June 16

A Grain Of Mustard Seed

He told them another parable: The Kingdom of heaven is like a mustard seed, which a man took and planted in his field. Though it is the smallest of all your seeds, yet when it grows, it is the largest of garden plants and becomes a tree, so that the birds of the air come and perch in its branches . . . I tell you the truth, if you have faith as small as a mustard seed, you can say to this mountain, ‘Move from here to there’ and it will move. Nothing will be impossible for you.

Matthew 13:31-32;17:20

Nicolaus Ludwig von Zinzendorf was born into a wealthy German family in 1700 and was raised with every opportunity to carry on his family tradition and live the life of a nobleman. Through the influence of his grandmother and aunt, however, as a child he became deeply interested in spiritual things. This interest was further developed through the godly example of one of his teachers at a Lutheran school at Halle, where he was sent to study at the age of ten.

While at Halle, Zinzendorf organized a small prayer band with some of his fellow students, and upon their graduation they vowed that they would remain committed to their pledge of praying and trusting God for his care and protection. In a solemn trust, they joined together in what they called the Order of the Grain of Mustard Seed.

“Zinzendorf and friends took the name of their order from Jesus’ parable of the Kingdom of God growing from small beginnings. They hoped their youthful enthusiasm, nourished by God, would become leaven in the world. No public organization was formed.

“Members individually pledged to work for the conversion and salvation of all people, including the ‘heathens’ across the seas, to improve human morals, to promote the unity of all Christians, and to protect persons persecuted for faith. In short, ‘knights’ of the mustard seed were to ‘love the whole human family.’”

For his part, Zinzendorf’s outreach was a model for what Jesus described as a tiny seed that would grow into a tree that spread its branches far. He founded a movement that became known as the Moravians. They were committed to overseas evangelism in an age when missions was not considered a vital aspect of the church.

Zinzendorf used his wealth to provide a community for religious refugees and then challenged them to take their faith abroad to those who had never heard the gospel. By 1760, more than two hundred of his followers had taken up that challenge, and in the years that followed their mission effort spread out across the globe. As a grain of mustard seed, he became one of the world’s greatest missionary statesmen of all time and “sparked the Protestant missionary movement.” ¹⁶