1. Grace, mercy, and peace
to you from God our Heavenly Father and our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. The message from God’s Word today comes from
Luke 17:6, where
our Lord Jesus said, “If you had faith like a grain of
mustard seed, you could say to this mulberry tree, ‘Be uprooted and planted in
the sea,’ and it would obey you.” It’s entitled, “Faith
Like a Mustard Seed,” dear brothers and sisters in Christ.
2. We hear a lot
of talk these days about how difficult it is to be a Christian. The world has
changed. The nation has changed. Increasingly, people are walking away from the
church or choosing never to affiliate because we are seen as irrelevant,
judgmental, or hypocritical. The more secularized we become as a nation, we’re
told, the less impact we Christians seem to have.
3. All this talk
about the challenges of living in “a post-Christian world” can lead to
timid, fearful, even doubtful disciples of Jesus Christ. Truthfully, our world
is not that different from the world of Jesus’ first disciples. Their world has
been described as a pre-Christian world in which people did not know Jesus or
His teachings or His mission.
4. That phrase “pre-Christian”
may be a better description for our world today, better than “post-Christian.”
It says that Christians are not participants in a dying institution but a
movement. It says that people are watching us, wondering what makes us tick. To
call our world “pre-Christian” is to say we can still have an impact by
the way we live. It says that our stories and songs matter and that our
everyday life means everything to the way the world sees Jesus Christ.
5. This is exactly
what was happening with Jesus and His first disciples in Luke 17. Jesus was
constantly teaching about everyday values and practices. Here He tells His
disciples that they would need to forgive others, even if they had been
wronged, seven times in a single day. He wasn’t talking about some
institutional health here but a way of life. He was referring to the simple but
challenging act of confronting another with their sin and voicing forgiveness.
This is the stuff of everyday relationships.
6. It is hard to
confront, though, isn’t it? And it is hard to forgive. The roots of bitterness
run deep and last long, like tree roots — like mulberry tree roots, stubborn
and strong. No wonder the disciples responded to Jesus’ challenge to forgive
with the words, “Increase our faith”
(Luke 17:5). They could have said, “Good Lord! You expect us to forgive like
that and that often? Now that’s challenging! We need greater faith for that!
Give us greater faith, Lord!”
7. It was one of
those teaching moments. So when His disciples said, “Increase our faith!” Jesus did not say, “Sure, presto! May you
have greater faith!” What He did say was, “If you had faith like a grain of mustard seed, you could say to this
mulberry tree, ‘Be uprooted and planted in the sea,’ and it would obey you.”
8. Jesus doesn’t
explain his response. Luke, who records Jesus’ words, doesn’t interpret them
either. You have to admit, it’s quite an image, though. With just a
little faith, Jesus is saying — faith as
small as a mustard seed, the faith you have right now — you can uproot a
thirty-foot mulberry tree and plant it at the bottom of the sea. I can imagine
a Christian saying to a mulberry tree, “Pull up your roots and head for the
ocean, tree! You will be the first mulberry tree successfully transplanted to
the ocean floor!” Then we see, of all things, this mulberry tree flying off
to its new surroundings, 4000 feet below sea level!
9. So what is
Jesus saying here? For one thing He is saying that it is not helpful to
quantify our faith. Jesus’ disciples were doing that with their request, “Increase our faith!” In other words, “Jesus,
give us more faith, heroic faith, enough faith to do the hard thing in hard
times.” Jesus’ response says that it is not helpful to make faith a
quantifiable possession. We say that, don’t we? “If only I had enough
faith!” “If I could just believe enough!” Or, negatively, we say, “I guess I
just don’t have enough faith!” Notice how the weight of those statements is
on us. Can we believe enough? Can we trust enough? Do we have enough faith to
make things happen?
10. So if faith is
not to be quantified, how do we understand Jesus’ words, “faith like a grain of mustard seed”? How can faith send mulberry
trees flying into the sea? I believe that Jesus’ concept of faith puts the
whole matter of faith into our relationship with Him. “Faith like a grain of mustard seed” is simply trust in Him, a trust
that abides in Him, depends on Him, and lives every day in Him. It is only in
Christ that we move mulberry trees, even the deep ones like bitterness or a
lack of forgiveness. That is possible only as Christ lives in us.
