Luke 13:20-21

Luke chapter 13. I want to read verses 18 to 21, but our focus is on 20 and 21. Then said he, under what is the kingdom of God like? Whereunto shall I resemble it? It is like a grain of mustard seed, which a man took and cast into his garden, and it grew and waxed a great tree. The fowls of the air lodged in the branches of it. And again, he said, whereunto shall I like in the kingdom of God, is like leaven, which a woman took and hid in three measures of meal to the whole. It was leaven, may God bless to us. He is holy and sacred word this morning. In the summer of 1936, Adolf Hitler began what he considered as the reconstruction of Berlin, his capital. He had grand plans for the capital of the Third Reich that it would match any of the great cities of the world. The government complex was modeled after the ornate, public buildings of the Napoleonic era, the Parthenon, and St. Peter’s Cathedral in Rome. It was supposed to be completed in 1950. These elaborate plans to the capital of Germany were memorialized for hundreds of years. They were supposed to memorialize for hundreds of years the might and the achievement of the Third Reich under Adolf Hitler. Hitler’s vision was so great that the capital was going to be four times greater than the U.S. capital. The top of this gigantic, rounded roof, Hitler had designed an iron sculpture of the German eagle sitting on top of a world. However, as we know, Hitler’s grand plans never came to pass. His ideas for the Third Reich were ruined by 1946 completely, and he never did complete the work. So his plans, as he had hoped, his empire, completely collapsed. Christ in our text is talking about the tremendous growth of the kingdom of God. and he uses the parable of the mustard seed and that then of the leaven to teach us about the growth of the kingdom of God. Unlike Hitler’s unfulfilled grand plans for Berlin, Christ promises that the kingdom of heaven is sure and certain and it’s going to grow and progress. And we see the truth of that. today as we look around in our world. Well, it has an insignificant beginning, and we talked about the fact that the mustard seed being the smallest seed, and yet look what kind of came out of it, how small it started, look what it was accomplished. But there’s another aspect of the kingdom of having money to look at. The mustard seed talked about the outward growth of the kingdom of heaven. But the parable of 11 talks about the inward growth of the kingdom of heaven. So there are two aspects here that we need to consider. So you find that here in these verses here that the kingdom of heaven has invisible growth. In fact, if you look at it with me at the scripture, here, we read here in verse 20 and 21, where which all shall I liken the kingdom of heaven is like, is like leaven, which a woman took and hid in three measures of meal, till the whole was leaven. Now, Jesus would have us ponder here, the idea of leaven working in. bread. We have a woman here who is baking bread. She takes leaven or sire dough, if you would, and puts it into a batch of other dough, and that little bit of sourdough, and that little bit of sourdough begins to work and to ferment the entire big mass of dough until the whole thing is leavened. you girls have seen your mother do this, so you probably have an idea of what Jesus is talking about here. And the Bible says, a little leaven at the whole lump. And that’s what happens. Now, the woman who put this lump of leaven in her dough cannot see it visibly working right away. You don’t notice it right away. But she’s perfectly confident that given time it’s going to work. Trusting that this will happen, she needs the dough into a loaf and prepares to bake it, expecting the dough to rise and get a nice loaf of bread. Now, the reason here that three measures are cias, which is an F, it’s about a half a bushel. Now, most of us would never. Make that much bread. We’d have to open a bakery, I guess, you know. But such a quantity was normally fermented and kneaded by the women at one time. You remember when the Lord and the two angels visited Abraham and the book of Genesis, and Abraham tells Sarah his wife, make ready three majors a fine meal, need it, and make cakes upon the hearth. according to the Jewish Talmud, three women would be employed in the, in making one lump of dough. One would need it, one would make it into the loz, and the other one would bake it. And they would make a bunch of it at one time, evidently. So here’s the figure of the Levin. Now, what we have here is a picture of the invisible power of the kingdom of heaven. Now, it is true that elsewhere in Scripture that Levin is using a bad sense. It’s used in reference to the man that was living in incest in the book of 1 Corinthians