Scripture: Luke 17:5-10
This is a short sermon on a big subject. Millie and I happened to be talking about sermon titles earlier in the week—along, of course, with things that are much deeper and weightier—and I commented that because I have to choose a sermon title before I’ve written the sermon, I often try to leave myself a good deal of latitude when I make up the title. I think you will agree that I left myself a great deal of latitude with this one.
The title came from the scripture where the disciples ask Jesus to increase their faith and Jesus replies that if they had faith the size of a mustard seed, they would be able to uproot a tree and plant it in the sea just by saying a word. The title also came from the fact that this is World Communion Sunday and it causes me to reflect on what this faith is that we all supposedly share, or say we do on occasions such as this. That’s why the title, or where it came from. That didn’t mean I knew what I wanted to say, just that I was pretty sure there was something I would have to say that would fit under that title.
Let me start with that verse about the mustard seed. I’m going to focus just on that short exchange this morning. The rest of the lectionary passage really fits more with the reading for next week, so I may come back to it. The disciples ask Jesus to increase their faith. That is, I think, a request that many of us would understand. My sense is, after 35 years in the ministry, that there are a great many people who feel like their faith could stand some increasing, who maybe feel like their faith, when you get right down to it, is pretty small, at least compared to what they would like it to be, or maybe compared to the faith they think other people have, or compared to what they sometimes need their faith to be. Jesus often referred to the people he was talking to, often including the disciples, as people of “little faith”. And oftentimes, in our own eyes anyway, that seems to be us: people of little faith, people who might well be wishing for their faith to be increased.
Jesus’ response to this request of the disciples to have their faith increased may not seem very compassionate. One way to read his response would be to have him saying something like: “Well, you sure are right to want to have your faith increased because if it were as big as even a tiny mustard seed, you would be able to move trees into the ocean just by speaking to them. If you had any kind of faith at all, you would be doing miracles all over the place, and since you are not, clearly your faith is smaller than small, microscopic maybe, or nonexistent.” That hearing of Jesus fits in well with whatever senses of inadequacy we might have with regard to our own faith and reinforces those tendencies in us. We don’t have any particular need or desire to move trees into oceans, but it might be nice to feel a little less lost, or lonely, or alone, or bewildered, or anxious, or angry, or anything that gets in the way of our being at peace with ourselves and the world and God. It would be nice to have faith the size—Jesus says it’s only a mustard seed—the size that would accomplish that kind of a miracle. And if we could somehow get a lot of faith, much more than a mustard seed then maybe we could be serene and loving all the time—or even most of the time would be good enough—or even a substantial amount of time…
Now maybe Jesus was saying something like this. I admit it sounds that way. I admit that it sounds like Jesus is saying “yes, you sure must be running on empty so far as faith is concerned ‘cause I’m not seeing many trees move around here”. Maybe he meant something like that, but I’m thinking maybe not. I’m thinking we think we understand Jesus too much. I’m thinking we should less often think we understand what Jesus was saying and more often think of him as being inscrutable. What if we received what he says here, for instance, more like it was the saying of a Zen master What if we heard him say, “My son, faith is like a mustard seed that moves trees into oceans.” And what if our response was, “hmmm, what does he mean by that.”
I’m not sure what he means by that, but I have a few thoughts about another way to think about faith the size of a mustard seed. Maybe the point of this saying is that faith is not supposed to be the size of mountains…or even a pile of mustard seeds. It’s more like just one. Maybe the point—or a point—is that faith by its nature is not something you are supposed to have a lot of, or can have a lot of. Maybe faith is not something that can be stockpiled. Maybe you can’t even talk about its size. When we do, don’t we have some idea that a large faith is a faith that believes lots of things, that is able to affirm all sorts of things about God and Jesus and life after death, that believing lots of things is having lots of faith and therefore if we’re having trouble with even just a few of those beliefs that our faith must be quite small. Or maybe we feel that a large faith is one that is certain and unshakable so that it takes up a lot of space inside us and there is no room left for questions or uncertainties or fears or griefs. Maybe faith has not very much to do with size at all. Maybe faith is more of an insubstantial thing, neither large nor small, more a quality than a quantity, more like the manna in the wilderness I was talking about a month or so ago, where what was given could not be accumulated and where it was just enough to guide you through the wilderness day by day and step by step. Maybe we’re looking for the wrong thing or an impossible thing when we ask for a faith that is large.
Maybe what we’re looking for is a faith that is more like a mustard seed, that is something like a tiny kernel at the core of everything about us that has to do with God, the seed that gives birth to every praise, every thank you, every belief, every image, every question, every complaint, every prayer, every cry of why, every awe-filled encounter, every anything—somewhere in the origin of every reaching out toward God—whether or not we think we are just filled to the brim or empty of faith—somewhere in the origin of every attempt we make to touch God or see God or understand God is this tiny, insubstantial thing, like a mustard seed. It is what faith is like. It is all faith is ever like.
Likewise somewhere at the beginning—and in the middle and at the end—of every journey is that faith that is like a mustard seed—the seed that gives birth to every decision made with God in mind but with no guarantee that the decision is a right decision, that gives strength to face an uncertain future, that gives birth to love in the midst of fear, that shapes a word spoken on behalf of justice that may not be heard or appreciated, that shapes every act of mercy. There is something like a mustard seed at the origin and at the heart of every journey and it is not a guarantee, and it is not a certainty, and it is not an assurance. We begin our journeys, sometimes hearing well the assurances that god will go with us as we venture out into the unknown, but sometimes not hearing those assurances so well, and sometimes not at all, but going anyway without assurances. There is faith in all of that, is there not? Whatever journey we are on, sometimes it is very hard to take that next step, and sometimes we don’t know where we’re going exactly, and sometimes we feel pretty lost or afraid, and sometimes there’s just no assurance that things are going to work out, …and all the time we are more faithful when we don’t shove those things aside, kick them under the bed, put them in the closet and quick close the door. All the time we are more faithful when we do not pretend that some great faith would make the next step easy, when we do not pretend that some great faith would make the way clear, or would prevent us from ever feeling lost or scared, or will provide some assurance that things will work out in the way that we have decided would be the best way. A mustard seed does not stand for a small amount of faith. It stands for the way faith most often is.
As we come to the communion table today, this world communion Sunday, we do not celebrate a faith that is loud and large. We do not celebrate a faith that people can have as though they own it. We proclaim a faith that is like a mustard seed, that leads us along unknown and surprising paths and that sustains us in our loving. It is a faith that is neither large nor small but that is precious and in the end is better than a mountain of beliefs and assurances and certainties. May God grant us faith like a mustard seed. May we be helped to see it in ourselves and in one another. Amen.
Jim Bundy
October 3, 2004