Chap. 7 - Like Unto Leaven
Based on Matthew 13:33; Luke 13:20, 21;
Many educated and influential men had come to hear the Prophet
of Galilee. Some of these looked with curious interest upon the
multitude that had gathered about Christ as He taught by the sea.
In this great throng all classes of society were represented. There
were the poor, the illiterate, the ragged beggar, the robber with the
seal of guilt upon his face, the maimed, the dissipated, the merchant
and the man of leisure, high and low, rich and poor, all crowding
upon one another for a place to stand and hear the words of Christ.
As these cultured men gazed upon the strange assembly, they asked
themselves, Is the kingdom of God composed of such material as this?
Again the Saviour replied by a parable:
“The kingdom of heaven is like unto leaven, which a woman took,
and hid in three measures of meal, till the whole was leavened.”
Among the Jews leaven was sometimes used as an emblem of sin.
At the time of the Passover the people
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were directed to remove all the leaven from their houses as they
were to put away sin from their hearts. Christ warned His disciples,
“Beware ye of the leaven of the Pharisees, which is hypocrisy.”
Luke 12:1. And the apostle Paul speaks of the “leaven of malice
and wickedness.” 1 Corinthians 5:8. But in the Saviour’s parable,
leaven is used to represent the kingdom of heaven. It illustrates the
quickening, assimilating power of the grace of God.
None are so vile, none have fallen so low, as to be beyond the
working of this power. In all who will submit themselves to the Holy
Spirit a new principle of life is to be implanted; the lost image of God
is to be restored in humanity.
But man cannot transform himself by the exercise of his will.
He possesses no power by which this change can be effected. The
leaven—something wholly from without—must be put into the meal
before the desired change can be wrought in it. So the grace of God
must be received by the sinner before he can be fitted for the kingdom
of glory. All the culture and education which the world can give will
fail of making a degraded child of sin a child of heaven. The renewing
energy must come from God. The change can be made only by the
Holy
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Spirit. All who would be saved, high or low, rich or poor, must submit
to the working of this power.
As the leaven, when mingled with the meal, works from within
outward, so it is by the renewing of the heart that the grace of God
works to transform the life. No mere external change is sufficient to
bring us into harmony with God. There are many who try to reform by
correcting this or that bad habit, and they hope in this way to become
Christians, but they are beginning in the wrong place. Our first work
is with the heart.
A profession of faith and the possession of truth in the soul are
two different things. The mere knowledge of truth is not enough. We
may possess this, but the tenor of our thoughts may not be changed.
The heart must be converted and sanctified.
The man who attempts to keep the commandments of God from
a sense of obligation merely—because he is required to do so—will
never enter into the joy of obedience. He does not obey. When the
requirements of God are accounted a burden because they cut across
human inclination, we may know that the life is not a Christian life.
True obedience is the outworking of a principle within. It springs
from the love of righteousness, the love of the law of God. The
essence of all righteousness
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is loyalty to our Redeemer. This will lead us to do right because it is
right—because right doing is pleasing to God.
The great truth of the conversion of the heart by the Holy Spirit is
presented in Christ’s words to Nicodemus: “Verily, verily, I say unto
thee, Except a man be born from above, he can not see the kingdom
of God.... That which is born of the flesh is flesh, and that which is
born of the Spirit is spirit. Marvel not that I said unto thee, Ye must
be born again. The wind bloweth where it listeth, and thou hearest
the sound thereof, but canst not tell whence it cometh and whither it
goeth. So is every one that is born of the Spirit.” John 3:3-8, margin.
The apostle Paul, writing by the Holy Spirit, says, “God, who is
rich in mercy, for His great love wherewith He loved us, even when
we were dead in sins, hath quickened us together with Christ, (by
grace ye are saved;) and hath raised us up together, and made us sit
together in heavenly places in Christ Jesus: that in the ages to come
He might show the exceeding riches of His grace in His kindness
toward us through Christ Jesus. For by grace are ye saved through
faith; and that not of yourselves; it is the gift of God.” Ephesians
2:4-8.
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The leaven hidden in the flour works invisibly to bring the whole
mass under its leavening process; so the leaven of truth works secretly,
silently, steadily, to transform the soul. The natural inclinations are
softened and subdued. New thoughts, new feeli