in Chapter 5 as evil, as immorality. It’s also used of the corrupt doctrine of the scribes and the Pharisees. When Jesus said, beware of their leaven. But when he says the kingdom of heaven is like unto this leaven here, then it’s used in a good sense. We’re talking about the gospel influence by the power or work of the Spirit, working like leaven is what we see. Notice that the leaven is hid in three major. of Meal because he is dealing with the personal invisible inward proof or inward aspect if you would of the kingdom of heaven here and that’s what we see Christ thought that the kingdom of God does not come from by observation neither shall I say so they say low here or low there for the kingdom of heaven is within you, he says, in Luke 17, 20, and 21. Romans 14 tells us that the kingdom of heaven, for the kingdom of God, is righteousness and peace and joy in the Holy Ghost. These are heart issues. These are inward aspects. So the leaven of the gospel must be needed into the dough. The Word of God must be here. The Word of God hidden in the heart by the Holy Spirit needing it, so to speak. The seemingly insignificant beginnings of the gospel, when one hears it, on account of its piercing, penetrating, spreading nature, has an abiding effect. It’s like a two-edged sword we hold, we’re told in Hebrews. It cuts into the heart and deals with men’s souls. So the Holy and Spirit empowered gospel reaches your conscience, pierces your heart, enlightens the understanding, subdues your will, and brings you an into conformity with obedience to Christ. We can call it, it leavens you. you, so to speak. The gospel works a change in you as you relish what you once detested. For they that are of the flesh do mind the things of the flesh, but they that are of the spirit, the things of the spirit. And while you were in the flesh, your mind was on the things of the flesh, but with the work of the spirit, now your mind is on the things of the spirit. and that’s what we see. So the gospel works and a universal change within you. Defusing itself into all the powers of your faculty to the whole is leavened. And so we’re talking here about it affecting all aspects of your being here. We’re not conformed to the world, but we’re transformed because our minds are renewed. were told in scripture. Some of you know Pastor Gordon Ketty. He said that when he grew up, he imagined that he was always a Christian. He said, and then came a day when it first crossed his mind that he might not be. He said he was at a shopfront meeting place in Edinburgh in the university there, where they had a Christian. union and he was listening to a man preach and he was preaching on Ephesians 2 1 that you are dead in trespasses and sins. He said there are people walking around who are dead spiritually. He said it’s the first time he dawned on him. I wonder if I could be like that. And so he was, he said it was like a He was shot with an arrow by this. He managed to keep this under wraps. He didn’t really go any further with it, but he said it stuck in his mind. He said later, about a year or so later, he was in a small town in Scotland, along with some of his pals to play a five-on-five soccer tournament, and then they were going to have a picnic. And that evening, they were supposed to have a picnic. a gospel rally that they were going to attend. Well, he said it was a Baptist preacher, a Reverend Gordon, who opened his Bible and spoke from Ecclesiastes 4, or 124, Remember thy creator in the days of thy youth. And Ketty said that as this man thundered out point after point, he showed that the thrust of this message had to do with the gospel of Christ. He saw as never before how that life was a gift that was easily wasted and that he had been more interested in soccer than he had been in the Savior. He saw with awesome reality that he was neither right with God nor committed to his son and he had taken everything for granted from his job. And the Holy Spirit applied the gospel to Kettie’s life. life and changed him. And so he ended up in the ministry because of this. It leavened him. It leavened him as he was brought to faith in Christ. So we find here you the kingdom of God has invisible growth. Secondly, you should rely on the power of the gospel of the kingdom of heaven. You must always put your trust in the Word of God for success. Now, if this parable teaches us anything, it teaches us this idea of trusting in the gospel. The woman here probably refers to the church, which is often referred to as the bride of Christ or the wife of Jehovah. In the book of Revelation, you’ll recall that the church is portrayed as a woman clothed with the sun, with the moon under her feet, bearing a crown of 12 stars in chapter 12 of that book. The implication of