Another parable put he forth unto them, saying, The kingdom of heaven is like to a grain of mustard seed, which a man took, and sowed in his field:
31. which a man took, and sowed ] “Which when it is sown,” St Mark, who thus does not name an agent, the planter of the seed.
in his field ] “into his (own) garden,” St Luke, with special reference to the land of Israel.
Fuente: The Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges
31 33. (1) The Parable of the Mustard Seed. (2) The Parable of the Leaven which leavened the Meal.
(1) Mar 4:30-32. (1) and (2) Luk 13:18-21
The “mystery” or secret of the future contained in these two parables has reference to the growth of the Church; the first regards the growth in its external aspect, the second in its inner working.
Fuente: The Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges
See also Mar 4:30-32. The kingdom of heavens See the notes at Mat 3:2. It means here either piety in a renewed heart or the church. In either case the commencement is small. In the heart it is at first feeble, easily injured, and much exposed. In the church there were few at first, ignorant, unknown, and unhonored; yet soon it was to spread through the world.
Grain of mustard-seed – The plant here described was very different from that which is known among us. It was several years before it bore fruit and became properly a tree. Mustard, with us, is an annual plant: it is always small, and is properly an herb. The Hebrew writers speak of the mustard-tree as one on which they could climb, as on a fig-tree. Its size was much owing to the climate. All plants of that nature grow much larger in a warm climate, like that of Palestine, than in colder regions. The seeds of this tree were remarkably small, so that they, with the great size of the plant, were an apt illustration of the progress of the church and of the nature of faith, Mat 17:20.
I have seen, says Dr. Thomson,this plant on the rich plain of Akkar as tall as the horse and his rider. It has occurred to me on former visits that the mustard-tree of the parable probably grew at this spot, or possibly at Tabiga, near Capernaum, for the water in both is somewhat similar, and so are the vegetable productions. To furnish an adequate basis for the proverb, it is necessary to suppose that a variety of it was cultivated in the time of our Saviour, which grew to an enormous size, and shot forth large branches, so that the fowls of the air could lodge in the branches of it. It may have been perennial, and have grown to a considerable tree; and there are traditions in the country of such so large that a man could climb into them; and after having seen red pepper bushes grow on year after year, into tall shrubs, and the castor-bean line the brooks about Damascus like the willows and the poplars, I can readily credit the existence of mustard-trees large enough to meet all the demands of our Lords parable. – The Land and the Book, vol. ii. p. 101.
Young converts often suppose they have much religion. It is not so. They are, indeed, in a new world. Their hearts glow with new affections. They have an elevation, an ecstasy of emotion, which they may not have afterward like a blind man suddenly restored to sight. The sensation is new and especially vivid, yet little is seen distinctly. His impressions are indeed more vivid and cheering than those of him who has long seen and to whom objects are familiar. In a little time, too, the young convert will see more distinctly, will judge more intelligently, will love more strongly, though not with so much new emotion, and will be prepared to make more sacrifices for the cause of Christ.
Fuente: Albert Barnes’ Notes on the Bible
Mat 13:31-32
The kingdom of heaven is like to a grain of mustard seed,
The mustard seed
I.
The kingdom of heaven in the world is like a mustard seed sown in the ground, both in the smallness of its beginning and the greatness of its increase. The first promise given at the gate of Eden contained the gospel as a seed contains the tree. Never to human eye did the seed seem smaller than at the coming of Christ; the infant in a manger.
II. The kingdom of heaven Is A human heart is like a mustard seed, both in the smallness of its beginning and the greatness of its increase. In the design of God moral qualities hold the first place, physical magnitude is subordinate and instrumental. Origin imperceptible, result great, small on earth, it will be great in heaven. From the diminutive life of grace, the life of glory will grow. The kingdom of darkness also grows gradually from small to great; the first sin a small seed. (W. Arnot.)
A great growth from a small seed
The operation of the same law may be observed in later ages. In the Popish convent at Erfurt a studious young monk sits alone in his cell, earnestly examining an ancient record. The student is Luther, and the book the Bible. He has read many books before, but his reading has never made him wretched till now. In other books he saw other people; but in this book for the first time he saw himself. His own sin, when conscience was quickened and enlightened to discern it, became a burden heavier than he could bear. For a time he was in a horror of rent darkness; but when at last he found the righteousness which is of God by faith, he grew hopeful, happy, and strong. Here is a living seed, but it is very small: an awakened, exercised, conscientious, believing monk, is an imperceptible atom which superstitious multitudes, and despotic princes, and a persecuting priesthood will overlay and smother, as the heavy furrow covers the microscopic mustard-seed. But the living seed burst, and sprang, and pierced through all these coverings. How great it grew and how far it spread history tells to-day. We have cause to thank God for the greatness of the Reformation, and to rebuke ourselves for its smallness. (W. Arnot.)
The grain of mustard seed
I. We are taught by nature that small beginnings are, under God, productive of great ends.
II. We are taught it in the kingdom of providence.
III. We are taught it in the kingdom of grace. In the change produced upon the human heart. In the progress of the gospel (Psa 72:16). (J. Campbell.)
The mustard seed
The kingdom of heaven.
I. Its present apparent insignificance.
II. Its vitality.
III. Its future grandeur. It might seem less likely to prevail and to become a universal benefit, than some other contemporary systems or influences. Christ, as a Jew belonged to the exclusive people. He was rejected by His own people. The few who were attached to Him misunderstood His teaching. After the resurrection His kingdom became slightly more visible. But our Lord was confident even under adverse conditions; His truth was of the nature of a seed. What is the vital element in Christianity but the wisdom and beauty of His teaching. Not the holiness of His life, or the love He showed, but the revelation of God in Him which draws men to Him; in His death our Lord points to the eventual greatness of His kingdom. It has indeed become a tree. To all disheartened in work; we must not measure work by size but by vitality. Have we joined the Church because it is large or because it is living. (M. Dods, D. D.)
Fuente: Biblical Illustrator Edited by Joseph S. Exell
Verse 31. The kingdom of heaven is like to a grain of mustard seed] This parable is a representation of the progress of the Gospel in the world; and of the growth of grace in the soul. That grace which leads the soul to the fulness of glory may begin, and often does, in a single good desire – a wish to escape hell, or a desire to enjoy God in heaven.
Fuente: Adam Clarke’s Commentary and Critical Notes on the Bible
31. Another parable put he forthunto them, saying, The kingdom of heaven is like to a grain ofmustard seed, which a man took, and sowed in his field;
Fuente: Jamieson, Fausset and Brown’s Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible
Another parable put he forth unto them, saying,…. As the former parable sets forth the condition of the Gospel church state until the end of the world; this expresses the small beginnings of it, and the large increase and growth of it, and its great usefulness to the saints.
The kingdom of heaven is like to a grain of mustard seed, which a man took and sowed in his field: by “the kingdom of heaven” is meant, as before, the Gospel dispensation, or the Gospel church state, and the ministry of the word, and the administration of ordinances in it: by the grain of mustard seed, either the Gospel, or the people of God, or the grace of God in them; and by the man that took and sowed it, the Lord Jesus Christ; and by his field, in which he sowed it, the world, or his church throughout the world.
Fuente: John Gill’s Exposition of the Entire Bible
Is like ( ). Adjective for comparison with associative instrumental as in Matt 13:13; Matt 13:44; Matt 13:45; Matt 13:47; Matt 13:52.
Grain of mustard seed ( ). Single grain in contrast with the collective (17:20).
Took and sowed ( ). Vernacular phrasing like Hebrew and all conversational style. In Koine.
Fuente: Robertson’s Word Pictures in the New Testament
THIRD KINGDOM OF HEAVEN PARABLE GRAIN OF MUSTARD SEED V. 31,32
1) “Another parable put he forth unto them, saying,” (allen parabolen paretheken autois legon) “Another parable he set before them (the masses) saying,” explaining.
2) “The kingdom of heaven is like to a grain of mustard seed,” (homoia estin he basileia ton ouranon kokko sinapeos) “The kingdom of heaven (or the church) is similar to a grain of mustard;” It had a small beginning, as an executive of the will and work of Jesus, when Jesus began calling and choosing and setting a functioning fellowship of His followers in order, for service and worship, in Galilee, Mat 4:18-22; Act 1:22; Joh 15:16; Joh 15:26.
3) “Which a man took,” (hon labon anthropos) “Which a man, upon taking,” or when he had taken; That man was Jesus Christ, the Son of man. The grain of mustard seed is that church institution, a mystery to those former ages, Rom 16:25-26; Eph 3:3-9.
4) “And sowed in his field:” (espeiren en to argo autou) “He sowed in his field,” as he sent them as apostles and lay-workers in His New Covenant church fellowship, called “The Kingdom of heaven,” in using a familiar Hebrew term of governmental jurisdiction, Mat 10:5-28; Joh 20:21.
Fuente: Garner-Howes Baptist Commentary
By these parables Christ encourages his disciples not to be offended and turn back on account of the mean beginnings of the Gospel. We see how haughtily profane men despise the Gospel, and even turn it into ridicule, because the ministers by whom it is preached are men of slender reputation and of low rank; because it is not instantly received with applause by the whole world; and because the few disciples whom it does obtain are, for the most part, men of no weight or consideration, and belong to the common people. This leads weak minds to despair of its success, which they are apt to estimate from the manner of its commencement. On the contrary, the Lord opens his reign with a feeble and despicable commencement, for the express purpose, that his power may be more fully illustrated by its unexpected progress. (222)
The kingdom of God is compared to a grain of mustard, which is the smallest among the seeds, but grows to such a height that it becomes a shrub, in which the birds build their nests. It is likewise compared to leaven, which, though it may be small in amount, spreads its influence in such a manner, as to impart its bitterness to a large quantity of meal. (223) If the aspect of Christ’s kingdom be despicable in the eyes of the flesh, let us learn to raise our minds to the boundless and incalculable power of God, which at once created all things out of nothing, and every day raises up things that are not, (1Co 1:28,) in a manner which exceeds the capacity of the human senses. Let us leave to proud men their disdainful laugh, till the Lord, at an unexpected hour, shall strike them with amazement. Meanwhile, let us not despond, but rise by faith against the pride of the world, till the Lord give us that astonishing display of his power, (224) of which he speaks in this passage.
The word leaven is sometimes taken in a bad sense, as when Christ warns them to
beware of the leaven of the Pharisees and of the Sadducees, (Mat 16:11😉
and when Paul says, that
a little leaven leaveneth the whole lump, (1Co 5:6.)
But here the term must be understood simply as applying to the present subject. As to the meaning of the phrase, the kingdom of God, and the kingdom of heaven, we have spoken on former occasions.
(222) “ A fin que sa puissance soit tant mieux cognue, quand on verra les avancemens qu’on n’avoit iamais attendus;” — “in order that his power may be so much the better known, when the progress, which had not been anticipated, shall be seen.”
(223) “ Qu’il fait aigrir et lever une grande quantite de paste;” — “that it embitters and causes to rise a large quantity of paste.”
(224) “ Iuques a ce que le Seigneur nous face sentir l’effect de cette vertu incomprehensible;” — “till the Lord make us feel the effect of that incomprehensible power.”
Fuente: Calvin’s Complete Commentary
THE FOUR PARABLES OF THE FIELD
Mat 13:24-30; Mat 13:36-40; Mat 13:31-32; Mat 13:44-46.
THE ministry of Jesus Christ was matchless in many ways. His words so amazed men that they said, Never man spake like this Man; His works so impressed them that they remarked, We never saw it on this wise; and His ministry was so many-sided that it seemed inexplicable, and in astonishment, they asked, Is not this the carpenter, the son of Joseph?
A few years ago, two of our greatest theological seminaries came into prominent debate. One of them proudly affirmed itself engaged in the larger task of making men ready for the metropolitan pastorates of America, and the other insisted that it was seeking to equip men for any station to which they might be called, high or low, communities of culture or of comparative ignorance, city-centers or country-districts.
The latter had evidently undertaken the larger task. The man who is equally adapted to open country and crowded city; the man who can compel audience in either place, is the unusual man the Spurgeon of his century, the Moody of the moment. Only the truly great can easily adapt themselves to violent changes and varying circumstances. The centuries have known no man who had such messages for the metropolis as did the Man from Nazareth, and yet, perhaps, the greater portion of His ministry was given to the open country, and to the industrial classes. He went to the men in the fields and taught them the greatest moral truths by employing the parables of the field.
To four of these we call attention today: the Parable of the Tares, the Parable of the Mustard Seed, the Parable of the Hid Treasure, and the Pearl of Great Price. In these four we find no disconnected argument, but a logical exposition of the Kingdom of God.
The first presents The KingdomOpposition; the second, The KingdomApostasy; and the third and fourth, The KingdomPurchase.
THE KINGDOMOPPOSITION.
Mat 13:24-30.
This parable, like that of the sower, Christ interpreted to His disciples (Mat 13:36-43), and thereby provided us with the second illustration of how to interpret parables. By this interpretation He gives such an exposition of the Kingdom-Opposition as clearly reveals the contending forces, the continued conflict, and the Christians conquest.
The contending forces! The Son of Man on the one side; Satan on the other. The children of the Kingdom on the one side; the children of the wicked one on the other. These indeed are the Captains and armies of all centuries. By comparison, they dwarf to insignificance those that have ever assembled under any other leaders, or for that matter, all other leaders; or contended for any other, or all other fields; or fought over any other, or all other subjects of division. John Milton, in his Paradise Lost sees the beginning of this battle in rebellion raised in heaven by him who set himself in glory beyond his peers, and trusted to have equalled the most High if He opposed; who, with ambitious aim, raised impious war in heaven and battle proud. But it took a Christ to properly depict it. What war! The whole world as the prize of the contention! The Son of God, and all good men on one side; Satan and his every duped subject on the other!
Christs interpretation of this parable is a death-knell of a good deal of New Theology! The universal Fatherhood of God is not found here! Men are divided into two camps rather, the children of the Kingdom, and the children of the wicked one. The first, begotten of Gods own will, by the Word of Truth (Jas 1:18), and made good seed, children of God by being born again, not of corruptible seed, but of incorruptible, by the Word of God (1Pe 1:23). The second are of their father, the devil (Joh 8:44), not alone because conceived and shapen in iniquity, but by the wilful choice, having made Beelzebub their Captain.
Christs interpretation of this parable is a blow to the universal brotherhood of which men speak. The children of the Kingdom and the children of the wicked one, while they may be of one blood in natural generation, are made to be of altogether different spirit by the regeneration of the former and the degeneration of the latter.
We meet people quite often who tell us they see very little difference between the members of the professing church and the men and women of the world. To this it is sufficient to reply, first of all, that the phrase the professing church is not identical with the phrase the children of God. And second, the tares and wheat look much alike, to a certain point, but when the tares bloom, then they become not only distinguishable, but prove themselves possessed of a peculiar poison which is borne about over the true wheat destroying even its fruitage. So it is in the Kingdom of God! The blight of many a Christians life, the loss of many a believers power is directly traceable to his too-close contact with the opposition. That is why the Apostle Paul wrote:
Be ye not unequally yoked together with unbelievers, for what fellowship hath righteousness with unrighteousness, and what communion hath light with darkness. And what concord hath Christ with Belial, or what part hath he that believeth with an infidel?
Little wonder that he quotes his Lord as saying, Come ye out from among them and be ye separate.
