Amen, please be seated. And if you have a Bible, let me invite you to turn with me to Matthew chapter 13. This morning verses 31 to 35. In chapter 13, Jesus gives a series of seven parables, which are meant to teach His disciples that His kingdom is not what they have expected.
They had one set of expectations. Jesus had another, and the disciples were going to be very confused, disappointed, and discouraged if they didn't learn to leave their expectations behind as they followed Jesus. Their expectations were what? Well, in part, that the Messiah, when He came, would set all things right.
And He would drive out the Romans. And Israel would be restored in glory, and even the pagans from Gentile nations would come streaming into Jerusalem to worship the Messiah. And Jesus said to them, let me up end your expectations of how this is going to go. And so we've already seen in chapter 13, the parable of the sower and the parable of the weeds and the wheat in the parable of the sower.
Jesus reached, teaches us that His kingdom will not advance by an army wielding swords, but by ambassadors, scattering seed, the seed of the word of God. And He's warned us that not everybody's going to receive that word. Not everybody will hear the good news and say, I'd like that for myself. But some, well, the preaching is going to fall on deaf ears.
And for others, as soon as trouble comes and the going gets tough, well, they're going to run away in a band and ship. And others are going to sink their teeth into this world and this life, and at the end of the day, it's going to be demonstrated. All they really cared about was this world and this life. They didn't want the kingdom of Jesus.
They wanted chunk of the kingdoms of this world. And so that was the parable of the sower. And then we saw last week in the parable of the wheat and the weeds that the kingdom of heaven is going to be again, different than they expected. It's going to be mixed in this world, even in pure in this world until the end, when then God divides the weeds from the wheat, when He divides the sons of the evil one, as Jesus calls them, from the sons of the kingdom of heaven.
And though that kingdom of Jesus is glorious, that glory will be seen in its consummation only at the end. And even in the final judgment, when God divides His kingdom and gets rid of evil and evil doers who are wicked, wickedly not trusting Jesus to be their Savior. Because by contrast, the righteous will shine like the son in the kingdom of the heavenly Father. And they are righteous because they put their trust in the righteous one, Jesus.
So already, Jesus is teaching His disciples what? It's not going to go fast and easy. And it's not going to be as glorious as you think as quickly as you want it. You're going to be patience to endure life in this world living by faith in me.
That's a message to all of us. And now here in chapter 13, beginning of verse 31, Jesus puts two parables together, the parable of the mustard seed and the parable of the leaven. And then Matthew will add a note at the end about Jesus fulfilling the Old Testament prophecies. So let's turn and hear God's holy and inspired word from Matthew 13, beginning of verse 31.
He, that is Jesus, put another parable before them, saying, the kingdom of heaven is like a grain of mustard seed that a man took and sowed in his field. It is the smallest of all seeds. But when it is grown, it is larger than all the garden plants and becomes a tree so that the birds of the air come and make nests in its branches. He told them another parable.
The kingdom of heaven is like leaven that a woman took and hid in three measures of flower till it was all leavened. All these things, Jesus said to the crowds in parables. Indeed, he said nothing to them without a parable. This was to fulfill what was spoken by the prophet, quote, I will open my mouth in parables.
I will utter what has been hidden since the foundation of the world. Amen. This is God's word. Let's look to him in prayer.
Father, you would be our teacher. We ask that you would give ears to hear and grace to the one who teaches that we all might hear and be transformed by Jesus. In his name I pray, amen. Three expectations about the kingdom of heaven, one from each parable and then one from Matthew's comment that Jesus has fulfilled Old Testament prophecy here.
So the first one, and I'll give them to you as we go, the first one is Jesus says there will be a small start, yet a great expansion in the kingdom I am building. This verse is 31 and 32. There will be a small start, yet a great expansion in the kingdom of my building. He put another parable to them saying the kingdom of heaven is like a grain of mustard seed, that a man took and sowed in his field.
It's the smallest of all seeds, but when it is grown, it's larger than all the garden plants, it becomes a tree. Jesus says once again, okay, it's different than what you think it's going to be. And it's frankly different than what a lot of people today and Christians even think it will be. I mean, we get excited about growth, don't we?
And we tend to measure things by their size. And we tend to be impressed when there's lots of numbers or high attendance or the income statements are bursting or there's building programs or there's other outward markers of success. And we say to ourselves, that's what really matters and that proves we're part of the kingdom of heaven. And this parable cautions us to be careful about measuring God's kingdom like that kind of way, to not just assume that bigger is always better, or that gathering large numbers is proof that God is at work, or that when you have a small collection that somehow God isn't at work.
