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Mark Wheeler
Luke 13:18-21
Mother’s Day, 05/08/2022
“The Beauty of Potential”
Lidgerwood Presbyterian Church
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O Lord, you’re Beautiful
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Join in as Jake leads us in our Call to Worship:
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Hello everyone! Happy Mother’s Day!! Welcome to worship at Lidgerwood!!
Welcome! We are glad you are here with us today!
We gather in our church sanctuary – a holy place – and it’s also a safe place – where the divine and the human connect together. Welcome to this holy sacred and safe place today.
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Let’s take a second to welcome each other, and those in the room, look at the camera and say HI to your friends who are at home. Tell your loved ones, whoever you can see , “The Lord is with you – and also with you!!”
Welcome to this “gathering” in God’s name. We are assembled in NorthEast Spokane, WA, along with people from all over the world. We are very glad you are “here” with us.
Be filled with God’s Holy Spirit presence and power, in your homes, through your phones and computers, in this building here, and in your lives. Pray with us … and hear and be transformed by God’s Word.
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Our Opening Song of Devotion and Praise is –– We Believe in God Almighty – #693!! A song based on the Apostles Creed
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Open our hearts today, O Lord, to feel the powerful strength and love You have for us. Help us to listen, not only with our ears, but with our spirits for Your Word of compassion and healing. Enable us to become more faithful disciples for You; for we ask this in the name of our Savior Jesus Christ. Amen.
“Isn’t she lovely? Isn’t she wonderful? Isn’t she precious?”
Do you remember that sweet little 1976 ballad by Stevie Wonder? Do you know who he was singing about? I thought it was his girlfriend or significant other. It wasn’t. It wasn’t a “love song”. He was singing about his brand new-born baby daughter! The very next line is “Less than one minute old”!
That sheds a whole new light on this song! And every parent knows exactly what he was singing about! Oooh I wish we had pictures to show on our screens!
The look on this Daddy’s eyes as he held his first-born twinkled Stevie Wonder’s words.
But this is Mother’s Day, Wheeler – stay in your lane!
I watched Jennifer hold Caitlin and Brianna and Andrew. I remember RaeAnn admiring Faith and Aaron. I’ve seen Lilly adoring Johnny. And Ashley coo into Oran’s eyes; Melissa wonder at the preciousness of Riley! Even if you’re not a parent, you kinda know what Stevie’s singing about.
But … why? All this little blob of humanity does is sleep, and eat, and complain, and poop. And … run down your bank account in ways beyond any ability to predict! So, why is “she lovely … (and) wonderful … (and) precious”?
1) Because she’s yours!
2) Because of her potential!
3) Because God says she is!
Turn with me in God’s Word to Luke 13:18-21. We are now three weeks into our study of Jesus’ parables in Luke’s Gospel, and we have seen a variety of kinds of parables, made up stories to teach a lesson. We’ve read the parable of the sower and the seed and the soil – 15 verses, and the famous Good Samaritan story about how to live life like it lasts forever – nearly 15 verses.
Today we read TWO parables … a total of FOUR verses! I guess not every sermon needs to take “all day”!
Let’s read Luke 13:18-21 …. ----
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18 He said, therefore, “What is the kingdom of God like, and what can I compare it to? 19 It’s like a mustard seed that a man took and sowed in his garden. It grew and became a tree, and the birds of the sky nested in its branches.”
20 Again He said, “What can I compare the kingdom of God to? 21 It’s like leaven that a woman took and mixed into fifty pounds of flour until all of it was leavened.”
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Jim Burford, the retired pastor from Emmanuel Presbyterian Church, once wrote about how C. S. Lewis began his autobiography with a story about a small, beautiful thing. When he was a boy, C.S. Lewis’ brother brought him a tiny garden he had created in a lid of a biscuit tin. “As long as I live,” Lewis wrote, “my imagination of Paradise will retain something of my brother’s toy garden. At its best, the life of faith gives an account of some small bit of the world – a bit of moss and twig and flower, a little bread, a little wine – and returns it to us as something larger, broader, more spacious. Religious traditions are full of stories in which something small repays practices of loving attention by cracking the world wide open.” In this toy garden, C.S. Lewis saw Paradise. He says, “I have noticed that some of my students shift uncomfortably in their seats when I talk about this. They are in school to learn how to change the world. When I say ‘small’, they hear ‘irrelevant’. When I say ‘beautiful’, they hear ‘decorative’.”
What Jesus tells us in the Parable with the Mustard Seed is that “small” is in no way “irrelevant”. “Small” holds the most potential! And “beautiful” might be “decorative”, but it is also that which glorifies God! That’s kind of what Stevie Wonder said in his song.
