Five Things I learned from the Mustard Seed | Speaker Pr Julian Saw

You're listening to a message to go from a church. We hope this message

will light up your day. I just feel God leading me to share about

what the Kingdom of Heaven is like to all of us and what it means

for us to be a line in God's kingdom. What does it mean?

What does it mean that Heaven rules in our lives? When God has his

sovereign power over our lives. And the last time I was sharing, I

was sharing from the parable of the lost pearl or the valuable pearl. And

today I want to share from a very familiar parable, and it's the parable

of the mustard seed. Okay, so I'm going to share this morning five

things I've learned from the mustard seed. Five things I learned from the mustard

seed. So let's go straight into it. If you have your Bibles or

electronic Bibles or paper Bibles, you can turn to Matthew chapter thirteen. Matthew

chapter thirteen, and we'll read from scripture. If not, you can also

look at the screen. It's a very familiar set of verses Matthew chapter thirteen,

Verse thirty one. Here is another illustration Jesus used the Kingdom of Heaven

is like a mustard seat planted in a field. It is the smallest of

all seats, but it becomes the largest of garden plants. It grows into

a tree, and the birds come and make nests in its branches. We

find the same scripture in Luke chapter thirteen, so you know you can go

to that as well, or even look at the screen. Then Jesus said,

what is the Kingdom of God like? So it gives us a glimpse

of what the Kingdom of God is like? How can I illustrate it?

It is like a tiny mustard seed that a man planted in a garden.

It grows and becomes a tree, and the birds make nests in its branches.

So most of you would notice this parable. The scripture is about how

something very small, the size of a mustard seed being planted can grow into

a tree that blesses even like different species like birds and all. Uh.

And and my dad's a botanist, right, so I have I've been mended

down the annoying thing to understand plants, I hope. So a botanist is

a plant scientist and doctor. Yeah, he has a PhD. Now he's

at so dat doctor? I mean but yeah, you know that's that's not

me. But the mastard seed is really is one of the small all the

seats, you know what I mean. It's widely accepted to be on the

smaller seats. And it's how so interesting that Jesus used this illustration to show

what the Kingdom of Heaven is like. So that's what we're gonna learn about

today. And I want to go through another set of scriptures that to me

also reflect back what the Kingdom of Heaven is like. So let's go through

the scripture first. Okay, so we went through Just Now Met You,

chapter thirteen, Chapter thirteen. Now we're going to jump to John chapter six.

John chapter six, So let's go. Jesus soon saw a huge crowd

of people coming to look for him. Turning to Philip, he asks where

can we buy bread to feed all these people? He was testing Philip for

he actually knew what he was going to do. Philip replied, even if

we worked for months, we wouldn't have enough money to feed them. So

you know the scripture, right, Jesus sweets to five thousand. Then Andrew

Simon Peter's brothers spoke up. There's a young boy here with five barley loaves

and two fish. But what good is that with this huge crowd sounds familiar,

something very small. The question is, what good is just this barley

loaves and fish in this huge crowd? How can it help? Verse?

Then tell everyone to sit down, Jesus said, So they all sat down

on the grassy slopes. The men alone numbered about five thousand Verse eleven.

Then Jesus took the loaves, gave thanks to God, and distributed them to

the people. Afterward, he did the same to the fish with the fish,

and they all ate as much as they wanted, and everyone was full.

Jesus told his disciples, now gathered a leftover, so that nothing is

wasted. I mean, I love this a lot, like even the left

overs Jesus can use. Nothing is wasted in this kingdom, right, So

they picked up the pieces and filled twelve baskets with scraps left by the people

who had eaten from the five barley loaves. Amen. Amen, So again,

five things I've learned from the mustard seed and also from the scripture in

the Book of John. And the first thing is going to be super obvious.

