We are men sent from his people
again. Gladly, foray, we adore him. Good choice. Good choice. That's good. I was able to enter into that
when we sung it. Hast thou not seen how thy desires
ere hath been granted in what he ordaineth? Understandest what
thou singest? Meaning that he hath chosen our
inheritance for us, and the lines have fallen unto us in pleasant
places, our desires, though many, our true desires. is after him. This is what he's ordained for
his people, like Abraham. Abraham, I am thy portion. He's
your true desire, and that's what he's ordained for you, and
he's granted it. There's many things we've asked
for and haven't received, but this one thing is needful, and
this one thing we desire, and this is what he gives us. That's a good hymn. And hast
thou not experienced how often grief hath not he brought thee
relief, spreading his wings to shade thee? That's a good hymn. And it figures
it was written back in the seventeenth century. Not in these last days. Matthew
chapter thirteen. is our text, Matthew 13. Another parable or two we're
going to look at. Let's read verses 31 through
35, Matthew 13. Our Lord is preaching, speaking
in parables here. Verse 31, Another parable put
he forth unto them, saying, The kingdom of heaven is like to
a grain of mustard seed, which a man took and sowed in his field,
which seed is indeed the least of all seed. But when it is grown,
it is the greatest among earth, and becometh a tree, so that
the birds of the air come and lodge in the branches thereof."
Another parable spake he unto them. The kingdom of heaven is
like unto leaven, which a woman took and hid in three measures
of meal, till the whole was leavened. All these things spake Jesus
unto the multitude in parable, and without a parable Without
a parable spake he not unto them, that it might be fulfilled which
was spoken by the prophet, saying," in Psalm 78, "'I will open my
mouth in parables. I will utter things which have
been kept secret from the foundation of the world.'" As you know,
a parable is an earthly story used to illustrate spiritual And that is the way our Lord
often spoke and preached in parables, though very simple. These stories
he told were very simple and common things, yet not easily
understood. Impossible to understand what
he was saying until he reveals it, and though simple, And brief,
this was just one, two, three, four, three verses. Very simple, very
brief, yet full of profound wisdom from above. Wisdom, man reveals his wisdom
by being able to put profound, deep, mysterious things in a
short, concise way. And our Lord did that in a line,
in a word, in a way, proving Himself to be wisdom. Two parables
here. We're going to look at both of
them. The parable of the mustard seed and the parable of the leaven. All right? He says the kingdom
of heaven is like the grain of mustard seed. Whenever the Scriptures
talks about Kingdom of Heaven. Our Lord preached the gospel,
for good news, of the Kingdom of Heaven. It's talking about
everything concerning God, concerning Christ, His King. Christ is His
King. Psalm 2, my favorite psalm. I have set my king on my holy
hillside." That is, he reigns and rules. Christ reigns and
rules over Zion, his church. That is his kingdom. Okay? Kingdom of heaven. Kingdom of heaven. It is how
God—who God is and who Christ is and how God makes up his subjects. for his kingdom, kingdom of God. All right? That's what kingdom
of heaven means. It's not of this world, but it's
heavenly. We're not going to stay here.
We don't have any continuing city here, God's people. Though they're taken out of the
world, they're not of the world. They're of God. And they're headed to God, heavenward,
the kingdom of heaven. Christ is the king. All right?
Whenever it says kingdom of heaven, that's what it's speaking of,
this whole thing of taking a lost son of Adam who's captive to
Satan, the god of this world, a subject in his kingdom, and
delivering them from darkness to light. taking captivity, the
captain of their salvation, and taking them to heaven with him. Not a fairytale. It's the truth. It's God's plan. Peter said,
this is no cunningly devised fable. This is the truth. Talking about the King of Glory.
Who is this King of Glory? And I've got to get to this.
Who is this King of Glory? The Son of God, the Lord Jesus
Christ, and these people are with Him. He's brought them into
His kingdom. And our Lord said, The kingdom
of heaven is like the grain of mustard seed, though it is least
of all seeds, the smallest. You may remember one time we
looked at this years ago, and I handed out to each one of you
a mustard seed. You probably lost it. It was
so small. Even the little, this is not
the mustard we know, Brother Henry, greens. This one turns
into a tree, mustard tree. But nevertheless, it's real small. The one we know is very, very
minute, isn't it? And it says, our Lord says, a
man takes this seed, this very, very small seed, and sows it
in his field. Sows it in his field. All right? Now, the field here is the world. Field is the world, like our
Lord said of the sower of the seed. Field is the world. The man which sows the seed.
