“Hearing hearts. Forgiving hearts—uprooting bitterness”

Today’s text has two objects ranging from the smallest to the largest—a mustard seed, one of the smallest of seeds, and a mulberry tree, one of the largest of trees. To put the size of a Mulberry tree into perspective, they can grow up to 12 metres high. They are anchored in the ground by long, lateral roots, which can do significant damage in suburban settings: cracking house foundations, lifting footpaths, and choking out other garden plants. This root system means that once they’re established, Mulberry trees are very difficult to remove.

So just imagine: on a beautiful blue-sky Spring day like today, with the forecast top of 27 degrees, you decide to head out this afternoon to the foreshore here at Glenelg. As you get closer to the esplanade, you can hear the booming thunder of the waves crashing to shore. In the distance you notice that there’s not as many boats on the water as usual, but a couple still dot the distance, bobbing up and down like a child’s toys in the bathtub. Suddenly, a large shadow moves overhead, and you look up to see…is it a bird? Is it a plane? No, its…a Mulberry tree, travelling through the air, with clumps of someone’s backyard dropping on to the beach. Startled seagulls hastily retreat as with an almighty kerplonk the Mulberry tree plummets into the water next to the jetty.

Now…who could possibly uproot a Mulberry tree, and transplant it in the ocean, simply by telling it to? And why does Jesus give this bizarre image in his teaching?

It comes in response to his disciples’ plea: “Give us more faith!”

Why are they asking for more faith? Because Jesus is teaching them about forgiveness.

Now, forgiveness is hard. I know that. You know that. It’s easy to forgive someone who we’re not hurt or upset by. We say: “Oh it’s alright, don’t worry, no stress, all good.” But it’s not easy to forgive when we are hurt by another. It’s so hard, because it hurts! Jesus knows this too.

Sometimes in the church I think we can underestimate this. Well meaning people might say: “You’ve got to forgive them” as the first point of care for a brother or sister. But that might not be the most helpful first response. Being sinned against hurts! Marriage unfaithfulness, being cheated out of our money, having our reputations destroyed, having our authority undermined, being gossiped about, suffering violence, bullying and abuse, and abuse of trust are all serious things, and they can do serious damage to us.

Jesus acknowledges that—he acknowledges how serious and despicable sin is. He says: “Things that cause people to stumble are bound to come, but woe to anyone through whom they come. It would be better for them to be thrown into the sea with a millstone tied around their neck than to cause one of these little ones to stumble.”

That’s how serious sin is! That’s why Jesus quickly adds: “So watch yourselves!” Did you notice—his disciples are not to watch others—pointing out their faults, judging them, condemning them, waiting for them to trip up. They are not to watch others—they are to watch themselves! And so are we. We are to watch ourselves so that our sin does not cause someone to stumble. And there is another way we can cause God’s children to stumble. To not forgive sin, but instead give a brother or sister such a roasting and shaming for their behaviour that they leave the church.

When our brother or sister sins against us, Jesus says we are to rebuke them; and if they repent, to forgive them. Now, that’s hard enough—but then listen to this: ^“Even if your brother or sister sins against you seven times in a day and seven times come back to you saying ‘I repent,’ you must forgive them.” ‘Seven times’ here is not a literal number, but a figure of complete forgiveness in a day. If a brother or sister in the church comes to us eight times, or nine times, or twenty times asking for forgiveness, we are not to let the day roll into another one without first forgiving them.

Now, that can be really hard. So it’s understandable that the disciples ask: “Lord, give us more faith!” Because forgiveness is not easy. It is costly. It costs us our pride. It costs us the chance to get even with those who hurt us. So forgiveness does not come naturally to the human heart. What comes naturally to us when we are hurt is to protect ourselves. That might be physically protecting ourselves—we might need to literally flee from risk of harm, or we might need to put some distance between ourselves and what others say to us or say about us, for our own emotional and psychological protection.

But we humans can use self-protection strategies to push away those who have upset us in harmful ways. When we do this, something happens in our heart: it changes shape, taking the form of a clenched fist, and becomes as hard and as cold as stone. We might secretly hope some downfall comes to the person who has wronged us, and when it doesn’t, our thirst for justice might mean we take justice into our own hands, seeking atonement and revenge. We might retaliate in a war of words, escalating the conflict. We might dismantle the person’s image and reputation publicly, spreading half-truths but not the full truth of the situation. We might withhold our help from the other person as a way to punish them.

That’s the natural way to respond to sin—the way of the flesh, but it is not the way of the Spirit. It is not God’s way, and not a good way—not good for others and it’s also not good for us. Jealousy, bitterness and resentment take root in the heart, like the roots of one of the largest of all trees—the Mulberry tree. The quest for justice becomes all-consuming and the flame of anger becomes a raging fire, burning inside, clouding our judgement, so that we lash out, bringing worse consequences upon ourselves than the original wrong. Soon these unhealthy emotions become all consuming, bringing physical effects too, as we live in negativity, complaint, bitterness, despair and depression.

The refusal to forgive never achieves anything, other than widening the chasm of relationship breakdown, or increasing the cycle of retaliation. Once the Mulberry tree takes root, it keeps growing, cracking the foundations of the faith in our heart, lifting up the footpath of following Jesus. It crowds out the teaching of his word we have received, all the time bearing fruit—fruit that is not of the Spirit, but the rotten fruit of walking by the flesh: hatred, discord, jealousy, fits of rage, selfish ambition, dissensions, factions and envy” (Galatians 5:20-21a).