The continued conflict! The contention of these forces is not for a day. Satan will not easily quit the field; the Son of Man will never surrender. The children of the Kingdom multiply; the children of the wicked one increase. No Christian rightly estimates the enemy if he believes that a generation will see the whole world Christianized by present methods; and the Haeckel-Atheist, who thinks that tomorrow will witness the surrender of the faith once for all delivered, the repudiation of the Bible, and the collapse of the church, is so puny a seer as to be the subject of scornful pity. When Satan undertook the capture of the world, he originated a conflict, the continuance and end of which he himself could scarcely have dreamed. It is easier to raise rebellion than it is to bring it to an end; it is easier to start war than it is to proclaim peace; it is easier to produce weeds than to grow wheat; but the harvest of the former is frightful to contemplate. Phillip and Edward III could go to battle over throne and crown, but all their followers could not produce peace, or even keep treaties when once they had been made; and so for 116 years, from 1337 to 1453, long after both these men had lain in their graves, the battles waxed and war between France and England went on. Think also of the thirty years war, shorter in duration, but more extensive in territory. It involved Austria; it reached England; it covered Holland; it affected Saxony; it swept to Spain; it compassed Switzerland and Sweden; in fact, the known world was caught in its sanguinary swirl. But what are the 116 years beside the thousands on thousands in which the forces of this parable have been in conflict; and what is battle in a dozen of the little states of Europe as compared with the battle that has been waged on every continent and in every island between Christ and the good seed on the one side, and the devil and every degenerate follower on the other?
There are those who would make short work of this. They would turn the trick of the Turk and put to death those who did not agree with them; or of the Papist and shed the blood of all such as spoke not their shibboleth; or even as the Protestants who sent to the stake Servetus and his allies. But their conduct is not of the Christ, Let both grow together until the harvest.
What did Christ mean then, that the church was not to engage in discipline at all; that the unruly were not to answer to officers; that transgressors were never to be brought to trials; that irreconcilibles were never to be excluded? Remember that Christ is not here talking of church discipline at all, but of the great world-field into which the children of the Kingdom and the children of the adversary are to continue to be sown, and to stand side by side and to bear their respective fruits, and to do silent battle till He send forth His angels to cut short the work by gathering degenerates to judgment. This is Christs protest against coercion in the name of Christianity; and this is Christs repudiation for the post-millennial philosophy that the Kingdom will speedily come through social reconstruction, ethical philosophy, and moral reformation.
On the one hand, the Kingdom will never come by the proclamation of the Evangel. The King Himself must come and exalt righteousness and bring unrighteousness to judgment. At the close of summer, there comes a season when the wheat can be separated from the chaff; when the one can be gathered into barns and the other assigned to the flames; so will there be a harvest in the end of the world, when Christ, by His angels, shall gather out His own and judge His opponents.
The Christians conquest!
Then shall the righteous shine forth as the sun in the Kingdom of their Father.
There are those who upon every observation on the battle between light and darkness, sin and righteousness, the Saviour and Satan, grow discouraged and become pessimistic. They believe that the battle has gone against the Church of God already, and that eventually it will go against the Christian faith, and against Christian fellowshipthe cohorts of God. There is no danger! Prophecy is the mould of history! The defeat of the devil is as certain today as is the destiny of the Son of Man; the overthrow of His followers as sure as the march of time! The consummation of the age will see the conquest of Christ and His hosts, and it will be complete. In the struggle between light and darkness, life and death, the Son of Man and the Satan of the centuries, the victories shall be to the former. Monkhouse, in his magnificent sonnet, depicts the battle after this manner:
From morn to eve they struggleLife and Death,At first it seemed to me that they in mirth Contended, and as foes of equal worth,So firm their feet, so undisturbed their breath.
But when the sharp red sun cut through its sheath Of western clouds, I saw the brown arms girth Tighten and bear that radiant form to earth,And suddenly both fell upon the heath.
And then the wonder came; for when I fled To where those great antagonists down fell,I could not find the body that I sought,And when and where it went, I could not tell;One only form was left of those who fought,The long dark form of Deathand it was dead.
Then shall the righteous shine forth as the sun in the Kingdom of their Father.
It is the day of the mighty conquest of the Son of God, and the manifestation of the sons of God.
THE KINGDOMAPOSTASY.
In passing from the parable of the tares to that of the mustard seed, we have our attention turned from the KingdomOpposition, to the Kingdom Apostasy. I am compelled to consent with those who so interpret this parable as to bring it largely into line with its predecessorsthe parable of the sower, and the parable of the tares. To be sure, it suggests the rapid and even the unexpected growth of the Kingdom, but it also hints that in that very growth is a sign of weakness rather than of strength, of conflict rather than conquest. We believe it is not straining of Scripture to see in this parable the fungus growth, the false appearance and the foul lodgers.
The fungus growth! Campbell Morgan insists that it is unusual for the mustard seed to become a tree; and yet admits that there are exceptional instances. It is unusual for cotton to become trees, but it does so, south of the frost-line. Credible writers declare that in hot countries, with moist atmospheres and rich soil, mustard, like cotton, becomes a perennial; and instances are even cited in which a mans weight could be supported by the branches; and in the season of its fruitage, birds flocked into it both to feed and rest.
The churchthe Kingdom in embryostarting from the first disciples of Jesus, small indeed in pretence and prophecy, found itself at the end of the first century an institution of might, and in the fourth century, under Constantine, sent its branches into all the world. And whatever may be said concerning the genuine growth and progress marking the first century, few thoughtful folk outside of Rome could be found who would approve the ample proportions of the fourth century churchproposed as a world-kingdom. It was only because that seed of the Pseudo-Kingdom was fertilized with the worlds wealth, and enveloped with the worlds atmosphere, and cultivated by the worlds husbandman, that it took on such proportions, and by its very growth brought its own name into disrepute, and raised the question as to its genuine character.
The false appearance! The mustard under certain circumstances, assumed to be more than it was. It belongs to the herbs; its very texture is not woody; and yet, its pretence is that of a tree. It professes what it does not possess. The phraseology of religion at the present moment falls into the same hypocrisy. Men talk glibly of the Kingdom of God, praise its proportions, reckon up its millions of subjects, prophesy its speedy conquest on the last continent and island, and all with a show, but without the substance, of truth. There is no such Kingdom. There is not even a Christian nation in the world! Every time you speak of one such, you coerce language. There are nations partially civilized by the touch of Christianity; but even in these, the majority are outside of the church, and the overwhelming majority have no kinship to the Kingdom of God. The three or four hundred millions of people who are in the professing church would be terribly reduced in number if there were applied any Christian test. The so-called Christian governments of the world, in their greed of territory, and in their conscienceless commerce, are illustrating a new cannibalism, more refined, perhaps, but not less consuming than that of the old savagery. R. F. Horton, the higher critic, is hardly chargeable with chiliasm, and yet, he says, The sorrow of history is the comparative rareness of humanity in it. And he adds, Our own government is partially humane because it is partially Christian. Some faint aroma of justice and mercy and truth is in our state apartments because the Son of Man has passed through them. The same writer remarked, Heaven is a state in which the will of God is entirely done; and earth is a place in which the will of God is habitually violated. The present constituted society is, as Trench remarks, like that of the ark, where unclean and clean mingle; like that of the pasture, the goats and the sheep are together; like that of the threshing floor, the chaff and the grain are mixed; like that of the field, the tares and the wheat growing together. At present, it is like the mustard seed, tree-like in appearance, but weed-like in nature and character.
The foul lodgers,
The birds of heaven come and lodge in the branches thereof.
There are two interpretations of this sentence, both of which, in my judgment, are correct. One set of teachers see in this sentence the beautiful shadowing and sustaining character of the Church of God. The worlds needy may find a refuge in it, be sheltered and fed by it; and some have even reminded us that the mustard seed is more than food; it is medicine. Thereby they have made their appeal that the church recognize its social obligations, and intelligently enter into the discharge of them.
Another class of interpreters say, No, birds in the preceding parable were agents of the adversary, and in other parts of Scripture, are commonly described as unclean, and the sentence suggests the great fact that the Church of God essaying to be a world-kingdom has been taken possession of by the unregenerate, who build their foul nests in its branches and bring up their broods under its shadow, and turn its beneficent character to the ends of commercial advantage, so that church-membership and corporate wealth are related the one to the other as birds are related to the hospitable, fruitful boughs.
Both are correct! The Kingdom of God, so far as it voices itself at all in that Church, which is preparing the way for it, should be a refuge to the worlds needy, clean or unclean. Jesus Christ was no canting Pharisee. He hesitated not to stretch out His hand of help to even the demonized; and He drew not His skirts about Him when the strange woman sought His counsel and begged His forgiveness. The Church of God that does not provide for the downs and outs, the branches of which suggest neither lodging nor food, nor medicine for the worlds children, is a poor representative of the Christ who received sinners, and did more than eat with them; He fed, counselled and healed them. Truly, as Bruce remarks, The choice few are to seek the good of the many; the fit are to strive to help the unfit. This is their special vocation, and when they cease to do it, they themselves become useless and reprobate!
Yet the other interpretation is equally and even more true. The very methods by which men in modern times have been rapidly increasing the growth of the church, are calculated to call the world into its membership, so that the unregenerate, in the interests of social standing and for the sake of commercial advantage, are joining themselves to the same. A minister told me that he had lost three of his best families to a wealthy neighboring church of the same denomination; that they had deliberately pulled them off through social functions, which tempted women whose husbands were men of moderate means, by offering them a fellowship with the wives of millionaires. This gives an appearance of the coming of the Kingdom, but no promise of it, save as it is a part of the apostasy that is to characterize the consummation of the age.
THE KINGDOM-PURCHASE.
The third and fourth of these field parables look to the Kingdom purchasethe purchase of the hid treasure and the peerless pearl of great price.
The hid treasure!
Again, the Kingdom of Heaven is like unto treasure hid in a field; the which when a man hath found he hideth, and for joy thereof goeth and selleth all that he hath, and buyeth that field.
A part of this parable has been interpreted for us already. The field is the world; the man is Christ; the price paid is His precious Blood. But what is the treasure hid?
Sometimes God hides from the wise and prudent that which He proposes to show to babes. I have read within the week from the pens of almost a dozen men attempting the interpretation of the hid treasure. Many of them were great men, but I found from the pen of one of less learning and less pretense the most intelligent interpretation, namely, that Israel is the hid treasure. Again and again in the Old Testament, she is called Gods treasure, and that she is hidden away now, in the nations, neither students of history nor prophecy can possibly dispute; and that Christ paid the price of His life for the whole world, knowing that by so doing He could win, first of all, His own, dearer to Him than all othersthe treasure, the very attractions of which brought Him from Heaven to earth, is the truth of many a text. Let one read Jer 32:37-42, and let him ponder Eze 37:21-25, and listen to the Psalmist while he sings also (Psa 135:4),
For the Lord hath chosen Israel for His peculiar treasure (Exo 19:5).
Paul loved his people with all the ardor of a Jew, and he could say,
I could wish myself accursed from Christ for my brethren, my kinsmen according to the flesh, who are Israelites.
But Christ loved them even better, and He put His all upon the altar that they might be saved.
The peerless pearl!
Again the Kingdom of Heaven is like unto a merchant seeking goodly pearls, who, when he had found one pearl of great price, went and sold all that he had and bought it.
The jewels of Jesus will come out of the Gentile world. If the converts of Paul were his joy and his rejoicing, the Gentile converts to Christ shall shine forth with a brilliance beyond the sun in that day when He makes up His jewels. Truly one is justified in changing the hymn and making it read not
Ive found the pearl of greatest price,My heart doth sing for joy,
but rather,
He found the pearl of greatest price,My heart doth sing for joy,And sing I must for I am His And He is mine for aye.
The price paid in each of these purchases is the same: For the hid treasure all that he hath; for the goodly pearl, all that he had. When Christ redeemed Israel, it took all that He had; when Christ redeemed the Gentile world, it cost all that He had. The purchases are not two different ones made at different times; they are the same purchase! God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son, and Christ so loved the world that He gave Himself, and the world is the Jew and the Gentile.
This purchase was not the barter of a man who was buying something from the Adversary, for Satan never owned the world. As its God, he is a usurper; and the transaction is not that of a son, who is trying to come into the selfish possession as against his fathers ownership, for, from the beginning, the world has belonged to Jesus. He made it. Without Him was not anything made that was made. This buying back, then, is the barter of the goelprecious purchase of redemption. In the Old Testament, when for any reason whatever, an estate was lost to the household, the son who was able to redeem it, did so; or if the members of a family went into slavery, the relative who could accomplish it, paid the price of their freedom. Oh, what a Son in the house of our Father, and what a kinsman in the Christ of Calvary! When my Heavenly estate was forfeited absolutely and I was in spiritual bankruptcy; yea, when I had fallen into the power of the enemy and was stripped of my citizenship, destroyed and stained, He appeared as my kinsman to pay the price and make me free. He is the Goel; He is the Redeemer! Truly, as one says, His very Name delivers a message and it is this: dark, defiled, demon-haunted spirit, black with venom and despair; you, the worst of men, you are a man, therefore the Son of Man does not despair of you. Rather, He has set His heart on saving you. He has come to seek and to save that which is lost. Herein is the ground of our hope, the occasion of our confidence, the answer to our need, the redemption from our defilement, the release from our captivity, the establishment of our citizenship in the Kingdom, the pledge of our eternal heritage with Him who loved us and gave Himself for us.
Len Broughton tells of a friend he knew in youth who was always seeking, but could never find the Lord. On one occasion, Dr. Broughton went back to preach in the country neighborhood. This young man rushed up to him, flung his arms about him and expressed his joy in seeing him again, and Dr. Broughton said, You are to spend the night with me, and he said, No, I must go back home to my wife and children. Well, just send word you are going to spend the night with me. He did so, and we went back into the old room where we used to frolic in bed at night, where we had kicked each other out of bed a hundred times. There in that old bed, once more boys, I said to him, Have you ever found Jesus? He hesitated a moment before he said, No! Have you continued to seek Him? Yes, and I expect to be seeking Him until I die! I will never give up. I said, Why havent you found Him? I do not know! I have thought of your being a preacher and wondered why it was that I just could not find Jesus. I have tried as hard as you ever did and as hard as anybody ever did. I said, Will you let me tell you the secret of it? Yes, if you can. You have not found Jesus because you have not realized the fact that all this time and even before you began to seek Jesus, He was seeking you. It didnt take hold of him at first. He asked me some questions about it, and I put it to him again. Jesus is seeking you. He came to this world to seek and to save that which was lost. Are you lost? Of course I am. Well, He is seeking you, instead of your seeking Him; you have been running from Him, thinking that you were seeking Him. You were seeking something else besides Jesus. You have been seeking feeling; you have been seeking somebody elses experience. Jesus has been seeking you; now stop running after experience and let Jesus find you right here and now. I gave him Joh 3:16, For God so loved the world, that He gave His only begotten San, that whosoever believeth on Him should not perish, but have everlasting life. In a moment or two I felt an arm slip around my neck and he began to cry; but it was not the cry of the seeker; it was the rejoicing cry of the saved. There in that bed, where we had frolicked in childhood days, he stopped running after an experience and simply let Jesus find him.
Fuente: The Bible of the Expositor and the Evangelist by Riley
CRITICAL NOTES
Mat. 13:31. Mustard seed.It is disputed whether the allusion is to the Sinapis or common mustard plant, or to the Salvadora Persica of European botanists. Dean Plumptre suggests that the name was probably used widely for any plant that had the pungent flavour of mustard. Dr. W. M. Thomson remarks that the mustard seed was the smallest of the seeds which the husbandman was accustomed to sow, while the plant, when full grown, was larger than any other herb in his garden (see R.V., greater than the herbs). Of the Salvadora Persica Dr. Royle says: The nature of the plant is to become arboreous, and thus it will form a large shrub, or a tree, twenty-five feet high, under which a horseman may stand, when the soil and climate are favourable. It produces numerous branches and leaves, under which birds may and do take shelter, as well as build their nests; and its seeds are used for the same purposes as mustard. Proverbial sayings of the Rabbins which take the mustard seed as the representative of smallest objects are collected by Wetstein.