That's God, isn't it? God. It's His seed we're going
to see. The seed is several things. We're going to look at the seed
as at least three things. The seed is God's Word. The seed is Christ. The seed is God's grace, the
work of grace. And as I said, this God's kingdom
is not of this world, but his subjects are in the world. And
this is where he finds them. And this is what he plans to
do. OK. The mustard seed of God's
Word. Now, I don't know, as I said,
I wanted to preach the Bible study now and this then. I'm planning right now, and God
has to give in for it, doesn't He? I can't, I really can't make
this in. No way, can't do it. But God can, and does. So I hope He will for somebody,
somebody. Me, I hope He does for me. The
mustard seed of God's Word, God's Word is called, Peter called
it the incorruptible seed, didn't he? By which we're born again,
the Word of God, which liveth and abideth forever. Seed, there's
life in it. It doesn't look like it, but
there is. You go down to the hardware store
and there's a big trash can full of seed, little
black mustard seed. Every one of those seeds has
life in it. Yeah, uh-huh. Doesn't look like it, does it?
But it does. This is God's Word, and there's
more Word in this than in a barrel of muskets. And there's Word
in one Word. I told you the story before of
Spurgeon trying out the acoustics in that building. True story. He went into this building one
day. Nobody was in there, he thought. He used to preach there
the next day, and he's never been in the pulpit. I do this
all the time. I go to a place and try out the pulpit, walk
up in it, to see mainly if it's too tall. But I go into it, and
Spurgeon did this, and he was 5'4". And he went up into this pulpit,
had a resounding voice, booming voice, they say. And he walked
up into the pulpit, and he said one line. He said it loudly, Look unto
me, and be ye saved. Oh, the kindreds of the earth. And lo and behold, there was
a janitor up in the balcony, Melanie, sweeping the floor. Didn't even know he was there.
Hup! Unto me. God save that man. He said, no, that's God's Word,
isn't it? And he preached the Word. Is
that enough? You've got to take that and save
a man with it. There's a thief hanging beside
him today. He looked. That's all that thief was doing,
was looking. Now, Lord save me. Mustard seed is God's Word, is
His power. incorruptible seed," he said,
"'it will not return void. It will give the increase I send
it to give.'" Uh-huh. This Word, this is what
gives me incentive to keep preaching, you know? There's awful times
I want to quit, like you do, your jobs. You think, what's
the use? What I'm doing is not in vain.
It's not in vain. Neither is your occupation. Whatever
you're doing, God has put you where he pleases, for his purpose. God's Word, like a mustard seed,
has small beginnings. The written Word, God's spoken
Word, didn't have a small beginning. God spoke, let there be light,
in a blooming, resounding voice, as no man could But God's written
Word came at first in a small way, at very small beginnings. I'll illustrate. A man in his early forties, a
shepherd by trade, by vocation. He sits alone in a desert place,
sitting alone in a deserted place. And he pulls out a skin. That's
what they used to write on back then. They didn't have paper.
They wrote on animal skin. He pulls out a skin, Sam, I just
kind of believe is a lamb skin. Don't you? Don't you think they
wrote on lamb skin? I do. And he pulled out this
lamb skin. and begins to write on this skin,
man, his early forties, years and years and years ago, sitting
alone in a desert. And as God moved upon him, as
God, the Spirit of God, spoke to him, he began to write, In
the beginning, God. That's Moses. Oh, how the word grew. Moses found himself saying, where
this is coming from, but he wrote and wrote and wrote and wrote
and wrote and wrote. Oh, how the Word of God started
the small beginning of death. Another young man, true story,
this is how it began. Another young man in his twenties,
again a shepherd by vocation, sitting, watching his flock. He's a good shepherd. young man. He's sitting there watching his
flock, perhaps under the stars, under the stars, under the heaven,
under the firmament. He lights a lamp. He pulls a
lamp out and he lights a lamp so he can see what he's reading
by the man before him. He has a copy of what that shepherd
wrote. And he lights this lamp sitting
out there, a lamp again, I'm quite sure, and begins to write,
Thy word is a lamp unto my feet. The heavens, he looks up, the
heavens declare the glory of God in the firmament, showeth
his hand to go day unto day, uttereth speech, night unto night,
uttereth knowledge. And he looks at his sheep and
says, Oh, the Lord is my shepherd. I shall not want him. He writes
and writes and writes. And he can't write fast enough.
