Concerning faith

     Today I had a couple of opportunities in the temple to study and ponder scriptures. I was reading in the Book of Matthew, chapter 17. Jesus was approached by a man who had a "lunatick" son and was hoping he could be healed. The man told Jesus that he had taken his son to disciples who were unable to help. Jesus "rebuked the devil" and "the child was cured from that very hour". I don't want to address possession by devils or demons. I don't want to address mental/spiritual/emotional handicaps because I have not yet gotten a full understanding of how that works as far as who has them or if it's just their excuse, how they can be "cured", or how accountable they are. I want to focus on Jesus's words to his disciples who came to him afterward, very puzzled, and said, "Why could not we cast him out?" And Jesus said unto them, Because of your unbelief: 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 unto you. They were with Jesus and believed in Him. Why did they lack such faith? What exactly is faith?
     Faith is not to have a perfect knowledge of things; therefore if ye have faith ye hope for things which are not seen, which are true. (Alma 32:21)
     Now faith is the substance of things hoped for, the evidence of things not seen. (Hebrews 11:1)
     I don't really feel qualified to expound on gospel principles better than Alma or Paul (I would strongly suggest reading both of those excellent descriptions of faith), but I wondered- what exactly must we have faith in to be able to remove mountains? Why did Jesus tell His disciples they could have such faith? I figure you need to have faith, first of all, that God exists because most of us will never have the experience in mortality to see Him, we couldn't handle it because He is so superior to us. We also need to believe Jesus Christ is and was who other witnesses have said He is. We need, especially, to believe in the witness each of God's children can receive from the Holy Ghost which will respond to every single person who asks with real intent- meaning you're not just asking out of idle curiosity then planning to go right on living the status quo. Real intent means that once you get your answer, you plan to make some major changes in your life to heed the promptings you will receive. That brings up the next object of faith you need to have- faith in yourself. You have to believe you are capable of being loved by God, capable of having the intelligence/wisdom/courage or whatever to decide for yourself that believing in God is the right thing no matter what anybody around you may choose. Even our own thoughts can be drowned out by the chaos of the world. There are multiple choices for paths to follow. The simple existence of so many choices can leave you stunned into paralysis. (Picture someone who loves chocolate being offered a choice of only one in a Godiva store!) When you believe in yourself, you can go ahead and make a choice. Once you make a choice, you can believe that "with God all things are possible".
     It's majorly important to understand that faith will not give you the power to move big mountains just for fun. It isn't like suddenly having super-powers to go around remodeling the earth. Part of having in faith in God is knowing who He is, who Jesus is. They don't perform miracles to show off. They only do that which is wise to do. It isn't like asking Grandpa to wiggle his ears. When we pray for something to happen, it needs to be according to God's will. Because we don't yet have anywhere close to the wisdom God has, it's likely that what we think we want isn't going to be what He knows is best. So, we can move a mountain, or part a sea, when there is a purpose- IF we believe we can do it and God has told us to do it. (Moses had an important task to accomplish so the Lord worked pretty hard to get him to a point where he could perform miracles necessary to free the Israelites then try to get them to listen to him.) Jesus told Peter to come to Him on the water. Peter started out just fine but lost faith in himself as well as faith that Jesus would not have him do something he could not do. Peter started to sink. I don't want to make this sound simple because it's not. Believing to the degree necessary to perform amazing miracles from healing to speaking in tongues to change or move physical objects is really, really, really hard. We aren't going to be able to do it simply by saying, like the little engine, "I think I can. I think I can. I think I can." As trite as it may sound, we must read God's word (scriptures) often enough and with enough concentration, pondering, and prayer that we feel familiar with Him. We need to trust Him enough to accept what He tells us is best even if we don't see how it could possibly work that way. Then we need to wait patiently, doing whatever our assignment may be (also called stewardship) until such time God may give us something really spectacular which may be never in our life. Our willingness is all He wants.