The Lord Jesus seemed to delight in using the common, everyday expressions and illustrations of His time and infusing them with life. His purpose was to reveal to us the mysteries of the Kingdom of God. In doing so, this Master-Teacher could turn the most ordinary observation of human existence into a great university of learning.
Jesus talked about the lilies of the field, the birds of the air, vines and branches, shepherds and sheep, trees, rocks, fishing, and a host of other things.
In His day, there was a common expression used to show smallness. That expression was "small as a mustard seed." This expression was much like our expressions, "sharp as a tack," or "high as a kite," or "flat as a pancake." Now these expressions are not the most exact scientifically. I’m sure that there are things sharper than tacks, higher than kites, or flatter than pancakes. But we use these expressions in our conversations to graphically illustrate the point we are attempting to make. So it was I that sense that this expression concerning the mustard seed came to use in Jesus’ day.
Now the mustard seed is not the smallest of all the seeds in existence. I believe the orchid seed is. Perhaps the mustard seed is the smallest of all the garden plants. But, in any event, it is exceedingly small. And by comparison to its size, it grows to a large plant.
It is in this context that Jesus uses the mustard seed to illustrate His point. It is a point which could revolutionize our lives if it is rightly understood. You see, this story is a story about potential. We all want to know the secret of tapping our potential in Christ. This story of the mustard seed is, in itself, an illustration of the potential available to each one of us as we serve the living Christ.
Firstly, let’s look at the illustration announced.
"And He said, ‘How shall we picture the kingdom of God, or by what parable shall we present it?’" (v. 30)
This is a story about the Kingdom. Over and over, Jesus would speak of the Kingdom of God. In story after story, He would reveal truth about the Kingdom from a different perspective. It is clear that the emphasis of Jesus’ teaching is on the Kingdom. Kingdom truth and Kingdom living were definitely priorities for Jesus. And that very fact is a powerful witness to us of the priority Kingdom living should have in our lives as well.
"It is like a mustard seed, which, when sown upon the ground, though it is smaller than all the seeds that are upon the ground, yet when it is sown, grows up and becomes larger than all the garden plants and forms large branches; so that the birds of the air can nest under its shade." (vv. 31-32)
Notice the contrast emphasized here. Jesus points up the fact of the smallness of the mustard seed. And then He compares the small beginning of this mustard seed to the large outcome as it grows to maturity.
The mustard seed is a symbol of smallness. "Small as a mustard seed;" everyone knew of the saying. They knew the mustard seed was typical of the smallest a seed could be. And Jesus purposely used this saying to make a point concerning the Kingdom of God.
To what would the Kingdom be compared? To this mustard seed. The Kingdom was compared to a seed which was so small that it could be blown out of your hand by a little breeze and never found again. Here was a picture of insignificance, of small beginnings. But even so, there is an important lesson to be learned. We must see that there is great untapped potential resident in the seed.
We see the potential revealed because the seed grows so large in comparison to what it was when it began. This seed virtually explodes in growth. This seemingly insignificant seed, which could hardly be seen by the birds of the air, would now become a place for them to rest.
This is a story of potential. The potential to become a giant tree is there, resident in the seed. But this potential is untapped. It is unseen until the seed is planted. Until it begins to unleash that potential, those looking on do not realize what it can become.
The contrast between the very small seed and the very large tree shows just how great that potential really is. The potential of the mustard seed is far greater than the uninformed might imagine. "Small as a mustard seed." To those who understood this saying, it immediately brought to mind the hidden potential available in even the smallest and most insignificant of things.
We have seen the illustration announced by Jesus. Now let’s turn our attention to the illustration applied to Jesus.
Here, the illustration of the mustard seed is applied to the Kingdom of God. In our text, Jesus is comparing the Kingdom to the mustard seed. By that, He is saying that the Kingdom is sown in apparent smallness and insignificance, but grows and grows and grows until it becomes large and powerful. The mustard seed is sown in smallness. It comes forth in greatness. It is sown a seed hardly noticed. It comes forth a tree, noticed by all.
The analogy was one that was familiar to Israel. In Scripture, a tree usually represents a person or nation in power. So here the Kingdom of God is presented as growing large enough to shelter the birds of the air; perhaps a figure for all the nations.
But the point is that the seed of the Kingdom is sown in smallness, but has the potential for greatness. Just as the seed of the Kingdom of God was sown almost two thousand years ago by Jesus Christ, so it is also sown again and again today. And just as the Kingdom multiplied across the face of the earth during the times of the early Church, so it can multiply again today in our community. The potential is there.
The only other places where we hear of the mustard seed are Matthew 17:20 and Luke 17:6. In both of these instances, the illustration is applied to faith.
Again, the same message is given to us. It is a message of the potential of a very small thing. If we have faith as small as a mustard seed, we can move mountains. We can affect great change. A small faith can bring great things to pass because it is a faith in a great God. It appears to be a small thing, but it has great potential.
Finally, let’s turn our attention to how the illustration can be appropriated for us.
