PARABLES OF CHRIST
THE MUSTARD SEED
DR. JIM DIXON
MATTHEW 13:31-32
MARCH 29, 1998
Jesus said that the kingdom of heaven may be compared to a mustard seed, the smallest of all seeds. Today, biologists and botanists tell us that there are many small seeds within the plant kingdom and the mustard seed is indeed one of them. However, botanists and biologists tell us that technically, scientifically, the mustard seed is not and was not the smallest seed. This has bothered some Christians, and it need not. In Philippians, chapter 2, we are told that our Lord Jesus Christ, “Though He was in the form of God, did not count equality with God a thing to be clutched or held onto but He emptied Himself, taking on the form of a servant, being born in the likeness of man.” Now, did Jesus Christ, in His humanity, in His incarnation, know all scientific truth? That is a matter of theological and doctrinal debate. But, you see, this much is absolutely clear: The audience to which Jesus was speaking that day believed that the mustard seed was the smallest of all seeds. The mustard seed had become proverbial in Israel for its smallness. Jesus was not giving a botany lesson. Jesus was not giving a lesson regarding the plant kingdom but rather regarding the kingdom of heaven.
So often, people get caught up in minutia and they miss the message of the parable. We do not want that to be true of you this morning. From this parable, this little parable of the mustard seed, there are clearly two messages. The first message is this: The kingdom of heaven is meant to grow. Indeed, the kingdom of heaven is destined to grow.
I want to tell you a story about a guy whose name was James. He was born in Hamilton, Missouri, in 1875. He was one of twelve children. He was reared by a father worked the land six days of the week and on Sunday preached in the local church for no pay. James accepted Christ as His Lord and Savior when he was very young. He believed in Jesus all the days of his life.
When James was in his early twenties, he took a job in a general store. He worked there for a number of years, saving money. He was Christ in his business practices. He gave his employees a share of the profits and he sold his merchandise for low prices. He had 750 department stores in forty-five states of this nation. He then changed the name of the department store. They were no longer called Golden Rule stores, but James continued to practice the golden rule. He continued to live for Jesus Christ.
By the time that James went to be with Jesus Christ in 1971 (he died at the age of ninety-six), he had 1,700 department stores, and each department store had his name out front, and that name was of course J.C. Penney, James Cash Penney. When you see the new J.C. Penney department store open this year at Park Meadows Mall or when you go to any J.C. Penney’s department store, you might remember the story of James who loved Jesus Christ but whose story was not unique.
You have heard of a man whose name was F. David Thomas. He was born on July 2, 1932, in Atlantic City, New Jersey, and his story is incredible. Dave never knew his parents. When he was six weeks old, he was adopted by a man and woman from Kalamazoo, Michigan. When Dave was 5 years old his adopted mother died. His adopted father began to move from city to city, from state to state, from job to job. When Dave was 15 years old, they lived in Ft. Wayne, Indiana. His father came to him and said he was ready to move again. Dave said, “I’m not ready to move. I want to stay here, Dad.” His dad left and Dave, at age 15, stayed in Ft. Wayne, Indiana. He took a room at the local YMCA. He took a job at the Hobby House Restaurant as a busboy bussing tables. He worked hard, so hard that he really could not hang in there with school. He quit high school after only one year.
At 18 years old, Dave joined the Army. In the Army he went to their school of culinary arts. Somehow an Army School of Culinary Arts creates cognitive dissonance. But it was there that Dave learned to cook and when he got out of the Army, he came back to Ft. Wayne, Indiana, to the same Hobby House Restaurant where he became the chef. That is also where he met his wife, Lorraine. They were married in 1954 when Dave was twenty-two. They loved each other.
In 1962 when Dave was 30 years old, he and his wife, Lorraine, moved to Columbus, Ohio. He went to work for Kentucky Fried Chicken. Dave took four bankrupt franchises and made them profitable, and he made a personal profit of $1,500,000. By the time Dave was 35 years old, he was a multimillionaire. He quit Kentucky Fried Chicken and he helped found another business. He helped found Arthur Treacher’s Fish and Chips. But, of course, Dave was not really interested in selling fish or in selling chicken either. It was hamburgers he wanted to make. It was November 15, 1969, right there in Columbus, Ohio on Broad Street, and Dave was 37 years old when he opened his first hamburger restaurant. He named it after his daughter, whose name was Melinda Lou, but her nickname was Wendy and of course that was the first Wendy’s Restaurant.
Dave really had humble goals. He wanted only two or three of those restaurants. That’s all he wanted, so his kids could have a place to work and maybe have their careers in the restaurants. But he had no idea that today he would sit over an empire that includes 3,800 restaurants all across this country and in 30 nations and territories of the world. At the Wendy’s Headquarters, there are 600 full-time employees today and 130,000 employees at Wendy’s Restaurants around the world. It is said that Dave Thomas has given his life to Jesus Christ as Lord and Savior just like J.C. Penney did. I know this. There is one sense in which Wendy’s Restaurants and J.C. Penney Department Stores are exactly like the kingdom of heaven and that is because they began very, very small and they have become very, very large.
