fear and lack of faith as being the problem, instead of grumbling against Moses or against God's provisions? This is nothing more than interesting speculation, of course, but in light of Yeshua, the living Torah, I sincerely believe that Israel's history, and their relationship with Yahweh would have been remarkably different. Anyway, it's food for thought.
Brother R. Michel Lankford