As brought out in my 'Doubting the leading' post on July 7, Paul had written to the Galatians that a little leaven leavens the whole lump. Paul did not make up that metaphor. Jesus used it first.
In the Gospel of Matthew, Chapter 16, Jesus was having a bad day, or perhaps more accurately, it was a bad day as measured by other peoples' responses. Technically, I guess I should say that a lot of people were having bad days, one group was actively making bad days for themselves and another bunch was passively becoming victims of circumstance, and both were hasty to be sharing their unbelief with Jesus.
First, Jesus had a run-in with the Pharisees and Sadducees. It is clear that they were not genuinely trying to figure out if Jesus could be the Messiah. They were bullying him to show them a sign from heaven. Jesus' answer was properly judgmental: It is a wicked generation that asks for a sign. Then He said that He'd give them the sign of Jonah.
The wicked and adulterous generation stumbled over the sign of Jonah, whose three days in the belly of the whale was a pattern of what would be Jesus' own death, burial, and resurrection. The Pharisees and Sadducees were the best educated on the land on this stuff; they ought to have been real hotshots in interpreting the sign of Jonah, but they missed that picture completely.
Back alone with his disciples, Jesus tried to, as present day people-managers are fond
of saying, "turn this into a teaching moment." He told them to be
on their guard against the leaven of the Pharisees and Sadducees. But
the disciples thought he was ticked off because they hadn't packed
bread. It turns out that the "ticked off" attitude that they were
picking up on had been caused by their failure to step up and figure out
what He really meant by "leaven." Jesus asked, "Why do you talk about
bringing no bread? Where is your faith?" Maybe "ticked off" isn't the best term. Maybe it was closer to being a "disappointment." In any case, the disciples knew "something" wasn't right.
By now you might be asking how all this makes a lesson from a runaway bride. That answer is: Because KatieLyn, the runaway bride, falls into the second group—the disciples who had no faith. Jesus was trying to teach them a profound insight that would feed their spirits and deflect problems for them in the future, but they were thinking on the flesh level of bread loaves.
In Faith that Prevails, Smith Wigglesworth wrote, "But the Master does not want us to reason things out—for carnal reasoning will always land us in a bog of unbelief—but just to obey." That is not the same as remaining clueless. We progressively gain our understanding the reasons as we walk out God's leading in faith. But to be pleasing to God, the faithful obedience comes first. That was the "something" that wasn't right.
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