One of the teachings of the mustard seed is that there is the potentiality to greatness in each of us. This is suggested to us by the parable. Each of us has the seed of faith, the seed of the Kingdom, resident within us. In Christ we have the potential to be all that God would have us be. We now have the privilege to tap into the great resource of the power of God. We now can tap our potential in Christ.
We must first understand that God would have us see our potential in Him. This is an area which has been neglected so much in the Church in days past. It as been re-emphasized somewhat in the last few years, which I believe is a good thing. Sometimes it has been wrongly taught, or perhaps wrongly received by some, in a self-centered, self-exalting kind of way. You can take anything to an extreme. But just because some have abused this truth, we need not shy away from it because it is so important for us to see what God can do in and through us if we will only be available to Him.
Zechariah 4:10 says, "For who hath despised the day of small things?" Implied in that question is that we do desire great things. We don’t want things to stay small. We want them to grow, to expand, to enlarge.
Don’t you want to see growth in your life? Don’t you want to realize all that God as for you? Don’t you want to realize your full potential in Christ? Certainly you do. I believe all of us do.
All of us want to succeed. We want to see our children succeed. We want to see our husbands and wives succeed. We want to see the Church succeed in fulfilling its calling and reaching others with the good news of salvation in Christ. We want to be a part of a great work for Jesus. We want to live our lives so that they count for something of eternal value. There is a desire for greatness in all of us.
Some of you may say, "Well, I want to do so much. But I can’t. I could never do this or that. I don’t have what it takes. I’m limited in my gifts or talents or resources." But that is precisely the point. We do not have to have much. We just have to allow God to use us. God has placed within each person far more than any of us could imagine. He has placed within us the life of His Son.
You see, we are much like that mustard seed. Just as the potential for greatness was locked within the genetic code of that seed, so the potential to fulfill God’s fantastic plan for your life is locked within your spiritual genetic code, so to speak. The Scripture says, "He who is joined to the Lord is one spirit." The Spirit of the risen Savior and our spirit have become one. We are born again. We have been given new life. We are no longer who we used to be. We are all new creations in Christ Jesus.
God has given us ample evidence of our potential, even in our natural abilities. A young English boy was called "carrot-top" by other students, and given little chance of success by some of his teachers. He ranked third-lowest in his class. The teacher’s report reads, "The boy is certainly no scholar and has repeated his grade twice. He is also a stubborn streak and is sometimes rebellious in nature. He seems to have little or no understanding of his schoolwork, except in a most mechanical way. At times, he seems almost perverse in his ability to learn. He has not made the most of his opportunities." What a sad picture. What chance for success would you have given this young lad? Many in our day would simply write him off as just another delinquent. But later, this young man settled down to more serious study. And soon the world began to hear about Winston Churchill.
If you want to reach your potential, if you want to rise above mediocrity, there is power in Jesus Christ to enable you to do so. God has a wonderful plan for our lives. It is a plan to give us an abundant life of true fulfillment to Him. It is not the fulfillment which the world offers. That is a shallow substitute which only leads to despair. Rather, what Jesus offers us is the ability to be fulfilled in the deepest sense of what man was created to be. He desires to give our lives eternal purpose. He desires that our lives count for something eternal, because we are going to live forever.
Let’s look at several keys that can help or hinder us from appropriating all we can be in Jesus Christ.
The first key is a willing heart. This is where it all begins. Unless we have a willing heart to seek the Lord, we will not even get to first base. Jeremiah 29:13 says, "And you shall seek Me and find Me when you search for Me with all your heart." Deuteronomy 6:5 says, And thou shalt love the Lord Thy God with all thy heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy might."
We are told, in Scripture, to prepare our hearts to seek the Lord. And as we open our hearts to Him, to hear His voice and to be obedient to what we hear, we take the first step towards realizing the potential of what the Lord has for us. We must be willing, not only to hear, but to obey. If we are not willing to obey what we hear, why should God speak to us. In fact, most people who want guidance from the Lord before they decide whether they will obey that guidance, never receive it at all. You see, they have taken themselves out of the position to receive from God. We must have a willing heart.
The second key is an abiding relationship with Christ. John 15:7 has a powerful word for us: "If ye abide in Me and My words abide in you, ye shall ask what ye will and it shall be done unto you."
If we would tap into the power we need to unleash our potential, we must have power in prayer. And in order to have power in prayer, we must have an abiding relationship with Jesus.
He said that we could ask what we will if we are abiding in Him and allowing His words to abide in us. In other words, if we are in harmony with His nature and His word, we are enabled to pray effectively. We can pray with great power. So we need to cultivate the most important relationship the Christian can have – our relationship with Jesus Christ. Whatever else you do as a believer, stay in love with Jesus. All else flows from that love relationship you have with Him. You see, if you love Jesus, all the work you do for Him takes on an entirely different perspective. What you do, you do not simply because of duty, but because you love Him.
The third key is understanding the promises which are ours through Jesus Christ. This is an area where many saints are all but ignorant. But if we are to know who are in Christ and what He has for us to walk in, we must come to know what are His promises.