our text is that the woman or the church here should put a trust in the power of the Word of God for success. For I am not ashamed of the gospel of Jesus Christ, Paul said. for it is the power of God into salvation. Now, I had Russell read Mark chapter 4, verses 26 through 29. And it dealt with really the secret work of the Spirit of God. Here’s a farmer. He goes out and he plants the seed, and it springs up. And you’ll notice it said, he knows not how. But it produces this crop. there’s a mysterious element by which God’s work of the Spirit is demonstrated in this parable because it works in men’s hearts. We know not how in many ways. I mean, we’re really not privy to seeing it working as we’d like. We don’t know what’s happening usually at first in someone’s life. Who can direct the mind of the spirit? Who can confine him to only a humanly devised plan of evangelism? The wind bloweth where it listeth. Now here’s the sound thereof. The casnot tell once it cometh and wither it goeth. So is everyone that is born of the spirit. We don’t know how the spirit’s going to work. But he works and changes people’s hearts. Now, in our world, we often think of some kind of plan or some kind of formula to use in our evangelism, thinking that through our skill and using the plan, that people were going to be converted. it. And it doesn’t matter whether we use some type of force or diplomatic brilliance or whatever we’re using in arguing our case. But the truth is this. The gospel, though off despise, is the power of God under salvation. And it works in whatever way the Spirit decides he’s going to work. And we cannot direct the spirit. spirit by our special plan. Do you remember the still small voice that Elijah heard on Mount Gorb, which made him cover his head with his mantle as God spoke to him. Now, think about this. He had seen God’s power on Mount Carmel when he called down fire from heaven and it burned up a sacrifice that was soaked with the power of Mount Carmel. all those barrels of water. It was a mighty man festation of the power of God from heaven. He thought perhaps this was going to change Israel and they were going to follow Jehovah, but we find that’s not really what happened. Jezebel was very upset having her prophets killed. And so she puts out a death sentence on the prophet, and he, in his first, fear takes off, goes into the desert, goes through the desert for 40 days and ends up at Mount Horrible. And God met him there. Now, when God met him, there was an earthquake, but God wasn’t in the earthquake. There was a whirlwind, but God wasn’t in that. Nor was he in the fire. And then there was the still small voice. where God spoke to you. My friends, the work was so powerful, so invisible in dealing with Elijah. and also, as God said, I have 7,000 have not bowed the knee to bail. You’re not the only one, Elijah. It’s that still small voice by which God spoke to these people. quietly, invisibly, but powerfully. God speaks to men’s souls, often with a still, small voice, dealing with their hearts. You know, the scriptures says a soft tongue breaks the bone in the book of Proverbs. God’s soft tongue is so powerful that it moves, man, It changes men. It’s mysterious how this works. But this is the spiritual leaven by which the kingdom of God is built. So you must always put your trust in the Word of God for success. You must display patience as you wait for the Lord to work. Now, the parable 11 teaches patience in our witnessing. You know, the yeast. the leaven doesn’t work immediately. Sire dota. It’s slow working, but it’s thorough and it’s worked. You know, we have the day of Pentecost. We have the Great Awakening. We think about some of the times in history, like the Reformation and so forth. We have a powerful working of the Spirit. But that’s not so common, sadly. What’s more likely to happen is that the Word of God working, in an unspectacular way, more like the leaven. That’s a more common way that God works. And he saves a person here and there throughout the kingdom as he saves people’s souls. We’re impatient. We want things to happen immediately. We want, you know, we want something dramatic to happen, but that’s not always the way God works. We could wish that were the way that. We could wish that were the way works but there are those occasions when he does work like that but it ought to teach us here that man devised canned programs with guaranteed responses are not the way in which the Lord usually works I think I told you this before when I was about 16 years of age in my home church we had an evangelist come in for a whole week had evangelistic services And on visitation night, which was a Thursday night, the evangelist spent about an hour talking to the many we’re going to go out on