Luke 13:18-19 Then said he, Unto what is the kingdom of God like? and whereunto shall I resemble it? (19) 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; and the fowls of the air lodged in the branches of it.
Unless you live under a rock, most of you probably know that it is NCAA college basketball tournament season. This coming weekend is the Final Four! At the beginning of each year’s tournament, most of us like to predict and see a good cinderella story. A cinderella story in college basketball,is known as a small college, who by their pedigree, does not seem to deserve to be among the major Blue Blood universities, but have won games in the tournament, knocking off a goliath type opponent. Everyone loves a good cinderella story. This year’s cinderella darling was Florida Gulf Coast University.
Jesus tells about another cinderella type story: His church. Instead of describing the church as “Cinderella”, he uses his typical farming analogy. He describes his church as a mustard plant. It starts as a small, insignificant type seed but grows to be as big as a small tree in which birds can use for living.
Like this mustard plant, the church too had humble beginnings. It began by a seemingly common man. Jesus was born to a carpenter in a animal shed. He was not born to a royal family or down the gene pool of a valiant warrior.
When Jesus began to recruit those that would carry out his mission, he found them from the lower echelons of society. Jesus recruited uneducated, poorly spoken, non leading men that would be hard to take serious when trying to perform a religious “revolution”. To go to an extreme, Jesus even recruited some that were among the dredges of society: Like tax collectors.
Jesus was also at politics. In fact, he did not care who he offended. He certainly did set out to offend anyone, but if folks were offended at the truth, he certainly did not soften his message to make it more palatable to the masses.
John 6:60 Many therefore of his disciples, when they had heard this, said, This is an hard saying; who can hear it? (61) When Jesus knew in himself that his disciples murmured at it, he said unto them, Doth this offend you?....(66) From that time many of his disciples went back, and walked no more with him. (67) Then said Jesus unto the twelve, Will ye also go away?
In spite of this meager beginning, at least from a worldly standard, the church spread through out the world. Today, the church is is practically every country in the world and is considered to be the world’s most populous religion.
Not only is it popular, but it has positively transformed millions of lives over the years.
1 Corinthians 6:9-11 Know ye not that the unrighteous shall not inherit the kingdom of God? Be not deceived: neither fornicators, nor idolaters, nor adulterers, nor effeminate, nor abusers of themselves with mankind, (10) Nor thieves, nor covetous, nor drunkards, nor revilers, nor extortioners, shall inherit the kingdom of God. (11) And such were some of you: but ye are washed, but ye are sanctified, but ye are justified in the name of the Lord Jesus, and by the Spirit of our God.
In verse 11, Paul told those at Corinth that they had been thieves drunkards, extortioners, fornicators, homosexuals etc. but now they had been changed from those sinful lifestyles and had been transformed into something better; all because the power of the mission of the Lord’s church.
I would call that a cinderella story!
Reflecting His SON,
Dennis Hogan
Minister, North Hardin Church of Christ
1804 Sam Stewart Dr.
Radcliff, KY 40160
Questions, comments or further explanation? Contact me at: dennis.hogan@icloud.com
If you have friends, family, or acquaintances that you feel could benefit from RTS, please forward
their e-mail address to me and I will add them to my mail list.
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