Skip to main content

**Faith is the Currency of the Impossible**


 ## The Unshakeable Currency: When Faith Confronts Africa’s Mountains  

**Akasia, Pretoria.** This morning, I watched mist cling to the Magaliesberg like a prayer shawl. My neighbour, Mama Ndlovu, met me at the gate—her son’s mining job vanished in a corporate downsizing. "They say *recession*," she spat the English word like a pip. "But God says *provider*." She marched to her shack singing *"Nkosi yam, ungadeli!"* (My Lord, don’t abandon me!). In her defiance, I saw it: **faith is the only currency that cashes Heaven’s checks when earthly banks collapse.**  

### I. The Anatomy of Faith: More Than Wishful Thinking  

Scripture defines faith as "*confidence in what we hope for, assurance about what we do not see*" (Hebrews 11:1). Yet in our townships, faith is often reduced to *"name it, claim it"* theatrics or fatalistic resignation. Let’s dismantle both deceptions:  

**A. Biblical Faith vs. Cultural Counterfeits**  

- **Faith ≠ Positive Thinking**: Unlike Western self-help mantras, biblical faith anchors in God’s *character*, not our confidence. Abraham didn’t believe *in* his hope—he believed *in the God "*who gives life to the dead and calls into being things that were not" (Romans 4:17) .  

- **Faith ≠ Ignoring Reality**: Abraham "*faced the fact that his body was as good as dead*" (Romans 4:19) . Faith stares down Goliaths but counts five stones.  

**Logical Precision**:  

1. *Premise*: Faith requires an object (Hebrews 11:6).  

2. *Premise*: The only infallible object is God’s self-revelation in Scripture.  

3. *Conclusion*: Authentic faith trusts God’s promises *because of who He is*, not circumstantial evidence.  

### II. Abraham’s Audacity: A Blueprint for African Believers  

In Genesis 22, God tests Abraham: *"Take your son... and sacrifice him"* (v.2). Notice the tension:  

- **Human Impossibility**: Isaac was the child of promise, born when Abraham was "*as good as dead*" (Romans 4:19) .  

- **Divine Certainty**: Abraham declared, *"God himself will provide the lamb"* (Genesis 22:8).  

**African Lens**: Abraham’s test mirrors our continent’s crises:  

- *Like Zimbabwean migrants in SA* facing xenophobia yet gathering monthly for Eucharist, declaring, *"We are God’s people on the way to an eternal homeland"* (Pope Francis, 2024) .  

- *Like Tanzanian jobseekers* in Arusha, told by Pastor Mdobi: *"Faith is tapping power to see the unseen"* (Hebrews 11:6-16) .  

Abraham’s faith *"gave glory to God*" (Romans 4:20) —not by denying pain, but by trusting the Promise-Keeper when promises seemed broken.  

### III. Mountains in the African Landscape: When Faith Roars  

Jesus said, *"If you have faith as small as a mustard seed... Nothing will be impossible for you"* (Matthew 17:20). But how does this confront our actual mountains?  

**Modern Moriahs**:  

1. **Economic Kilimanjaros**: Load-shedding. 45% unemployment. Yet at the 2025 G20 Summit, Bishop Mbuyisa thundered: *"Africa must raise its moral voice! We speak not just with economic data but with the cries of our people!"* . Faith demands we *"call things that are not as though they were"* (Romans 4:17)—advocating debt justice while creating township cooperatives.  

2. **Relational Quakes**: Gender-based violence against migrant women spiked during COVID lockdowns . Faith isn’t silence; it’s *"the shield that extinguishes Satan’s flaming arrows"* (Ephesians 6:16) —arming churches to protect the vulnerable.  

3. **Spiritual Droughts**: Syncretism sweeps SA—*"blessers"* replace providers, sangomas prescribe "holy" muti. True faith *"demolishes arguments that set themselves against God"* (2 Corinthians 10:5).  

**Objection Anticipated**: *"If faith moves mountains, why do prayers go unanswered?"*  

→ **Rebuttal**: Faith isn’t a vending machine. God’s "no" to Isaac’s sacrifice (Genesis 22:12) reveals: He may **remove** the mountain, **reshape** us as we climb it (Romans 5:3-4), or **reveal** His greater provision (Jehovah-Jireh).  