But what do you think The first point is small? Yeah? So

I'm gonna give you five piece this morning. Five piece, And the first

P is puny puny because you've gotta make smaller P word, right, So

it's puny. So the meaning of puny is small. I mean we use

this word like, oh man, that puny little kid, what's wrong with

him? Like he looks so skinny. I used to be that kind of

kid, right, like tiny, puny little kid. And and I want

to say the first course, because most great things start out small. Do

you agree that most great things start out small? I mean, there's so

many inspirational stories about how a person that started from nothing became something and blessed

manny. I was reading about Walt Disney recently. You know Walt Disney because

we had like three or very cheap movie tickets to a by grab yeah promo

for grab to to watch some Disney movies. And and Walt Disney was a

person that was actually laid off, means he was fired from his job,

and and he started with from scratch, and people rejected his drawings. And

he was like a person that illustrated you know, characters, until he illustrated

Mickey Mouse, which all of us know and made him a very well known

person, and all of us, I'm sure have been affected or watched or

moved by something what Disney has done today. And really life is like that.

A lot of things that are great now start out small. So I

want to start here with the word puny. Puney is such a funny word,

right, puny. Tell a neighbor puny puny. So let's recap a

scripture Matthew, chapter thirteen. Again, the Kingdom of Heaven is like a

mustard seat planted in a field. And I love this. You know,

the Book of Matthew says it is the smallest of all seats. It is

the smallest of all I mean, seats are really very small, right,

but Jesus chose the smallest of the small. Right. This morning I was

reading the Book of Samuel, and it's about King Saul. Before King Saul

was King Saul, and the prophet Samuel was was told by God that he

wanted Saul to be king. And you know, I mean King Saul didn't

end his reign very well, but he started very well. And I love

how Saul, before he was king, told Samuel, why is God choosing

me? I come from the tribe of Benjamin, the smallest of all tribes.

And my family in the tribe of Benjamin is a very insignificant family.

Why me, because that's how God works? Right, the smallest of all

seats, John six nine, that's a young boy here with five barley loaves

and two fish. But what good is that? With this huge crowd?

Are you asking self? Are you asking yourself that question today? Like?

What good am I in this huge crowd? What good am I in this

company? What good is my little faith in this situation? How can it

help? How can it help? Have you seen a mastered seat before?

No, I've got a picture right here, it's a micro picture. Wow,

puny, Yeah, it's puny. It's very very small. That's a

finger, yeah yeah, so that's a master still on the finger. And

you know, fingers very small, you're right, And you know it's like

maybe maybe like half a millimeter or something like that. Very small, right,

very small, the smallest of all seats. So I've got two sub

points for what small is very obvious, and my first my first thought on

the words small is small does not mean insignificant. Small does not mean insignificant.

You know, this parable about the mastered seat is actually a reflection of

God's plan for salvation right on read This is very profound. When the first

century Jews looked forward to a messiah, So there were a lot of prophecies

that a messiah, messiami is, a savior would come and save and redeem

and bring victory to the nation of Israel. They had a very nationalistic expectation.

So you know, a king or a savior coming with chariots on horses

and and uh, you know, in today's context, you will be like

sound very powerful coming to save Malaysia, right or save this nation. And

they were looking forward to the re establishment of a ring Israel that would never

have to fear its enemies again. And even after Jesus's death and the resurrection,

the disciples were still expecting Jesus to lead them to overthrow Rome and make

Israel mighty again. So we cities in actually the one verse six, you

know, the disciples asked Jesus as they gathered around him, Lord, are

you at this time going to restore the kingdom to Israel? But we know

that the kingdom wasn't going to come in the way that the Jews had always

expected. It was going to start as the smallest seat and grow into something

monumental. And this parable tells that whole story about salvation. God's plan for

salvation is not always the way that man thinks. I mean, in this

picture we see we see first of all, how Jesus came into the world.

Was you know, was in a manger, was through a unknown person.

How you know this? The next picture here is Jesus on the donkey

on Palm Sunday. And it was just a few days before the crucification of

Jesus, before he went on the cross. And he didn't again come in

chariots or horses and people surrounding him, but he came on a humble donkey.