In another place Jesus says, “If only you had as much faith as a Mustard Seed, you could say to this mountain ‘Move into the sea’, and it would go!” Potential! … in you … in us!
G. Campbell Morgan, an early 20th Century pastor and theologian, wrote: “Jesus predicted the great success of the Kingdom … different from being a Christian nation … we are not a Christian nation … there is none. On the contrary, there is very much that denies success.”
This Mustard Seed parable is not told to suggest that we will, in our lifetime, see the fulfillment of the finishing growth of the Kingdom of God. That may not happen until the end of the age. But what we should expect to see is the progress! My prayer is that this week’s Supreme Court news leak leads to such progress.
There is some science in this parable, isn’t there? Mustard Seeds are all over the Holy Land. When we were there in February 2007 and 2009 they were just starting to be in full bloom, and we saw whole fields and hillsides covered in tiny yellow flowers. But we never once saw a Mustard Tree! It is not a Tree. It is an herb! At its best it is a ‘garden shrub outdoing itself.’ In three-weeks I will be back – in June – I truly hope to see some full-grown Mustard “Trees”! (I’ll bring photos back!)
So what does Jesus mean when He says the Kingdom of God is like a Mustard Seed which was planted and grew into a great Tree? Jesus is describing something which cannot happen by nature alone, or by the work of humanity. He describes something that is supernatural; probably something not to be finished in this life, but ultimately to be finished in the next!
And what about the “birds of the air that nest in its branches”? I have always thought that this was simply a metaphor, a word picture, describing how big the mustard seed grew! But Mary Miller, a long-time member here (she died in 2008 at age 89) once got me thinking and studying a little deeper. She said that she had always considered the “birds of the air” to be something of Satan, like the birds which snatched up the seeds that were sowed on the road in the Parable about the Soils that receive the Seed of God’s Word.
I remember arguing with her and correcting her, and then I went and re-read and read further, and studied and prayed. And guess what? … I think Mary was right after all! And here’s why … because Jesus tells another parable immediately after this one that says the same thing!
He says, in essence, “Let me give you another illustration … let’s see, the Kingdom of God is like … Oh, I know, a woman who takes three measures of meal and mixes in some leaven. What happens? All the meal gets leavened!” I know that the NIV, the Bibles in the pew racks, don’t say “three measures”, they simply say it was a large amount of flour. That’s OK, it was a large amount. But the fact that it was “three measures” (look in the footnote, there it says “3 satas”), I think, is vital to the accurate understanding!
Most of our Bibles probably title this parable something about the “leaven”. But read it carefully. It is not a parable about leaven; it is about “three measures of meal!”
Leaven in the Bible, always is used as a metaphor for evil. So why would Jesus say the Kingdom of God is like leaven? Rather, he says, “It’s like three measures of meal!” We, 21st Century Americans aren’t smart enough to really understand this metaphor; but you better believe that 1st Century Jews understood it well!
You see, “three measures of meal” is a common Old Testament figure of speech. The first time we read it is way back in Genesis 8, while Abraham and Sarah are camped under the oaks of Mamre, and three visitors come to them, and Abraham greets them while Sarah prepares “three measures of meal” for dinner! This is the story where Abraham and Sarah are told they will be pregnant and have a son in a year’s time and Sarah laughs. But then a year later they give birth to Isaac.
A few hundred years later we discover another instance, with Moses, where we find “three measures of meal.” And again another few hundred years later with Gideon in the book of Judges.
In each case the “three measures of meal” represent hospitality and fellowship. In each case the fellowship is not just with “visitors” or friends, it is with God (or at least with God’s messengers). The “three measures of meal” represents relationship and communion with God! So … the Kingdom of God has to do with fellowship and communion with God!
But no one put “leaven” in their three measures of meal! Jesus tells us, “The Kingdom of God is likened to that which happens when something is introduced which makes fellowship on the highest level impossible.”
The first parable is a parable of comparison! Be like a Mustard Seed that grows beyond what our finite human minds can even imagine!
The second is a parable of contrast! Be in fellowship, good, wholesome, pure, real fellowship with one another, and with God, and don’t allow the leaven – the evil – in! But when it comes in, trust that it is still the Kingdom of God, and treat it so!
I once saw a 1953 sermon by Billy Graham. Let me quote a few paragraphs from this sermon: “The church in America is well organized. There seems to be no limit to funds. Church buildings are going up on every hand. [1953 was a different time than 2022, wasn’t it…] We seem to have need of nothing, and yet I hear those same words burning and piercing our souls, ‘(from Revelation 3:17) You … do not know that you are wretched, miserable, poor, blind, and naked.’ The time has come to call for repentance among Christians.