MAIN HOMILETICS OF THE PARAGRAPH.Mat. 13:31-33
The growth of truth.These two parables are regarded by some persons as a kind of counteractive to the preceding two. In the parable of the sower we are warned not to expect fruit from every description of soil. In the parable of the tares we are taught that there may be evil fruit even where good fruit is produced. What we seem now taught is that, even so, there is another side to the case. Truth will grow and the gospel prevail, notwithstanding these drawbacks. This will be the case, first, in the world. This will be the case, next, in mens hearts. So (with many) we understand the two parables now before us.
I. In the world.On this point the parable of the mustard seed is thought to instruct us the most. The truth of the gospel has already been compared to a seed. In that comparison there are more than one seeds of hope, as it were. There is one such, e.g., in what we see of the nature of seed, specially of such a seed as that specified now. Proverbially small as the mustard seed was, we yet see in it, as we see in all other seed, a thing meant to increase. We see in this seed, indeed, a thing meant to increase in a proverbially remarkable way. So much so, that, in few cases is there a greater difference in magnitude between beginning and end. Witness what was true about it in connection with the birds of the air. Not improbably only such eyes as theirs could see it at first. Afterwards even whole flocks of them could find shelter in its branches. That was an exact picture of what was to be true of gospel truth in the world. Utterly insignificant as it might appear at first amongst other influences in the world, it would so grow in time that many of those other influences would be glad of its protection at last. This is to be true, alsohere is another ground of hopefrom the very nature of growth. How does the mustard seed grow in the ground? Only, as it wereapart from Divine influencethrough that which belongs to itself. Certainly it owes nothing, in this way, to the wisdom, or skill, or might of the hand which casts it into the ground. All the materials, on the contrary, necessary for its increase, it collects for itself. All the energies, also, necessary for assimilating and transmuting that which it collects, it contains in itself. Given only the soil, in fact, and the requisite heat and proper humidity, and that tiny seed will ultimately build itself up into its farthest subsequent growth. And even so is it, again, with that truth of God of which that seed is a figure. Gods creative hand has given it such intrinsic force that it is able to grow of itself (cf. Mar. 4:28). And nothing is wanting, therefore, on mans part, except to give it the opportunity for so doing. A great encouragement, indeed, when we remember the magnitude of the task which it has to accomplish; and a sure ground of confidence among all the difficulties and hindrances of the case.
II. In mens hearts.Here the other parable, that of the leaven, is considered to teach us the most. And a new figure is supposed to be used because both a new locality and new exigencies are here referred to. A previous parable (Mat. 13:18-23) showed us what were the chief obstacles to the growth of truth in mens hearts, viz. want of attention, want of consideration, want of thorough sincerity. In this parable we seem taught how that truth itself is calculated to overcome them. For what does leaven do, when hid as here, in a collection of meal of the ordinary amount of three measures? It begins at once to turn the portion next it into that which is identical with itself. And, having so begun, it goes on, naturally, to do the same in the rest of the lump, working through all, and by all, everywhere, till the whole is leavened. The word of God is calculated to do just the same with regard to mans heart. Once hid there, there is a power about it which tends to assimilate all it finds there to itself; and to do this, also, in an increasing degree, till it has assimilated all to itself. And that, also, whatever the nature of the hand which hid it therein. This is thought to be the reason why we are told here, finally, that the leaven was employed by a womanthe usual agent to be employed in all cases of this kind. The thing, in a word, for our thoughts to fix on is the leaven itself. The entrance of Thy Word giveth light (Psa. 119:130).
If these interpretations of these two parables are accepted, one cannot but admire the wonderful way in which experience has fulfilled them.
1. In the world.Every record of sustained missionary effort has illustrated the parable of the mustard seed. Most of all has the history of the church at large. What was the gospel when this parable was spoken? In the eyes of the world a thing too small to be seen. What is it now? With all drawbacks, with all rivalries, with all corruptions and treacheries, the mightiest force upon earth.
2. In the heart.The story of the leaven has been the story of every converted soul from the first. Sanctify them through Thy truth; Thy word is truth (Joh. 17:17). That has been the assimilating energy which has wholly leavened the lump (cf. Psa. 119:11; Psa. 37:31).
HOMILIES ON THE VERSES
Mat. 13:31-33. Parables of the mustard seed and the leaven.We are now to see Christianity from the inside, as a hidden life which must put forth its own indwelling strength, and make its own way in the world. A little attention to the two emblems before us will show that this is the central idea common to both. Yet each presents that truth on a different side.
1. The parable of the mustard seed.When our Lord first spoke of seed He meant by it the word of God. Next, He used it for those men themselves in whom Gods word quickens a religious life. Now you have, instead of numerous and separate corn-seeds in the field, one single seed only, which bears the many branches of Gods great kingdom upon a single stem, to be nurtured from one root. By this last modification of the emblem, are we not carried down to the ultimate fact that, though Christians are many, they are but one after all in the secret source of their life? That the kingdom of the church is a unity springing from the solitary Seed-corn who flung Himself into this worlds soil, and died that He might bear upon Himself the entire spiritual fruitage of humanity as a vine bears shoots and grapes? Here we have, at least, one beautiful and suggestive lesson in the first parable, which is absent or less obtrusive in the other. For the lump of dough, even when leavened, though it may be made into one loaf, possesses no such living unity as belongs to a plant. We measure roughly with the eye the power of growth which resides in a plant by the disproportion we discover betwixt the smallness of the seed and the largeness of the perfect plant. Now of this the mustard formed an excellent, familiar instance. On this point of comparison rests the stress of the parable. Christianity is not only a creation of the Saviours own life, it is the work and monument of the most extraordinary spiritual force we know.
II. The parable of the leaven.Both parables represent progress; but in the mustard seed progress means growth, in the leaven it means change. Again, we have a small beginning and a large result. The real point of consequence is the alteration of the mass into a new character through a foreign substance introduced into the heart of it. What our attention is now to be fixed upon is, that the gospel works upon human society, not merely grows up within it. It grows by altering and assimilating what it finds. It is a regenerating principle, transforming into its own character the nature and the lives of men. One can readily see how a system so many-sided as the kingdom of God should be incapable of exhaustive treatment under any single emblem. Yet the use of this particular emblem must strike us as strange. For it was very closely associated in a Jews mind, not with grace but with sin. How came our Lord to employ the same figure which had for ages set forth the permeating power of sin, to set forth the permeating power of grace? Was it for this reason that simply to cast out the old leaven, were that possible, would be inadequate? The gospel is not a merely negative process. There is a new leaven as well as an old. There is need for the new to undo and reverse the action of the old.
Lessons
1. The source of Christian life is not in me, it is not in my fellow Christian; it is in the Root that beareth both of us.
2. The life of Christ, if it is to do its work upon us, must do it in the way of change and overcoming.
3. It is by individual effort and personal influence that the blessing spreads.J. O. Dykes, D.D.
Mat. 13:31-32. Rise and progress of the church.
I. Compare the insignificance of Christianity at first.
1. Unostentatious worship.
2. Simple teaching.
3. Social position of Apostles.
4. Small number of disciples.
II. Careful planting of Christianity.
1. A single seed taken.
2. Designedly sown.
3. In a chosen place.
III. Rapid growth of Christianity.See history of church in first three or four centuries.
IV. Phenomena consequent thereupon.Birds come.
1. Men who first opposed come for their own ends.
2. Men for their salvation.
3. Christians lodge there, and draw others, as singing birds attract by their song.J. C. Gray.
Mat. 13:33.Leaven.
I. The working of evil.As our Lords eye travelled over the field of common life it rested on one phenomenon, which, habitual and ordinary as it was, nevertheless had a look in it of something abnormal and sinisterthe working of leaven. This did not seem at first sight to belong to the more regular processes of nature. Mans imagination had been long struck here by a likeness to something dark and ominous and evilthis strange disturbance into which the natural substances are thrown by the arrival of this alien matter. What did it express? Was it healthy? Was it not typical, rather, of disease and corruption? It looked so uncanny, so uncomfortable. This mysterious tumultsurely, men said, here is the very picture of what we mean by the nature of sin. They might use it, indeed, for the homeliest affairs, but still it had become to them a type of evil; its working seemed to embody the dreadful character of the mystery of evil, so proverbially it had a sinister significance, and the Bible always, with this one exception, uses it with this meaning. Know ye not, saith St. Paul, that a little leaven leaveneth the whole lump? So he spoke as if he detected in the Corinthian church the germ of some hateful growththat sin which they had moving in their midst as a focus of fermentation, a spot of disease spreading and festering till its restless irritation, its feverish energy would be felt everywhere. Do ye not know well how a little leaven leaveneth the whole lump? Or, again, Beware of the leaven of the Pharisees. So our Lord Himself used the metaphor. Leaven would obviously image that working of the spirit of the Pharisees, that spirit which so insidiously crept in unseen within the very heart of goodness, within the very core of the moral will, and thence it sent its noxious, turbid, infected motions, till, like an evil possession, it permeated the entire man. Beware of that leaven. And then how deeply was this impression intensified by the sacred memory of the Jews great feast of deliverance, the Feast of the Passover. There, at that hour of high thanksgiving, in grateful remembrance of the redemption that once for all brought them up out of the darkness of Egypt, the Jew was summoned year after year, to cast out of his house every fragment of the evil leaven that recalled the black days of sin and servitude. Such was the Jews natural memory of leaven, and we can well understand what force it would lend to St. Pauls appeal to this ancient feeling as he bade those Corinthians Purge out the old leaven that ye may be a new lump, as ye are unleavened, etc. (1Co. 5:7-8). Leaven was popularly, was instinctively, a metaphor that suggested the mystery of iniquity, the working of evil.
II. The beginning of good.But our Lord, as His eyes rested on its familiar use, as He caught sight of this or that woman inserting the little piece of sour dough into two or three large measures of meal, saw a symbol, a type which He might use for the portrait of His own kingdom. This, you say, is the well-known way in which evil creeps. Well, it is a strangely effectual way, it is typically complete; why not turn it to good use?
III. The leaven in the church.If we turn our eyes to what claims to embody and represent the kingdom of heaven, we need again and again to recur to this parable. For here, too, there is such a huge mass of matter involved that has suffered no change to pass over it; it lies there within the church, sluggish and heavy. How little the surface of this church speaks of the spiritual thrill that is alive within it; how much of it is blindly unconscious of the secret it enshrines! God can be patient as the woman that watches the three measures of meal. A little leaven will at last, if you give it time, leaven the whole lump. Christ is our leaven. That is our sole security, and that security is alsolute.Canon H. Scott-Holland.
Leaven as a symbol of Christianity.
I. Christianity is really alive.Careful investigation has shown that the process of fermentation entirely depends upon the presence and growth of certain living organisms forming the ferment (Roscoe). Christianity is itself a living, breathing presence, not a mere dull, dead thing; a life not a book; a Person, and that Person our Friend and Saviour, our Reconciliation and our Rest, our Hope and our Victory. The rule of God is not like a set of parchment laws stored in the archives of a government library; not like a telephone dependent upon the skill and activity of the worker; not like an empire directed by an absentee ruler; no it is like leaven, it is alive.
II. Christianity is at work as well as alive. It is characteristic of leaven to show an almost insatiable greed of activity. It is a type of stupendous increase. The globular or oval corpuscles which float so thickly in the yeast as to make it muddy, though the largest are not more than one two-thousandth of an inch in diameter, and the smallest may measure less than one seven-thousandth of an inch, are living organisms. They multiply with great rapidity by giving off minute buds, which soon attain the size of their parent, and then either become detached or remain united, forming compound globules. Yeast will increase indefinitely when grown in the dark (Huxley). In no point is the Teachers simile better sustained by facts than in the unspeakable and irrepressible activity of the gospel. It is a living force.
III. Christianity, like leaven, works in a congenial and much assisting sphere.It is hid in meal, the material which has an affinity for it and upon which it is specially fitted to act. The leaven is placed where it is wanted, where it can work, and where it can work with success. Leaven is not better suited to work in meal than Christ in mens hearts for their salvation.
IV. The most distinguishing feature of leaven is that it leavens the meal in the midst of which it is placed.So the most characteristic effect of Christianity is that it christianises men; it assimilates them to Christ by filling them with the life of Christ. He puts His life into each part of a man.
1. The life of His thoughts into his thinking.
2. The life of His love into his heart.
3. The life of His righteousness into his conscience.
4. The life of His obedience into his will.
V. The leaven moreover is hidden in the meal, and all the work it does, it does secretly.Christs best, most real, and most powerful work is always unseen.
VI. But it advances victoriously and totally.Till the whole is leavened. It is so in:
1. The individual.
2. Nations. Christ speaks of a woman as putting the leaven into the meal. Does He thereby indicate that Christianity is to be propagated by the winning forces of tenderness, and sympathy, and fulness of grace, so characteristic of woman, rather than by the rougher forces of this world, the sharpness of swords and the strength of States?John Clifford, D.D.
Similitudes used in opposite senses.The appropriation by Christ to His kingdom of a similitude which had previously been applied in an opposite sense, may be illustrated by many parallel examples in the Scriptures. Of these, as far as I know, the different and opposite figurative significations of the serpent are the most striking and appropriate. A similar example occurs in the parable of the unjust steward; it teaches that the skill of the wicked in doing evil should be imitated by Christians in doing good (W. Arnot, D.D.). In different passages the lion is used as a figure of Satan, but also of Christ; the serpent as a figure of the enemy, but also of the wisdom needful to the Apostles; birds as a figure of believing trustfulness, but also of the devil catching away the Word.J. P. Lange, D.D.
Reformation from within.There are two ways in which you may revolutionise any country or society. You may either pull down all the old forms of government, or you may fill them with men of a different spirit. A watch stops, and somebody tells you it needs new works, but the watchmaker tells you it only needs cleaning. A machine refuses to work, and people think the construction is wrong, but the skilled mechanic pushes aside the ignorant crowd, and puts all to rights with a few drops of oil. Your bread is unwholesome, says the public to the baker, and he says, Well, Ill send you loaves of a new shape; but the woman of the parable follows the wiser course of altering the quality of the bread.M. Dods, D.D.
Inwardness.The soul of all improvement is the improvement of the soul.H. Bushnell, D.D.
Christianity as leaven.Sir Bartle Frere speaking of the gradual change wrought by Christianity in India, says in regard to religious innovations in general, They are always subtle in operation, and generally little noticeable at the outset in comparison with the power of their ultimate operation.
Fuente: The Preacher’s Complete Homiletical Commentary Edited by Joseph S. Exell
C. THE PROBLEM OF GROWTH AND SUCCESS IN GODS KINGDOM: THE TRIUMPH OF TRUTH
1. THE PARABLE OF THE MUSTARD SEED
TEXT: 13:31, 32
(Parallel: Mar. 4:30-32; cf. Luk. 13:18-19)
31 Another parable set he before them, saying, The Kingdom of heaven is like unto a grain of mustard seed, which a man took and sowed in his field; 32 which indeed is less than all seeds; but when it is grown, it is greater than the herbs, and becometh a tree, so that the birds of the heaven come and lodge in the branches thereof.
THOUGHT QUESTIONS
a.
Why do you suppose that it was so very important for Jesus to reveal to His disciples, even in this veiled way, that His Messianic Kingdom would have a small, insignificant beginning? What was there in their background that would have made this special information necessary?
b.
To what extent, if at all, may we regard these parables as prophecies about the features to be expected in Christs (then) coming Kingdom? If they are to be considered as prophecies, then what does this make Jesus? If they are not so to be considered, in which case Jesus is just telling it like it is, then what does that make Jesus?
c.
How does this story about the mustard seed contribute to the general impression of the government of God revealed elsewhere in the near context of the great sermon in parables, and in the larger framework of Scripture? In other words, how does this parables message harmonize with, or incorporate, ideas expressed in other parables and elsewhere in the New Testament?
PARAPHRASE AND HARMONY
Jesus set before them another story: To what is Gods rule comparable? What story would describe it? Gods Kingdom is similar to a grain of mustard seed which a farmer took and sowed in his field. The mustard seed is, relatively speaking, the smallest of all the tree seeds on earth. Nevertheless, when it is sown and has grown up, it becomes the largest of all shrubs. It puts forth large branches and becomes a tree, so that birds can come and make nests in the shade of its branches.
