{"id":82501,"date":"2026-09-18T10:48:22","date_gmt":"2026-09-18T14:48:22","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.easternmennonite.org\/?p=82501"},"modified":"2026-09-18T11:37:51","modified_gmt":"2026-09-18T15:37:51","slug":"parable-of-the-yaupon-plant","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.easternmennonite.org\/es\/2026\/09\/parable-of-the-yaupon-plant\/","title":{"rendered":"Par\u00e1bola de la planta de yaupon"},"content":{"rendered":"

The Parable of the Yaupon Plant: Finding God in the Unexpected<\/b><\/b><\/p>\n

\n
\"\"

Plant and Harvest Communi-TEA – Pastor Emily Nyce<\/p><\/div><\/blockquote>\n

\u201cHi, full circle,\u201d Emily Nyce greeted the EMS chapel audience with a smile. \u201cI was Simon and Nina\u2019s nanny for a while, it\u2019s good to be with you all.\u201d<\/p>\n

Emily Nyce, youth pastor and pastor of formation at Community Mennonite Church, recently spoke at Chapel on one of her favorite parables of Jesus. She gave the well-known Parable of the Mustard Seed a surprising twist\u2014she called it the Parable of the Yaupon Plant.<\/p>\n

\u201cYou\u2019ve probably heard the parable before,\u201d she said, referencing Matthew 13:31\u201332. \u201c\u2018The kingdom of heaven is like a mustard seed, which a man took and planted in his field. Though it is the smallest of all seeds, yet when it grows, it is the largest of garden plants and becomes a tree, so that the birds come and perch in its branches.\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n

Emily explained that Jesus\u2019s original audience would have immediately recognized the imagery. \u201cMustard wasn\u2019t a mighty cedar. It was a small, scrappy, medicinal shrub that grew in backyards\u2014accessible, healing, and hospitable to God\u2019s creation.\u201d<\/p>\n

She drew a contrast to the ancient text of Ezekiel. \u201cIn Ezekiel, cedar trees represented power. Nations boasted about their gods like cedar trees\u2014tall, impressive, untouchable. But Jesus flips it. He\u2019s saying God\u2019s kingdom isn\u2019t like a mighty cedar. It\u2019s like local mustard\u2014ordinary, healing, and available to everyone.\u201d<\/p>\n

Fast forward 2,000 years, and Emily found herself in seminary in Richmond, Virginia. Her school owned a small park\u2014a green space at risk of being sold. \u201cI met someone in Richmond who cultivated Yaupon,\u201d she recalled. \u201cYaupon is the only native caffeinated tea plant in the Americas. It\u2019s resilient, medicinal, and, like mustard, it grows scrappy, bushy, and low to the ground. Birds make nests in it. It heals. It\u2019s abundant. It\u2019s right in our own backyards.\u201d<\/p>\n

The connection was instant. \u201cI thought, if Jesus was walking around Virginia, he\u2019d call it the Parable of the Yaupon Plant,\u201d Emily said. \u201cBecause Yaupon, like mustard, invites us to imagine God\u2019s kingdom as local, hospitable, and healing.\u201d<\/p>\n

Emily shared how she and her allies rallied to preserve the seminary park. \u201cWe planted Yaupon together. We hosted kids\u2019 camps, art projects, and community events. We applied for grants\u2014some we got, some we didn\u2019t. It was grassroots, scrappy, sometimes heartbreaking, and completely Spirit-led. In the end, we saved the land. We named it Yaupon Place.\u201d<\/p>\n

Her takeaway was clear: \u201cGod does not call us to be like mighty cedars\u2014impressive, untouchable, or set apart. God calls us to be like mustard and Yaupon: local, accessible, wild, and healing. Communities where birds can nest and people can thrive.\u201d<\/strong><\/p>\n

The story of Yaupon Place is a living parable\u2014a reminder that the kingdom of God grows in ordinary, overlooked places, right in our backyards.<\/p>\n

\n

\u201cMustard and Yaupon,\u201d Emily concluded, \u201cthat\u2019s how the good news grows.\u201d<\/h2>\n<\/blockquote>\n

Watch the full servicio de capilla de 20 minutos<\/a> with Simon Dula’s introduction.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The Parable of the Yaupon Plant: Finding God in the Unexpected \u201cHi, full circle,\u201d Emily Nyce greeted the EMS chapel audience with a smile. \u201cI was Simon and Nina\u2019s nanny for a while, it\u2019s good to be with you all.\u201d Emily Nyce, youth pastor and pastor of formation at Community Mennonite Church, recently spoke at…<\/p>","protected":false},"author":30,"featured_media":82505,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[578,434,323,80],"tags":[312],"class_list":["post-82501","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-chapel","category-community","category-faith-formation","category-news","tag-chapel"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.easternmennonite.org\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/82501","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.easternmennonite.org\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.easternmennonite.org\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.easternmennonite.org\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/30"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.easternmennonite.org\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=82501"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"https:\/\/www.easternmennonite.org\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/82501\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":82518,"href":"https:\/\/www.easternmennonite.org\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/82501\/revisions\/82518"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.easternmennonite.org\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/82505"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.easternmennonite.org\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=82501"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.easternmennonite.org\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=82501"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.easternmennonite.org\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=82501"}],"curies":[{"name":"gracias","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}