And oh, how mightily grew the Word of God. How mightily it grew and grew
and grew. And in every generation from
there on, God did not leave himself without a witness, without a
prophet. In every generation, a little man Perhaps in a great
big place that he wrote as the Spirit of God moved upon him
for fifteen hundred years. Forty men. Fifteen hundred years. Forty men wrote and wrote and
wrote until the whole thing was complete. The volume was complete. The Word of God, a mighty, mighty
tree of life. that we can resort to and abide
in, like birds singing sweetly in the trees. And don't, as you
read these leaves, the leaves of which are for the healing
of a nation, don't you just want to sing of the glory of God,
most especially of His glorious Word? It started out like a seed, a
mustard seed, one man riding. And it grows into a mighty tree. Well, the word, the mustard seed
is Christ. The mustard seed is Christ, the
Lord Jesus Christ, who himself is called the seed, is he not? Our God, when God Almighty first
preached the gospel of His Son, God's the first one who announced
His Son, God said, He's a seed. That's what God called His Son,
a woman's seed. What's smaller than a mustard
seed? Sperm. Insignificant. But in it is life, the woman
seed, who is also called the Word, who is also called the
incorruptible one, the incorruptible seed, whom God sent into this
world. God, God hath made him to be
so forth. God, of God are you in. God sent
him into the world. He's sent by God. The Father
hath sent me into the world. God sent him. God's the man here
who planted this seed, who planted this seed. He shall come up,
well, he's made of a woman, but it's not man's seed. He's not
from Adam, but the seed of God. Made of a woman, made under the
law, he shall come up, Isaiah 53 says, as a root out of dry
ground. See, that vast wilderness that
this world is, right over there in the middle, right in the heart
of it, in that little bitty place called Israel, called Bethlehem,
Ephratah, though thou be little among the nations, yet out of
thee shall he come. One day the seed was sown, and
a woman, and a virgin shall conceive, and bear a son, and a root popped
up in that guy. Now, that's nothing. Nothing. That's going to be where all of God's people, though
they be like the stars of the sky, like birds. How many birds
are there? Starlings. Maybe you won't hate
starlings after you think about this. They're all a bunch of
black, useless birds, aren't they? Huh? Aren't they? They're everywhere. What good
are starlings? What good is any bird for that matter? Well, these
old black starlings. Isn't it amazing how many of
them can get in one tree? Huh? You see a tree, and it's
just black. It's just covered, and something
happens, and all of them. None of them stayed behind. All
together, all the time, all together. Here's a tree, we'll abide there.
Well, all of God's people, though they be as the stars of the sky,
the sands of the sea, they abide in Christ, the tree of life. Christ, who was indeed least
esteemed among men, wasn't. He was despised and rejected
of men. Least esteemed. We did esteem
him smitten and stricken of God. He's a nothing. He's a nobody.
Oh, no, he's that tree we read of in Revelation, the leaves
of which are for the healing of nations. And he grew, Scripture
says, he grew in wisdom, stature, and favor with God and men, and
his power and his glory exceedingly grew until he became the greatest
of all, Erb. Erb. Man was originally created
to eat herbs. That was his meat. Christ is food of his people,
greater than Moses, greater than Aaron, greater than Solomon,
tree of life in whom all his people lodge. Then it says that
the kingdom of heaven is like to a grain of mustard seed. This
mustard seed is the grace of God, sovereign grace of God,
the work of God, the work of grace, we call it, and it's by
grace. By grace are you saved. It's what God does. This is what
God does to his people, and it's the grace of faith. By grace
are you saved through faith, that is, looking to Christ. And this thing of faith, this
sovereign grace of God put in his people, it has a beginning. You know, everything and everyone
has a beginning but God. Everything and everyone has a
beginning but God. And everything, everything and
everyone begins very, very small. Very, very, very small, very
minute, seemingly insignificant. And we're seeing now that nothing
is insignificant, like a mustard seed. Everything and everyone
begins small. God had Zachariah, one of those
minor prophets. There's no such thing. I don't
know why we—but anyway, Zachariah wrote who hath despised the day
of small things." Now, he didn't really know what he was writing,
but I do. You do, don't you? All right,
let me give you a few illustrations, all right? I'm about to lose
some of you. I hope I'll get you back. Small beginning. Everyone has
a small beginning. Here's an old man. The old man
sits, speaking to his family. He's reading from God's Word
from that volume that that shepherd wrote. He's reading from God's
Word. He's telling them of God. No, he's not reading from that.
