I JUST have to share this as it’s one of those thoughts that just pops out in my head. Many of these thoughts I keep to myself, but this one needs to be shared. It’s an “Aha!” moment that might also make you go, “Aha!”
It’s a passage in the Bible.
“Because you have so little faith. Truly I tell you, if you have faith as small as a mustard seed, you can say to this mountain, ‘Move from here to there,’ and it will move. Nothing will be impossible for you.” ~Matthew 17:20
This verse has been preached about since my childhood (and yours, too, maybe). Now that I’m a full adult who has deliberately learned what all these are really all about, I realize that all those homilies about faith as small as the mustard seed were repeating only one thing over and over again.
That is: the size of the mustard seed. Literal beings as we are, the awe that preachers try to generate from us is the size of the mustard seed that’s equivalent to the size of faith needed to move mountains. But since we can’t imagine how that small faith can move mountains, and so far, we haven’t even been able to move a stockpile by a mere command, the mustard seed becomes one of those heavenly thoughts we know we will never fully grasp, but feel good that we know about it.
While reading this verse anew, a thought form appeared in my mind as thought forms for my articles do, I just have to be quick enough to put them down in writing so they will not disappear as fast as they zip in.
The size is important, but that is not the be-all end-all of the parable.
Rather, it is about the unquestioning, never-hesitating errrmmm... it’s a seed and I’m not sure if it has “faith” as humans know faith. Still... its never-hesitating faith, certainty, that it is growing to be a mustard.
It’s a seed and when planted, it never hesitates whether it will become a mustard plant or not. It knows and it grows as a mustard. Period. Not even the fact that it’s a tiny dark thing that doesn’t look like a mustard plant will stop it from becoming the mustard plant that is thousands if not a million times bigger. That is the faith required here.
It’s not just its tiny-ness but its sureness.
“To those who listen to my teaching, more understanding will be given, and they will have an abundance of knowledge. But for those who are not listening, even what little understanding they have will be taken away from them.
“That is why I use these parables, For they look, but they don’t really see. They hear, but they don’t really listen or understand.” (Matthew 13:12-13)
A very interesting gospel here that I just stumbled on...
Enjoy your Sunday!