The Mindset of a Seed
Dig for spiritual treasure and you’ll find it
Last week, I discovered that having the faith of a mustard seed is more profoundly complex than I first understand. Then again, each parable, as with anything Jesus said, only grants its treasure to those who hunt and dig.
John the Baptizer’s inspiring directive is still essential today: “Repent (change your thinking completely and turn from what you’re doing), for the kingdom of heaven is at hand.” It’s here, now, and has been since the Son of God walked the earth. I want it. Do you?
Here’s a story that hopefully illustrates the enviable “mindset” of this special seed.
There was once a little seed. He was the tiniest of all the seeds, but no worries. The other types of seeds had no power or authority over Little Seed’s destiny. He only aspired to be like the one who sired him, who gave him life.
Though tiny, Little Seed already carried within a vision of what he was called to do. Therefore, he acted and spoke like a mustard tree while waiting for his seed coat to split open and his stem to poke through the dirt. His mind was set, and his roots were burrowing deep, giving no place to confusion. He did not expect to sprout pine cones and he did not fear the possibility of growing hooves. He never behaved like a thistle or an evergreen, and he never croaked like a frog—Little Seed never thought like those things that were not of his true identity.
Never doubting his DNA, Little Seed transformed from glory to glory into a mature mustard tree. His hope, trust, confidence, and faith were bound to the tree he came from and to the tree he was becoming. Why would he lower his thinking to accommodate anything less than his divine calling?
As a child of the Father of light and glory, are my actions and speech evidence of my spiritual DNA? Do I possess the unwavering mindset of the mustard seed? Are my hope, trust, confidence, and faith bound to the God who gave me life and to the destiny and purpose He has set before me?
In the context surrounding the parable of the mustard seed (Matthew 17:14-20), Jesus is pointing out the lack of faith and the unbelief in the the disciples’ and the people toward their true identity in their Creator. He called them a “perverse” generation. [Perverse, diastrephó: summed up to mean walking down a path of completely wrong thinking and wrong doing. Or untransformed minds (Romans 12:2).
As John the Baptizer said, repent, metanoeo: change your thinking, for the kingdom of God is HERE.
Does my mindset allow God to heal others through me? To set captives free through me? Is my thinking lined up with Heaven to the degree that the Lord could even raise the dead through me, without my unbelief hindering His Spirit? Or do I lower my thinking to accommodate a life that’s beneath my divine calling (John 14:12-14)?
Do you have the same steadfast mindset
as that of the mustard seed?
The Thought-Life of an Embattled Spirit
Matthew 17:15-20 The steadfast thought life of the mustard seed
“Lord, have mercy on my son, for he is an epileptic and suffers severely; for he often falls into the fire and often into the water. So I brought him to Your disciples, but they could not cure him.”
Then Jesus answered and said, “O faithless and perverse generation, how long shall I be with you? How long shall I bear with you? Bring him here to Me.” And Jesus rebuked the demon, and it came out of him; and the child was cured from that very hour.
Then the disciples came to Jesus privately and said, “Why could we not cast it out?”
So Jesus said to them, “Because of your unbelief; for assuredly, I say to you, if you have faith as a mustard seed, you will say to this mountain, ‘Move from here to there,’ and it will move; and nothing will be impossible for you.”
