August 21, 2016

In our reading for Sunday, Jesus has just healed a crippled woman on the Sabbath, which you know didn’t sit well with the authorities.  But instead of directly engaging their concerns, he tells a couple of parables:  the parable of the mustard seed and the parable of the yeast.  Then he tells us all to strive to enter the narrow door. . . .  We will consider questions about how the kingdom of God can be so expansive and ever-widening (like the mustard seed and yeast), and yet how the entrance can be so narrow and seemingly exclusive.  General themes are spiritual growth, persistence, and unparalleled welcome.