Leaven

My mother came up from Carlsbad this afternoon. We had been having really clear traffic going back and forth to UCLA, so we were surprised to hear that it took her 5 hours to get here! Dad's been recovering well from his surgery, so she felt like it was OK to leave him alone for a while. She was pretty tired by the time she got here, so we were all grateful that Mia McElwee had brought us a prepared meal.

Krista and I had a much better day today. Krista even broke out her old Fibromyalgia exercise tapes to do a little low-impact stretching. Her intestinal problems faded away, but the frequent urination continued. Throughout the day, urination became more painful and Krista became concerned that she had a bladder infection. The doctor had her take a sample to test for bacteria, but gave her an antibiotic just in case.

Infections are a big deal when you're immunosuppressed because they can get out of control quickly. It's the same principle that we learned about last week in the Seder dinner. Before the dinner, the mother and kids are supposed to go through the house and remove every trace of leaven, but they intentionally leave one piece behind. At the beginning of the Seder, the father inspects the house and isn't done until he finds the one piece left behind. The act is supposed to remind the family of the importance of keeping one's life and doctrine pure before God, because the scriptures frequently use yeast as a symbol of sin. Just like the yeast bacteria multiplies and spreads through dough, so also sin multiplies and spreads in our lives and in our communities when left unchecked. And that's why Jesus came -- to break the cycle of sin and change our nature from one that multiplies sinful thoughts and actions to one that multiplies righteousness. That is what Jesus was communicating in His shortest of parables:

He told them still another parable: "The kingdom of heaven is like yeast that a woman took and mixed into a large amount of flour until it worked all through the dough."
(Matthew 13:33)