Mustard Seed Living
“And the apostles said unto the Lord, Increase our faith. And the Lord said, If ye had faith as a grain of mustard seed, ye might say unto this sycamine tree, Be thou plucked up by the root, and be thou planted in the sea; and it should obey you.“ (Luke 17:5-6 KJV)
One of Jesus’ favorite ways of illustrating faith was with the mustard seed. He used this tiny seed to show how a big thing can come from a small beginning. The size of our faith is not the critical ingredient in Discipleship. Our tiny amount of faith in God is all that is needed from us. Our relationship with God is what the Old Testament called a “Suzerainty” Covenant; or, a partnership between a weak partner and a very strong partner. It is a legal term in today’s world, as when a person with a few thousand dollars enters into a business partnership with a partner who puts tens of thousands of dollars into the new business. Often, the weak party has some experience that will be of practical use in operating the new company. For example, a person who has years of experience operating a gas station, but little money, joins with a rich man who has no practical experience but a lot of capitol. Our weakness is made strong through God Almighty’s infusion of grace and power. Our contribution to the New Covenant, relationship with Christ is just a tiny, mustard seed sized, amount of faith. Indeed, our willingness is all that is necessary to enter into friendship with God.
In fact, our faith is so small that it is often described as “nothing.” There is no-thing that we can do to enter into partnership with God but present ourselves to Him. We are valuable to God because He loves us. God is our spiritual Father, and as a Father loves His child, so the child inherits a place at the table simply because we are a daughter or son. Thus, Jesus minimized our ticket price by comparing it to the tiniest of seeds.
A tiny amount of simple childlike faith is all it takes to get started, but as with a seed that is planted, it take sunshine, rain and most of all time for the seed to germinate and grow up to become a 35 foot tall mustard tree. Do we really want Jesus to increase our faith or, do we think that such notions are the signs of weakness? If we start taking this religious think really seriously, we might end up giving chunks of our money away, or volunteering our time, or forgiving folks whom we have judged as unforgivable. Christ likeness might remold the tough character that we have been trying to portray. Our secular foundations might begin to crumble. Faith might unveil a new you!