And that's why we should look at the kingdom of God and how we

apply ourselves to God's kingdom is to not see the small as insignificant, but

the small is very significant to God's eyes. Right. The next thing about

small, the small is not insufficient. Small is not insufficient. And I

love this verse mat two, chapter seventeen, verse twenty. So this verse

comes after the disciples couldn't cast out a demon from a boy, right,

and Jesus said this, you don't have enough faith. Jesus told them,

I tell you the truth. If you have had faith even as small as

a mastered seat, you could say, to this mountain, moved from here

to death, and you would move. Nothing would be impossible. Faith as

small as a mastard seat. Luke seventeen is when the apostles ask Jesus,

show us how to increase our faith. I need more. It's too small,

too little. Verse six says the Lord answered, if you had faith

even as small as a mastered seat, you could say to this smallberry tree,

and you'll be uprooted and planted in the seat, and it would obey

that. So being small, right, is significant. It's also sufficient.

The disciples were asking Jesus, how do I increase my faith? I need

more faith. Jesus didn't say, going fast, go and listen to this

preacher preach, go and pray, read the Bible. But all he said

worse, All you need is faith. The size of a mastered seat,

so small is enough for God to move, is enough for the impossibilities,

So it is sufficient. It is sufficient. I don't know Baston, and

he always uses this example, and I love it. So he will give

you a Let me give you a math math question this morning, right,

what is zero times one trillion zero. Right, So even LEVI, my

sixty old son, knows that. And there is what God is. He's

the biggest, he's the strongest, he's the almighty being. He's like one

trick in a really big number. Right. And all it takes for us

to partner with God is just a minute small seat, like what is one

times one trillion? One trillion? That's all it takes for us, come

as we are, bring a little bit of faith, even the size of

a master's seats enough, it's enough. I want to share just a little

bit of a testimony of what I've been going through and work, I mean,

because it works a big part of my life. Right, So so

we I wouldn't share a lot of details because it's still ongoing and we have

like clients, no, yeah, yeah, then there might be my clientcy

in this room and yeah all future clients. Um. But all of us

have been through situations where we feel very small. And when you're very when

you feel very small, you feel you don't have much control over the situation.

You feel like I'm I mean, this big room, there's so many

things going on, is going out of control, and a couple of weeks

ago. I felt like that in work, as many of us too often

or in different life situations. And the gist of it is one of our

clients weren't happy with what's going on, and they I mean, it's it's

got to the point where they actually asked me for a meeting. I mean,

we have other consultants to handle the project, but I had to actually

just go and meet the bosses to explain the situation. And the bottom line

is is it kind of wasn't our fault because it was like a software issue.

I don't know, I'm borrowing all day story. I'm just trying to

give us some contexts about about how how dire the situation was. And I

have I haven't been in these kind of situations often throughout my career because I

tried to always be on top of everything and my reputation as a on salton

in the industry on the line, right. Uh So, So I found

myself in a very difficult situation and I feel out of control and there's so

many things happening that I'm just lost for what to do. But I did

try a lot of things. I did try a lot of things. I

called different people, I tried to get in touch with the software guys.

You know, we had corresponding emails, and then they just pushed me to

a to a support ticket, as it people always do. Yeah, yeah,

as I people always do, push you to a support ticket. Then

he gets lost, He gets lost in a black box for a few weeks,

and then and then it goes quiet. Right, So I tried,

I tried my best. That was a few weeks ago, and really I

really was again lost forwards because there's you know, I'm in this situation.

And one thing I didn't do was actually pray, you know, because sometimes

you know, in the context of work, like you know, you feel,

okay, come on, God, I've been doing this for ten years.

You know, I'm a professional. I know how to had no situations.

I mean, we're going to manage to swell, right. But God

reminded me that it just takes a little bit of faith into a situation,

even when all the other stakeholders are not in God's kingdom or do not know

how God operates. It could be my colleagues, my teammates, my clients,

the software guys, come on it guys in a black box somewhere,

support ticket guys, all the stakehold. Yeah. Yeah, the sales guy

sales can can can can can, then six months later cannot then push you

to the operation. Guys. That's how it works. Man. So I

I prayed, I prayed, and I'll share the second half of this story

later. But I want to say that at this start, like it just

takes that small into a bit of faith and us stepping out into that situation

in faith. That's all it takes. That's all got sort of once.

So small is a significant small is sufficient? First point? Puny, puny.