He's reading from Job, is what he's reading. That shepherd wasn't
around yet. This fellow's before him. He's
reading from Job. That's all you need to know in
that book. But he's reading from the book of Job. He's reading
it to his family. And he's preaching. He's telling his family of God's
sovereign mercy and sovereign grace. He's telling his family
of the Christ to come, the woman's seed. He's telling his family
of the Lamb of God to cover our sins, the Redeemer whom Job wrote
of, that liveth. The days when he's telling his
family The one who's to come, the intercessor, the mediator
between God and man. There's just one, God's son. The seed is being sown. This
man is reading, preaching the word to his family. And the seed
is being sown in some of their young heart. And the man's name?
Abraham. He's got a small grandson listening
to him. His name's Jacob. And the seed is being sown. And
young Jacob is sitting and listening. And from him twelve manner of
fruit. Just a little grandson, named
Jacob. That's Israel. Everything, all
will come from him. And that young boy grows up to
be Israel. Here's another true story. This
time it's an older woman. An older woman, in her last days
perhaps, sits talking to her great-grandchild. And that happens
today, doesn't it? My mother has two great-grandchildren. And they're getting older. Back
then they lived longer. For this woman, the older woman,
sits talking to her great-grandchild of God's amazing, saving, sovereign,
saving grace to her, of God's sovereign, providential grace
that called her from idolatry, telling this young grandson of
how she used to be a former idolater, not worshiping the living and
true God. living in a land of Gentile idolater, and how that
God brought her one day, brought her down as low as she could
go by His sovereign purpose, and then brought her back to
the land where God's people were, where there was bread to be found.
She was dying and didn't know it, married to a man who didn't
know God. But God, God had to kill her
husband and brought her back to this land where the bread
of God was, where the people of God were. And lo and behold,
one day, she tells her grandson, great grandson, one day God sovereignly
directed me to go gleaning. I was hungry and directed me
to go gleaning in a field. And it was my hap, it just so
happened that I landed in the only field of the only man who
could redeem me from all my sin and my kinsman-redeemer. Son, grandson, great-grandson,
that was your great-grandfather named Boaz. Who was that boy
listening to her? David. That's a great story, Grandma. Just another boy. Oh, no. Oh, no. Out of his loins shall
come the Son of David, the Christ. Like a mustard seed. Every believer in here
has a story. I told you about that young boy
on that park bench down in Key West, Florida. Every believer has a story. Small
at first, and it's faith, the grace of faith that God gives.
And it is a gift. By grace you say through faith
we do believe, but it's not of yourself. It's the gift of God. And where does it come from?
Where does faith come from? Seed. Seed. And God plants it. Like
the wind. You know, how does, if there's
no farmer around to plant seed, how does it get planted? The wind. The wind. Lord, we're
enlisted. Those seeds. Birds take it. That's the only thing they are
good for. That's the only thing they are good for, is to take
that seed. Let me tell you the real story of the birds and the
bees, young people. This is what it's all about,
the glory of God, the furtherance of his word, the carrying of
that seed, the pollinating, the mating of God's word to the hearts
of his people. That's what the birds and the
bees are. Propagation of truth. furtherance
of the faith. The bees take it. Well, pollinate, so on and so
forth. But these birds, that's about all they're good for is
taking seed, isn't it? They don't know it, but they're
taking it and planting it somewhere. They don't know. Oh, what a picture that is, believer.
What a great picture that is. And where am I? Faith. let's talk about it has
been given a small beginning and that's good that's good so
no pressure bar Right? Nobody's going to glory. No man's
going to glory. I wanted him so and so today.
