The Parable of the Mustard Seed and other spiritual videos? The Parable of the Mustard Seed was taught in rhetorical hyperbole. Here, Jesus uses a shrub/tree coming from a seed (John 12:24) to represent kingdom growth, consistent with other tree/kingdom references (Ezekiel 17:23 and Daniel 4:11-21). The seed’s growth attracts the presence of evil—depicted as birds (Matthew 13:4,19; Revelation 18:2)—to dilute the church while taking advantage of its benefits. Matthew 13:31-32 tells the parable of the mustard seed: “The kingdom of heaven is like a mustard seed, which a man took and planted in his field. Though it is the …