What's the second point? Potential potential? Because what is small now has

the potential to be big tomorrow. What is small now has the potential potential

to be big tomorrow. So do you still remember what the mustard seat looked

like? I'll shore big jugin let's jump too. Yeah. So, how

many of you I have seen you know, in the scripture we read about

how this small seat grows into a tree, right, a mustard tree.

How many of you have seen that tree before? So I have a picture

here about you though. This is what it looks like after the process of

growth. Okay, So there are many different type of mustard trees. Or

plants. But I have the scientific name up there right, so you can

go and cross check and cross reference. But that small seat, one seat,

one small seat, grows into this big plant, and you can see

that it does provide shape, it does provide refuge and shelter for different animals.

Um Again, the point here is potential Matthew, thirteen thirty two.

It is the smallest of all seeds, but it becomes the largest of garden

plants. It rolls into a tree that's growth. So let me say this

is when a farmer plants a small seed, he does not just see the

seat. He sees the potential of the seed becoming a tree, producing fruit,

shelter, livelihood. So if you're into agriculture or gardening, you know

that when you put a seed into a ground and soil, you're not expecting

the seed to remain, right. You do not even want to expect it

to remain because then you're wasting your energy, wasting your time. But what

you're seeing is the potential of that seed becoming something more than it is in

day one. And basically, seeing the potential is faith. Seeing the potential

is faith he Brews eleven one. Now faith is a substance of things hope

for, the evidence of things not seen, the evidence of things not seen.

So you start out small. You know that it's significant, you know

that it's sufficient, but you have to go to the next step, which

is seeing the potential of what that small can be. And faith is the

evidence of things not seen. It's not there yet. The tree that planned

that we saw is not there. The break true has not occurred, the

healing has not come, peace has not come. But what you're doing is

you're seeing the potential already. You're seeing in the eyes of faith. You're

seeing in your heart. You're seeing that healing already, are seeing that break

true already, and it's very important is internal. But through the eyes of

faith and true scripture, we can receive that. Again, Nalty says this,

he push up the heaven was one. Faith shows the reality of what

we hope for. Shows you can see it. You can see the reality

of what we're hoping for. It's not already in place, but we can

see in eyes of faith. It is the evidence of things we cannot see.

So this will move u to the next step. So I want to

say that you don't stop at the small don't stop at the seat, don't

stop at the start. Again, don't stop at the small, don't stop

at the seat, don't stop at the start. We need to see the

potential and plant in faith, which leads me to my next point. Plant

plant. So you got puny. It's small, it's very small, but

we can see the potential in a situation. See God in situation. And

the third point is plant. So again, manage up thirteen verst thirty one

seats again the same scripture. The Kingdom of Heaven is like a master seat

planted in a field. And I think it's very key being planted. If

the seed was not planted, it would have just remained the smallest of all

seats, right if you just laugh in the fridge, like we have a

bunch of seats in the free someone gave us. Someone gave us this like

gardening pack, you know, and then we just put it in the fridge,

right, I don't know, and they pretty because coal and tahan and

then one day plantla. So it's kept it's kept in cold storage. But

it did not grow into a tree in the fridge because it's not planted in

the soil, not planted in the field. Right. Planting is putting your

faith into action. So potential is having the faith seeing it, but it

cannot just stay there. You have to put that faith into action. So

you'll know. The scripture James Chapter two, verse seventeen tasks also faith by

itself. If it does not have works, it's dead. We can't remain

at just seeing the potential. We can't remain as just being at the start.

But we need to put that faith and plant that seed of faith.

You know the thing about sometimes being in situations or we forget to act out

in faith, We forget that we have a God that can help us.

Right, So nowadays, when I get hit by worry or anxiety, or

when I get hit by a situation that I can't control, instead of worrying,

instead of reacting in a way that doesn't help the situation, just plant

a seed of faith. Just plant prayer of faith. God, I'm in

a situation. Help me, God, I cannot control the where to help

me. God, I cannot control this person. Help me, God,

my kids are going crazy, Help me not to shout. We need to.

