In my article last July 31st, I mentioned that I enjoyed my childhood days when our mother would teach us how to bake bread. I loved putting a tiny amount of yeast in the dough. I have always marveled at the way yeast works. I love watching bread rise in the oven to the point that they even begin to topple over.
Great things began small. Big movements started with just a single person with a vision, a mission, and a solid decision to get it going. Remember that tiny shoe store that sold nothing but shoes and bags, and has now become a big conglomerate? Or that apartment-sized university that set off in the crowded world of tertiary education that now opens its doors to tens of thousands of students all over the country?
Greatness
Greatness was never meant to be equated with size and might. The Church began with but a handful of very ordinary men: fishermen, net menders — individuals who would not be expected to make waves in backwater Galilee. But greatness did not depend on might but perhaps on something akin to the lowly mite. It was premised not on earthly position, but on a divine decision to send His own Son in our midst, to become man like us — from lowly and insignificant Nazareth, from the ranks, not of the ruling class, but of the working class, who eked out a living with their rough and callous hands.
In the parables of the mustard seed and the yeast, Jesus shows us that even though the things of the Kingdom of God may seem very small and insignificant, in God’s eyes they are very great and powerful. Let us not be discouraged when our work seems small and insignificant because if done with love for God, it will bear an abundant harvest in His time. Courage, little flock! You are never too small or too insignificant. God counts on you.
Jesus, I am but a grain of sand in the vast ocean of humanity. Grant me the grace to celebrate my smallness that becomes greatness in You.
REFLECTION QUESTION:
Do you believe God can bring your small beginning to greatness?