I heard of a man who had an identity crisis and an energy crisis at the same time. He didn’t know who he was and he was too tired to find out. We must take the time and expend the energy to find out who we are in Christ. And God’s promises tell us who we are.
2 Peter 1:4 gives us this word, "For by these He has granted to us His precious and magnificent promises, in order that by them you might become partakers of the divine nature." 2 Corinthians 1:20 says, "For as many as may be the promises of God, in Him they are yes; wherefore also by Him is our Amen to the glory of God through us."
The promises make us partakers of the divine nature. And all the promises are yes in Christ Jesus. But the only way we are going to know what the promises of God are is to read the Word of God, the Bible, because that is where they are contained.
Let’s suppose that Bill Gates died. He, of course, is the primary stockholder in Microsoft. His stock is worth over 20 billion dollars. Let’s suppose he died and you received word that you have been named as one of the heirs. Now, I know that probably will not happen. But if we are going to dream, let’s dream big. You receive a copy of the will in the mail. Will you read it, even the fine print? You bet you would because you would want to know several important things: The first is how much; the second would be the conditions you would need to meet to claim the inheritance.
But that is precisely what has been done for us. We have been given great promises in God’s book. And it is incredible that Christians do not take the time to find out what is theirs in Christ. All of the promises of God are found in the Bible. Read it.
The fourth key is vision. We all know the Scripture which says, "Without a vision, the people perish." Well, without a vision of what we can become in Christ, we will never begin to try to reach our potential. We will never even think along the lines of being anything other than what we have always been, or doing anything other than what we have always done. We will end up trapped in the same patterns of failure and defeat that have been our experience in the past. And the devil would like for us to believe that we can never be any different.
I heard of an experiment done with a Great Northern Pike. He was placed in a tank, and in that tank were placed minnows, his favorite food. This pike snapped them up so fast you could hardly see his head move. He thought he had died and gone to pike heaven. But then they placed a clear glass cylinder in the tank, and into the cylinder they put more minnows. Of course, the pike went for them, and he bumped his nose. He went again, and again bumped his nose. He tried again and again and again, until he finally got it into his head that those minnows were beyond his reach. So he just settled down to the bottom of the tank. Then they removed the cylinder and the minnows began to swim free. But the pike didn’t try to get even one of them. He had been programmed to believe something that was no longer true. It was true at one time, but it was no longer true. The sad fact was that he didn’t know it.
The devil would like nothing more than for us to believe his lie that we will never accomplish great things for Jesus Christ. He would like to trap us in the past of our experience. He does not want us to come to understand that now the situation has changed. Now in Christ, we can do all things. Now we can have victory where we had defeat. Now we can be the people we never thought we could be.
What we need is a vision. We need to allow God to put a dream in our hearts, in our spirits; a dream of greatness for His glory. We need a vision to reach for. We need a dream to excite us about the future.
Great men and women of God have always been visionaries. They have had dreams born by the Spirit of God which captured their imaginations and led them to higher ground. Every great work for God began as a dream in someone’s heart. Let God put a dream in your heart. He has one for you.
The fifth key is concrete goals born in prayer. We not only need a general vision of what God desires for us to do or be involved in, but we must have a way to get from where we are to where we are going. Psalm 37:23 says, "The steps of a good man are ordered by the Lord." Psalm 119:133 says, "Order my steps in Thy Word." And Proverbs 16:9 says, "A man’s heart deviseth his way; but the Lord directeth his steps."
This is the point at which most people fail. They either set a plan of their own making, without really seeking the mind and will of God, or they set no plan at all because they think it is not spiritual to do so. But if we want to accomplish God’s goals, we need to find out His plan for doing so and get in on it. We must seek God in prayer, for not only the large goals, but the steps along the way. Otherwise, we will flounder. Someone said, "He who is without a list is list-less" That is so true. We need concrete goals for which to shoot.
And the sixth key is hard work. That’s right — hard work. You can have all we’ve mentioned, and yet it will not come to pass unless you put your hand to the work. Remember what James says. He says that faith without works is dead. Hebrews 6:12 says, "That ye be not slothful, but followers of them who through faith and patience, inherit the promises."
The promises are not inherited by a slack hand, but through faith and patient working. We must put our hand to the plow, to break the fallow ground. We must put our hand to the work of the Kingdom to inherit the promises.
What is it the Lord has for you? Have you ever considered that He may have something greater than you could ever imagine? What great work can you do in the Kingdom? Don’t settle for second-best. You don’t have to. God called you knowing all about your limitations and failures. It’s not dependent on your ability, anyway. The work is His to do.
Listen to this word: "I can do all things through Christ who strengthens me." If the word of God is true, then this promise is for you. Every command of God is not a demand upon you, but a demand upon the God who gave the command. For it is His power in us which enables us to fulfill His will for our lives. I believe the Lord would have us aspire for greatness for His glory. We need not settle for second-best when we can be the best we can be through Him.
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