No, sir. The ones you think you want are
lost. The ones you may think are lost are won. That's the
way it is. No place is going to glory in
his face but God. He said, My word will not return
void. It will accomplish what I send it to. And God Almighty,
the wind which bloweth where it listeneth, when the sound
goes out, the word of God is preached. Line upon line, line,
seed upon seed, it goes out. And God Almighty takes it. It goes in here to reach the heart. It goes down and sticks out. Hasn't happened. Have you planted anything yet,
Henry? Have you planted any gardeners yet? Anybody has for my illustration? Milton did. Milton planted some
greens last winter. Greens down there will grow through
the winter. He planted some seed. Well, you
go out and plant something. You may not see it for a long
time. Grass takes, what, nine days to germinate. And other
things take much longer. Those are the children that you
have. Nine months. And you don't know
when that seed was planted, do you? God does. He's the giver of life. 11 months in, long time. You don't see anything. Seas planted. You understand
what I'm getting at now? I can only tell you what happened
to me. I can only tell you what great things the Lord has done
for me. You have your own story. But I sat under the sound of
the Word, the incorruptible seed, for years. The Word went out,
oh, line upon line, heaven upon heaven, line upon line, precept
upon precept, here a little, there a little. Oh, I heard a
lot of preaching. The Word, the Word of God. And
you know, something's planted. If the person
is one of God's own, something is planted in God's Word. And in due time, if they're God's
own, He'll bring forth the end cream. You'll see a root. I just distinctly remember—I don't know
how old I am. Well, I do know, but I'm not
going to tell you. But anyway, I distinctly remember. I was reading something in a
book, The Earth of Pain, for a little while, and his preaching
is just so full of the Word of God. And it was the seven sayings
of the Savior on the cross that he took each saying of Christ
on the cross, Christ's crucifixion, and preached from it. And the
first saying, Father, forgive them. They know not what they
did. And I thought somebody spoke
out loud. And I began to read, and I heard
things I've been hearing all my life. I distinctly remember
saying, I heard my pastor preach, and I heard that I was hearing. I never had, I had ears, but
I didn't hear. I had eyes that I didn't see.
I had a heart, but it was stony. But one day, it all had been
sung. And one day, water, the Spirit
of God moved up a roof. Praise God. I believed. I called. I trust Him. But it's just a root. It's just
small. Just little faith. What did our
Lord say about little faith? What did He say about it? He
said, if you have faith, there's a grain of mustard seed. Does little faith save? All right, here's a young believer
who trusts Christ. That's faith. That's faith to him. Don't make
it be anything else. It's not a great understanding
of Jesus. I mean, no. He didn't have it. He didn't understand all the
mysteries that Prophets and 1 Corinthians 13 did. He's a young person. They trust Christ,
the salvation of their souls. And here's a great old preacher,
missionary of the gospel, all those years, down in effect. Which one's more Satan? No faith, great faith. It's not the measure of the faith.
It's not the size of the faith. It's not the strength of the
faith. It's the object of the faith. Here's people on a ship crossing
a vast ocean. Here's a baby in arms, a baby. Here's a strong man holding the
baby. Which one's more safe? And our sight is in the ark. They're both saved the same way
if they're in the ship. See, it's not faith that saves
us, but it's the object of our faith. And a little bit of faith
is faith just the same as a great bit of faith. And we all think, oh, I don't
want that much faith. Isn't that faith? I believe. Help him up. Well, then, you're
a child of God. Isn't that good news? Huh? Oh,
that's good news. And it grows, though. It does
grow if we're around a while, and the only way faith grows
is by the what? See, it all depends on this thing.
The sincere milk of the word, you may, grows over the year
and also trials, experience. This causes us to grow. And the
church of God is like a mustard seed. The church of God is like
a mustard seed. Though it's least, all right,
here we go again. Here's another illustration.