SUMMARY
The concrete, visible beginnings of Gods Kingdom on earth will be small, but His rule will show extensive growth until its impact in the world is significantly felt.
NOTES
Mat. 13:31-32 A grain of mustard seed . . . becometh a tree . . . ISBE (2101, article Mustard) notes
Several varieties of mustard (Arab. khardal) have notably small seed, and under favorable conditions grow in a few months into very tall herbs10 to 12 ft, The rapid growth of an annual herb to such a height must always be a striking fact. Sinapis nigra, the black mustard, which is cultivated, Sinapis alba, or white mustard, and Sinapis arvensis, or the charlock (All of N.O. Cruciferae), would any one of them, suit the requirements of the parable; birds readily alight upon their branches to eat the seed (Mat. 13:32, etc.), not, be it noted, to build their nests, which is nowhere implied . . .
However, the expression, the birds of the heaven come and lodge in the branches thereof may rightly be rendered make nests, since kataskenon means to live in or settle in a place; of birds, to nest in the branches. (Cf. Rocci, 1004; Arndt-Gingrich, 419) Plummer (Matthew, 194) reminds that tree (dndron) does not necessarily mean a timber-tree. We speak of a rose-tree and a gooseberry-tree.
Had Jesus furnished an interpreters key to this parable, it might have sounded something like this: The field is the world, the man who sowed the seed is the Son of man, the grain of mustard seed is the rule of God in mens hearts. Even with an unpretentious debut, it will expand throughout the world until many nations, peoples and tongues will find peace in its realm.
If, then, the mustard plant actually becomes a tree, the Lord does not have to extend the literal qualities of the mustard bush beyond its botanical limits in order to make a tremendous impression upon His Jewish audience. The description of something insignificant when planted, but begins bringing forth boughs and becoming a noble tree under the shade of which will dwell all kinds of beasts and in whose shade birds of every sort will nest, is familiar prophetic language to those Jewish hearers. (Cf. Eze. 17:22-24 in its context; Eze. 31:6; Eze. 31:12 in the parable of the cedar; Dan. 4:10-27) Is it possible that this choice of language is deliberately and appropriately utilized by the Lord to call direct attention to something for minds alert to such apocalyptic jargon? What would these words have communicated to readers familiar with Ezekiel and Daniel? In those prophets such language describes the grandeur of empires magnificent enough to provide people with refuge, defense and the satisfaction of their needs. The alert listener to Jesus could not but recognize a prediction that His Kingdom, despite its inauspicious beginning, would progress by gradual growth to become an empire so vast and so powerful that it could protect all its subjects and satisfy the desires of their souls.
How desperately needed was this information at that historical moment! The thought that the Kingdom could begin small and arrive at greatness only through gradual growth is always a view totally unacceptable to people itching to get where the action is. Had a sounding of public opinion been taken to determine popular sentiment regarding the Kingdom and Jesus, the results would have probably left many a serious disciple shaking his head. At this stage of the game the powerblock of Jerusalem and especially the Pharisees were beginning to line up a stiff, growing opposition. The important backers began to raise eyebrows at the trends becoming more and more visible in Jesus proclamation of the Kingdom. Realistic observers could sense that Jesus had no intention of setting up a military kingdom with a fully developed power structure which would usher in a paradise of prosperity for all. And it was this very reluctance of His that would deeply trouble those who had high hopes of making a fortune in that Kingdom. A statistical review of Jesus hard, countable successes would confirm the unspoken suspicion that He was making no progress at all. Worse still, His message menaced judgment for all that was held dear by the various representatives of standard Judaism: the rabbinical traditions, the temple graft, nationalism, material prosperity, ostentation and class and race superiority. Rather than organize the elite and court the heads of organized labor and government, rather than rally the masses in anti-Establishment crusades, His major efforts were directed at regenerating the folks on the fringe, the ordinary, the down-and-outers, the renegades,in short, the nobodies. Humanly speakings, this was no way to organize a mighty messianic machine for bringing in the Kingdom with its flurry of trumpets, its flash of heraldry and the stirring roll of drums. (Cf. Luk. 17:20-21 in context) The absurdity of Jesus being able to accomplish very much with the temperamental, ordinary, problematic people in His immediate coterie of associates, must have been staggering to the Jewish public!
The disciples themselves too, throughout their associations with Jesus, had unceasing trouble with this kind of thinking. (Study Mat. 19:24-28; Mat. 20:20-28; see notes on Mat. 11:2-6; Act. 1:6.) Other disciples, after the feeding of the 5000, tried to take the Lord by force to make Him their kind of king, but He refused. (Joh. 6:15) The next day, when He bared the spiritual character of His mission, people abandoned Him en masse. (Joh. 6:22-66)
Nevertheless, as indicated elsewhere in His teaching, Jesus had been intimating His intentions to found just this sort of Kingdom, i.e., one that constitutionally strikes at the heart of material ambitions, nationalistic conquest, pampered pride and superficial religiousness. (Cf. the Sermon on the Mount as a vigorous polemic against these views.) Further, if the fundamental message of the Parable of the Sower is that God intends to use only the influence of His Word to transform men who remain absolutely free to accept or reject it, then does it require any particular astuteness to foresee that any Kingdom of God that follows such policies MUST BEGIN SMALL, IF AT ALL? And yet Jesus divine foresight is evident in His unshaken confidence that His Kingdom, however discouragingly insignificant its beginnings, would grow to become a powerful, worldwide empire.
We do not esteem Jesus words at their proper worth unless we see just how far from being hyperbolic they were. If it seemed an exaggeration that He should speak of the mustard seed as the smallest of all seeds on earth, when compared with the realities they symbolized they are almost an understatement!
1.
Christs Kingdom began in a very obscure way without any reasonable prospect of success, without any hope of greatness. Its King did not appear in public until His thirtieth year and then taught only two or three years occasionally in the capital, but more often in the provincial villages.
2.
The Kingdom began among the Jews, a subject people chafing under the yoke of foreign lords. It began as the smallest sect among this people in a despised province of the Roman Empire. Its leader contradicted the cherished notions of His own people and, consequently, was rejected by them. He made only a few real followers among the poor and ignorant. He had no political power in His own homeland and no hope from abroad. The founder of this Kingdom was shamefully executed by His own people. Even after the day of Pentecost, the Kingdom seemed to its enemies a struggling movement crying for elimination through persecution and death. THIS is the beginning of the universal Reign of God on earth? (Cf. 1Co. 1:27-29)
And yet it grew and became a force to be dealt with in the world. (Cf. Rom. 16:25-26; Col. 1:6; Col. 1:23) Do YOU believe Paul, or is his rhetoric a bit hyperbolic for you? (1Th. 1:6-10; Act. 28:22; Act. 17:6) And it is still growing!
For further notes on the impact and significance of this revelation, see after the Parable of the Leaven, its companion.
FACT QUESTIONS
1.
How does one harmonize the fact that many seeds are actually smaller than the mustard seed, with Jesus declaration that it is the smallest of all seeds?
2.
What illustrative stories in the Old Testament furnish the imagery for Jesus parable here? What was the major point of those stories? Did Jesus say that these are His source? If so, how? If not, what factor connects the story of Jesus with those OT pictures?
3.
Describe the Palestinean mustard plant showing how it fits Jesus use of it as a fitting symbol of His Kingdom.
4.
Had Jesus presented this truth before? If so, how or where?
C. THE PROBLEM OF GROWTH AND SUCCESS IN GODS KINGDOM: THE TRIUMPH OF TRUTH
2. THE PARABLE OF THE YEAST
TEXT: 13:33 (cf. Luk. 13:20-21)
33 Another parable spake he unto them: The kingdom of heaven is like unto leaven, which a woman took, and hid in three measures of meal, till it was all leavened.
THOUGHT QUESTIONS
a.
Some people believe that yeast in the Bible is always a symbol of the far-reaching, pervasive influence of evil. Do you agree? If so, on what basis? If not, why not? In what way, then, is the Kingdom of God itself like yeast?
b.
If the Kingdom of God is to progress by the most vigorous public evangelization that gives the Gospel the widest hearing possible, how can Jesus say that the Kingdom expands secretly and quietly and by intensive growth like yeast works in dough?
c.
What is there in this parable that had already been suggested in Jesus other messages, like, for example, the Sermon on the Mount?
PARAPHRASE
He told them another story: Gods Kingdom is like yeast that a woman worked into three measures of flour, till the dough was entirely leavened.
SUMMARY
The Rule of God in the world will grow quietly, without great fanfare, but its progress will not be hindered until its intensive, transforming power influences all of life.
NOTES
Had Jesus furnished an interpretative key to this parable it might have perhaps run as follows: The three measures of meal represents humanity, The woman that kneaded the dough stands for the Son of man. The yeast is the dynamic, transforming influence of the Word of God by which the Kingdom of God penetrates and transforms mankind. The three measures of flour should not be thought especially mysterious, because that may have been merely the right amount for the usual recipe for homemade bread. (See Gen. 18:6; Jdg. 6:19 where 3 seahs = 1 ephah.) The idea that a woman should be used to represent Jesus is no problem, since in Luke 15 He used a man seeking a lost sheep and a woman sweeping the house for her lost coin to symbolize Gods search and rejoicing over repentant sinners, without concerning Himself whether people would be confused about whether God be male or female. So, if bread-making in the home is usually the work of a woman, and if Jesus wants to use yeast as His main symbol, it would have been more surprising to His audience were He to have inserted man, instead of a woman. What is really startling is to hear the Lord compare the glorious Messianic Kingdom to YEAST, of all things! After all, as Edersheim comments in another connection (Life, II, 70, note 2),
The figurative meaning of leaven, as that which morally corrupts, was familiar to the Jews. Thus the word . . .(Seor) is used in the sense of moral leaven hindering the good in Ber. 17a while the verb . . . (charnets) to become leavened, is used to indicate moral deterioration in Rosh ha Sh. 3b, 4a.
This same negative feeling about yeast as a figure of speech for something corrupt and corrupting is back of the proverbial saying twice quoted by Paul (1Co. 5:6-8 and Gal. 5:9) as well as that reflected in Mat. 16:6; Mat. 16:12. However, yeast in this parable has nothing whatsoever to do with an evil, corrupting influence, however often it be so employed elsewhere.
SYMBOLS ARE JUST NOT UNIVERSAL.
Readers need to beware of supposing yeast to be a universal symbol of corruption, because Bible writers can change the standard symbology if they want to! The fact that Jesus Christ is the Lion of the tribe of Judah (Rev. 5:5) does not mean Peter is mistaken to call Satan a roaring lion, seeking whom he may devour (1Pe. 5:8). Although Jesus is the Lamb of God (Rev. 5:6-12), this does not hinder His charging Peter with the care to feed my lambs (Joh. 21:15). Birds can be (1) nations at rest within an empire, Eze. 31:6; Eze. 31:17; or (2) Satan, Mat. 13:19; Mar. 4:15. Serpent can represent (1) Satan, 2Co. 11:3; Rev. 20:2; or (2) the only means of salvation and symbolic of Christ, Joh. 3:14; or (3) a symbol of Christian wisdom, Mat. 10:16. Vine can represent (1) Jesus Himself, Joh. 15:1 ff; or (2) Israel, Mar. 12:1; Isa. 5:1-7; Eze. 19:10-14. Mountain can suggest (1) great world empires, Dan. 2:35; Dan. 2:45, or (2) any apparently insurmountable obstacle, Mat. 17:20. Shadow can be (1) a symbol of blessing, Isa. 32:2; or (2) protection, Isa. 49:2; Psa. 91:1; or (3) a short-lived existence, Psa. 102:11; or (4) a lack of spiritual enlightenment, Isa. 9:2; Mat. 4:16; Luk. 1:79. The point is, of course, to let a given Bible writer or speaker use a symbol in any way that suits his subject, regardless of whether anyone else, or even he himself, ever used it that way before, Let Jesus tell His own story without anyones dictating to Him what symbols He may utilize!
While everyone else sees in yeast a symbol of corrupting influence, Jesus, with the eye of a keen observer, can also see in that live ferment a picture of transforming power for good and for God. What a contrast! That drowzing Jewish audience, quite naturally expecting leaven to be used as a symbol of defilement and corruption, must have been brought wide-awake and to the edge of their seats to hear Jesus compare something so vibrantly glorious as the Kingdom of God with something so sinister, dark, ominous and evil as yeast! But literal yeast itself is innocent. Its permeating, transforming, ever growing character had just always furnished a handy clich for the influence of evil among men. But Jesus turns that metaphor to His advantage by pointing out that what had served so well to illustrate the way evil increases in humanity, serves just as well to depict the growth of His own Kingdom! By so doing, He not merely rescued yeast from the stereotyped role usually assigned to it as a symbol. He flashed before His audience a picture of a Kingdom that is vibrantly alive, effectively at work, vitally influencing everything around it, and gloriously conquering until every area of human life feels its effect, even though its entire work is not readily discernible.
Hidden in the mass. Trench (Notes, 44) remembers that
In the early history of Christianity the leaven was effectually hidden. This is shown by the entire ignorance which heathen writers betray of all that was going forward a little below the surface of society, even up to the very moment (with slight exceptions) when the triumph of Christianity was at hand.
Hidden in the mass till it was all leavened suggests two applications:
1.
The influence of Gods will in human affairs through the Kingdom of Christ is the first reference. Jesus could foresee the Churchs vitality and energy, her enthusiasm in evangelizing humanity and her zeal for edifying. What a transforming power He intended to unleash to disturb and unsettle the basis of despotic government, and to right the standards of ethics in human relations! (Cf. Joh. 11:45-53; Act. 4:16-17; Act. 5:24; Act. 5:28; Act. 17:6; Act. 28:22) He could see the wide-sweeping social revolutions fermenting at the grass-roots level in men made over in the image of Gods Son. (Cf. 2Co. 10:3-6) All . . . leavened: what a goal: all of human lifeits work and play, its philosophy and religion, its politics and commerce, its science and artsall is to feel the pervasive, persuasive pressure of a robust, convincing Christianity that neither compromises its influence by closing itself in monastic seclusion to avoid contamination nor leaves its Christian morality behind when it enters society. Till it was all leavened is the prophetic past tense that speaks of as past a future event so sure to take place that even before it happens, it is declared to be a fact! Jesus guarantees us here nothing short of the final triumph of Gods Kingdom and of His people. (Cf. 2Co. 2:14; Rom. 16:19; Rom. 16:26; Col. 1:6; Col. 1:23; Rev. 11:15; Dan. 7:14; Dan. 7:27)
2.
The influence of Gods will in the life of each individual Christian who accepts that rule. If the Kingdom of Christ is to do all that is predicated of it, then it follows that every single Christian must be a person in whom the Kingdom is a reality. The rule of God expressed through His Word when buried in a mans heart is living and powerful and persistent in bringing that entire man to obey it, transforming him completely until he becomes at last a totally new man in Christ Jesus. (Cf. 2Co. 3:17-18; 2Co. 5:17; 1Co. 6:9-11; what a change!)
THE RELATION OF THESE TWO PARABLES TO THE SERMON ON THE MOUNT
The Parables of the Mustard Seed and of the Yeast reveal little that is absolutely news to any disciples steadily tuned-in to Jesus. In the Sermon on the Mount He had pictured the ethics of the Kingdom of God as motivated by selfless love and grounded in a single-minded devotion to God as a gracious Heavenly Father, an ethic which expresses itself in a generous helpfulness to even the ungrateful (Mat. 5:39-48), in a forgiving spirit (Mat. 6:12; Mat. 6:14-15), in a clemency in judgment (Mat. 7:1-5) despite a proper reserve towards people with no appreciation for the holy or the priceless. That kind of Kingdom, launched in a world of dedicated egotists, cannot but progress slowly, granted, of course, that its chief Proponent could succeed in convincing even a few people that ideals of this sort will really function, convinced enough, that is, to give them a try and help Him launch the idea. For, unless Jesus is willing to abandon His ideals long enough to get His program underway, such a spiritual Reign could never even get off the ground. And, if it should turn out that He really inaugurate such a movement, without some artificial priming, it must necessarily have not only an embarrassingly small debut, but also undergo a painfully slow progress in the world. Any shrewd humanist who seriously weighed Jesus words could have expected these two parables sooner or later. What he could not have expected was Jesus bringing these dreams to reality in exactly the way He planned.