### IV. Practical Faith: Turning Receipts into Reality  

Faith becomes currency through:  

1. **Speaking to Mountains** (Mark 11:23): Like the Tanzanian writer who saw Kilimanjaro after jacarandas fell—*"loss uncovered beauty once obscured"* . Name your crisis: *"Unemployment, be cast into the sea! Family strife, be uprooted!"*  

2. **Feeding Faith Facts**: *"Faith comes by hearing the Word"* (Romans 10:17). Ditch fear-fueled fantasies for God’s résumé:  

   - Split seas (Exodus 14).  

   - Shut lions’ mouths (Daniel 6).  

   - Fund a tax payment with a fish’s mouth (Matthew 17:27)!  

3. **Community Courage**: Zimbabwean migrants in SA survive through *"faith and fellowship"* . Your faith grows stronger when shared (Ecclesiastes 4:12).  

**Conclusion: The Audacity of “Even If!”**  

Last week, a youth in Soshanguve showed me his "impossible" dream: a tech hub in a hijacked building. *"They say it’s gang territory,"* he shrugged. *"But if God is for us..."* (Romans 8:31).  

Faith isn’t denying the mountain’s mass. It’s hearing God whisper: *"What is that to you? Follow Me"* (John 21:22). Abraham’s faith forced Moriah to kneel. Yours can silence load-shedding, xenophobia, despair.  

> **Prayer**: *Yahweh-Jireh, we stand at our Moriahs—job loss, sickness, broken nation. We declare: You are God of resurrection! Forge in us Abraham’s faith: unyielding, God-glorifying, mountain-crushing. Make us roar "EVEN IF!" when fear whispers "what if?" Amen.*  

**Harold Mawela** is a voice from Akasia, weaving biblical truth with African soil. His next book, *Unshakeable: Faith in the Fires of Mzansi*, releases 2025.

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

The Rooster’s Restoration

The Rooster’s Restoration: When Failure Becomes Your Foundation By Harold Mawela Akasia, Pretoria Scripture: “The Lord turned and looked straight at Peter. Then Peter remembered the word the Lord had spoken to him: ‘Before the rooster crows today, you will disown me three times.’ And he went outside and wept bitterly.” (Luke 22:61-62) I woke up this past Tuesday to the sound of a rooster crowing somewhere in the dusty streets of Akasia. My neighbour, old Mr. Dlamini, keeps a few chickens in his backyard—much to the annoyance of the municipality, but that is a story for another day. That crow pierced the morning silence like a prophet’s whisper. And immediately, my mind went to Simon Peter. Now, let me be honest with you. For years, I preached Peter’s denial as a cautionary tale—a warning against pride, a lesson in failure. I stood behind pulpits in Mamelodi, in Soshanguve, in the city centre, and I would point my finger and say, “Don’t be like Peter! He boasted when he should have pray...
Post a Comment
Read more

The Law of the Open Hand

The Law of the Open Hand: From Scarcity to Divine Supply in a Clenched-Fist World By Harold Mawela From my study in Akasia, Pretoria, I look out at a nation holding its breath. We live in the perpetual tension between promise and provision, between what is pledged from podiums and what is present in our pantries. The headlines scream of crises competing for our fragmented attention, while our hearts whisper the ancient, agonizing question: “Will there be enough?” In this climate, a primal instinct takes hold: the clench. We clench our fists around our finances, our futures, our fragile sense of security. Yet, I come to you today with a counter-intuitive, kingdom truth, a law as immutable as gravity but activated by faith: The Law of the Open Hand. The Parable of the Tightened Fist: A Story from Soshanguve Let me tell you a story. Not from a dusty theological text, but from the sun-baked streets of Soshanguve. I visited a community kitchen run by a widow, Gogo Mthembu. Her pension was a...
Post a Comment
Read more

The Investigator's Faith

The Investigator’s Faith: Where Reason and Revelation Meet in the African Soul A Personal Encounter with Truth My friends, let me tell you about the day I became a detective of the divine. It was right here in Akasia, Pretoria, where the red soil stains your shoes and the summer heat shimmers like a mirage over the Mabopane Highway. I was sitting in my study, surrounded by books—theological tomes, scientific journals, and the daily newspaper filled with stories of load-shedding and political turmoil. That particular day, the front page carried a story about our local police station struggling with only five operational vehicles to serve 152 square kilometers . Can you imagine? How does one enforce justice without proper tools This got me thinking about our spiritual tools—how we investigate the greatest claims of truth. Are we properly equipped? I recall my uncle, a lifelong skeptic, challenging me: "How can an educated man like you believe a dead man came back to life?" Inst...
Post a Comment
Read more