Just as a Mulberry tree is so difficult to uproot, so also are these things. This happens when we do not think of ourselves in the same way Jesus does—as ‘little ones’—but instead think of ourselves according to our own estimation—as powerful and prideful, with the right to get our own way, at whatever cost. Who can uproot this wild, untamed tree growing out of control in the garden bed of the human heart and stop producing such damaging fruit?

The right way to take sin seriously, then, is to do it in a way that forgiveness can happen—not only God’s, but ours. Jesus says: “If your brother or sister sins against you, rebuke them; and if they repent, forgive them. Even if they sin against you seven times in a day and seven times come back to you saying ‘I repent,’ you must forgive them.” We do not need a backhoe, or trenching equipment, or cranes and scaffolding to uproot the Mulberry tree of bitterness and unforgiveness. Jesus’ followers need only a word—or more particularly, three words: “I forgive you” and the Mulberry tree will be uprooted and planted in the sea, as we cast our burden onto God.

Why does Jesus mention the sea of all places for a Mulberry tree to be transplanted?

In ancient mythology, the sea was seen as the abode of chaos and evil. Perhaps then the sea is a more fitting place for bitterness and unforgiveness to belong, instead of the heart of the Christian. If the extensive root system of a tree soaked up salt water, the salt water would kill the roots, and the whole tree, bringing an end to that tree’s fruit production of bitterness and resentment.

Jesus’ response to the Apostles of uprooting a Mulberry tree is intended to encourage them. Who among the human race could carefully uproot a Mulberry tree, and then transplant it in the ocean, simply by telling it to? No one! That’s impossible. But not impossible with God. If God were to tell such a huge tree to be uprooted and relocate to the sea, then it would happen. After all, at the beginning of the Bible we are told this is how God spoke creation into existence: “God said ‘Let there be’…and it was so”. God’s powerful word does what it says.

So how much more then, when Jesus’ word is simply spoken through his church to bind and forgive sins will his word do what is said. What mere human has the authority and ability to bind and forgive sins? Nobody! But Jesus does! In Matthew’s Gospel Jesus tells us that all authority in heaven and on earth has been given to him (Matthew 28:20). And he says to the church that whatever is bound on earth is bound in heaven, and whatever is loosed on earth is loosed in heaven (Matthew 18:18-20).

So what an encouragement for the church—that when the Apostles (and those continuing the apostolic ministry today) speak Jesus’ word to bind and forgive sins, Jesus’ Father will simultaneously do in heaven whatever is agreed between two or three on earth, with Jesus in their midst.

That’s exactly why the disciples don’t need more faith—because in the Person of Christ with them, and his powerful word, they already have everything they need. To look to our faith is to look to ourselves. To look to whom our faith is in is to look to God. So whether their faith is the size of a mustard seed or a watermelon, what they believe will be done for them, because it is not about their efforts and ability, but the strength and capability of Jesus. As they speak, Jesus speaks and he does something more wonderful and miraculous than transplanting a Mulberry tree in the ocean—he forgives sins, to uproot bitterness and bring his own peace flooding into human hearts.

Plunging the Mulberry tree with its roots that grip our heart so tightly—and the fruit of bitterness and jealousy it yields—into the saltwater ocean is nothing other than living in our baptism each day; daily drowning the old sinful self with all its evil deeds and desires through daily repentance, so that day after day a new self should arise to live with God in righteousness and purity forever (Luther SC, Baptism: art IV).

God has planted the mustard seed of faith in your hearts when he gave you new birth by water and the Spirit. He is with you—even in the most wretched and despairing situations—not just to the end of your life, but the very end of the age. Until that time he is in his church every Sunday to do for his people what he does nowhere else: to forgive all of us all our sins in the name of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit, and the risen Christ proclaims his words: “Peace be with you!” The mustard seed faith God gives you opens you ears to hear those words as Jesus’ own words to you, which free you from your sin to forgive others, and to ask others to extend forgiveness to you.

As that happens, the tree of faith from the mustard seed grows. It grows big branches and lush foliage, and deep roots, and a strong trunk. It grows into a big and beautiful new creation of God, where new possibilities can happen: relationships can be restored, or new ones begin and flourish. Instead of people being driven them away from the one place where there is forgiveness of sin, they stay and grow to be more like Christ and share God’s forgiveness with others. The church shines bright as the light of Christ in this broken and crumbling world, reaching out with the hope of the gospel of forgiving seven times a day, rather than writing people off. The church is sheltered by God as a refuge where his hope and peace abound, and we, his children, are encouraged and built up, and live with him and each other in peace and freedom, as a foretaste of our freedom in heaven forever. Amen.

Pastor Tim Ebbs
St Paul’s Lutheran Church, Glenelg
Time after Pentecost, 2025

REFLECTION AND APPLICATION POINTS:

 “…the disciples don’t need more faith—because in the Person of Christ with them, and his powerful word, they already have everything they need.

• Are their times where it seems you don’t have ‘enough’ faith? What are the circumstances that led you to think this?
• Someone once said: “A drop of water is water just as much as a whole ocean.” How would ‘great faith’ be a temptation to rely on ourselves? Why does ‘mustard seed’ sized

faith help us focus on Jesus?

• Who has hurt you in the past? Were you able to forgive them? What did you do? How might Jesus’ recognition of the seriousness of sin and hurt help you?
• Are there times where anger and bitterness have been your experience? To forgive is costly – but how is not forgiving more costly—and dangerous?
• Make a list of people from the past you need to forgive, then a list of people you need to ask forgiveness for. Compare the length of each list.
• Now picture Jesus’ teaching, that wherever two or three are gathered in his name, there he is with them. How might this give courage and strength to take the next step of forgiving, or asking for forgiveness?

 

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