Mixing in God

Scripture

Matthew 13:33

³³ [Jesus] told them another parable: “The kingdom of heaven is like yeast that a woman took and mixed in with three measures of flour until all of it was leavened.”  (NRSV)

Devotion

Every now and then, I get the urge to bake bread.  The process starts out fun before quickly turning to an exercise of willpower and patience.  I don't have a bread mixer, so I get annoyed with the physical effort it takes to mix my yeast into all of the flour.  I also hate waiting for the dough to rise.  As the minutes and hours tick by, I find myself worrying something will go wrong.  Why won't the yeast just hurry up and do its job already?  Why isn't the dough rising faster or higher?  The longer I wait, the more convinced I am that the time and effort I have put into following the recipe has been wasted.  Why on Earth did I decide to bake bread in the first place?

My baking struggles are nothing when compared to those of the woman in Jesus's parable.  First, I have nice, safe yeast to work with, while the woman in the parable was actually working with leaven.   In the Ancient world, leaven was created by setting aside a portion of leftover bread to spoil just long enough to cause new dough to rise without giving people people food poisoning (Waugh, 287).  This was tricky work that required a good eye and a lot of faith in what you were doing.

Second, I only bake a loaf or two at a time.  This woman was working with the equivalent of 144 cups of flour...or enough to make 50 to 60 loaves of bread.  It would have taken a sheer act of will to mix and knead the dough well enough to ensure that the tiny bit of leavening she put it has worked through the entire batch.  Then, she would need to shape the loaves and patiently wait for them to rise.  If the leavening didn't work, she would have wasted enough flour to feed an entire wedding banquet. 

So how is the kingdom of God like a woman carefully mixing leaven into a vast amount of dough?  I believe that Jesus has given us an image of the the hard work that goes into spreading the Kin-dom of God.  As followers of Christ, we are called to roll up our sleeves and mix little bits of God's goodness into the world until each and every part of our lives have been touched by it.  As we do so, we wait patiently for our everyday efforts help transform our families, communities, and world.

Like the leaven that the woman mixes into all that flour, our efforts may seem small when compared to the world's vast needs.  Their effects may be hidden and unnoticeable at first.  But over time and with God's help, our small actions change the shape and structure of the world around us in big ways.  The communities that we interact with begin to "rise," and people come to know a more abundant way of life.   Through it all, God the Baker gives shape to the effects of our Spirit-filled efforts.  When our work is combined with the holy leaven that others have mixed in, it helps transform the world in miraculous ways.  The Kin-dom of God becomes more and more apparent.  The day will come, when there will be enough "bread" to feed the everyone on Earth.

Mixing yeast into dough and then waiting for it to do its job slightly maddening, but the end result is worth it.  When my timer goes off, I discover my small lump of dough has grown into a big beautiful ball that is ready to be shaped, baked, and consumed.  This miraculous transformation only occurs because an unseen agent acted on the environment around it...but that agent still needed me to carefully add it in to the recipe. 

The Kin-dom of God is the same.  Christ is the one responsible for transforming the world, but it is our Spirit-filled actions that carefully mix him into the places where his presence is sorely needed.   If we are committed enough to doing that work and patient enough to see it through, we will eventually see the transformative effect of Christ at work in the world.

Friends, the Kingdom of God is a woman rolling up her sleeves and diligently working leaven into a giant amount of dough.   Let us roll up our metaphorical sleeves and do our part.  In God's own time, we will see the miraculous results of our time and effort.  And we will take part in the joyful feast that is to come.

 

Prayer

Divine Baker,  we ask you to give strength and purpose to our efforts to mix your holy leaven into our world.  Fill us with dedication and patience as we do our part to fulfill your purposes on Earth.  We look forward to witnessing the transformations you are bringing into being.  Amen.