Grace to you and peace from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ. Amen

The kingdom of God is like when a person took the tiniest of all the seeds, a grain of mustard seed, a seed so small that if I had one on my finger you would not be able to see it. The person put the tiny seed in the ground, and it began to grow. The shrub grew so big it was like a little tree, and the birds of the air came and they made their nests there. (cp. Luke 13: 18-19)

Now I wonder if the person who put the tiny seed in the ground has a name.
I wonder if the person was happy to see the birds coming?
What was the person doing while the shrub was growing?
I wonder if the birds have names?
Were they happy to find the tree?
I wonder what the tree could really be?
I wonder if you have ever come close to this kind of tree?

Jesus says, “If you had faith the size of a mustard seed, you could say to this mulberry tree, ‘Be uprooted and planted in the sea,’ and it would obey you.” (Luke 17:6)
Now I wonder, is Jesus angry? Have the apostles asked the wrong question when they say “Increase our faith”?

Looking at the Greek text, I see a sentence structure, grammar that does not work. Why does Luke the fine writer do that?
In Greek he begins his sentence like this: When you have faith... or: since you have faith..., meaning, you have some faith, the size of a mustard seed. And he ends it: you could say to this mulberry ‘Be uprooted...’ and it would obey you.
“Since you have faith, you could say to this mulberry tree, ‘Be uprooted and planted in the sea,’ and it would obey you.” (Luke 17:6) It isn’t elegant in English neither is it in Greek. It must have a meaning that way.

There is more wondering to do:
I wonder, have you ever said, “Increase our faith”?
Has the church ever said “Strengthen our faith”?

Of course!
When we were in the pit, lonely, torn, sick, full of pain that let us lose our mind, confronted with death. We saw our faith, how small it really is, and we prayed, Give me more faith, o Lord, just some more.

When the churches saw after 1945 what had happened, they cried out, increase our faith.
When we first came to realize what happened on September 11, 2001, we all prayed here, “Increase our faith.”

It is a legitimate exclamation, a legitimate sigh of the faithful. “Strengthen our faith!” comes out of situations of genuine need, genuine distress.
There is so much need, so much distress, and also so much plain work to do, there hardly seems enough faith to go around. It seems natural to ask for more.

• In our congregation people take time right now to think through the issue of the Church and Homosexuality. We do this necessary work while we know there is a great number of other pressing issues in society that need our attention as people of faith.
• Or, among the churches, we have kind of gotten used to the fact that many still will exclude baptized Christians from the Lord’s table if they are from the wrong church. Even if we have grown used to it, such exclusion continues to sow bitter pain in families and churches.
• Or, we are driving across town with our mostly too big cars day in and day out, using up the last precious resources of oil, depending on it more rather than less. We have been given the mandate in creation to take good care of the earth that God has given us, and I take pride in teaching the confirmation students that dominion means “to take good care”. But am I doing what I am teaching? How many empty water bottles have I thrown in the trash this week and not in the recycling bin?

There is so much to do, and it seems there is not, there cannot be enough faith to go around.
All we can do is, say as the apostles did:
Good Lord, increase our faith! It can only be your gift. Make the gift you have given us ever stronger, ever more firm!

Now, the way we are used to hear Christ’s answer to the apostles makes him look a heavy handed Lord: “If you had faith the size of a mustard seed, you could say to this mulberry tree, ‘Be uprooted and planted in the sea,’ and it would obey you.” (Luke 17:6) This response makes the prayer of the apostles “Increase our faith” be wrong, illegitimate.

I think we should really hear it this way: “Since you have faith the size of a mustard seed, you could say to this mulberry tree...” Because a heavy handed Christ does not fit the kingdom of God, does not fit the images that Christ uses to portray it: birds making nests in a mustard shrub, lilies dressed more beautiful than Solomon was, a beautiful pearl, a lost but found son, a found sheep, a found coin, a poor man in Abraham’s lap.

I have a suspicion why we would still resist a translation that better reflects what the Greek text actually says and rather put up with a mean answer of our Lord:
Denying the apostles of the church and with them us any faith, not even the size of a mustard, seed seems to fit more our own hidden fears that we would not be worthy, not accepted, not good enough in God’s eyes. We still cannot believe that the loving side of God should not have a dark side lurking somewhere, and today this fear seems to get new nourishment We still have a hard time trusting that the kingdom has come, that the time is fulfilled and God has given us God’s son who ends all our fears and strife.

Now, listen again, sisters and brothers.
“Since you have faith the size of a mustard seed, you could say to this mulberry tree, ‘Be uprooted and planted in the sea,’ and it would obey you.”

This is the language that fits the kingdom of God. It brings back the parable of the kingdom that is like a mustard seed. Brings back the birds in the tree, the man who found the pearl, the woman who found the coin. It is a kingdom people never saw, people never lived in before or ever visited.

Now this kingdom is with us. Like Jesus was with his disciples, like Christ with the apostles in the early church, so is the kingdom with us. Maybe small like the tiniest seed of them all, the mustard seed, but look into what it will grow.

It is among us, Christ is among us and therefore the gift of faith, and we may ask our Lord without fear: Increase our faith so that with cheerful minds and hearts we may do the good works of faith. We will do them without complaining, like in the parable of the slave and the master. And there will be enough faith to go around.

The kingdom of God is like when a person took the tiniest of all the seeds, a grain of mustard seed, a seed so small that if I had one on my finger you would not be able to see it. The person put the tiny seed in the ground, and it began to grow. The shrub grew so big it was like a little tree, and the birds of the air came and they made their nests there. (cp. Luke 13: 18-19)
I wonder, have you ever seen a mustard shrub planted in the sea?
(In original manuscript: I wonder, have you ever come close to this kind of tree?)

Amen.