visitation, explaining how to win souls with guaranteed results. Supposedly, you had to have the track God’s Simple Plan of Salvation, and you read this track word for word to the person, he even told you how to fold it so that you could, you know, when you could, you know, you’re reading and only let them see one page at a time. And you need a black Bible and you need a red handkerchief, black Bible to emphasize sin and the red handkerchief, the blood of Christ. And supposedly after reading the track and illustrating how Christ saves a soul by his blood, you then have them repeat word for word a sense. salvation prayer that the track contained. You just had to, like, read it off. And he assured us we would win more people for Christ if we just followed this, his methods. Here I am 16 years of age, and I’m thinking, why is he taking up all our time when we should be out visiting people? And the other thing I thought of is this is never going to work. It just seemed too hokey to me. And it was, of course. Okay. We tend to tire enthusiasm to some predetermined short-term goal here. Because waiting on the Lord to work is in our cup to tea. We want to sort of run people through the hoops and say, well, now you’re saved. That’s a good way to have a whole church full of unsaved people, by the way. is you find out if you pursue that. When these evangelistic methods fail to work as you hoped, you get discouraged. You think, well, you know, isn’t anybody going to get saved? Well, they’re not going to get saved that way. The temptation is to invent, you know, let’s invent something new. Let’s try another approach. Friends, we don’t know who we’re going to meet. We don’t know what their needs are. We don’t know even sometimes how we’re going to approach the witness. We just have to go along with the situation and step in and speak about Christ and bring him up. So Jesus demands our patient faithfulness. In the parable of the East here says God has to work in his own way. And we don’t always know how he’s going to work. It’s secret in his work. You know, Paul says I planted Apollos watered, but God gave the increase. Well, maybe you’re only planning. Maybe somebody else has to come along in water. There’s a time lapse between this. There’s a time lapse between putting leaven in the dough and it rising. So when you witness for Christ, allow the Holy Spirit to work in a person’s life, conversions are not always instantaneous. Gordon Ketty said there was like a year in between when he first heard that he could be dead at trespasses and sins. And when he realized, hey, I’m not serving the Lord at all. And, you know, I’m more interested in soccer than the Savior. All that took time. It doesn’t mean that God wasn’t working in his life, but he wasn’t working speedily. He was working slowly to bring him to self. salvation in Christ. So keep on working and praying and keep on quietly obeying the Lord’s revealed will in your life when it comes to witnessing for him. Work with assurance that God’s word will not return unto him void, but will accomplish the purpose for which that has been sinned. Let me make one final observation about the work of grace. here. Be assured that the work of grace once begun in your soul will continually work. Leaven once introduced to the dough completely leavens the lump. It will gradually leavened your whole self. Little by little it influences your conscience, your mind, your will, your will be makes changes. Once the Holy Spirit’s work has begun in your heart, your whole person is inevitably going to be changed. Old things will pass away. All things will become new. As Paul says in Philippians 1-6, being confident of this very thing, that he which has begun a good work and you will perform it until the day of Christ. He never stops. He keeps leavening. So I asked yourself this question. Is there any work of grace in my heart? Do you know anything here of the progressive sanctification of the leavening process that we’ve been talking about this morning in this parable of the leavened. It’s true that some believers grow in grace. much faster than others, but we should see spiritual progress in her life. And it should continue. It should be something that’s a continuous change that’s taking place in improvement from year to year as we go through this life. Well, Hitler’s grand plans came to nothing. Didn’t work out. The kingdom of God is promised to grow. into something great. And we know it will. And it works in our lives inwardly and does something great too. And so we see the growth of the kingdom within us. And this is how we see the parable of the sower and the cerebral of 11 here that God secretly works. But look what he accomplishes in people’s hearts. We’ll let us close with the word of prayer.