Here’s a meditation from my book No Ordinary Stories originally published as To Put It Another Way. It offers us a reminder that what we can’t do, God can!
THE MUSTARD SEED
Reading
He also said, ‘With what can we compare the kingdom of God, or what parable will we use for it? It is like a mustard seed, which, when sown upon the ground, is the smallest of all the seeds on earth; yet when it is sown it grows up and becomes the greatest of all shrubs, and puts forth large branches, so that the birds of the air can make nests in its shade.’ Mark 4:30-32
(This parable can also be found in Matthew 13:31-32 and Luke 13:18-19)
The meditation of the gardener of Joseph of Arimathea
A mustard seed!
You can’t get much tinier than that, can you?
One breath,
the faintest of breezes,
and it’s gone,
tossed away to heaven knows where!
It’s hard to believe it grows as it does,
tall enough for the birds to build their nests in.
Yet isn’t that the way life so often turns out,
small beginnings yielding the most surprising of results?
From a gentle spring comes a mighty river,
from a single spark a leaping flame;
day after day it happens, if only we have eyes to see.
I shouldn’t have needed reminding of that, should I? –
for I’d seen it often enough,
but when it came to grasping the growth of God’s kingdom
I suppose I simply never thought of it in those terms.
Foolish of me, I know,
except that I’d been brought up to think differently,
the picture in my mind one of some dramatic event,
the glorious advent of the Messiah coming to claim his throne,
splendid,
spectacular,
sensational,
indisputable proof that here was the one we’d waited for –
God’s chosen deliverer sent to set us free.
So when it came to Jesus,
for all his wonderful words and deeds, I was unconvinced;
attracted, certainly,
deeply challenged,
yet unable to stop myself asking,
‘What can God achieve through him?’
He just didn’t fit the bill.
And when I saw him finally hustled before Pilate,
condemned to death
nailed to a cross,
well, that seemed to be it,
the final nail in the coffin, you might say.
Only it wasn’t,
for, like a seed entombed in the earth,
he rose up,
reaching out not just to us but all the world,
the extent of his purpose beyond anything I’d imagined,
the breadth of his love utterly breathtaking;
and I realised that in this man
God had worked the most staggering of miracles,
from the child of Bethlehem, the King of kings and Lord of lords,
from one man’s death, life for us all!
Prayer
Lord Jesus Christ,
there are times when we wonder what we can possibly do
to advance your kingdom or further your will.
We feel hopelessly inadequate for the task before us,
our resources so small,
our gifts so few;
the idea that we can achieve anything worthwhile
or make any meaningful impression on the world around us
hard to credit.
And in human terms, we know that is true;
there is nothing special about us
to guarantee the success of our efforts.
But we thank you that our strength lies not in ourselves but in you –
your word,
your love,
your transforming power.
Time after time you have worked through those
whom the world deemed insignificant,
bringing the most astonishing of results
from the most unpromising of beginnings.
Help us then to trust you now,
and to offer our service, poor though it may seem,
confident that you will take and use it to your glory,
for your name’s sake.
Amen.