Of course, the kingdom of heaven began very small. Our Lord Jesus Christ, being born in Bethlehem and growing up in Nazareth, began to choose His disciples in Galilee. He chose twelve men, including four fishermen and one tax collector. Most of these guys we do not even know what they did. They were not, by the world’s standards, great men. But they fell in love with Christ, and they were filled with the Holy Spirit and the church of Christ began to grow.
Jesus said, “I will build My church and the powers of hell will not prevail against it.” You know that today there are 1,700,000,000 people who call Jesus Christ Lord. There are one billion, seven hundred million nominal Christians and more than a million individual local churches around this world. Yes, the kingdom of heaven has grown. At the birth of our Lord Jesus Christ, it was announced that of His kingdom and of its increase there would be no end.
If you belong to Jesus Christ, you must be committed to the growth of His kingdom. If you have received Jesus Christ as your Lord and Savior, you must be committed to the growth of His church and to the growth of His kingdom. It is incomprehensible that someone could say they are a Christian and not want to see the church of Christ grow. At this church, we are committed to the growth of Christ’s kingdom unabashedly, with no shame. We are open and honest about this. We want to grow the church of Christ. We want to grow the kingdom of Christ. We want to lead men and women and children to faith in Jesus Christ and we state these purposes on the front of our Grace Notes, that we live to exalt Christ and to bring people to Christ and bond people in Christ and build them in Christ and send them out in Christ that they might lead others to Christ because we want to see the kingdom of heaven grow.
As John mentioned, we are going to have a congregational meeting today after the second service and we invite you to come. It has to do with building a ministry center for children and for youth. It has to do with buying Option Parcel D. It has to do with paying down debt. But really, it is all about the mustard seed. Really, it’s all about the growth of the kingdom of heaven which we’re committed to, and we hope and pray you’re committed to. Through your faithfulness in our general operating budget and through your faithfulness in our Growing by Grace campaign, and through anonymous foundation gifts which God has led a foundation to give to our church over these past few years, we trust, and we pray that there’s going to be sufficient money to enhance the ministry to this church in these next few years. We hope to have enough money to give millions of dollars to missions and to pour into the inner city, to build the ministry center, to reduce debt, and to purchase Option Parcel D. But we do not want you to think that we’re sitting pretty like fat cats. We are not.
The truth is that this ministry center…We are only going to be able to do phase one in the ministry center and the upstairs is going to be entirely unbuilt, just a shell. We had to lop off some of the classrooms for kids in the lower level because we did not have enough money and we continue to need and always will need your faithfulness as you seek to grow the mustard seed, as you seek to grow the kingdom of heaven and the church of Jesus Christ.
There is a second teaching from this parable. It is a teaching that oftentimes is missed. The second message of this parable is this: The kingdom of heaven is not only destined to grow but the kingdom of heaven is the only place of security. It is the only place of security. Jesus said that the kingdom of heaven is like a mustard seed which a man took and planted in a field. It is the smallest of all seeds but when it is grown, it is the greatest of shrubs so that it becomes a tree and the birds of the air come and make their nests in its branches.
In the ancient biblical world, kingdoms were oftentimes portrayed through the imagery of a tree and the people of the kingdom portrayed through the birds of the air nesting in the branches of that tree. Historians tell us and archeologists tell us that they see this time and again in the portrayal of ancient kingdoms. In the book of Daniel, in the 4th chapter, we see how the Babylonian Empire and the Babylonian Kingdom is portrayed as a tree with the birds of the air making their nests in its branches, the people of that empire finding their provision and protection through that kingdom.
In Ezekiel, chapter 31, the Kingdom of Assyria is described as a great tree in which the birds of the air came and made their nests in its branches. In Ezekiel, chapter 17, the nation of Israel is portrayed as a great tree in which the birds of the air come and make their nests in its branches and the people of God finding nurture and provision and protection in that tree, in that kingdom. Jesus is drawing on that imagery here. The kingdom of heaven is a place where the people of God are to nest. The kingdom of heaven is a place where the people of God are to find their protection and their provision.
This is true of the mustard plant in Israel, which was very different, by the way, than mustard plants we have in our country. Those mustard plants would become 12 or even 14 feet high. Birds would just swarm over those mustard trees because they would be able to eat there, and they loved the seeds. They would build their nests in the branches, and they would be protected from ground animals and they would find shade under the branches. There is this imagery of protection and provision that the people of God are to find in the kingdom of heaven. Jesus Christ would ask us this morning where it is that we find our security and where it is that we have built our nest. Where do you find your security? Where have you built your nest?
We live in a world where some people find their security in money. Some people find their security in money, but Jesus told the story of the rich man and his barns who put his security in money and Jesus said he was a fool because that very day his soul was required of him and the things which he had accumulated, whose would they be? The Bible says, “What does it profit a man if he gain the whole world and forfeit his soul?” It is no place to nest. Some people put their security in health and in their personal health, but the Bible says, “All flesh is like grass and all of its glory like the flower of the grass. The grass withers and the flower falls but the word of the Lord abides forever.” Do not place your security in personal health. These bodies are very temporary, frail, and fragile. They are no place to nest.