I mean, think of how this kingdom of Jesus begins. He gathers a group of 12 disciples close to him. One who will betray him. And he gathers a larger group of 72 disciples.
There were sort of layers of discipleship. And certainly crowds followed him, but those crowds were fickle. Most were unbelieving. And they were the crowds that shouted crucify him.
And then Jesus betrays him, Peter denies him, and they all scatter, even as close as friends, while he goes to a cross and is buried in a grave. And his kingdom looks like nothing. It looks like a mustard seed hidden under soil. And Jesus is telling them ahead of time, don't despise that.
Don't despise the day of small things. When it looks like nothing, it's not nothing. Don't judge the seed by its size. Don't think because the world is unimpressed with me, that my kingdom is unimpressive.
New life arises out of the ground from that seed, in his resurrection from the dead. And he reassembles his followers. And slowly, over time, the group of believers begins to expand. Now why did Jesus have to tell them that?
Because again, their view of the Messiah as he would enter triumphantly and set up shop, rule the roost, and the nations would come streaming in to behold his glory. I mean, remember James and John at one point turned to Jesus and said, Lord, when you come into your kingdom, can I sit at your right hand and my brother at your left hand? I mean, this is what dominated their minds. Triumphalism.
They expected glory. They wanted seats of power. What they didn't expect, though Jesus told them time and again, what they didn't expect was his humiliation and his suffering before his exaltation and his triumph. And so they had no idea then that not only would that be the experience of Jesus, but that would be the pattern of ministry of the church of the Lord Jesus.
That things start small before they grow. That is people need to die to themselves and endure opposition from others before his kingdom will flourish. But that is the nature of gospel ministry. That is the nature of kingdom expansion.
So don't despise the day of small things. Don't save yourself. Well, that church over there, wherever that is, pointing in no direction. Point purposefully.
Point in no direction. Don't say, well, that is just a small church and it will never amount to much. Don't say, your little efforts are insignificant and don't matter to the kingdom. Don't say your little efforts at sowing and scattering the seed of the good news of the gospel can't amount to anything.
And don't say, you know, God has only done a really, really little thing in my life. And I just don't think he is ever going to do much more. The kingdom, Jesus says, is like a mustard seed that grows. This mustard seed, of course, was a seed that was planted and cultivated in ancient Palestine by farmers out in their gardens and fields.
Botanists today, it's become commonplace to note it. Botanists today can point out that there are in fact smaller seeds in the world. As best I did in my little research and I'm no botanist, but Google can tell you anything is that the wild, there's a wild orchid with a seed that's smaller, as small as 0.05 millimeters. So small, you really can't see it with a naked eye.
Jesus, I want to tell you, wasn't ignorant of those things. He's the creator of the universe. But the context makes it clear that Jesus was addressing a local lay audience, not an international conference of botanists, and he was using a colloquialism. He was using something that had become proverbial in their generation to speak of something really small was to say it's as small as a mustard seed.
That's just kind of the way people talked and Jesus is using that here. I mean, we know for instance that Jesus will use this same language elsewhere to speak of faith as small as a mustard seed, right? It was something people could hang their hats on. So what we also know is that in Palestine that mustard seed could grow to be the largest of the garden plants that were cultivated in that day.
It could grow to as much as 10 or 15 feet in height and spreading its foliage out so that birds could actually build nests in it. Not unlike I suppose, and I'll invite my gardening friends to correct me on this if I'm wrong, but I suppose not unlike lilacs and cretmerdals, which are shrubs with multiple stems and grow and they can sort of look like they're a tree. Well here, this tiny little seed out of it comes the largest of the garden shrubs or bushes or plants and God's kingdom is like that. It may start out in the American small, but it expands over time.
It may seem weak. It may seem insignificant. It may seem of no account, but it grows strong and expansive over time so much so that people like birds building nests in its shade will come from all over the world and rest in its shade. Jesus is actually picking up Ezekiel chapter 17 here, verse 23, where the Lord had promised through the prophet Ezekiel that he would establish his people like a tree where the nations would find refuge and rest.
