Growing Fuit: the Power of a Mustard Seed

Welcome/Intro/Prayer/Scripture Reading

Greeting:

Good Morning Church! How is everyone doing this morning? It has been an incredible weekend with the Warm weather! I want to welcome the women back from their retreat! I hope it was a blessed and refreshing time! I also hope that all of the husbands survived without their wives for a few days too!

Prayer: Would you pray with me to prepare our hearts for God’s word today?

Introduction: Do you ever get discouraged when?

As some of you know, I go to the gym at least twice a week to work on strength training. A couple of months ago I almost gave up because I just wasnt seeing any results.

I spent hours at the gym, I used pre-workout to improve my preformance while lifting, I have a protien shake when I got home and for weeks I was not seeing any results. In fact, I almost stopped going again, just chalking it up as a fluke.

But after about three months after I made a change to how I was lifting and what I was eating and I started to see some growth, little by little, I could lift more weight.

Have you ever felt like I did a couple of months ago? Feeling like your putting in effort, but not seeing results?

What difference am I really making I am just one person out of billions?

Maybe its at your job, or on the farm, or even in your prayer lives

Work your butt off on the farm, but the weather just didnt co-operate this year.

Pray and you just dont see God moving or working

Work your butt off on the farm, but the weather just didnt co-operate this year.

Maybe thats how we feel as a church? We are small and getting older..

Do we ever feel like this church?

Well! I have some good news for you! Let’s open our Bibles to Matthew 13:31-32. (Read Scripture)

Walking through the Text: Matthew 13:31-32 - Parable of the Mustard Seed

What is this parable all about? a mustard seed that is super tiny that becomes one of the largest plants in the garden, its so big that birds can perch on it.

Context:

Mustard Seed was the smallest seed known in Palistine at the time. (Picture of Seed)

The seed can grow into a massive tree compared to the seed from a tiny speck to a tree more than 12 high when uprooted. (Picture of the Tree)

What was Jesus saying to the Disciples in his time?

This would be something that is shocking! They were not expecting the Kingdom of God to start as something Small

They were expecting a Joshua to come and lead a military to come against the Romans in a uprising.

Yet, they had seen many other uprisings start and be crushed by the weight of Rome. But in this parable the Mustard seed grows stonger in the end not crushed by the weight of the birds.

They werent expecting the Kingdom that comes through people, but by God’s miraculaous intervention like when he brought his people out of the land of Egypt.

However, God worked through Christ to Change the Lives of People everywhere, and use those people to bring the Kingdom, thats how he is still working today.

Whats the Bit with The Birds? Why are the birds so important?

A couple of thoughts here:

Birds are foreign they are an entirely different spieces than the plant

Now this is where it gets really cool! You know how I just mentioned Rome crushing rebellion, well some scholars think that the birds Jesus was referring to were eagles.

The eagle was the symbol of Roman Military so what some people think that Jesus is alluding to here is the Kingdom that Grows into from the tiny seed to a tree wont be crushed by the weight of Rome! isnt that cool?

What does the Parable Speak to Us today?

World Change Begins with One Person

Example: William Wilberforce, the man responsible for freeing slaves in Britain, got the idea from a reading the exposure of slave trade by Thomas Clarkson, then later on one day was sitting in the garden of William Pitt, the prime minister at the time, and in the simple moment of sitting in a garden , the idea of freedom was sugguested that would effect the lives of hundreds of thousands of people, and think about it, by now millions.

Witness begins with One Person Sharing the Word

When we hear this we might think, but I am not an evangelist, I am no billy Graham, or George Whitfield or Charles Spergeon.

or if your a woman, think I am no Bathseba Kingsly, who preached during the first great awakening

Honestly, I struggle to share Jesus because I feel like most approaches to sharing Jesus are manipulative and toxic so when I could speak I am often silent.

Then I remember what James writes in James 5:17 (Slide)

James 5:17 NIV

Elijah was a human being, even as we are. He prayed earnestly that it would not rain, and it did not rain on the land for three and a half years.

Elijah was a man, just like us. Billy Graham was a man Just like Us. These people we think we cant be are humans just like us, they are more like us than we know

Reformation and Revival Brings with one single person.

Does anyone know who this is? (Slide)

Menno Simmons a Catholic who joined the reformation, if you dont know this Man is where we get our name as Mennonites.

This is something that speaks powerfully each of us today.

William Burclay notes,

The Gospel of Matthew, Volume 2 The Small Beginning (Matthew 13:31–2)

, Jesus is saying to his disciples, and to his followers today, that there must be no discouragement, that they must serve and witness in their own situations, that each one must be the small beginning from which the kingdom grows until the kingdoms of the earth finally become the kingdom of God.

Transition: Now, where does that leave us when we are trying to put in effort, but we dont see results, we know God can, but we dont see it. What then? Whats the answer?

Well, let me read another parable about a Mustard seed!

Read: Matthew 17:20- (Slide)

Synopsis- the Disciples are trying to cast out a demon from a boy, but they cant do it, they are trying, but they arent seeing results and what does Jesus say?

Your faith is too small? Can you believe that?

Walking through the Text: Matthew 17:20 - The Power of the Mustard Seed.

Tempted to make us the center of the Text!

Jesus seems to be saying that if we faith the size of a mustard seed, we can say to a mountain, move and it will move, Nothing will be impossible for you.

Camp Mustard Seed: When I was younger I went to a camp with my brother for Kids with Special Needs, This verse was the inspiration for the Director to start the camp, reminding everyone that even mustard seed sized faith counts, but Camp taught me the wrong lesson.

The Point, what Jesus is saying, isnt about the size of faith at all, but what God can do with a person .

We can read this and see the mustard seed as the target, but What Jesus is actually saying is you can move mountains, with faith.

Think about it this way, When you buy a car, like a sports car do you focus on the slowest it can go or the fastest?

Truck, do you look for the smallest it can two.

Greek Lesson: In greek faith always have to be in something or someone, its implied in the verb, faith does not exist as a stand alone concept faith as this atheral thing has been a product of translation.

Same way with Faith, Jesus isnt saying aim for a small faith, but a faith in God that can move mountains!

Application: I want to handle the application a little differently this morning.

We explored a bunch in these small passages. I want you to take a few minutes in your seat and reflect, ask the Holy Spirit to show you what the next step is for you.

What is my action step after hearing from God this morning? It is personal for each of us! (Slide)

Share your action step with the Person next to you! Next Week we will check in with each other!

Sending: Id like to invite the Worship Team to Lead us in the sending Song

Benediction:

God of small seeds and mighty plants, you take our meager lives and with your love cause them to produce acts of loving kindness for you in this world. You hear our cries and find us when we are lost and wandering in fear. You bring us home with you so that we may be made whole, rejoicing in your goodness. Help us to joyfully serve you all our days, knowing that you are always watching over us. Help us to Go from this place knowing that even if we feel tiny with you we can become fruitful trees for your Kingdom. Yahweh, may you move mountains in and through us! Go In Peace Church!