We need to start putting our faith into action, and it can be

very small. Just a prayer, just like a seat prayer being planted,

just an act of encouragement we heard this morning, so I was sharing just

that a little bit of encouragement, encouraging word can change the situation because it's

done in faith. Right. So two more things about planting. I want

to say this planting. If you're a farmer, planting is not just planting

and leaving the seat there, right, I mean, if if you've done

gardening before, or you are you are in agriculture, how many of you

are like avid farmers here we can oh, not farmers? How many of

you are every what do you call it gardeners? Or have green fingers?

Lift up hands? I want to just see no what? Okay? How

many you have a garden at home? Right? Right? Okay? A

few? A few of us, a few of us. So so we

know was it plastic? We know that when we plant a seed it takes

care. Right, You have to water, you have to weed, you

have to brune. It takes care. It's not just planting. And and

that's how our faith journey is sometimes, especially when we are seeing our prayers

not answered yet. You know, God, we planted in faith. We've

done this. I've tried my best. I'm giving the situation to you into

your hands. I've prayed for healing, but it still takes care. You

gotta watch your heart. Care for your heart, watch that you're saying the

right things, Watch what you're listening to, watch what you receive in your

spirit, that you may remain faithful in faith. Right, So there's care,

and the other word is control, because even if the farmer or the

gardener has so much care for that seed or that seedling or that plant,

there are things he or she cannot control. Right. Maybe there's a drought

that comes, maybe there's the weather, or past caterpillars, different things that

are out of our control. And that's where God comes into the picture.

Right, that's where God comes to the picture. I'll just share a bit

the second part about what happened to that to that client. So I was

telling you about I was in a crazy dire situation, like you know,

the career is going to end, the client's gonna come and swoe me,

you know what I mean? Not that bad, but but I was in

a very bad situation. And how I forgot to pray and I go to

the it guys and they threw me into a ticket system which got me lost.

But God reminded me to speak faith into that situation. So I started

praying about it. I was asking God about it and to just to give

a bit of context, we were in this like turmoil back and forth trying

to solve a problem since December last year, so that's six to seven months

of struggling. Right then, maybe two weeks ago, God said, God

reminded me to speak faith in the situation, to pray to bring it to

Him. So I did. I remember also doing this in praise of Vice

in KK last this week tweeks ago. Yeah, um, and I think

there was a call for for anybody with a need to to raise your hands

ourselves. Like it's like God, I need you, I need you so

much, so so recent, right two weeks ago. And let me tell

her just this amazing thing. So imagine being in termouth for six months,

no no solution in mind. Like I was telling my my team, I

feel like it's gonna be completed soon, like it's gonna be done. Law.

Then my my colleague, who's uh not of the same faith, she

was telling me, I can't even see see the light. At the end

of the time, I got no hope in this situation. Um, so

I just to wope, you will pray. I don't know. I just

say that you'll pray. Um. And and so I was praying, surrendering

to God, uh, seeing in faith what he can do, basically basically

planting my faith, putting action to what I believe God can do, which

for me was prayer. And then I make a call. I made a

call again, so I call it the software guys again, and I called

the sales director of the region and we spent ten minutes on the phone,

and I just told him the situation, which already told him before through email.

By this time I called him, he was in Singapore, and all

all he did was just set up another meeting with the director of the whole

the MD of the whole region here, and set up another virtual call,

so that in that span of two to three days, he actually just explained

to me that, yes, our software is not able to give you what

you need. And he pulled in another party, which is a third party,

which is a license that we're not subscribed to. Uh. He's from

Japan. So imagine me on a call with people from different regions in different

time zones and telling them the situation like you've got to help me because you're

not you're not delivering what your software Stacey can deliver. And this the first

testimony the the other party just says, Okay, we'll do this foc for

you. You passed us the project fouls and we'll deliver in one week.

So I'm like, what okay. And usually people charge a lot for this

kind of services, like it's in the tens of thousands of sing dollars.

So I'm like, okay, you're offering that. I accepted. I accepted.

