It is the smallest of all seeds, but when it has grown it is larger than all the garden plants and becomes a tree, so that the birds of the air come and make nests in its branches. The contrast between the smallest seed and the largest garden plant communicates the kingdom's growth pattern: the mustard tree that becomes the nesting place of birds is the image of the kingdom that grows from the seemingly insignificant beginning of Jesus' Galilean ministry to the universal scope of the church's global mission. The birds nesting in the branches echo Ezekiel 17:23 and 31:6, where the great cedar tree becomes the nesting place of all birds — the eschatological gathering of the nations.

COMMUNITY REFLECTIONS

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