Nor had Jesus been silent about the eventual greatness and success of His Kingdom. While His emphasis in the Sermon on the Mount is decidedly on the personal implications of Gods Rule, still He does not ignore the world-wide impact Christians are to make as salt of the EARTH . . . light of the WORLD. (Mat. 5:13-16) The Kingdom is the subject of prayers that it come and that Gods will be done on EARTH with the same joyful seriousness it is being done in heaven. And who could be satisfied with partial success or half-way obedience to God? Those who share Jesus views and His love must pray that the Kingdom of God cover the entire globe and affect every creature.
So these stories about yeast and mustard seed are stupendous illustrations of a spiritual kingdom that comes not with observation, but is within you. (Cf. Luk. 17:20-21; Rom. 14:17)
THE APOLOGETIC FORCE OF THESE PARABLES
There is embedded in these stories a persuasive apologetic power to convince skeptics, that Jesus cannot be explained in terms of the popular messianism of His people, since it would be difficult to imagine a concept of the Kingdom of the Messiah less nationalistically Jewish than that presented here. Conspicuous for its absence is any allusion to a privileged place for national Israel in the Kingdom. These seemingly harmless little tales are on a collision course with the aims of people who desired to rush on past the judgment to introduce the Messianic Paradise. (Cf. Sib. Orac. lines 285294; 652808; Enoch 62:11) The meaning of these unexplained stories remained unintelligible enigmas to these Jewish hearers. Therefore, Jesus did not weave them out of theological materials lying around Him. His revelations are made out of divine stuff.
Here again we are confronted with one of the motifs of the Gospel: the Messianic reserve, in the sense that the Kingdom will not be proclaimed in any triumphalistic sense by tyrannic force of arms, but with absolute respect for human freedom, without all of the apocalyptic artillery that many of Jesus nationalistic contemporaries dreamed would be absolutely essential. (Cf. Sib. Orac. 652ff) Further, the scandalous, continued presence of sin in the world and Jesus failure to call down heavenly fire to destroy the more obvious sinners could not help but raise many eyebrows. However, since Gods judgment is not to be anticipated, men must not even conclude that the Kingdoms regenerating power be somehow not functioning to transform society as it changes the men who compose it. Rather, they must even now submit themselves to the will of the King and recognize the evidences of the invisible activity of the Kingdom which is not mans work alone, but Gods, and dedicate themselves to its vigorous proclamation. They must take the long view.
These parables still shock and remain unbelieved by modern churchmen who promote great political schemes, even to the point of smuggling machine-guns to bring peace through peoples movements for liberation. They would install air-conditioners and piped-in music in hell, while hoping to make it possible for more people to enjoy the questionable benefits of a conscienceless materialistic kingdom of God here on earth. (Cf. Sib. Orac. 657!) They just cannot conceive of a Kingdom that can operate effectively on the basis of a message patiently taught to wobbly, often undependable people, tenderly and lovingly cultivated but whose foibles and mistakes, more often than not, embarrass, rather than glorify, their Lord. Such ecclesiastical organizational procedure has little time for bruised reeds and smoldering wicks (see notes on Mat. 12:20) nor stoops to preach good tidings to the poor from any truly Biblical perspective. (See notes on Mat. 11:5) But do we ourselves believe with Jesus that the Kingdom of God will progress only to the extent that we care about the lambs (Joh. 21:15-19), the little child . . . who believes in me (Mat. 18:1-14), the babes (Mat. 11:25)? If so, we may well wish to table our grandiose schemes to bring in the Kingdom, and join Jesus in the slow, often disappointing, but ultimately fruitful, business of evangelization of the unbelievers and edification of the saints. (Cf. 1Th. 3:10)
Jesus is to be believed precisely because He is NOT the revolutionary wanted by the doctrinaire apostles of modern social change who would use Him as their banner for political or social subversion of the status quo. On the contrary, these parables picture a Christ who can settle for gradualism, a not unimportant heresy to those who demolish and burn in the name of instant change. While He preached a gospel capable of producing gradually the personal and social changes necessary to deal with every iniquity weighing upon the shoulders of a suffering humanity, He deliberately did NOT mount a protest against the current regime nor harangue the crowds about the living conditions of the underprivileged. The revolution, rather, to which He dedicated Himself and to which He calls us, challenges every Christian to preach this Gospel of the Kingdom and live in conformity with it, as if that alone would bring in the Kingdom.
These parables reveal the future, inevitable triumph of the Kingdom! They speak not only of a God who triumphs over the wicked in the end. They describe also a Church that, during the progress of its history, will enjoy a glorious growth and a penetrating force throughout the world. Therefore, any hasty, superficial judgments about any given stage of the Kingdoms progress are out of place, on the part of both believers and unbelievers alike. We must not be discouraged by the temporary retreats, the heartbreaks, the battles lost, nor must we be impatient if it seems that the Gospel is not bringing immediate results. Even if it seems that Gods people are not yet holy enough or numerous enough or the Kingdom not powerful enough, we may not make snap judgments about it, because we have not yet come to the end of the present age, and Gods Kingdom has some more growing to do.
These parables reveal the spirit behind the Kingdom of God as a missionary spirit. Yeast cannot function unless it is living in vital contact with that which it must influence. Therefore, the monastic spirit is essentially antichristian. No true Christian can avoid human society for fear that he might be contaminated by it, because his mission, as was His Lords, is to touch human life at every point so that every facet might come under the influence and penetrating gaze of Christian morality and ideals. Rather than take up a defensive position within which to protect what remains of our pretended humanity, our final orders are to attack! (Mat. 28:18-20)
FACT QUESTIONS
1.
What is the one basic point shared commonly by the Parable of the Mustard Seed and that of the Yeast?
2.
In what way are these two parables different in emphasis?
3.
State in one clear sentence the literal message Jesus was communicating in this story.
4.
What is learned about Jesus from the fact that He taught THESE truths instead of their more popular opposite concepts?
5.
Is there anything significant about the fact that it was a woman who put the yeast in the dough? Or that it was precisely three (and no more) measures of flour in which she put the yeast? If so, what is the hidden meaning? If not, what does one do with this information?
6.
Had Jesus taught this same truth before? If so, where or how?
Fuente: College Press Bible Study Textbook Series
(31) The kingdom of heaven is like to a grain of mustard seed.The two parables that follow are left without an explanation, as though to train the disciples in the art of interpreting for themselves. And, so far as we can judge, they seem to have been equal to the task. They ask for the meaning of the Tares, but we read of no question about these.
It is scarcely necessary to discuss at any length the botany of the parable. What we call mustard (Sinapis nigra) does not grow in the East, any more than with us, into anything that can be called a tree. Probably, however, the name was used widely for any plant that had the pungent flavour of mustard, and botanists have suggested the Salvadora persica as answering to the description. (See Bible Educator, I. 119.)
The interpretation of the parable lies almost on the surface. Here again the sower is the Son of Man; but the seed in this case is not so much the word, as the Christian society, the Church, which forms, so to speak, the firstfruits of the word. As it then was, even as it was on the day of Pentecost, it was smaller than any sect or party in Palestine or Greece or Italy. It was sown in Gods field of the world, but it was to grow till it became greater than any sect or school, a tree among the trees of the forest, a kingdom among other kingdoms (comp. the imagery of Eze. 31:3; Dan. 4:10), a great organised society; and the birds of the air (no longer, as before, the emblems of evil)i.e., the systems of thought, institutions, and the like, of other raceswere to find refuge under its protection. History has witnessed many fulfilments of the prophecy implied in the parable, and those who believe that the life of Christendom is an abiding life will look for yet more.
Fuente: Ellicott’s Commentary for English Readers (Old and New Testaments)
THIRD PARABLE The Mustard Seed, Mat 13:31-32.
31. Another parable The parable of the mustard seed is a sort of supplement to the parable of the tares and wheat. It supplies what that had omitted, namely, the fact that while the wicked would not be destroyed, yet the kingdom of God should be progressive and triumphant on the earth. Though there should be no millennium by the destruction of the wicked, yet there may be one by the growth of the cause of righteousness. The kingdom of heaven is in this parable, as in the last, the divine administration, and the field is again the world. The Church is here not the wheat, but the mustard seed, sown by the same divine hand as the wheat. If it was discouraging to the disciples to learn that the wicked would not be destroyed, yet it was cheering to know that righteousness, however small its beginning, would triumph on the earth.
Like to a grain of mustard seed The plant here spoken of was probably the “Khardal” or Turkish mustard, (botanically the Salvadora Persica,) which from a very small seed grows to a tree with a wooden fibre, and to such a size that it can be climbed by a man; and so it truly becometh a tree. It produces numerous branches and leaves, among which birds may and do take shelter, and build their nests. Such is the statement of Dr. Royle, Art. Sinapi, Kitto’s Encyc. Prof. Hackett, after long and doubtful search, found on the plains of Akka, on the way to Carmel, a little forest of mustard trees which he thus interestingly describes: “It was then in blossom, full grown, in some cases six, seven, and nine feet high, with a stem or trunk an inch or more in thickness, throwing out branches on every side. I was now satisfied in part. I felt that such a plant might well be called a tree, and, in comparison with the seed producing it, a great tree. But still the branches, or stems of the branches, were not very large, or, apparently, very strong. Can the birds, I said to myself, rest upon them? Are they not too slight and flexible? Will they not bend or break beneath the superadded weight? At that very instant, as I stood and revolved the thought, lo! one of the fowls of heaven stopped in its flight through the air, alighted down on one of the branches, which hardly moved beneath the shock, and then began, perched there before my eyes, to warble forth a strain of the richest music. All my doubts were now charmed away. I was delighted at the incident. It seemed to me at the moment as if I enjoyed enough to repay me for all the trouble of the whole journey.”
Fuente: Whedon’s Commentary on the Old and New Testaments
‘He set another parable before them, saying, “The kingly rule of heaven is like to a situation where a man took a grain of mustard seed, and sowed it in his field, which indeed is less than all seeds, but when it is grown, it is greater than the herbs, and becomes a tree, so that the birds of the heaven come and lodge in its branches.” ’
The emphasis in this parable is on organic growth from small beginnings. Whether in Jesus’ mind the ‘grain of mustard seed’ is the kingly Rule itself, or the small band of disciples, does not really matter. The point is that what starts out as something very small will become something very substantial. A grain of mustard seed was very small, the smallest known in Palestine. (‘Less than all the seeds’ has in mind the seeds with which a Palestinian farmer would be familiar. To the Rabbis the mustard seed was proverbial for its smallness. Or it may indicate that the farmer selected the smallest of all the mustard seeds for planting). This emphasises the tiny beginnings of the Kingly Rule of Heaven (‘fear not, little flock, it is your Father’s good pleasure to give you the Kingly Rule’ – Luk 12:32). The field is clearly the world, in which the Kingly Rule of Heaven is planted. And the Kingly Rule then grows into a ‘tree’ (very large bush). The mustard was in fact the only herb that grew to such a great size in contrast with the size of the seed. Mustard trees/bushes can often grow to over two metres (seven feet) tall, and even more. But as this demonstrates, had Jesus had intended simply to indicate hugeness He would actually have chosen a tree. The emphasis here is clearly rather on the growth from small beginnings.
The fact that the birds of heaven came and lodged in its branches accentuates its size, but they may well also be intended to indicate the nations of the world because that is precisely what they indicated in an Old Testament parable (Eze 31:6; see also Eze 17:22-24; Eze 31:3-14; Dan 4:7-23). Thus the Kingly Rule of Heaven will grow from tiny beginnings to something so surprisingly substantial (even though it is a herb) that the nations of the world will be able to find shelter in it (Mat 12:18; Mat 12:21). It is a phenomenon.
Fuente: Commentary Series on the Bible by Peter Pett
The Twin Parables of the Mustard Seed and the Leaven (13:31-33).
These two parables have very different emphases. The emphasis in the first case is on the size to which it grew from small beginnings, from a tiny seed to a great tree with birds in its branches, from a tiny band of disciples to a world wide presence including both Jew and Gentile (Mat 8:11; Mat 10:18; Mat 12:18; Mat 12:21). The emphasis in the second case is on the leavening process whereby a little leaven permeates a whole batch of flour, indicating the invisible power that will be at work through the tiny band of disciples bringing about the final product in a larger ‘congregation of Israel’, the new people of God. In this case the batch of flour indicates the potential Kingly Rule of Heaven.
Analysis.
a
b Which indeed is less than all seeds, but when it is grown, it is greater than the herbs, and becomes a tree, so that the birds of the heaven come and lodge in its branches (Mat 13:32).
a He spoke another parable to them; “The kingly rule of heaven is like a situation where a woman took leaven, and hid it in three measures of meal, until it was all leavened” (Mat 13:33).
Note that in ‘a’ the grain of mustard seed is sown into the field, and in the parallel the leaven is hid in three measures of meal. Centrally in ‘b’ the tiny mustard seed grows into a large ‘tree’ in which the birds can come and lodge in its branches.
Fuente: Commentary Series on the Bible by Peter Pett
Parable of the mustard seed:
v. 31. Another parable put He forth unto them, saying, The kingdom of heaven is like to a grain of mustard seed, which a man took and sowed in his field;
v. 32. which indeed is the least of all seeds; but when it is grown, it is the greatest among herbs, and becometh a tree, so that the birds of the air come and lodge in the branches thereof. He set before them choice spiritual food for their instruction and edification. The kingdom of Christ in its growth is like a grain of mustard seed, whose size and appearance give no intimation of the force of its sprouting nor of the size of the herb at its full maturity, whether one restricts the word to the garden herb or includes the mustard tree of the Orient, whose great size is often referred to by Jewish writers. So large does it become that the birds may make their roosts in its branches. It seems almost incredible that such a tiny seed can produce such a large, treelike plant. But even so, as Christ here predicts, the kingdom of Christ grows from small beginnings until it extends over the whole earth, and becomes a place of rest and of peace for all people. The few despised disciples whom Christ gathered about Him were the nucleus of the great Christian Church, which came into existence and is maintained through the power of the Gospel.
Fuente: The Popular Commentary on the Bible by Kretzmann
Mat 13:31-32. Another parable put he forth The former parables relate chiefly to unfruitful hearers; these that follow, to those who bear good fruit. In the present parable our Lord shews, that notwithstanding the gospel appeared at first contemptible, by reason of the ignominy arising from the crucifixion of its Author, the difficulty of its precepts, the weakness of the persons by whom it was preached, and the small number and mean condition of those who received it; yet having initself the strength of truth, it would grow so great as to fill the earth, affording spiritual sustenance to persons of all nations, who should be admitted to it, not in the quality of slaves, as the Jews imagined, but as free-born subjects of the Messiah’s kingdom, enjoying therein equal privileges with the Jews. This sense of the parable is the more probable, as our Lord seems now to have had his eye on Nebuchadnezzar’s dream, Dan 4:10-12 in which the nature and advantages of civil government are represented by a great tree with spreading branches, fair leaves, and much fruit. This parable was well calculated to encourage the disciples; who, judging of the Gospel by its beginning, might have been apt to fall into despair, when, instead of seeing it preached by the learned, countenanced by the great, and instantly received with applause by all, they found it generally opposed by men in high life, preached only by illiterate persons, and received by few besides the poor. These, certainly, were melancholy circumstances according to outward appearance, and what must have given great offence: yet in process of time they became strong confirmations of the Christian religion. The treasure of the Gospel was committed to earthen vessels, that the excellency of the power might appear to be from God. The phrase, the least of all seeds, is a figure frequently used in common discourse, and signifies one of the least; or the least of all those seeds with which the people of Judaea were then acquainted; so small, that it was proverbially used by the Jews; to denote a very little thing. “The globe of the earth, say the rabbies, is but a grain of mustard-seed, when compared with the expanse of the heavens.” See ch. Mat 17:20. The term tree is applied bybotanists to plants of the larger kind, which grow to the magnitude of shrubs; and for that reason are termed plantae arborescentes. The Talmud mentions a mustard-tree, or at least what the Orientals comprehended under the species of the sinapi, so large that a man might with ease sit in it; and another, one of whose branches covered a tent. It is certain, that we should be much mistaken, if we judged of vegetables or animals in the Eastern or Southern countries, merely by what those of the same species are with us. The word , rendered lodge, signifies, “They find shelter, and pass their time there.” See Tremellius and Lightfoot’s Hor. Heb. on the place.
