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The words of Christ may properly suggest to us -

I. THE QUIET PEACEABLENESS OF THE CHRISTIAN METHOD. The starting and the spreading of "the kingdom of God" is like a woman taking and hiding leaven in some meal. How impossible to imagine any of the founders of the kingdoms or empires of this world thus describing the course of their procedure! The forces they employed were forces that shone, dazzled, smote, shattered; that excited wonder and struck terror; that crushed and clanged and conquered. Those which the Son of man employed were such as fittingly reminded of a woman hiding leaven in some meal - silently but effectually penetrating to the depth; quietly, peaceably spreading on every hand. He did not "strive nor cry," etc.; his gospel "came not with observation," with beat of drum, with dramatic display; shunning rather than seeking celebrity, he lived, taught, suffered, witnessed, died, leaving behind a penetrating power for good that should renew and regenerate the race. There may be occasion, now and then, to say and do that which astonishes or alarms or otherwise arouses; but that is not the Christian method. The influence which steals into the soul, which insinuates itself into the whole body, which noiselessly communicates a right spirit and diffuses itself without ostentation or pretence from centre to circumference, - that is the method of the Master.

IX. THE DIFFUSIVENESS OF DIVINE TRUTH FROM WITHIN OUTWARDS. "Leaven, which a woman... hid;" not spread over the surface, but put into, placed in the heart of it, there to spread, to permeate, working from the centre towards the surface. This is the method of the gospel as distinguished from that of the Law. The Law exerts its power in the opposite direction - from without inwards; it acts directly on behaviour, leaving behaviour to become habit and habit to become principle.

1. Jesus Christ places the leaven of Divine truth in the mind, in the understanding, teaching us how to think of God and of ourselves, of sin and of righteousness, of the present and the future.

2. Then Divine truth affects our feelings, producing awe, reverence, fear, hope, trust, love.

3. Thence it determines the desires and convictions, leading to choice, decision, full and final determination.

4. And thence, moving towards the surface, it decides behaviour and ends in rectitude of action, excellency of life; so "the whole man," the complete nature, is leavened. Similarly, Divine truth is placed in the heart of the community, and, once there, it communicates itself from man to man, from home to home, from circle to circle, until "the whole" nation is leavened. But a man may ask, How is my entire nature to be thoroughly leavened with Christian principle - perfectly sweetened, purified, renovated, as it is not now? Have we enough of the sacred leaven hidden within us? It is true that "a little leaven leaveneth the whole lump," but there is a quantity, less than which is insufficient for the work. Have we enough of the truth of Christ lodged in our minds for this great and high purpose? Are we thinking, as Christ meant us to think, of our Divine Father, of our human spirit, of our human life, of the needs and claims of our neighbour, about giving and about forgiving, and about eternal life? Is our Master's thought on these great, decisive, determining themes hidden in our hearts, doing its sweetening and renewing work within us? Christ says, "Come to me;" he also says, "Learn of me. Are we diligently, meekly, devoutly learning of Christ, receiving more and more of his hallowing and transforming truth into our mind, to stir our feeling, to regulate our choice, to beautify and to ennoble our life? - C.

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KJV: And again he said, Whereunto shall I liken the kingdom of God?

WEB: Again he said, "To what shall I compare the Kingdom of God?