“‘I tell you the truth, if you had faith even as small as a mustard seed, you could say to this mountain, ‘Move from here to there,’ and it would move. Nothing would be impossible.’”  –Matthew 17:20 (NIV)

One Saturday night, my family and I were going out for dinner. Along the drive to the restaurant, a noise developed at the rear end of my van and continued growing louder.  Puzzled by this since we had just had the car in the shop a few weeks beforehand, we took it back the following day to the same business which had done the most recent repairs. After a couple of hours of inspection, the auto mechanic called, saying a rear strut needed fixing, but they were unable to do the repair. Estimating now that the van needed about $500 in repairs, my husband and father then took the car to another shop, so the next mechanic could check it out the following morning.            Throughout this period, my family kept praying over this process.

Dad asked, “Lord, please let this repair get done quickly, and let it be done at a reasonable cost.”

Then, I added, “Yeah, like zero dollars.”

Dad then said, “Kristen, it won’t be zero dollars.”             The next day, after the shop called with a description of what needed to be done and a cost to the repair, we all began hoping and praying that it would be done by the end of the day.  Several hours passed, and since we had heard no further update, Jeff called the mechanic to determine where he was in the process.

The repairman explained that, as they began the repair, they determined that there was no damage to the van; it was only the lug nuts that needed to be tightened.

“Great! How much do we owe you now for that?” Jeff asked.

“Nothing,” the man replied on the other end of the phone line.

Though my earthly father echoed the reality of the financial situation we were facing, all it took was the “faith of a mustard seed” for our heavenly Father to make the impossible possible.

Lord, no matter the situation before us, may we have the “faith of a mustard seed” to acknowledge the divine possibilities. Amen.