Above: Garlic Mustard Plant Invasion
Photographer = Steve Hillebrand, United States Fish and Wildlife Service
The Extravagance of God and the Irrepressible Kingdom of God
MARCH 23, 2022
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The Collect:
Eternal God, your kingdom has broken into our troubled world
through the life, death, and resurrection of your Son.
Help us to hear your word and obey it,
and bring your saving love to fruition in our lives,
through Jesus Christ, our Savior and Lord, who lives and reigns
with you and the Holy Spirit, one God, now and forever. Amen.
–Evangelical Lutheran Worship (2006), page 28
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The Assigned Readings:
Numbers 13:17-27
Psalm 39
Luke 13:18-21
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Numbers 13:17-27 and Luke 13:18-21 speak of the extravagant generosity of God.
Canaan, the Promised Land, is the bountiful territory overflowing with milk and honey in Numbers 13. One finds similarly wonderful descriptions of the promise of the Jewish homeland after God has ended the Babylonian Exile later in the Hebrew Scriptures. Those were dashed hopes, as the narrative of the Old Testament indicates, but the hope for a better future free from deprivation and foreign occupation continues to inspire people living in difficult circumstances.
Unfortunately, the ubiquitous slave mentality and unreasoning fear of the Canaanites led many Israelites to oppose entering Canaan. Many, according to Numbers 14:3, regretted ever having left Egypt, where they were slaves but at least the leftovers were nice. God punished the generation which had left Egypt, the Book of Numbers tells us, by granting them their wish not to enter Canaan. At least God was merciful enough to refrain from striking them dead or sending them back to Egypt.
The generosity–grace–of God–demands a faithful response. What will we do with grace? Will we even accept it and its accompanying responsibilities? Human life is transient, as the author of Psalm 39 understood well, but it does offer many opportunities to function as an agent of God to others.
Above: A Cedar of Lebanon, 1898
Image Source = Library of Congress
Reproduction Number = LC-DIG-matpc-06183
Luke 13:18-21 provides two brief parables illustrating the irrepressible nature of the Kingdom of God. In the first parable (verses 18 and 19) the Kingdom of God is like a tiny mustard seed, the small beginning of a large, if not noble, mustard plant–a large shrub, really. A mustard plant, which can grow to be as large as twelve feet tall, offers shelter to a variety of birds. Implicit in the Lukan version of the parable is that Gentiles are welcome in the Kingdom of God. The parable shocks by not invoking the image of a mighty, impressive cedar of Lebanon. Such imagery would indicate a mature plant. The imagery of a mustard plant, however, promises continued growth. The Kingdom of God is present among us, but not fully; there is more to come.
Then again [Jesus] said,
“What can I say the kingdom of God is like? It is like the yeast which a woman took and covered up in three measures of flour until the whole had risen.”
–Luke 13:20-21, J. B. Phillips, The New Testament in Modern English, Revised Edition (1972)
The second parable is that of yeast which a woman hides in three measures (fifty pounds) of flour. Most contemporary translations I consulted render a certain Greek word as “mixed,” but the proper meaning is “hid.” The Revised Standard Version (1946, 1952, and 1971), the Revised Standard Version–Catholic Edition (1965), the Revised Standard Version–Second Catholic Edition (2002), and the New American Standard Bible (1971 and 1995) render that word properly as “hid.” The 1958 and 1972 editions of The New Testament in Modern English (J. B. Phillips) use “covered up,” which makes the same point. The woman in the parable seeks to conceal the yeast by hiding it in flour, but the yeast permeates the flour instead. The parable contains the element of hyperbole, for baking 50 pounds of flour, enough to feed 150 people, at one time, is perhaps improbable. The hyperbole points to the extravagance of God and the irrepressible nature of the Kingdom of God.
Nobody among mortals can conceal or destroy the Kingdom of God. That lesson comforts me. Secularization of society and religious persecution are powerless to conceal or destroy the Kingdom of God, which is like yeast pervading the whole. The blood of the martyrs waters the church, which has, in certain times and at certain places, gone underground yet remained alive. The lesson here is about what God does, often despite what certain people do. God is sovereign. We can accept or reject that reality, but we can never change it.
KENNETH RANDOLPH TAYLOR
NOVEMBER 19, 2015 COMMON ERA
THE FEAST OF JOHANN HERMANN SCHEIN, GERMAN LUTHERAN COMPOSER
THE FEAST OF F. BLAND TUCKER, EPISCOPAL PRIEST
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LENTEN AND EASTER DEVOTIONS 
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