Years and years and years and years and years ago. Eight people
in a boat. Eight people in a boat, floating. There goes God's kingdom. That
little, uh-huh, that body in that boat, no other. A hundred
and twenty in an upper room. Thousands of years later, in
a little upper room, a hundred and twenty people met. A hundred
and twenty? Well, that's the kingdom of God,
like a mustard seed. Oh, how mightily it grew. Let
me get to this last parable, okay? Verse thirty-three. The kingdom of heaven is like
leaven, which a woman took, hid in three measures of meal, till
the whole was leavened. To the whole world, leaven is
often used in a bad sense, isn't it? Leaven is often used as sin,
self-righteousness, which the woman, you know, could be the
great whore, the Revelation speaks of. But this says the kingdom of
heaven. The kingdom of heaven is like
unto a woman, all right? In the Godhead you have how many
persons? Three. These three are one. These three are together in this
great making up of God's kingdom. You have God the Father. You
have God the Son. The Holy Spirit represents this woman.
This woman. The Holy Spirit, like this woman. That's Leaven. What would Leaven
represent? like the mustard seed is God's
Word. Eleventh, the Holy Spirit takes this Word, that's what
we're talking about. Wind bloweth where it listeth, Spirit of God.
So as everyone is born of the Spirit, the Holy Spirit takes
this Word and hides it in three measures of men. Three measures
of men. Peter said, Don't be ignorant
of this, brethren, this one thing, that a day is as a thousand years,
a thousand years as a day. Our Lord said 2,000 years ago,
this generation shall not pass away till all these things be
fulfilled. This generation. Generation? Or three generations? Throughout time. From Adam to Moses, from Moses
to Christ, till he comes again. Basically 2,000 years. That's
the secret revealed unto God's people. The Holy Spirit in every
generation has taken the Word of God, like leaven, and put
it in God's people. Hidden it. It's hidden, isn't
it? Hide thy word in my heart, David said. Hide it. It's there. Old Benjamin Teach,
who, I forget if he succeeded. No. John Hill succeeded him, I think. I forget. Same place. Benjamin
Keech said these things about leaven, and I quit. Leaven has
four qualities, basically. Diffusing, assimilating, quickening,
and softening. Now let me just, real quick,
diffusing, leaven. You ladies ever bake any bread?
All right, you put that leaven which is yeast. What is yeast? Well, that's my next point. You put that leaven in the dough
and knead it, mix it up. It has a diffusing quality. It will get to every part of
that dough, till the whole lump is leavened. Oh, yeah. That's the quality that leaven
has. Meaning the whole lump takes
on the same form. So that's good, isn't it? Of
the same lump, the whole lump takes on the same form. Doesn't
mean it doesn't matter if you pull off a piece over here, pull
off a piece over here. It all looks just alike. Are
you with me? The Word of God is conforming
us to somebody's image. They all look just like that.
Of the same lump of vessel and arm. It's quickening. Yeast is what? What is yeast,
actually? Bacteria. Isn't it? Yeah, it
is. Come on, somebody agree with
me. It's bacteria. What's that? It's life. It's
a living organism. That yeast you buy in the stores,
in that package, you think it's dead. It's not dead. It's full
of life, isn't it, everybody? Full of life. You watch. Well, it's quick. The Word of
God is quick. It's full of life. It'll raise
the dead. Before you put yeast in it, that
dough is just flat. Flat. You can't make it rise.
Can you, Barbara? You can. I'm sure you can do
that. No, you can't make it rise without yeast, without leaven. Word of God, quick and fast. We rise, resurrected in Christ. And it has a softening effect.
Nancy makes the bread for our table all quite often, unleavened
bread, meaning no yeast. Well, do you know why it's so
hard? No leaven. And often you make bread that
doesn't rise, and it's hard as a rock, and it's biscuits like
hockey pucks. The yeast didn't take effect.
It didn't soften it. It didn't soften it. But if the yeast, the life, really
comes out, it'll fill it up and soften it. And what does it become? It's hidden. Our Lord says hidden.
And it does not, when you put that yeast, that leaven in that
lump of dough, you knead it up, and you put it in a little pan,
and you cover it, put it in a warm place. It won't rise cold. It's got to be warm. Preferably near the spire. But
it's hidden in it. It does not yet appear what it
shall be. Come back in the morning. Better
yet, wait till the master baker takes it and puts it in the furnace.
What are you doing that for? Puts it in the furnace of affliction. Oh, and it comes out fit for
the master. The kingdom of heaven, like an
apple, which a woman took, and hid it in three measures of meal,
till the whole was ready for her. The word of God. Okay. Brother Gary? Hymn number 258, and let's stand. We'll sing the first and last
verse, number 258.