Then the disciples came to Jesus in private and asked, “Why couldn’t we drive it out?” He replied, “Because you have so little faith. Truly I tell you, if you have faith as small as a mustard seed, you can say to this mountain, ‘Move from here to there,’ and it will move. Nothing will be impossible for you.”
Matthew 17:19-20 NIV
When the disciples came to Jesus privately, they asked why they could not drive out the demon. His answer was direct and disarming. “Because you have so little faith,” Jesus said (Matthew 17:20). Yet in the very next breath, he spoke of faith as small as a mustard seed. He said it was sufficient to move a mountain. Nothing would be impossible for you, he told them. They had some faith. Yet it was still not enough.
When Faith as Small as a Mustard Seed Is Still Out of Reach
The disciples were not unbelievers. They had walked with Jesus, witnessed his miracles, and attempted to act in his name. Their effort to cast out the demon was itself an expression of faith. However, Jesus diagnosed their faith as “little” — and apparently it was even smaller than a mustard seed. That is indeed a confronting verdict. How is it possible to have faith and yet possess less of it than the tiniest of seeds?
Jesus does not say they had no faith. He says they had so little of it. This distinction matters. The phrase “little faith” in Matthew therefore describes faith that exists in principle but lacks the substance to act. It cannot act on what it claims to believe. It is faith in theory — faith that wavers at the critical moment. Furthermore, it raises a sobering challenge for every believer. You can carry a conviction about God’s power without truly releasing your situation into that power. Yet carrying it and releasing it are two very different things.
Jesus then sets the standard: faith as small as a mustard seed is sufficient to move a mountain. The seed is tiny — its smallness is precisely the point. Jesus is not raising the bar; he is lowering it to the most accessible standard imaginable. Yet the disciples, in that moment, fell below even that. Their faith had not yet arrived at that place of full release before God. This passage is not ultimately a rebuke of failure. Instead, it is an invitation to examine the quality — not just the quantity — of the faith you carry. Do you believe, or do you truly believe? There is a difference, and Jesus sees it clearly.
Living It Out
Ask God to increase the substance of your faith — not just the words you confess. Faith as small as a mustard seed moves mountains. So the goal is not great faith but genuine faith, one that releases the situation entirely to God.