“The Scripture teaches that there are three kinds of people. First, there is the natural man or woman…. Second, there is a group called carnal Christian…. Third, there are spiritual Christians…. The question before us is this: How can the carnal Christian become a spiritual Christian?
“There was a time, perhaps, when you were a spiritual Christian. You still had your first love; a fire burned in your heart for God. But something happened along the way, something has disturbed your relationship with God, and you no longer know the joy, the peace and the thrill that you once knew.”
Graham is describing the leaven that’s been mixed in the three measures of meal!
What Jesus is calling us to do to be an effective church for fellowship, outreach, worship and ministry is to – keep the leaven out, it will swell the whole loaf and interrupt/breakoff fellowship with God! But even if it gets in (selfishness, pride, ego …), trust that God’s fellowship is still real! “Wherever two or three of you gather in my name, I am there with you!”
What is the purpose of these parables for us? They call us to recognize the facts of the age in which we live. They are parables describing the Kingdom of God as Anti-false greatness. They are entirely pro-Real Greatness, which they promise will come by Being what God wants us wants us to be and doing what God wants us to do! When we do THAT, we will grow! If not in numbers – and maybe that, too – in depth of real faith!
They call us to live with “Mustard Seed Faith and without Leaven Attitudes”. Be ready to grow (in your personal faith AND in our corporate gathering of saints), and renounce any corrupting attitudes (that you hold toward anyone else in this fellowship)!
Let’s Be the Kingdom of God! You are a believer – and we are a Christian community – with Beautiful Potential!
Aren’t we lovely? Aren’t we wonderful? Aren’t we precious? In God’s eyes, Yes we are!
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Great God of Creation, we worship You in spirit and in truth.
Lead us into our 2nd hundred years of learning how to love our neighbors.
Prepare us for Your coming Kingdom and everything You would have us do and be here at LPC. Help us to know our Beautiful Potential!
Confirm Your direction with joy and hope.
In Jesus’ authority. Amen.
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Our Choral Anthem !!! Choir – – “every Time I Feel the Spirit”
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Prayer
- what are some praises, thanksgivings, adorations we want to offer?
- Is there a person or a situation you want to lift to our Lord for His answers and grace?
16 We pray this in the name of Jesus, who taught us to pray: [The Lord’s Prayer]
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Just like those earliest Christians, we sing praises here in this place because of the commitment and faith and generosity of others who shared the Good News of the Gospel in their time.
So we turn now, in our time, and share our faith and our commitment through generous giving to support the ministry of this church in Christ’s name. Let us gather our gifts together and offer them to God in gratitude and praise.
Receive our tithes and offerings as symbols of our very lives and livelihood, given as response to Your life given for us! Bless it, and by it bless the world around us. In Christ’s name, Amen.
– Offering (4449 N Nevada St, Spokane, 99207 ; or click HERE, www.givlia.com/g/lidgerwoodpresbychurch, or text 833-976-1333, code “Lidgerwood”)
Expedition Song #44 – Great Is the Lord –! We began today singing the proclaiming God’s Wonder, and we close singing of God’s Greatness!!
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We continue with this benediction: May we Grow in the grace and knowledge of Jesus Christ.
Be filled with God’s Holy Spirit.
And give glory to God, today, and forever! Amen.
And as we do that: “May the Lord bless you and protect you;
may the Lord make his face shine on you and be gracious to you;
may the Lord look with favor on you and give you peace.”
24-25 Announcements
Resources:
Burford, James; “Leaven: A Small, Beautiful Thing”; The Messenger (newsletter of Emmanuel Presbyterian Church); Spokane WA; May 2007; Pp. 1-2.
Graham, Billy; “Victorious Christian Living”; Decision; May 2007 (originally 1953); BGEA; Pp. 2-5.
Morgan, G. Campbell; The Parables and Metaphors of Our Lord; Revell Co; NY; 1943; Pp. 54-65.
Wheeler, Mark; “The Beauty of Potential”; Lidgerwood Presbyterian Church; 05/06/2007.
Wonder, Stevie; “Isn’t She Lovely?”; Motown; 1976.
https://re-worship.blogspot.com/2013/06/prayer-of-people-good-samaritan.html
Isn’t she lovely
Isn’t she wonderful
Isn’t she precious
Less than one minute old
I never thought through love we’d be
Making one as lovely as she
But isn’t she lovely made from love
Isn’t she pretty
Truly the angel’s best
Boy, I’m so happy
We have been heaven blessed
I can’t believe what God has done
through us he’s given life to one
But isn’t she lovely made from love
Isn’t she lovely
Life and love are the same
Life is Aisha
The meaning of her name
Lordie, it could have not been done
Without you who conceived the one
That’s so very lovely made from love
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