Ezekiel 17, verse 23, on the mountain height, will I plant it that it may bear branches and produce fruit and become a noble cedar and under it will dwell every kind of bird and in the shade of its branches, birds of every sort will rest. How many? So many that God could promise our Father in the faith Abraham that he would have descendants believing descendants as numerous as the stars in the sky and as the sands on the seashore. How many?
So many that you couldn't count them yourself. Jesus says in Revelation, purchased people for God from every tribe and tongue and language and nation. But in any local place when the gospel first comes to it, it may not seem that way at all. But just don't be fooled by that.
Don't despise the day of small things. Don't turn up your nose at little works of God, small churches, tiny ministries, or just one convert professing faith in a large family. God often begins his works just that way. Christianity after all began not with a coronation as another put it, but with a crucifixion.
And then his few female friends and followers met him risen. And then he appeared to his apostles. And then it grew from a few dozen to a few hundred and then a few thousand from city to city and nation to nation until today. When you add it all up, those who adhere to Christianity, there are more in number than those who adhere to Islam or Hinduism or Buddhism or Judaism or atheism or other religions of the world.
And Christianity is spread across every nation of the world and in every continent. There are people finding shade and rest in the branches of the Lord Jesus Christ. So this must be seen. It must be seen.
So the kingdom grows. But as it's planted in new places, reaching new people, it often seems very insignificant at the beginning. That's the first thing. The second thing from the second parable is this.
We see the subtle yet thorough influence of the kingdom Jesus is building verse 33. The subtle yet thorough influence of his kingdom. He told him another parable. The kingdom of heaven is like 11 that a woman took and hid in three measures of flower until it was all leavened.
So Jesus wants us to see that there is a subtle at times invisible activity that has a powerfully influential work in his kingdom. Like a small piece of leaven, talked into a large batch of flower, worked into it, needed into it, pressed and folded and whatever bakers do until it causes the whole batch over time to rise. The leaven would have been a leftover piece of sourdough from a prior batch held back just for this very purpose. It's 11 the next loaf causing the flower to rise so that what you get is bread instead of I suppose crepes or something like that.
Notice that the measure here, Jesus says of flowers is in verse 33. It's pretty large. Three measures as the ESV translates. That's about 22 liters or five gallons of dry flower roughly.
And Jesus says that little piece of leaven, the whole lump and that may make enough bread to feed 100 people. And that's what the kingdom is like. You can't see it working. You can't always.
It's mysterious in its progress. But its potency is irresistible. If the parable of the mustard seed emphasizes, again as another hopefully noted, if the parable of the mustard seed emphasizes extensive growth, then the parable of the leaven emphasizes the intensive growth, internal growth. And notice that then with a number of these parables that what has to happen is that something from outside has to be brought in.
You see this with the parable of the sower? We saw this as well with the parable of the mustard seed and now here with the parable of the leaven. That the thing that causes the kingdom to grow is not naturally present. But it has to come from the outside and be planted within.
Like seed is planted in soil or like leaven is pushed into dough. Which is just a good reminder that the way to grow in life is not to look within, but it is actually to look without. The way to be blessed by God. The way to experience the forgiveness of sins and reconciliation with God and eternal life is not to look within yourself and find what's there and depend upon it.
But it is to have something from outside brought in a supernatural work of the spirit of Christ doing for us and in us what we can't naturally do. It's a gift of grace we receive. And the spirit takes what belongs to Christ and makes it ours in our hearts. And in that heart it slowly, subtly, inevitably, influences the whole person.
That may not seem like much at first. Some people have dramatic conversion experiences I know. And they just go from black to white. They just go from evil to light and righteousness.
And it makes a dramatic visible change in their experience that everybody can see. But of course there's more work to be done when that happens. But for some of us, some of you perhaps growing up in the body of Christ under the care of believing parents and elders who prayed for you and pastors who preached to you your whole life. You have just been told about the love of Jesus and it is slowly, progressively, over time dawned on you that you are beloved.
And he is your hope of forgiveness. Well, don't despise that quiet work of God. Why did Jesus have to teach this parable to his disciples? Because they expected the quick transformation of society.
They expected a radical change in society because the king was coming. And his kingdom would rapidly transform people and institutions and governments. And there would be this overnight success and pomp and circumstances and glory and majesty. I mean, they were thinking the descendant of David is coming to the throne and he's greater than the glory of David's kingdom.
