We want God to wave His hand over our world and change it all at once. And indeed a day will come when Jesus will return to earth bringing all evil to an immediate halt and believers will be transformed in the twinkling of an eye. But, for now, until He comes again, that's not the way God grows His kingdom. With the parable of the mustard seed, Jesus is revealing God's strategy to win the world. And what a surprising strategy it is! He takes one person who is filled with His Spirit and places them in a group of people and then uses that person to draw others to Himself. God delights at selecting people that seem insignificant and weak, and accomplishes great things through them so that when the work is done, everyone must glorify God.

Jesus Himself is the first "seed" which God has Thrown" into His "garden," which is the world. Then, just as God "cast" His own Son into the earth so the Son of God casts His followers (Mt 13:36-38). As these declare Him to others the Holy Spirit indwells each new believer, and they in turn, also become seeds that the Son scatters into the world. Just as a plant multiplies the life that is in it by bearing fruit which become fruit-bearing plants themselves, so God's rulership expands through the human race until Christ is the head of a great kingdom composed of people from every nation.

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