Fuente: Commentary on the Holy Bible by Thomas Coke
Mat 13:31 . ] a herbaceous plant that, in the East, sometimes attains to the height of a small tree; Celsii Hierob . II. p. 250 ff. In Attic Greek it is called , Phrynichus, ed. Lobeck, p. 228. Inasmuch as the plant belongs (Mat 13:32 ) to the order of the , it is unnecessary to suppose, with Ewald ( Jahrb . II. p. 32 f.), that it is the mustard- tree ( Salvadora Persica , Linnaeus) that is intended; comp. in preference the expression (Theophrastus, h. pl . i. 3. 4).
] an instance of the usual circumstantiality (comp. Mat 13:33 ), but not intended to convey the idea of the care with which so tiny a seed is taken into the hand (Lange).
Fuente: Heinrich August Wilhelm Meyer’s New Testament Commentary
“Another parable put he forth unto them, saying, The kingdom of heaven is like to a grain of mustard seed, which a man took, and sowed in his field: (32) Which indeed is the least of all seeds: but when it is grown, it is the greatest among herbs, and becometh a tree, so that the birds of the air come and lodge in the branches thereof.”
Different from all the Commentators I have seen, 1 cannot but think, that neither the great men of the earth, neither kings nor princes, are at all alluded to in this similitude; as if the Gospel, from small beginnings, attracted the notice of such men. But the simple beauty of this parable is, according to my view, that as a little leaven leaveneth the whole lump; so the grace of God, when put by the Holy Ghost into the heart of a, sinner, small and unnoticed as it is, produceth such vast things, that angels look with wonder and astonishment at the change which is wrought. Luk 15:7 .
Fuente: Hawker’s Poor Man’s Commentary (Old and New Testaments)
Chapter 54
Prayer
Almighty God, thou dost take the years from us, one by one, silently but surely, and no man can lay his hand upon that which is gone and bring it back again and set it in its former place. Behold thou dost change our countenances, and send us away: little by little thou dost take the strength out of our bone and sinew; behold men are aged and bowed down before they have fully reckoned their years. So teach us to number our years as to apply our hearts unto wisdom. Are there not twelve hours in the day? and whilst we count them, they fly, and are less in number at the close than at the beginning. We have scarcely breath enough to say the year is born, until lo, it begins to wither away. O that we might buy up the opportunity, and redeem the time with fulness of love that knows no break in its sacred and ardent continuity. Help us to redeem the time, inspire us with the spirit of importunity which beats upon heaven’s gate with the violence of both hands until it be opened and we be admitted into the higher places. Enable us to be amongst those wise servants who shall be found waiting when their Lord cometh, eagerly longing for him, and sometimes bitterly crying in their hearts because of his long delay.
Behold we meet this Christmastide, and Herod still is king. The young Child is fled away to Egypt, and we wonder why he abideth there. Our cry is Why do the heathen rage and the people imagine a vain thing, and kings and rulers suppose themselves to be a match for the Lord and his anointed? Lord Jesus, come quickly: hear thy sighing Church, listen to thy moaning, wondering bride, hasten thy chariot wheels: we are poor without thee, we are cold without thee, we have no hope in thine absence; and our hearts are as lead within us and they fall down in the bitterness of dejection. Yet the times are in thy hand, thine eye is not slumbering, thine hand is not slack, thou dost move by a compass we cannot measure, thou dost take the circuit, the sweep whereof no figures can represent. A thousand years are in thy sight but as one day, and one day is as a thousand years. We cannot measure thy circle, we have no instruments by which to reckon up thy movements, we can but wait and long and love and serve and hope. O see thou that our oil does not run out, but may it be supplied by a secret hand; may the lamp be trimmed even whilst we sleep, lest our hope perish and we become a gazing stock and a mockery unto men.
Bring in the years as thou wilt: through all violence and tumult, through all uprising and rebellion, severe and uncontrollable discord, thou wilt bring in thy kingdom. Thou makest a road for its passage, thou wilt not fail of thy purpose, it is a purpose of love, it is a design of mercy, it is a plan of love we therefore wait for thee, and we would regard our impatience as impiety to be repented of, and our prayers wherein we would hasten thee, we would take as expressions of our weakness. O thou who dost rest in eternity, and come up from everlasting and stretch thy thoughts, to everlasting, give us somewhat of thine own quietness, make us calm with thine own peace, fill us with thine own spirit.
Help every good man to work on with a cheerful heart and an undiminished hope: now and again bring thy great encouragements to bear upon him and. they shall prove to be inspirations of strength, and extensions and deepenings of his confidence. The Lord grant unto us some sign of hopefulness: let us see the blade, then the ear, then the full corn in the ear, then the yellowing, goldening harvest, and may we hear the sound of the angel’s sickle as the wheat is gathered into God’s garner.
We bless thee for all the mercies of the year now closing. Thou hast never forsaken us by land and by sea, by night and by day, in health and in sickness, in high energy and complaining infirmity, thou hast ever been by our side. If the shadows have been great, it is only because the light has been intense: who thou hast given much sorrow thou hast given greater comfort; where thou hast smitten the tree with the axe, thou hast also healed the heart with thy balm. The Lord receive our united praises for all the mercies of the year now dying: continue thy favour unto us in great abundance, establish us in the faith of Christ, who was born for the sins of the world, and who died and rose again for the same, whose great sweet name is linked up for ever with the world’s great sin. Enable us to preach thy word with more fervour, simplicity, tenderness, unction, and determination to take the prey from the mighty: enable us to hear thy word with keener attention, with devouter thankfulness, with larger expectancy of soul. Enable us to love thy word with some hope that our lives may tell what our tongues can never speak.
Say to those whose days are numbered, that ending time is eternity begun, that when the body shall be thrown off, the soul shall be clothed upon with its house from heaven. Gather the young together into thine heart O throw around them thine infinite and most tender embrace, and by nearness to thee may they find wisdom and the sobriety of heart which is the beginning of joy. The Lord turn the attention of all men to the cross, bind all hearts to the cross, lead all sinners to the cross, unite the Church to fear, love, and trust the cross. O cross of Christ, lift up thyself above our guilt like a star above the darkness, and give us hope in the day of sore distress.
What we pray for ourselves we pray for all the Churches of the Saviour, for all good and earnest souls the world over, for our dear ones across the sea, for our children wandering in the ways of life and endeavouring to gain an honourable livelihood, for the sick and the poor, the friendless and the homeless good Lord, gather up thyself into some other and greater effort of providential visitation, and show the people again, as thou has continually done, that the Lord reigneth, and that there is rest in faith.
Regard the country: God bless our native land, whether it be this or that, whether it be near or far away bless with thy favour those who rule over us, direct and lead us, and inspire the sentiment of nations the Lord’s light be round about them that they stumble not, and the Lord’s spirit be in them that their thoughts may be right and their words may be wise.
The whole earth is thine: thou didst round it, thou didst fill it with waters and cover it with its flowers and its forests, thou didst make the birds to sing above it, and find their nests in its green places. The whole earth is thine, sinful, wandering, prodigal earth thou hast come after that which was lost, and thou wilt surely find it and set it again in the brotherhood of the stars, to go out no more for ever. Amen.
Mat 13:31
The Grain of Mustard Seed
Is it true that there is a conquering force in vitality? Do really good things always grow, and in their expansion offer hospitality and defence to others? May what is here said of the kingdom of heaven be said of every other kingdom that is true, grand, pure, and beneficent? If so, then surely it may be said of the kingdom of heaven with infinitely multiplied force, and with infinitely extended meaning. First of all, therefore, let us grapple with the case as an earthly one, and then look forward to its heavenly bearings and applications.
Take, for example, the mustard seed of liberty; would it be wise and right for any great historian or poet to say the kingdom of liberty is like unto mustard seed which a man took and sowed in his field, which indeed is a little seed, but it so grows as to throw off all tyrannies and oppressions, and give the poorest man a status and a chance in life? Would that parable outrage any laws of intellectual conception or any laws of intellectual and patriotic expression? It would fit the case precisely, it would illustrate in picture one of the grandest doctrines that ever forced itself upon the attention of mankind. Liberty was the problem of parliaments, it has been the cause of wars; men have fought that other men might be kept in bondage, nations would not relax their grip upon the neck of millions of slaves but the little mustard seed of liberty was sown, and whatever has in it vitality given it of God must grow. The little seed will take root, the root will expand, and growing roots will split rocks as certainly as they can be sundered by gunpowder. That little root will never rest until it has broken up the huge rock so the seed of liberty grew and extended itself with beneficent expansion in England, and at the cost of millions of treasure human slavery was abolished as an iniquity and. a curse.
What is true of our country has been also true of other lands. Wars have been fought, intrigues have been entered into, the most desperate courses have been resorted to for the purpose of maintaining human slavery, but the little mustard seed of liberty has kept growing all the time, night and day, never ceasing to grow, and before its spreading roots the great stumbling-blocks have given way, and liberty is growing still, and must grow until the word slavery in all its baser applications is expunged from human speech, and hills and valleys rejoice in the light of universal and beneficent liberty. So far therefore the parable holds its place amongst purely human and political illustrations.
Take the mustard seed of genuine force of character, high quality of manhood would he be a mere romancist, who said, “The kingdom of noble, pure, heroic character is like a grain of mustard seed, little to begin with, but it will grow and develop and strengthen until the men who despised it shall seek the hospitality of its shadow?” Any man saying these words would be speaking no poetry except the highest, which is fact and logic on fire, the poetry of truth that that which is divine, simple, useful, beneficent, redeeming, must come to have the heathen for its inheritance and the uttermost parts of the earth for its possession. If you are a true man you cannot be kept down in the long run; if your character is right, it will in due time assert itself and claim its own. Men may proscribe you, condemn you, try to write you down, try to draw your clients, customers, patrons, and supporters from you, may indulge in every form of interference and unkind suppression known to the most mischievous genius, and yet not a hair of your head shall perish; no weapon formed against you shall prosper. Have we not seen this illustrated in countless instances is it not the very blossom and glory of human history is it not the confidence of all men who pray and wonder that the answer is long in coming? So far therefore the parable holds its own in purely human and social conditions; perhaps it may also hold its own in relation to that invisible, impalpable, immeasurable kingdom which we have come to know by the sweet name of heaven. Let us see.
Take the mustard seed of a truly meritorious invention: go even to that purely materialistic and mechanical side of life. Is it possible to keep down anything that is really true in mechanics? I have read the history of English manufactures to little purpose if I have not found that it has always been impossible to keep out of the mill and the factory and the place of mechanical operations any invention that was really good and really useful, and that completely answered the purpose for which it was put forward. If I go back to the north of England some thirty, forty, or fifty years and read the history of manufactures there, I shall find that machinery was burnt, that factories were burnt to the ground, that workmen were proscribed, that masters were slandered, and that opposition of every kind was offered to this or that particular mechanical invention. The working classes would not have it, great combinations of men were established for the purpose of putting it down; but where is it today? It was like a grain of mustard seed; it had mechanical truth, it had commercial reality in it, it was able to bless the very people that cursed it; and so, under the Divine Providence that takes care of all things true and pure and useful, and includes them all in the kingdom of heaven, we have seen that man’s opposition has been turned aside, and that true things have grown to fulfil their purpose; and so it must be to the end of time.
We see, therefore, that there are illustrations enough of the doctrine that truth is mighty and must prevail. You cannot permanently keep down whatever is true in doctrine, in manhood, in science, or in politics. Water cannot drown it, fire cannot burn it, contempt cannot discourage it, and perdition cannot overcome it. This is not the case, you see then, with theology alone. A thing is true to me because it is true to my whole nature, and to the whole outlook and reality of life. If it shall come and separate itself wholly from everything known to my consciousness and my experience, it will bring with it its own difficulty which may prove to be insuperable; but if it connect itself with all that I know best and have established most thoroughly and confidently, then it may lead me on step by step to its own higher self and its own broader claim.
It is thus that God comes to us. He does not strike upon the intellect like a great thunder blast that has no connection, reference, or illustration in any quarter of human consciousness, experience, or observation. He comes to establish himself in my confidence in this way, namely like as a father pitieth his children, so the Lord pitieth them that fear him. As a nurse nourisheth and cherisheth her children, so the Lord. If ye, being evil, know how to give good gifts unto your children, how much more shall your Father, which is in heaven, give the Holy Spirit unto them that ask him. The argument is cumulative; it begins in the human, the known, that which is fully ascertained and established, and then it proceeds to what we know as transcendental and supernatural heights; but we trust by that which we do know, and can test and prove, and we calmly, lovingly wait the broader revelation; and in waiting we are inspired with noble hope, constrained to beneficent service, and are indulged with ineffable rewards.
This doctrine, therefore, is as true of medicine as it is of divinity, of mechanics as of the gospel, of navigation as of theology. Sometimes the full growth is long delayed; some men have to die as the price of their appreciation; some inventions and reforms have to flee into Egypt to escape the wrath of some angry Herod. Still the sovereign law holds good that truth, in all departments of life, must come uppermost and sit securely on its appointed and inevitable throne. Let this be your confidence, men and brethren. If it be your confidence you can wait without murmuring you can tarry without complaining; and when he comes who has been more misunderstood than you can possibly be, he will not forget his servant who has endeavoured to represent in speech and life that which he has felt to be true.
In the light of these human, social illustrations, let us see how the parable fulfils all the conditions of things as they are clearly known by us, every one. First of all, the kingdom of heaven is not ashamed of small beginnings. Herein it startles me very much. I should have thought that if the kingdom of heaven were coming amongst men it would have made for itself a great rent in the sky, and with blast of trumpets and rollings of thunder and flashings of lightning, amid the pomp of heaven’s hierarchy and the whole muster of its angel crowd, it would have come down lo the earth and dazzled and confounded men by its infinite blaze of glory. God does not so come: he is not ashamed to illustrate his progress by the development of small and relatively contemptible things. He is as the dawning of the day, he is as the growing of the mustard seed: he begins in a whisper, he challenges one and then another, he works in the individual heart, setting up there a good conviction, kindling an unquenchable enthusiasm, nourishing and cherishing a holy purpose then another is added and the plural thus begins, and the two go forth together to seek a third; and thus the kingdom grows, friend finding friend, the evangelist finding the prodigal and bringing him home, the hopeful soul speaking the word of cheer to the dejected spirit, and thus the kingdom grows.
Be rebuked then, O impatient man, thou who dost want, with great demonstration and force of arms, to impose the kingdom of heaven upon men. Let it grow according to its own law. Despise not the day of small things. A little one may become a great nation, and a small one an immeasurable people. Believe in the truth, and not in its merely numerical and demonstrative force have faith in anything that is true and good, because it is true and good, and deliver yourself from the miserable fallacy and most mischievous sophism that a crowd is necessary to success, and that multitudinousness is a proof of truth or of reality. All history condemns such violent reading, and all history confirms the sublime teaching that whatever is true may have a small beginning; but it must overturn, overturn, overturn, until all hindrances are levelled with the dust. Thus and thus God’s kingdom comes and his will is done on earth as it is done in heaven.
