Faithbase

You see this mustard seed on my finger? It's so small that even if I actually did have one on my finger, you wouldn't be able to see it because they're only like one millimeter big. In Mark 4, Jesus talked about the parable of the mustard seed. And what starts off as this really small one to two millimeter seed ends up growing into this really tall 10 to 12 foot tree. And what's super neat about it is these trees are so sturdy that birds can come and find rest within the shadow that these trees provide. And what's absolutely lovely about that is that's the way that Jesus describes the kingdom of God. It can be kind of hard to see at first or it can be hard to find, but when you know how to look and when you begin to look with intentionality, you'll begin to see it everywhere, right? It's really hard for us to miss a 10 to 12 foot tree, especially like when we're actually looking for trees. And so what I love about that story is really we see the kingdom of God make its way to earth in our most like immediate context, right? And usually this happens best within our family. I was thinking about my own life growing up as a missionary kid in the Philippines and how I spent so much time with my two older brothers. And I've got this story from when I was two years old when my eldest brother pulled me off a drainage pipe there and there was no one around. I had fallen down into this little area that was wooded and there would have been no way for me to be found. And I probably would have died had he not been there at the right time. And so it's things like that that I've come to realize as I've gotten older is that's the kingdom of God making its way to earth, right? Heaven is a place that we want to help participate and cultivate here and now. So while that story might be a pretty extreme example, it teaches me kind of two things about what we know to be true in this story of what Jesus is talking about. In this parable, when Jesus makes mention of the birds being able to find rest within its perches or its shade, it really means people who are intentionally looking like Christians, people who follow Jesus, who are trying to connect and find and experience the kingdom of God on a regular basis can actually do so if they know how to look. And what I've noticed is it's usually best to start within my own family unit. If I'm really looking for the kingdom of God or if I'm trying to be intentional about bringing God's kingdom here to earth, there's two things that I have to do. And the first one is recognize when I'm being served. When people are going out of their way to serve me or love me or take care of me on my behalf at their own expense, it teaches me something about being able to see God's work in action. And the more I begin to tune my eyes to that, the more I begin to be intentional about how I'm looking for it, the more I begin to see it in every place and that's where I realize that this tree is growing so big and the kingdom of God is becoming so obvious. And the second thing that's important to do is to actually participate in the laboring of bringing the kingdom here to earth. It's not enough just to watch people serve me because then I become lazy and spoiled and everything else. But that's a good start, right? We've got to be grateful and we've got to recognize that and we've got to pay attention to those things. But equally, if not more importantly, is we have to participate in bringing that kingdom here. It's so crucial and critical to make sure that in our own family dynamics, like we love God and then we love our family and then we pursue them and we serve them. So if you're somebody who has a family that's a little bit difficult or things are scattered or things like that, know that there are certain boundaries or things that you're not ever going to necessarily be able to do or to overcome or there are things like that, that people choose not to have healing, people don't want to have relationship. That's not the thing that I'm kind of talking about here. But what can be done is how far can you go, right? As long as it is with you, as far as it is with you, how can you live at peace with people? But what about your friends or your immediate contacts, maybe your workers, your coworkers, your boss or whatever, maybe you are the boss. How can you serve your employees? How can you take care of them? Whatever it is, there's a family pod or a unit of people that you spend a lot of time with that you have the ability to serve and to be blessed by their serving. So if you'd like to talk about this more, please feel free to reach out to me on Instagram. I'm at Joshua underscore Carmen or you can private message me here on Facebook. I would love to connect with you. Thanks so much and have a great week. Mustard trees. Is that what they're called? Yeah, I guess so. You said these trees. Yeah. Okay. Mustard trees. Okay. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Just coming out of it.