Jesus uses two parables to describe the Kingdom of God in which the initial "offering" is small; a tiny seed and a dash of yeast. And yet, in both cases, the outcome is something much greater. Both the initial images have much greater influences than their visible properties would suggest. I suggest that one takeaway is that, while it is tempting to look for big moments and big events to be a part of, what we end up missing is the small, everyday opportunities to serve that carry far more influence than we might initially imagine.

The Sermon on the Mount in Matthew 5-7 casts a vision for a life lived faithfully. Right smack in the center of it, Jesus declares that it is our perspective that must shift in order to make any of this possible

8th Century Israelites were experiencing the most comfortable, successful existence they could have imagined. Their neighbors had weakened, the empires to their Northeast (Assyria) and Southwest (Egypt) were in slumps and they controlled a large portion of the major regional trade route. Life was good. Unfortunately, they missed their failures because of their certainty that the good things they were receiving had been earned by their faithfulness to God. Its a lie human beings often tell themselves- do good, get good; do evil, get evil. It is as if we assume a relationship with the Divine is a transaction-based system yielding earthly benefits. The danger in functioning that way is that we blind ourselves to authentic service in the kingdom of God because we are most concerned with our earthly situation.

I am of the opinion that the problem with most of American Christianity is that it has lost of heart of the good news of Jesus. We, instead, have replaced the spirit of Christianity with an ethical code of do's and don'ts that completely miss what it means to be transformed by the spirit of God. Philippians 2 offers an image of what it looks like to live a transformed life. It starts by giving up the certainty that "I know what's best" for me and for others, and discovering that faithful living is found in service and sacrifice.

Nathaniel, when told by his good friend Phillip that he has found The Messiah, the one promised by Moses and the prophets, reacts in disbelief. His disbelief, however, isn't because the claim is farfetched. Many people during that time were looking and hoping for the promised one. Instead, the disbelief is generated by one word; "Nazareth." Nothing good comes from there. 

Nathaniel nearly misses a chance to walk with Jesus because of a built-in prejudice. Are we really any different? What have we missed out on because of our base-level reactions against others?