In the next place the kingdom of heaven connects itself with the greatest law known amongst us namely, the law of growth. It grows in the individual mind, it grows in the national mind, it grows from alphabetical forms into broader substances and expressions, and then away again from all that is formal and mechanical up into the purely spiritual regions wherein we are enabled to say, because we are enabled to see, that God is a Spirit.
If the kingdom of heaven is associated with the law of growth, then it must proceed silently. I know of no growths that are noisy; the great oak makes no noise as it strengthens itself with the growing years. So is it with the kingdom of heaven: it grows silently in the heart, yet men take knowledge of the enriched character of the expanded mind, of the nobler tone, of the broader generosity; and they say, “This is growth in grace.” If it associates itself with growth, then the progress of the kingdom of heaven will often be invisible in its minuter movements. Whoever saw a flower grow from this point to that whilst waiting and looking on? This flower has nothing to show for any one moment of its existence; the flower or the tree is not to be reckoned up from day to day: leave it for a month, leave the tree for a year, for ten years, and then return and remember that all this accretion has been going on without a single created eye observing the increase. We like to see things grow. Sometimes the child takes a little spade and digs up the seed to see if it has begun to grow. Perhaps we have all done this, and have been proud to see how the little white life, or green life, was coming up out of the seed we sowed, and then we have put it back again; and again we have come back to observe the growing, and yet we have never seen the operation. We have seen the results, but how they came to be results is a mystery to us, and must be a lesson.
Ay, the mysteriousness of growth who can understand it, who knows how much goes to the making up of it the earth, the sun, the rain, the dew, the light, the wind what chemical elements are set in motion, thrown into combination; what ejections, what absorptions, what strange and subtle combinations, and the whole thing moving on to express a purpose in the mind of the Creator? It hath pleased God to say, whilst we are looking upon all the vegetable kingdom, “My heavenly kingdom, my larger kingdom, is just like that as silent, as invisible, as mysterious, as certain, growing up to the full expression of the purpose which was in my heart when I created this great theatre of the universe and sent man into it to fulfil his destiny.”
Another thing is that the kingdom of heaven carries its greatness even when it is in its most minute and microscopic form. The greatness is in the seed itself: if we had instruments fine enough to look really into the seed, we would see the mustard tree in the mustard seed, the oak in the acorn, the great cedar in the seed out of which it grows. The cedar, the oak, any other tree or flower is not something added afterwards, but it is in reality in the root or seed which is in the earth. We are prevented seeing it simply because of our want of natural or instrumental vision. So it is with the kingdom of heaven. Men do not take on other selves and other manhoods as they advance in life, but they fulfil a writing and a destiny in themselves not only from the moment of their birth, but through eternity. Nothing happens as a surprise, nothing is written on the margin of the divine programme as an afterthought; everything is fore-appointed, fore-ordained, elect, standing fast in the counsel of God, and is a surprise only to our weakness. So the kingdom of heaven is always great: great when you are teaching it in the Sunday-school to a little child, when you are writing about it on the blackboard, when you are endeavouring to put its mysteries into words of one syllable, so as to lodge the truth in the little mind of the little hearer; it is the kingdom of heaven still, compressed, condensed, simplified, made easy, but carrying in it all the force that shall conquer creation, all the mystery that shall spread itself out before the admiring and grateful gaze of men as the revelation of God’s mercy and love and grace in Christ Jesus. The planet is in the molecule; tell me the creation was made out of the molecule, and I find but the broader confirmation of the truth of my text in that statement. A molecule will do to begin with, but what a molecule, that has grown and split itself off into constellations and suns and universes, and which astronomy has no tape long enough to throw round to take the measure of the circumference thereof. What a mustard seed it must have been!
So with God’s kingdom; it will grow until Christ shall have the heathen for his inheritance and the uttermost parts of the earth for his possession, and the handful of corn upon the top of the mountain shall grow until the harvest, waving in the south wind, goldened by all the suns of the universe, shall proclaim the fulfilment of the divine purpose, and angels shall gather it and sing the harvest home.
The last confirmatory point is that the kingdom of heaven is available for other uses than those which are sometimes thought to be distinctively religious as with the mustard seed grown into a tree, the birds come and lodge in the branches of it; did the tree grow for the sake of the birds, or did the birds avail themselves of the hospitality of the tree? It is even so with the kingdom of heaven; whatever is true has a right to be in the Church, all art and science, all commerce and literature, all recreation and joy do not banish these sacred birds from the branches of the Church tree, for they all are God’s, and if they do not receive hospitality in the Church, they will find it elsewhere, and the Church will be the loser in the long run.
Take the broadest view of the Church; it should offer hospitality to all the birds of the air, to all creatures that need lodgment and help, defence, education, strength it should throw itself out in loving and mighty appeal in every direction and offer the hospitality of heaven to all the children of earth. Open your churches for music, open your pulpits for lectures, open your schoolrooms for amusements, open all your premises that you may spread a meal for the hungry and offer rest to the weary, and by-and-by men and women will say, “Where are we? This is a wondrous song, this is inspiring music, this is bread truly useful for us in the hunger of life where are we? What is this building? there is something strange about it. What is that in which the man stands and from which he speaks and what are those seats, and those books lying here and there?” and it may come to dawn upon them that they are in their Father’s house, and they who came to hear the entertainment, or be fascinated for a moment by some transient enjoyment, may remain to pray. Do not drive the birds away, do not starve the birds: the Church was not distinctively built for any of these outward or collateral purposes, but as the birds of the air came and lodged in the full-grown mustard tree, so may many birds, and men, and women, and little children, and outcasts, hopeless and heartless ones, come and find it warm in the Church and be drawn by its glow of charity still further, until at last they enter the sanctuary of its truth.
I am thankful for this suggestion of growth: it does not affright me, it gives me the true law of judgment; night and day the kingdom grows, it makes no noise, it resorts to no violence, but quietly and sublimely and solemnly it comes to the perfectness and grandeur of God’s purpose. Sometimes when we awake to an appreciation of summer growth we say, “The flowers, the trees, seem to have come out in the night time: what a change! how sudden!” Mayhap it will be thus with Messiah’s kingdom. To-day Herod is on the throne, today the sword is slaying the innocent, today he who is born Christ the King is taken away to Egypt, the upper hand seems to have been given to those who devise evil purposes and carry out mischievous intentions but still the kingdom moves, still the seed develops, still the growth expands; some day it may appear to us as if quite suddenly the consummation had been realised, and we shall say to one another, “This is none other than God’s kingdom come, and the earth has been warmed by the summer of heaven.”
To that end let us work, and let us, from that purpose, gather courage to speak the broader, bolder prayer at the throne of the heavenly grace.
Fuente: The People’s Bible by Joseph Parker
31 Another parable put he forth unto them, saying, The kingdom of heaven is like to a grain of mustard seed, which a man took, and sowed in his field:
Ver. 31. Is like to a grain of mustard seed ] “Which soon pierceth the nostrils and brain,” as Pliny noteth, a and “hurteth the eyes,” as the very name in Greek importeth. b But that which our Saviour here observeth, and applieth in it, is the smallness of the seed, the greatness of the stalk or tree that comes of it, and the use of the branches, for birds to build in. This grain of mustard seed sowed, in the word preached: which though it seem small and contemptible, proves quick and powerful. Hitherto fly the birds of the air, God’s elect, for shade in prosperity, for shelter in adversity. Yea, as the trees of America, but especially of Brazil, are so huge, that several families are reported to have lived in several arms of one tree, to such a number as are in some petty village or parish here: so is the growth of the gospel, it runs and is glorified,2Th 3:12Th 3:1 , as the Jerusalem artichoke overruns the ground, wheresoever it is planted. It was a just wonder how it was carried, as on angels’ wings, c over all the world by the preaching of the apostles at first, and now again, in the late Reformation, by Luther and some few other men of mean rank, but of rare success. These were those angels that came flying with the everlasting gospel (no new doctrine, as the adversaries slander it) in the midst of heaven, or between heaven and earth, Rev 14:6-7 ; because their doctrine at first was not so clearly confirmed to others, not so fully understood by themselves Melancthon confesseth, Quod fugiamus habe mus, sc. Pontificios: quos sequamur, non intelligimus. And Cardinal Wolsey (saith the same Melancthon), reading the Augsburg Confession, saith, “that our cause concerning the righteousness of faith was stronger in the confirmation than in the confutation of the contrary opinion.” Quod verum est, as he there yieldeth quia facilius construere in sophisticis quam de struere: In physicis contra. But our John Wycliffe, long before Luther, wrote more than 200 volumes against the Pope. d The Lady Ann, wife to King Richard II, sister to Wenceslaus, King of Bohemia, by living here was made acquainted with the gospel. Whence also many Bohemians coming here, conveyed Wycliffe’s books into Bohemia; whereby a good foundation was laid for a future reformation. After this, were stirred up there by God, John Huss, and Jerome of Prague; who so propagated the truth in that kingdom, that in the year of Christ 1451 the Church of God at Constantinople congratulated to the University of Prague their happy beginnings, and exhorted them to perseverance. For before, the Hussites, by the mediation of Queen Sophia, who favoured them, had obtained of the king the free exercise of their religion throughout Bohemia. Howbeit, soon after this, they suffered great persecution by the Popish party, who yet could say no worse of them than this: In their lives they are modest, in their speeches true, in their love one towards another fervent; but their religion is incorrigible, and stark naught, saith Jacobus Leilenstenius the Dominican. And why stark naught? Reinerius, another of their persecutors, shall tell you. Their doctrine, saith he, “is most pestilent, 1. Because of so long standing. 2. Because so far spread. 3. For their show of purity, &c.” e This paved a way for the great work which Luther began in Germany, the last of October, 1517. And it was strangely carried on: 1. By diligent preaching. 2. Printing good books. 3. Translating the Holy Scriptures into common languages. 4. Catechising of youth. 5. Offering public disputation. 6. Martyrologies. Here in England was a great door opened at the same time, but many adversaries. The establishing of that Reformation, how imperfect soever; to be done by so weak and simple means, yea, by casual and cross means (saith one), f against the force of so puissant and political an enemy, is that miracle, which we are in these times to look for. It is such a thing (saith another) as the former age had even despaired of, the present age admireth, and the future shall stand amazed at. g King Henry VIII, whom God used as an instrument in the work, had first written against Luther, and afterwards established those six sacrilegious articles. And sitting in parliament, he thus complained of the stirs that were made about religion. “There are many,” saith he, “that are too busy with their new sumpsimus, h and others that dote too much upon their old mumpsimus.” i The new religion, though true, he and they all, for the most part, envied: the old, though their own, they despised. John Frith withstood the violence of three of the most obstinate among them, Rochester, More, and Rastal: whereof the one by the help of the doctors, the other by wresting the Scriptures, and the third by the help of natural philosophy, had conspired against him. “But he, as another Hercules,” saith Mr Fox, “fighting with all three at once, did so overthrow and confound them, that he converted Rastal to his part: Rochester and More were afterwards both beheaded for denying the king’s supremacy.” Reformation hath ever met with opposition, and never more than now, men fighting for their lusts, which they love as their lives, and are loth to part with. But Christ shall reign when all is done: and those golden times are now at hand, that the new Jerusalem, which signifies the state of the Church in this world, when it hath passed the furnace of affliction, presently upon it shall be all of fine gold. Let us contribute thereunto our earnest prayers and utmost pains, not abiding among the sheepfolds with Reuben, nor remaining in ships with Dan, &c., Jdg 5:16-17 ; not standing off, and casting perils, as the priests and Levites in Hezekiah’s days,2Ch 29:112Ch 29:11 ; but beginning the reformation, as Gideon did, at our own hearts and houses, lest, with Uzziah, instead of making up the breach, we prove makers of breaches. Were our dangers greater, thy single reformation may do much to prevent them, Jer 5:1 . As, were our hopes greater, thy sin and security may unravel them, and undo all, Ecc 9:18 . One sin destroyeth much good: be moving therefore in thine own orb, and bestir thee as Nehemiah did, trading every talent wherewith Divine Providence hath intrusted thee for Jerusalem’s welfare; giving no rest either to thyself or to God, as his remembrancer, until he have established, and made her a praise in the whole earth, Isa 62:6-7 .
a Sublimis fertur, quando non aliud magis in nares et cerebrum penetrat. Pliny, xx. 22.
b , Heb. iv.
c Evangelium tam celeri volatu ferebatur, et quidem spatio menstruo per universam Germaniam, et aliquot regiones exteras, ut ipsi Angeli cursores, et huius doctrinae praecones ess viderentur. Melch. Adam.
d Scripsit plus quam 200 volum. contra Papam. Pareus in rev 146.
e In moribus et vita sunt boni, veraces in sermone, in caritate fraterna unanimes: sed fides eorum est incorrigibilis et pessima. Eorum doctrina maxime est noxia. 1. Quia diuturnior. 2. Generalior. 3. Ob speciem puritatis.
f Sir Edw. Sands’ Relat. of West. Relig.
g Eccles. Angl. reformationem desperasset aetas praeterita, admiratur praesens, obstupescet futura. Scultet. Annul. dec. 2. ep. dedicat.
h A correct expression taking the place of an incorrect but popular one (mumpsimus). D
i One who obstinately adheres to old ways, in spite of the clearest evidence that they are wrong; an ignorant and bigoted opponent of reform. D
Fuente: John Trapp’s Complete Commentary (Old and New Testaments)
31, 32. ] THIRD PARABLE. THE GRAIN OF MUSTARD SEED. Mar 4:30-34 .Luk 13:18-19Luk 13:18-19 . On the connexion of this parable with the two last, Chrysostom observes (Hom. in Matt. xlvi. 2, p. 483), , , , ‘ ;’ , .
The comparison of kingdoms to trees was familiar to the Jews: see Dan 4:10-12 ; Dan 4:20-22 ; Eze 31:3-9 ; Eze 17:22-24 ; Psa 80:8-11 .
Fuente: Henry Alford’s Greek Testament
31. ] . = . . Luke.
Fuente: Henry Alford’s Greek Testament
Mat 13:31-35 . The Mustard Seed and the Leaven (Luk 13:18-21 (both); Mar 4:30-32 (Mustard Seed)). A couplet of brief parables of brighter tone than the two already considered, predicting great extensive and intensive development of the Kingdom of God; from Luke’s narrative (Mat 13:10 ), apparently part of a synagogue discourse. It is intrinsically probable that Jesus in all His addresses in the synagogue and to the people used more or less the parabolic method. To this extent it may be literally true that “without a parable spake He not unto them” (Mat 13:34 ).
Fuente: The Expositors Greek Testament by Robertson
Mat 13:31 . : from , late for in Attic, which Phryn. recommends to be used instead (Lobeck, 288).
Fuente: The Expositors Greek Testament by Robertson
NASB (UPDATED) TEXT: Mat 13:31-32
31He presented another parable to them, saying, “The kingdom of heaven is like a mustard seed, which a man took and sowed in his field; 32and this is smaller than all other seeds, but when it is full grown, it is larger than the garden plants and becomes a tree, so that the birds of the air come and nest in its branches.”
Mat 13:31-32 The parables of the mustard seed and the yeast and Mat 13:31-33, are parallel. They are repeated in Mar 4:30-32 and Luk 13:18-19. Those who respond to the gospel seem small and insignificant, but they are part of a spiritual kingdom which will ultimately fill the earth.
Mat 13:32 “so that the birds of the air come and nest in its branches” The capitalization in the NASB assumes this is a quote from Daniel (Mat 4:11-12). This would make the phrase a way of asserting how large the mustard seed plant became, here a symbol for the extent of the Messianic kingdom of the eschaton.