11.
In Latin there are two words for faith. The first is
fides, which might be said to be
quantifiable. It is faith that certain things are true. Fides says, “I believe that … that God created the world … that
Jesus was born of a virgin … that Jesus was crucified and raised from the dead
… that the Spirit brings life.” Our creeds are examples of fides. The other word for faith in Latin is fiducia. This is relational faith. It is trust in the Lord, being
rooted in the power of God. Fiducia
was Martin Luther’s preferred word for faith. You can hear fiducia at work in Paul’s familiar words in Philippians 4:13, I can do all things through him [Christ] who strengthens me.
12. So “faith like a grain of mustard seed”
says that I can forgive not so much because I have enough faith to do it but
rather because I live and make decisions inside a strong relationship with
Jesus Christ. “Faith like a grain of
mustard seed” says I already have what I need to live my Christian life and
witness: I have Christ, or better, Christ has me! The One who came and died for
me, the One who broke through death and came to life for me, the One who called
me in Baptism and made me His own — He makes seemingly impossible things
possible.
13. So, in Christ,
I confront the person who has wronged me, and I offer forgiveness. I do the
hard thing and share my faith with my neighbor. I make time to pack food for
the hungry when I thought I was too busy. I drop a quarter in an LWML mite box,
believing it will make a difference. I hold the hand of a neighbor in the
hospital, maybe not my favorite neighbor. I phone a friend who has become
distant.
14. So, in Christ,
our church takes on a new ministry, knowing that it will be a stretch, simply
because it is what Christ would have us do. So we see our community not as the
enemy, but as our mission field. And underneath it all, you hear mulberry trees
moving — hard things, seemingly impossible things, happening because Christ
lives within me, because Christ lives within us!
15. The Lutheran
Women’s Missionary League has always lived by mustard seed faith. Little gifts,
mites, combined across our synod, make big things happen in mission across the
world. Christ has been moving mulberry trees through the LWML since 1942. What
a model they are for Christian discipleship! If our congregations are the soul
of the LCMS; if our pastors, workers, and missionaries are the beautiful feet
of the LCMS; if our seminaries and universities are the mind of the LCMS; if
Lutheran Hour Ministries is the voice of the LCMS; then the LWML is the heart
of the LCMS. The women of our church have taught us what it means to move
mulberry trees with just a little faith.
16. In another
gospel Jesus talks about moving mountains with mustard seed faith. Here it is
the mulberry tree that gets moved. Either way, the message is the same. In our
relationship with Jesus, we have what is necessary to do difficult, even
seemingly impossible, things. And why should that be so hard to believe? He has
moved us from death to life, from being orphans to being His, from guilt to
cleansing, from conflict to reconciliation.
17. A painting by
Vincent van Gogh is titled “The Mulberry Tree.” (Show painting on screen or print copy for bulletin. See www.vggallery.com/painting/p_0637.htm) He painted it in 1889 while in
voluntary confinement at the Saint-Paul-de-Mausole asylum in Saint-Rémy,
France. The mulberry tree van Gogh gives us is impressive. It is strong,
gnarly, abundant with bushy foliage, and, in his painting, rich with tones of
yellow and gold. It is formidable, rooted in rock and set against a deep blue
sky. For van Gogh, an ordinary tree took on the character of beauty, strength,
and even joy. Yellow was his color for joy.
18. May that be our
attitude the next time we say that it is difficult to follow Christ. What
appears to be hard, and even impossible, may be just the thing we need to do as
we live with Christ day-in-day-out. And because Christ abides with us, the
difficult thing can be done with joy. It may not be easy, but it is possible in
Christ. May it be said of us, “Those were the days when Christians moved
mulberry trees!” Amen. Now the peace
that passes all understanding guard your hearts and minds in Christ Jesus until
life everlasting. Amen.
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