"Truly I say to you, whoever says to this mountain, ‘Be taken up and cast into the sea,’ and does not doubt in his heart, but believes that what he says is going to happen, it will be granted him. Therefore I say to you, all things for which you pray and ask, believe that you have received them, and they will be granted you." Mark 11:23-24

A move of God usually follows a move of faith. When the children of Israel began to pray in earnest for the God to deliver them from Egypt - God moved.

In about 900 B.C. Israel split into two separate nations with two separate kings. The ten northern tribes were called the House of Israel and the remaining two tribes of Judah and Benjamin became known as the House of Judah, or the Jews. Because of sin, the Israel was defeated by the Assyrians and carried away as slaves in about 721 B.C., and the Jews were invaded and defeated by Nebuchadnezzar’s Babylonian Empire in about 586 B.C.

 

The Babylonians burned the magnificent Temple which Solomon had built. God had promised that after a period of 70 years of captivity He would raise up a Persian King who would allow the Jews to return to Jerusalem to rebuild the Temple. As this period of time drew near the Jews began to offer faithful prayers in anticipation of the fulfillment of this promise.

Notice faithful Daniel’s prayer, -"I, Daniel, observed in the books the number of the years which was revealed as the Word of the Lord to Jeremiah the Prophet for the completion of the desolations of Jerusalem, namely seventy years. So I gave my attention to the Lord God to seek Him by prayer and supplications, with fasting, sackcloth and ashes." (Dan.9)God was faithful to His promise.

A Syrophoenician woman moved in faith and received deliverance for her daughter who was cruelly possessed by a demonic spirit. She had followed Jesus as He was traveling through the district of Tyre and Sidon crying, -"Have mercy on me, Lord, Son of David; my daughter is cruelly demon-possessed."

Jesus did not answer her. After a while the disciples grew weary of hearing her desperate pleas and asked Jesus if they could send her away. Jesus turned and said, -"I was sent only to the lost sheep of the house of Israel. It is not good to take the children’s bread and throw it to the dogs." What a searing statement! Surely this would anger and offend this Gentile woman to the point that she would leave - but it didn’t.

She humbly bowed before Jesus and said, -"Yes, Lord, but even the dogs feed on the crumbs which fall from their master’s table." This demonstration of great faith so moved the Lord to say, -"O woman, your faith is great; it shall be done for you as you wish" and her daughter was healed at once.

 

This Gentile woman had no promise of blessings and was not from a people in Covenant with God - she understood that Jesus had not come to minister to Tyre and Sidon - she knew that she was not even worthy to stand before the Lord and did not deserve to have her request granted - but she was counting upon the mercy of the Lord. Believing in His mercy gave her faith to ask for a miracle. Her faith moved God.