Readings of the Day: Habakkuk 1:1-4; 2:1-4 | Psalm 37:1-9 | 2 Timothy 1:1-14 | Luke 17:5-10
We jump right into the action here: The apostles ask Jesus for what we all want: “Increase our faith!”
Who can blame them? They’ve been following him long enough to know what he’s asking isn’t easy: Lead with humility. Forgive without limit. Protect the little ones. Serve without recognition. They can feel the weight of it pressing down, and they ask for what seems reasonable—make me more. More faith. More strength. More capacity to handle what’s coming.
Or, in other words... Supersize me, Jesus.
But Jesus replies with something strange: “If you had faith the size of a mustard seed...”
Just a seed—tiny enough for even the slightest wind to blow out of your open palm.
Faith, it seems, isn’t a substance we stockpile. We don’t need more faith like we needed more toilet paper during the pandemic.
In Greek, the word for faith is pistis—trust.
The strength of faith is never in its size or magnitude, but in its object.
We can’t grow our own faith. We can only know the grandiosity of who we’re trusting.
Which brings me to something that’s been heavy on my heart lately: the confusion between Christian faithfulness and Christian nationalism.
There’s a seductive temptation right now—especially in our age of anxiety, polarization, and despair—to reach for power. There’s a pendulum that’s swinging like crazy right now. The temptation is to think: if we could just control the levers of government, pass the right laws, dominate the culture (both sides play this game)... then God’s kingdom would come (or the secular utopia will come). Then we could force this broken world back into shape.
It’s the apostles’ request all over again: Supersize us, Jesus. Give us the strength to bend the world to your will.
But (and I’ve been helped lately by some of Tullian Tchividjian’s1 writing on this...) there’s a world of difference between being a Christian in the world and trying to make the world Christian by force.
One is incarnation. The other is conquest.
One trusts that the grace of Christ works through ordinary human life. The other thinks that Jesus needs our coercion to get the job done.
I’m not saying Christians should retreat from public life. The opposite, actually. I think the grace of Christ shows up most powerfully in the most everyday places: the classroom, the hospital, the city council meeting, the little league field, the dinner table. We’re called to be present in the world, not to retreat into some holy huddle.
But presence isn’t the same as dominance.
When a Christian teaches algebra, he doesn’t need to sneak Bible verses into the quadratic formula for that work to honor God. He teaches clearly, patiently, sees each student as made in God’s image. That’s enough. That’s how grace moves.
When a Christian makes music or art, they don’t need to justify every verse or brushstroke with Scripture references. Beauty itself—honest, excellent beauty—reflects the Creator. It doesn’t need a religious stamp of approval.
When a Christian serves in government, she doesn’t need to force Christian policies on society to be faithful. She can pursue justice, care for the vulnerable, work for the common good. That’s the call.
Jesus never said: “Go therefore and make a Christian nation, legislating all I have commanded you.” What he did say is simpler and way harder: Love God. Love your neighbor.
Yes, die to yourself and your agenda. Serve without counting the cost.
Mustard seed-sized faith doesn’t conquer. It trusts.
And I say this: Jesus is the mustard seed.
In Jesus, God didn’t come storming into the world with armies and power, forcing everyone to bow. He came small. Vulnerable. Born in a barn to a young girl in an occupied country. He grew up in obscurity, worked with his hands, hung out with fishermen and tax collectors and people of questionable reputation.
And then—he let himself be executed. Stripped naked. Mocked. Hung on a Roman cross like a common criminal.
On the cross of Jesus is the moment when the Creator of the universe made himself smaller than small, weaker than weak, emptying himself out completely to show us the cruciform pattern of how love actually works in the world.
Not through conquest. But surrender. Not through dominance. But through dying. Not through forcing the world into shape. But through being broken open so the world could be healed.
That tiny seed—that humiliated man on a cross—cracked open the tomb, shattered death itself, and grew into a kingdom that will never end.
That’s what Jesus is offering the apostles. Not a bigger platform. Or a stronger military. Or measurable cultural dominance.
He’s offering them himself—his presence, his eternal pattern, his endless love poured out like wine that never runs dry.
He’s not calling them to conquer. He’s calling them to trust.
There’s a story about Martin Luther being approached by a shoemaker who had just embraced the gospel. The man asked, “Dr. Luther, now that I believe, what should I do? Should I become a missionary, a preacher, or something else?”
Luther replied, “What do you do now?”
“I’m a shoemaker,” the man answered.
“Then make good shoes,” Luther said, “and sell them at a fair price.”
We read this poem earlier by Galway Kinnell about Saint Francis and a sow. Kinnell writes that sometimes “it is necessary to reteach a thing its loveliness.”
Saint Francis, lover of sparrows and wolves and lepers, puts his hand on the creased forehead of a sow, and he tells her in words and in touch the blessings of earth. And the poet writes that the sow begins remembering all down her thick length—from her earthen snout all the way through the fodder and slops to the spiritual curl of her tail—”the long, perfect loveliness of sow.”
St. Francis doesn’t put lipstick on this pig. He doesn’t dress her up or make her more loveable than she already is. He reminds her of what’s already true: her belovedness. She merely receives it. She remembers it. Because it was always already there.
That’s what happens when we stop trying to be God and remember we get to be creatures instead. We get to listen to our Creator’s love for us. To be reminded. To be re-membered. Put back together as one body of Christ.
We’re gonna bless some animals in a few moments. But here’s my opinion. I think they already know their belovedness. I don’t think they need to be convinced.
It’s interesting… There are two Greek words in Scripture that get translated as “life.” Bios—as in biology—the functional act of breathing, hearts beating. And zōē, which means essence, vibrancy, fullness of life.
Other creatures have zōē just by having bios. A lizard is fully alive and fully a lizard simply by being a living, breathing lizard. Lizards don’t wonder if they’re lizarding correctly. They don’t try to make other lizards more lizard-like. They just inhabit their lives.2
Humans, though? We can have bios without zōē.
We can be functionally alive—beating hearts, breathing lungs—but detached from our living, not fully inhabiting our own being. We can be so busy trying to control the world, manage the chaos, seize power for God’s kingdom, that we forget we’re held.
The animals already know. We humans are the ones who forget.
So a blessing that settles into the soil of our being gives us zōē—not by making us more-than, but by reminding us of who we are and whose we are. Not by giving us earthly power, but by freeing us from the exhausting, impossible work of being god without God’s belovedness.
In a few moments, we’ll gather at this table. We’ll come with our bios—our beating hearts, our anxious minds, our exhausted bodies still carrying the weight of the world.
And Christ will meet us here with zōē—the fullness of God given in bread and wine, reminding us that we are held, that we are loved beyond measure.
We don’t come to this table because we’re worthy.
We come because we’re hungry.
And Christ—who became a servant, who took the towel, who gave everything—feeds us with himself.
So, come. Receive. Remember.
You can’t supersize a mustard seed.
But God can feed the whole world with one.
And so it is. Amen.
Full disclosure: Tullian does not have a spotless record (who does?), but he’s open about it and is one of the best out there at preaching grace imho.
Root, Andrew; Root, Kara K.. A Pilgrimage into Letting Go: Helping Parents and Pastors Embrace the Uncontrollable (A Faith Journey for Anxious Parents and Overwhelmed Pastors Learning to Trust God’s Plan) (pp. 111-112). (Function). Kindle Edition.
This was absolutely life changing. Exactly what I needed to hear. Thank you, truly.
Needed this today. Lovely reminder.