I was shocked that they even say that, because I would never do

that. I would never give that kind of free service to anyone. Right

is my business right as a service that we do. But it was offered

to me by a person who I've never met before and spend like thirteen minutes

on a virtual call. So that was the first like, wow, God,

you're coming in a situation six months of turmoil and I have a solution

in the pipeline and and uh. And there's another small testimony how how it's

very funny because I was studying Laura about it and then I say, or

you know, tomorrow, I want to meet some people here for lunch and

the client is not very happy with me, and then he he uh,

he told me that they're gonna have lunch another Patila. But what happened was

all of us ended up in the same place. Um, which for me

was also God because all this is happening in a matter of days. So

it gave me an opportunity to rapo with the CEO of the of the company,

my client, and build more trusts because of just a random thing in

the eyes of people of us meeting in the same lunch place to happen.

But to me it was God's grace to me. God put the whole situation

too for his glory. And yesterday was Friday. The two days ago was

Friday. We saw we saw this thing coming to the finish linea like I

finally have the result that we need. And he took them only one week

to settle what took us six months of a challenging, difficult situation. So

I want to say that it's possible if you plant in faith. Amen.

It's possible if you plan in faith. To God be the glory. Amen.

So my last two points I've combined together so that weekend any time for

lunch process and partnership. Process and partnership. So let's look at the mustard

tree again. Okay, do you want to take a guess how long the

you take for that small little seed to become this tree? Any ideas homys?

Twenty years? Okay, five years, forty okay, okay, we

got about five twenty and forty Here I did my research. It takes seven

to nine years for that small little seed to grow into this tree. The

tree grows to about twenty five feet, has a has a trunk weight of

about one to two feet. So the gist of it is, it takes

time. There's a process that we have to grow through in God's kingdom.

It sometimes is not how we imagine it, especially now in a time where

everything's instant, where when we want food we just call grab, where when

we want results, we just press a button. We just asked chat GPT

what to do. Uh. That's instant gratification. And I think one of

the things we can teach our kids, right is the power and significance of

process. Right. Um, you know our kids, they they've been skateboarding

a lot, and skateboarding as a spot right or most spots I think has

has very little instant gratification. So if you're a golfer, right, if

you're a golfer, how many of you play golfer? I like, whoa

golfers in the house? I heard? Even with golf, you you cannot

like buy a set of what do you call it golf clubs and just hide

to the greens and play golf. You have to do your time in the

driving range for at least one to two years. You have to learn the

art of swinging of putting before you can enjoy the game of golf. That's

a process to it. Same with skateboarding, like you see Tony Hawks,

which is a skateboarder. If you don't know doing all the tricks and like

flying around and jumping here and there, I can tell you that it probably

took him their kids to get where he is. That's a process, and

I think our children really need to learn this that things don't come easy.

We need to go through the process. There will be troubles, there will

be difficulty, but breakthrough comes after the process or breakthrough is at the other

side of this process and partnership with God. Because if you look at the

scripture about how it ends by saying the mastard tree provided shelter to birds and

they make nest there. Or when you refer back to the scripture about Jesus

is feeding the five thousand, how all of them five thousand and more will

fat that day, you kind of want to just jump straight there, right.

I want to be in that situation. I want to be driving,

I want to be sheltered, I want to be provided fall straight away,

God send me there. But the Kingdom of God doesn't work that way.

God brings us to a process. He brings us to a process. So

what does the process do to us? That is the key, right,

So this is my last slide. The process proves our maturity. The process

proves our maturity. God does this in our lives so that we come to

know Him better. We step out in faith, and it matures us as

a Christian, as a person. And the partnership proves God's glory because you

can be just our own. It's because the seed combined with the soil and

God grows, it becomes a tree. There's a partnership that happens in this

process, and it's only by His power, only by his sovereign strength.

In our situation and that partnership with us, even as small as we are,

he won trillion God one trillion, ourselves just one. That partnership brings

God glory. Amen. So that's the word I have for you today about

the Master's seat. And I pray that that I can get the bann up.

Pray that today this morning, even as we listen to God's word as

we hear, as we hear and also receive God's word this morning, they

will fine faith arising in our spirits, that fine God saying in every situation

today that He is in control. We hope you've been blessed by this message.

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