Join us as we reflect, ponder, and pray together inspired by today's Gospel.
Today's Gospel: Luke 17:1-6
In today’s Gospel, Jesus tells his apostles,
“If you have faith the size of a mustard seed, you would say to this mulberry tree, ‘Be uprooted and planted in the sea,’ and it would obey you.”
I’ve always loved this brief parable. It reminds me how powerful God really is. He doesn’t need much from us, just a tiny mustard seed’s worth of faith, and He can do the rest. Mustard trees can actually grow to be quite large, so I used this metaphor in my first book for educators to remind them that we plant small seeds in our students and, even if we don’t see the fruit of our labor, God can take our small offerings and turn them into something amazing—even if it takes years after we teach our students for it to become a full-grown mustard tree.
The meaning of this metaphor deepened even more for me when I was leading a retreat for teachers with a Jesuit priest friend of mine. When he heard that I was going to be talking about this passage, he offered to lead the attendees in a “mustard seed ritual.” Somehow, he had managed to get his hands on mustard seeds from the Middle East, the kind Jesus and His followers would have known. It turns out that Middle Eastern mustard seeds are exponentially smaller than the variety we know in the United States. The seeds come in pods, and the individual seeds inside those pods are no bigger than the point of a finely sharpened pencil.
When Jesus told His followers they only needed a little bit of faith, He really did mean a tiny amount. Imagine what we could do if our faith increased even a small amount!
Ponder:
Pray:
Lord, just as the first disciples asked, so do I also ask for You to increase my faith. Take what little I can offer, and make something beautiful out of it!
Copyright 2023 Amy J. Cattapan
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