They were thinking about political and cultural revolution. Jesus wanted them to understand spiritual transformation. So Jesus says that by kingdom will be more like, not the David Messianna figure you think is coming, but it will be more like a woman baking bread, adding leaven to dry flour. She's going to take a little piece and work it in and wait for it to rise.
That's what my king will be like. You may never notice it. I mean, the old saying, watchpot never boils. I don't know, maybe a watch batch of bread never rises.
It seems to do it our house. And yet it does, of course. You leave it and you come back and there it is. So the king of heaven doesn't start with a big splash.
It doesn't have to draw attention to itself. It doesn't have to show off. It doesn't have to brag. It doesn't have to boast about itself.
It doesn't need to. It boasts in Jesus who is quietly going about his work for his glory. Of course, it prays for him. It prays for him to do what only he can do.
It prays for him to take people out of the kingdom of darkness and into the kingdom of light. It watches for fruit to be born over time. It waits for him to begin a good work knowing that he will as he promises carry on the good work until the day of Christ Jesus. And it does.
His people scatter seed. We bring the gospel to people in the hopes that it will bear much fruit. But we know that only Jesus can drive it home to the heart. And so we wait in expectation.
And it does. Where it takes root, where it is worked in, it begins to take over. And over time, more and more pieces and parts of our hearts and our lives, our way of thinking, our way of feeling, what we care about, what we prioritize, how we go about doing life. It is transformed as the leaven influences the whole dough.
So that's the second thing. You have this small start, you have a large expansion of the kingdom. Then you have this subtle yet thorough influence of the kingdom. And the final thing we see in Matthew's note about the submission of the king is that the king submits to scripture.
And that's the foundation of this building. It's the foundation of this kingdom, the submission of the kingdom of the scriptures. Notice this language of verse 34 and 35. All these things Jesus said to the crowds and parables.
Indeed, he said nothing to them without a parable. And by that Matthew isn't denying the sermon on the mount, which isn't a parable. He's not denying that Jesus taught in other ways, but that Jesus did teach in parables and frequently enter the crowds. And he says, this was to fulfill what was spoken by the prophet.
I will open my mouth in parables. I will utter what has been hidden since the foundation of the world. So why did Jesus teach this way to fulfill scripture? And you need to understand that that was his mission.
That's why Jesus does what he does. That's why he teaches the way he teaches, to fulfill what was spoken by the prophets. Because the prophets looked forward to the coming of the Messiah and the kind of ministry he would have. And he purposefully set out to fulfill those things.
Here he quotes Psalm 78 verse 2 from the Greek translation of the Hebrew, I will open my mouth in parables. I will utter what has been hidden since the foundation of the world. So why is he speaking this way to fulfill the prophets? And what we need to understand is that does two things for us.
On the one hand, it helps us to recognize Jesus is the Messiah who was promised. As we see time and again, the prophecies fulfilled in the life and ministry of Jesus. How do you know Jesus is the one the Old Testament prophesied? Read the prophecies and see that he has fulfilled them.
But it also on the other hand reminds us not only who the Messiah is, but it tells us something very important about how he goes about his work. He obeys scripture. He does the will of God as prophesied. That elsewhere it says of him in Hebrews, quoting the scriptures, Jesus the Messiah saying, Hold, I have come to do your will, O God, as it is written of me in the scroll of the book.
And this is helpful to us all because it is by his doing of the will of his Father in heaven that we can be saved. It is by his doing of the will of his Father in heaven, of being our great high priest, of offering himself up upon the cross to be the Tony sacrifice for our sins that we can be forgiven of our transgressions, that we can be cleansed of our corruption, and that we can be and have our hearts and our lives transformed. So our growing up in the kingdom, our being transformed over time by Jesus begins with resting the care of our soul on Jesus who did the will of God, all the will of God, for us by his perfect obedience. And if that has been the case for you, then your heart will sing with the psalmist better as one day in your courts than a thousand elsewhere.
I would rather dwell as a doorkeeper in the house of my God than dwell in the tents of the wicked. You want to be part of kingdom that endures forever? You want to be part of a kingdom that is indestructible, a kingdom that gives shelter to people from every tribe and tongue and nation, then put your hope not in yourself, but in another, not in your submission, but in his submission, even submission to death on the cross in your place on your behalf. May that be good news to you.
Let's pray. Our Father in heaven, we ask that the seed of your word would be deeply rooted, well-watered, fertilized by you, and grow up to bear much fruit for your glory. In Jesus' name, amen. Amen.
Let's stand and sing.