NASB”pecks”
NKJV, NRSV,
NJB” measures”
TEV” bushel”
This Greek term saton translated the Hebrew unit of measurement seah. It’s exact volume is uncertain, but it was a large amount (parallel to the large tree).
SPECIAL TOPIC: Ancient near Eastern Weights and Volumes (Metrology)
Fuente: You Can Understand the Bible: Study Guide Commentary Series by Bob Utley
31, 32.] THIRD PARABLE. THE GRAIN OF MUSTARD SEED. Mar 4:30-34. Luk 13:18-19. On the connexion of this parable with the two last, Chrysostom observes (Hom. in Matt. xlvi. 2, p. 483), , , , ; , .
The comparison of kingdoms to trees was familiar to the Jews: see Dan 4:10-12; Dan 4:20-22; Eze 31:3-9; Eze 17:22-24; Psa 80:8-11.
Fuente: The Greek Testament
Mat 13:31. , a man) The similitude is here taken from a man, as in Mat 13:33, from a woman; cf. Luk 15:4; Luk 15:8.
Fuente: Gnomon of the New Testament
kingdom
2 Another parable
The parable of the Mustard Seed prefigures the rapid but unsubstantial growth of the mystery form of the kingdom from an insignificant beginning Act 1:15; Act 2:41; 1Co 1:26 to a great place in the earth. The figure of the fowls finding shelter in the branches is drawn from Dan 4:20-22. How insecure was such a refuge the context in Daniel shows.
kingdom (See Scofield “Mat 3:2”).
Fuente: Scofield Reference Bible Notes
put: Mat 13:24, Luk 19:11, Luk 20:9
The kingdom: Mar 4:30-32, Luk 13:18, Luk 13:19
Reciprocal: Ezr 3:12 – when the foundation Job 8:7 – thy beginning Psa 72:16 – There Isa 60:22 – little Eze 47:5 – waters to swim in Hos 14:6 – branches Zec 4:10 – despised Mat 3:2 – for Mat 17:20 – a grain Mat 18:23 – is Mat 20:1 – the kingdom Mat 22:2 – kingdom Mat 25:1 – the kingdom Mar 4:26 – So Mar 4:31 – like Luk 17:6 – as Joh 3:30 – must increase Act 1:15 – an Act 21:20 – how Phi 1:9 – your
Fuente: The Treasury of Scripture Knowledge
THE TREE FROM THE SEED
The kingdom of heaven is like to a grain of mustard seed so that the birds of the air come and lodge in the branches thereof.
Mat 13:31-32
The truth which our Lord teaches by this parable is that His Church should rise from a small beginning and grow and spread gradually like some vast tree from a very small seed.
I. The history of the Church.And so it has ever been in the history of the Church. Our Lord Himself is the seed. In that little Babe who lay in Marys arms the whole Church was contained, as the great spreading oak is hidden at first in the little acorn. He chose His twelve apostles, and that little handful of missionaries went forth and boldly preached the Gospel. In one land after another, our own among the rest, a little band of earnest missionaries has raised the standard of the Cross and preached the Gospel of the Kingdom, and, slowly but surely, a branch of the Christian Church has grown and put forth leaves and borne fruit, until it has overshadowed the land. And this work is going on now.
II. Our responsibility.In India, in Africa, in all parts of the world, the false systems of heathenism are crumbling into decay, and surely, if slowly, the Christian Faith is taking root and spreading. If we will not put forth a hand to help it forward or breathe a prayer for its success, Christ can do without our aid, His kingdom must come. But if we remain inactive, uninterested, lookers-on, our sin is great and great is our loss. As Christians, we are bound to help on the work.
(a) By giving ourselves to labour in some part of the Mission Field.
(b) By our alms and prayers.
III. The coming kingdom.If we long for His speedy return, if our hearts prayer is, Come quickly, Lord Jesus, let us, remembering that He said, The Gospel must first be published among all nations, pray and work, each according to the ability which God giveth, that the good seed may be sown in all lands, and grown and spread, until a little one shall become a thousand, and a small one a strong nation, and the earth be full of the knowledge of the Lord, as the waters cover the sea.
The Rev. J. E. Vernon.
Illustration
A very striking sight often meet the eye of a traveller in India, which beautifully illustrates this growth of the Kingdom of Christ and overthrow of the errors of heathenism. Out of the roof of an ancient temple is seen growing a great tree. It is curious to see it spreading and flourishing with nothing but the stones, as it seems, to subsist upon. How could it have come there? A breath of wind or a little bird has at some time deposited a living seed on the dome of the idols temple; the dust which has been collecting for centuries in the chinks and crevices of the roof has given it soil; the silent dews or the pouring rains, together with the warm rays of the sun, have caused it to sprout. By and by a shoot has appeared, but so small as hardly to be noticeable; months pass by; all the while the roots have been twining themselves in and out among the stones. At length the heathen priests find out the growing mischief. They climb up and try to root it out, but it is too late; they cut down the tree level with the stone; but it is of no use,the roots are there still. In a few weeks the tree appears again. It is a hopeless case: the priests feel it to be so, they are obliged to let the evil go on, assured of what the upshot must bethe dead temple must yield to the living tree.
(SECOND OUTLINE)
LIFE IN THE SEED
Here are two objects: a very minute seed and a very large plant. We may apply the parable to
I. The religion of Christ.Its beginning was very small. There were two disciples of St. John the Baptist, and one of the two brought another to Christ, and then Jesus finds Philip, and Philip finds Nathanael, and so the Kingdom grew.
II. Any Christian enterprise.Sometimes a tiny seed grows to a forest. There shall be an handful of corn in the earth upon the top of the mountains; the fruit thereof shall shake like Lebanon (Psa 72:16).
III. The Divine life in the soul.Be thankful for good desires: dead souls have no desires after Christ. Be thankful if only you desire to fear His Name (Neh 1:11), and be assured that He who has begun a good work in you will perform it to the day of Jesus Christ (Php 1:6).
The Rev. F. Harper.
Illustration
How faint and feeble life may be! There is a child just taken out of the waterdrowned. She is thought by all bystanders to be dead; they all say, She is dead! And as the eyes do not see, as the ears do not hear, as the hearts beat cannot be felt, as the form is so still and ghastly, you might well suppose that life had flown. But, see! there is the faintest possible quiver of the lipso faint that none have seen it but that anguish-stricken, quick-eyed mother! Precious sign; it means life! So there may be in your soul just a little quiver, just a faint pulsation of love to Christ, just a dawning interest in things Divine. Do not think little of it. Count it, rather, inestimable treasure. It is a germ of infinite potentiality; it is the minute seed of Life Eternal.
Fuente: Church Pulpit Commentary
3:31
The parable of the tares was dropped for the present because the multitudes were still present and the explanation was not to be for them. Before dismissing them Jesus spoke two shorter parables, one of which was about the mustard seed.
Fuente: Combined Bible Commentary
Mat 13:31. A third parable, also from agricultural experience. A grain of mustard-seed. The plant grows wild, but was often found in the gardens of the Jews. In the fertile soil of Palestine it reached the height of several feet A grain of mustard seed was the proverbial expression for the smallest thing conceivable (comp. chap. Mat 17:20).
Took. Probably a hint that the small seed must be taken up carefully or it would be lost.
Fuente: A Popular Commentary on the New Testament
Our Saviour’s design in this parable is, to shew how the gospel, from small and little, from unlikely and contemptible beginnings, shall spread and increase, fructify and grow up; like a mustard seed, one of the smallest grains, grows up to a considerable tallness; and as a little leaven turns a great heap of meal into its own nature; so the gospel shall spread and increase, nations and countries becoming Christians.
Learn, That how small beginning soever the gospel had in its first plantation, yet, by the fructifying blessing of God, it has had and shall have a wonderful increase.
Fuente: Expository Notes with Practical Observations on the New Testament
Mat 13:31-32. Another parable put he forth The two former parables relate chiefly to unfruitful hearers: the two that follow, to those who bear good fruit. The kingdom of heaven Both the gospel dispensation in the world, and the kingdom of grace in the souls of true believers, especially the former; is like to a grain of mustard-seed Small and contemptible in its beginning. Which is indeed the least of all seeds That is, of all those seeds with which the people of Judea were then acquainted. Our Lords words are to be interpreted by popular use. And we learn from this gospel, Mat 17:20, that like a grain of mustard-seed was become proverbial for expressing a small quantity. But when it is grown, it becometh a tree The term tree is applied by botanists to plants of the larger kind, which grow to the magnitude of shrubs, and for that reason are termed plant arborescentes: and that there was a species of the sinapi, [mustard seed,] or, at least, what the Orientals comprehended under that name, which rose to the size of a tree, appears from some quotations brought by Lightfoot and Buxtorf from the writings of the rabbles, men who will not be suspected of partiality when their testimony happens to favour the writers of the New Testament. The Talmud mentions a mustard-tree so large that a man might with ease sit in it; and another, one of whose branches covered a tent. And it is certain we shall be much mistaken if we judge of vegetables or animals, in the eastern and southern countries, merely by what those of the same species are among us. Doddridge. Thus, from small beginnings, will the Christian doctrine spread in the world, and the life of Christ, or true religion, in the soul.
Fuente: Joseph Bensons Commentary on the Old and New Testaments
LIV.
THE FIRST GREAT GROUP OF PARABLES.
(Beside the Sea of Galilee.)
Subdivision E.
PARABLES OF THE MUSTARD SEED AND LEAVEN.
aMATT. XIII. 31-35; bMARK IV. 30-34.
a31 Another parable set he before them, saying, b30 And he said, How shall we liken the kingdom of God? or in what parable shall we set it forth? [These questions are intended to emphasize the superior excellence of the kingdom.] 31 It aThe kingdom of heaven is like unto a grain of mustard seed, which a man took, and sowed in his field: ba grain of mustard seed, which, [337] when it is sown upon the earth, though aindeed bit be {ais} bless than all the seeds that are upon the earth [that is, the smallest of all the seeds that are sown in a garden], abut b32 yet when it is sown, groweth up, and awhen it is grown, it is {bbecometh} greater than all the herbs, and putteth out great branches; aand becometh a tree [in Palestine it attains the height of ten feet], so that the birds of the heaven come and bcan lodge under the shadow thereof. ain the branches thereof. [This parable sets forth the smallness of the beginning of the kingdom, and the magnitude of its growth.] 33 Another parable spake he unto them; The kingdom of heaven is like unto leaven, which a woman took, and hid in three measures of meal, till it was all leavened. [In Oriental housekeeping, yeast is not preserved in a separate form. A piece of leavened dough saved over from the last baking is added to the new dough to ferment it. Three measures contained the quantity usually taken for one baking. Leaven represents the quickness, quietness, thoroughness, and sureness with which gospel truth diffuses itself through human society. A woman is named because baking was part of her household duty.] 34 All these things spake Jesus in parables unto the multitudes; b33 And with many such parables spake he the word unto them, as they were able to hear it [that is, as they had leisure or opportunity to listen]; 34 and without a parable spake he not {anothing} unto them [that is, he used nothing but parables on that occasion, for both before and after this he taught without parables]: 35 that it might be fulfilled which was spoken through the prophet [at Psa 78:2 which is usually attributed to Asaph, who is called a seer ( 2Ch 29:30). His teaching typified that of Christ], saying, I will open my mouth in parables; I will utter things hidden from the foundation of the world. [Jesus fulfilled this prophecy in a notable manner, being the only teacher in history distinguished in any marked degree by the use of parables.] bbut privately to his own disciples he expounded all things. [338]
[FFG 337-338]
Fuente: McGarvey and Pendleton Commentaries (New Testament)
THE GRAIN OF MUSTARD SEED
Mat 13:31-32, & Mar 4:30-32. And He said, To what must we liken the kingdom of God? or in what parable may we expound it? It is like a grain of mustard, which, when it may be sown upon the earth, is the smallest of seeds which are upon the earth, and when it may be sown and becomes greater than all the herbs, and produces great branches, so that the fowls of the air are able to lodge under its shadow. Mark says, And when it may grow up, it is the greatest of herbs, and becomes a tree, so that the fowls of the air come and lodge in its branches. Our Savior was speaking on the bank of the Galilean Sea, near Capernaum, where the mustard plant grows spontaneously, very numerous, and quite large, high as a mans head, with spreading branches, so as to shade the birds, as Mark says, or even bear some of them on its branches. As it is designated an herb, it is highly probable that was the mustard to which our Savior made the allusion. The dragomen who escorted us in that country gave it as their opinion that the herb was really the mustard here used to symbolize the kingdom. It is also a matter of fact that there is a tree in Palestine called mustard, from the pungency of the seed, imparting a burning sensation when taken into the mouth, and thus resembling the mustard plant. This tree grows up about thirty feet high, spreading out its branches very copiously, and thus fulfilling the description with reference to the lodgment of the aerial tribes. You will find specimens of this tree at the Fountain Engedi, at the southern terminus of the Dead Sea. (Eze 47:12.) In the Parable of the Sower, which is a part of this same sermon, you see the fowls gathering up the seed sown by the wayside emblematized devils. We see no reason why we should change the application in this parable. While the kingdom of grace, originating in a community from the smallest beginning, will gradually spread throughout the whole country. Fifteen hundred years ago, St. Patrick was carried by kidnapers into Ireland, and sold into slavery, quite in his boyhood. This godly youth preached the gospel, which spread over the entire island. You know how corrupt, superstitious, and priest-ridden Romanism has blighted that country a thousand years. Can you not see how the filthy, destructive fowls of the air-i.e., the demons from the bottomless pit–came and took possession of the gospel-tree, lodging in its branches and devouring the fruit? The gospel is rapidly spreading throughout the whole earth. Yet if you will follow in its track, you will see the air darkened by the black wing of the ravens, devouring the fruit, and polluting the tree by their contaminating touch. The great Churches of the Old World, which numerically throw Protestant America into eclipse, have long ceased to show up a trace of spirituality, having apparently degenerated to the level of mere politico-ecclesiastical institutions.
Fuente: William Godbey’s Commentary on the New Testament
Verse 31
Mustard-seed. The mustard plant of Palestine is said to have been of much larger growth than the one known by that name among us.
Fuente: Abbott’s Illustrated New Testament
13:31 {5} Another parable put he forth unto them, saying, The kingdom of heaven is like to a grain of mustard seed, which a man took, and sowed in his field:
(5) God begins his kingdom with very small beginnings so that by its growing (even though men neither hope nor expect it to) his mighty power and working may be displayed all the more.
Fuente: Geneva Bible Notes
The parable of the mustard seed 13:31-32 (cf. Mar 4:30-32; Luk 13:18-19)
The mustard seed was so small that the Jews used it proverbially to represent a very small thing (cf. Mat 17:20). [Note: Mishnah Niddah 5:2.] When mature, the mustard plant stood 10 to 12 feet tall as "the largest of garden plants" (NIV). [Note: Cf. Lenski, p. 528.] Consequently it became a perch for birds. Several Old Testament passages use a tree with birds flocking to its branches to illustrate a kingdom that people perceive as great (Jdg 9:15; Psa 104:12; Eze 17:22-24; Eze 31:3-14; Dan 4:7-23). The birds evidently represent those who seek shelter in the kingdom.
The Jews correctly believed that the messianic kingdom would be very large. Why did Jesus choose the mustard plant since it did not become as large as some other plants? Evidently He did so because of the small beginning of the mustard plant. The contrast between an unusually small beginning and a large mature plant is the point of this parable. [Note: Cf. N. A. Dahl, Jesus in the Memory of the Early Church, pp. 155-56.] Jesus’ ministry began despicably small in the eyes of many Jews. Nevertheless from this small beginning would come the worldwide kingdom predicted in the Old Testament. [Note: See Mark L. Bailey, "The Parable of the Mustard Seed," Bibliotheca Sacra 155:620 (October-December 1998):449-59.]