Some people place their security in family and friends. Family is so important, but it is no place to really nest. It is no place to really find your ultimate security because relationships fail, and relationships are broken. Our loved ones and our family members can leave us, either by choice or by death. But it is Jesus Christ who said, “I will never leave you or forsake you. I will never fail you.” It was Jesus Christ who said, “Seek first the kingdom of heaven and its righteousness and you will be given everything you need.”
And so, we have this second teaching in this parable that we are to find our security in the kingdom of heaven and that is where we are to build our nest. I know this last Tuesday morning many of you were shocked as you rose and you read the newspaper and you saw that an 11-year-old boy and a 13-year-old boy at an Arkansas middle school had set off the fire alarm and then gone into the woods with guns. As the students came running out of the school, they just opened fire. They shot down four of their fellow students. They killed four of their fellow students and killed a schoolteacher and shot many other people and wounded them. People have been stunned and people have been saying, “How can this be? What would prompt little boys to murder? What is going on?”
I think there has been a great deal of debate and discussion and some of that discussion has focused on juvenile crime, which has doubled in this nation since 1985. Some of that discussion has focused on our gun control laws, which are the most liberal in the civilized or industrial world. Some have focused on the place of television and the fact that children watch 20,000 murders on TV by the time they are 18. Some of the discussion has focused on broken homes and the breakdown of the family. Both boys, of course, came from broken homes.
I think the Governor of Arkansas in the aftermath of this made a very true statement. Governor Mike Huckabee said that the moral underpinnings of this nation are being shattered. He said that we have witnessed an assault on morality and civility in this nation and we have become, in the words of Governor Huckabee, “a diseased culture.” Certainly, there’s truth in that. We live in a nation where nests are falling and eggs are being shattered.
Barb and I just sold our home, which was up by Arapahoe Road. We lived in that house for 14 years. Every year, birds would come and build a nest on our front porch there on top of the lamplight of the porch. It happened every year. Maybe they did it because of the warmth of the lamp which came on automatically every night, but it was a dumb place to build a nest. It really was. And yet every year for 14 years it would happen. They would build this nest there on the lamplight on our front porch and every year it was the same. The nest would begin to grow and pretty soon you would see the little birds sitting in the nest and pretty soon there would be eggs. But, you see, every time the door was open or closed, it moved the nest just a little bit, no matter how careful we all tried to be (and we really tried to be careful). The wind would, just like it is now, howl across the front porch of our house and inevitably the nest would fall. It was a dumb place to build a nest. Inevitably the nest would fall, and the eggs would break and scatter or maybe the little bird would already be born but not able to fly. By the time we came out and saw what happened, the little birds would be dead on the ground.
The truth is birds build nests in dumb places and so do people. You cannot find your security in this world, not in this culture, not even in this nation. And that is why so many nests are falling, and eggs are breaking. It’s a really sad situation. But we have the promise of Christ, that there is the kingdom of heaven and in this kingdom, there is forgiveness. In this kingdom there is the nurture of God’s word. In this kingdom there is the promise of eternal life. In this kingdom, there is His providence and His protection. When we come and we dwell in that kingdom, there is eternal security.
That is really what this church is all for—to help you dwell in the kingdom of heaven, to invite you to be born into the kingdom of heaven and then learn to dwell there and to build your life there and the lives of your children. Everything we do is to help you come into the kingdom of heaven and serve that kingdom and find all the blessings of the kingdom of heaven.
You know, as we close, I know that there are many of you who have heard of the six cities of refuge mentioned in the Old Testament. They are mentioned in the book of Numbers, the 35th chapter. You read about the city of Bezer, which was a refuge city built in a barren wilderness, and the city of Hebron, one of the cities, the second city of refuge. Nineteen miles from the city of Jerusalem, the city of the patriarchs, the city of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob, the city of Sarah, Rebekah, and Leah. There was the third city of refuge, the city of Kedesh, which was built on Mt. Naphtali. There was the city of Shechem in the hill country of Samaria, the city of Ramoth-Gilead, and the city of Golan, which was in Bashan. These were the six cities of refuge.
What were they for? Why did the commandment of Moses and the will of God decree that there be six cities of refuge? What were they for? They were for people who had unintentionally shed blood. They were places of security and sanctuary where those people could go, and they could escape the law of life for life and receive fair trial and fair treatment.
It is true that in the Old Testament era the world was a scary place, and it was dangerous physically and it was dangerous spiritually. But that is also true today. Perhaps in this nation the physical dangers are less but the spiritual dangers are greater than ever. There is only one place of security, and the Old Testament tells us in Isaiah 8 and Ezekiel 11 and in Psalms 90 where we are clearly told that only God can give you sanctuary and only the kingdom of heaven truly provides security.
So, this morning as we close… first of all, we want to invite any of you who have never entered the kingdom of heaven to do so. And then we want to invite those of you who are perhaps building your nests in the wrong places and finding your security in money or in health or even in family to make Jesus Christ and His eternal kingdom the center of your life. Let us look to the Lord with a word of prayer.