Infected

DEVOTION

THE GOSPEL OF MATTHEW

INFECTED

Matt 13:33

33 He told them still another parable: "The kingdom of heaven is like yeast that a woman took and mixed into a large amount of flour until it worked all through the dough." 

NIV

We know one thing for sure about yeast, it will not stay dormant if place within flour. Yeast will silently infect the whole amount of the flour, it will do its work relentlessly. Once placed within the flour it cannot be extracted, nor stopped from spreading throughout the complete batch of flour. A memory of this yeast in flour serves to illustrate the point Jesus was making. As a child of parents who at one point owned a donut shop and who had hired a teenage boy, yeast became a great laugh. He was ordered to put ¼ lb of yeast into the measured amount of flour. He misunderstand and put 4 lbs of yeast. The flour grew and grew as the yeast did it business. Soon the batch had to be thrown out into a 55gal barrel drum in the back of the shop. By the next morning, the glob of dough had overgrown the drum and covered the entire back parking space. Yeast was in charge! This is the story of the gospel message. It was placed in a very small part of the world, but as yeast it continues to spread silently, continually until all the world has been infected by its power. Nothing can extract it once it has been placed within. But this could also be applied to our lives. Once the gospel message has been placed within our being, it will spread throughout all our being. Its power will take charge over our being, we cannot extract it once it is there. We are completely infected by the truth of the gospel. We grow and grow and even overflow outside ourselves covering the area around us, infecting others with the yeast. This has been the plan of God all along. When he formed Adam from the dirt of the earth he infected him with the yeast, as he breathed into his nostrils that breathe of life. After he had formed Eve from the rib of Adam, He told them to multiply and fill the earth. It was not just a command to fill the earth with children, but to fill the earth with the breath of God, with the kingdom of God. He placed Adam and Eve in a paradise, with everything they would ever need, without toiling for it. All they had to do was infect all their offspring with the breath of God, spreading this paradise over the whole world. Although God knew they would fail and yield to the temptation before them, he still gave them that mission. Yet knowing in advance and because God is always present, Jesus already had paid the price for their failure. Yet in the timeline of man, in the linear sense, when he actually came in the flesh to pay the price, it was at that time, he once again infected the world with the message of salvation, of being able to return to that paradise. The Kingdom of God will not be denied, it will prevail over all else. This is simply a fact. No matter how evil seems to be spreading, the kingdom of God will not be extracted nor extinguished, it will overcome, both in this world and in our lives.