When I was growing up my parents opened a bakery. It was a small family owned business. My parents did most of the baking and were there from 2am to 6pm most days, except Sundays. Yes, you read the times right. They were dedicated to this business. My brothers and I worked after school, on Saturdays, and summer break. It’s that kind of place that just one scent, one small bite, or one mere mention of Deagel’s Pastries and More and I’m right back in that kitchen fighting my mom over washing the dishes, getting a baking lesson from my dad, or sitting on a bucket icing cookies with my now husband.

I have learned so many lessons during those bakery days. Lessons about work, life and baking tricks and maybe some day I’ll write more about those. But for today our focus is the parable of the leaven in Matthew 13:33 and repeated in Luke 13:20-21.

“Another parable He spoke to them: “The kingdom of heaven is like leaven, which a woman took and hid in three measures of meal till it was all leavened.” Matthew 13:33

“And again He said, “To what shall I liken the kingdom of God? It is like leaven, which a woman took and hid in three measures of meal till it was all leavened.” Luke 13:20-21

We don’t use the word leaven anymore. At least I don’t and I don’t think the clerk at the grocery store would know what you were talking about either. Today we would call it yeast. My dad would purchase it in bulk because just about everything used yeast. The funny thing is that yeast never did it’s job just sitting in it’s packaging. We never showed up at the bakery in the morning and seen it overtaken by mounds and mounds of yeast. It doesn’t grow by itself. Yeast needs certain things to grow and if something isn’t just right it won’t grow. Yeast is picky. Yeast needs the right food. Yeast needs the right temperature of liquid. Yeast needs the right environment. And if the growing conditions are just right it grows, gradually. You can watch it for five minutes and it doesn’t seem like it’s going to work. Wait forty five minutes and wow you have lots of growth, if the conditions stay just right.

Jesus, our master teacher, compares the kingdom of heaven to leaven. We know from previous studies that the kingdom of heaven here is the church, the one Jesus came to this earth to build (Matthew 16:18) and the one He is the head of, the one He loved and gave His life for (Ephesians 5:23-25). This leaven, this church, was hid in three measures of meal. At the time Jesus spoke this parable, the church wasn’t established and wouldn’t be until the day of Pentecost (Acts 2). For a lack of a better term it was hidden, not lost, just being mixed with what it needs to grow and rise at the proper time.

The leaven was hidden in three measures of meal till it was all leavened. Just like how yeast needs food and the right conditions to grow so does the church. The church cannot grow without people, but not just people, it needs people who are willing and able to feed on God’s Word (Hebrews 5:12-14). When we are eating (studying) we are going to grow in knowledge and that knowledge will help us to be able to teach others and those others will grow and teach others and pretty soon our whole lump will have grown so much that it is overflowing. Our little knowledge has turned into much.

Once you mix yeast with its proper ingredients you cannot separate it. It saturates the whole lump. You are unable to discern while you are eating a piece of bread which it the yeast and which is the water, butter, flour, and sugar. It becomes one. That’s the way our lives should be. We should be so invested with our Lord and working with and for His church that our lives cannot exist without the other.

I have eaten so many wonderful treats that were made using yeast and just the thought of them makes me smile. I have been many places and have seen our Lord’s leaven working, growing, and producing many wonderful things and it makes my smile so much bigger! The next time you bake something using yeast think about how you are helping the church grow. The next time you eat something made with yeast remember our lives make up the church and it’s our attitudes towards it that creates the environment in which it will grow.

By: Kristina Odom