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The Mustard Seed: God’s Kingdom Will Start Very Small And Grow Very Large

31 He put-before them another parable, saying, “The kingdom of the heavens is like a seed of a mustard-plant, which having taken, a man sowed in his field— 32 which is smaller than all the seeds, but when it grows is larger than the garden-plants. And it becomes a tree[a], so that the birds of the heaven come and are nesting in its branches”.

Like Leaven In Bread, God’s Kingdom Will Permeate The World

33 He spoke another parable to them, “The kingdom of the heavens is like leaven, which having taken, a woman concealed[b] into three measures[c] of wheat-flour until which time the whole thing was leavened”.

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Footnotes

  1. Matthew 13:32 That is, in relative size. Compare Mk 4:32.
  2. Matthew 13:33 Or, hid in. Normally, we would say ‘mixed into’, but this puts emphasis on the mixer and the mixing. Jesus is putting emphasis on the hiddenness of the leaven within the flour, and its transforming of the whole from within.
  3. Matthew 13:33 Or seah, a Hebrew measure, amounting here to about six gallons or 25 liters, a batch size seen in Gen 18:6.

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