Your Mouth Is the Mountain Mover: Speak, Don't Bow to Your Problems

Sermon outline

Everyone faces mountains, but Jesus told us to speak to them, not pray to them or bow to them, so command your mountains in His name, without doubting, and keep speaking God's promises until they move.

1. Plant flowers, and there will be fewer weeds

   Everyone faces difficulties and gets thrown curveballs, and sometimes the mountains seem to grow until you want to give up hope. He pauses to call a long-standing member to share how God healed her at a recent altar call after a long battle that had made her lose hope, and calls that her mountain.

   Illustration: A doctor spent every weekend pulling weeds in the hot sun until his elderly neighbour told him that if he planted pretty flowers there would be fewer weeds.

   “Everybody is beautiful in their own garden.”

2. Speak to the mountain, don't pray to it

   Mountains may be financial, emotional or spiritual, and Jesus' answer is to command them. Mountains have ears: fear, doubt and unbelief respond when you speak to them in faith, and on the other side of the mountain God is waiting with your answer. Speak in the name of the Lord, not your own, and do not doubt.

   “It didn't ask you to pray to the mountains. It said speak to the mountains.”

   • Mark 11:22-24

3. Don't bow to your mountains

   Miracles await those who say what God says about their problems instead of bowing to them. God often gives us tasks we are not adequate for so we will lean on Him, but He needs your mouth. Delight in the Lord, speak His promises when it looks dark, and listen to the voice of God rather than the devil or people. Delays come from an enemy who wants you to doubt, but God will answer.

   Illustration: When he prayed for sick people with tumours and other conditions, he would have them say, 'I shall not die, but live and declare the works of the Lord.'

   “We must not bow to mountains. We bow to the Lord Jesus Christ who helps us remove mountains, but he needs you. He needs your mouth.”

   • Psalm 37:4
   • Psalm 118:17
   • Matthew 17:20

4. See what's on the other side

   When the mountain seems overwhelming and nothing changes, don't be discouraged and don't let go of your faith. God wants to give you exceedingly, abundantly more than you ask, and often gives something bigger; as surely as there are demonic spirits, there are warrior angels, money angels and protecting angels guarding you.

   “We ask God for something and then he gives us something bigger.”

   • Ephesians 3:20

5. Your mouth is the mountain mover

   Start each day declaring that God's favour is opening doors, because His Word will not return void. Religious people, bound like Lazarus in the tomb, are the hardest to reach, but Jesus did not plead with Lazarus: He had the stone removed and spoke to a mountain of death. Talk back to the devil, refuse what he sends, and filter the tens of thousands of thoughts that pass through your mind each day.

   Illustration: Your tongue is like the huge earthmovers at a road construction site that scoop up great loads of soil and dump them into the truck. He refers to his book Talk Back to the Devil: tell the devil he has come to the wrong address, send his package next door and close the door.

   “So how do you move a mountain? You move it with your mouth.”

   • Isaiah 55:11
   • John 11:39-44

6. The withered fig tree: deal with the root

   Jesus spoke to the fig tree and it withered from the roots. Every problem has a root, and when you deal with the root, circumstances change. Jesus said that with faith and no doubt, you can tell a mountain to be thrown into the sea and it will be done.

   Illustration: Called to a hospital to anoint a pastor who had only hours to live, he was told by the Holy Spirit not to go in but to gather the group in a circle and give thanks, because they had already prayed. He did, drove home wrestling with doubt, and the next day the pastor was out of intensive care; months later people saw him dancing on a cruise.

   “For every problem you have, is a root problem.”

   • Matthew 21:18-22

7. We are who God says we are

   Faith is simply believing God and taking Him at His word. In Christ we are new creatures, delivered from darkness, more than conquerors and joint heirs with Christ. We have life, light, liberty, love, joy, pardon, purpose, power, provision and a future prospect, and we can do all things through Christ.

   Illustration: Our pardon is like the get-out-of-jail-free card in Monopoly: the prison doors are broken and you are out.

   “No matter what it is, move it with your mouth.”

   • 2 Corinthians 5:17
   • Colossians 1:13
   • Romans 8:37
   • Romans 8:17
   • Ephesians 1:3
   • 1 John 5:12
   • John 8:12
   • 2 Corinthians 3:17
   • Romans 5:5
   • John 16:22
   • Acts 1:8
   • Philippians 4:19
   • John 14:2
   • Philippians 4:13