The Leaven That Changes Everything

I get this question a lot: “Susan, if submission becomes subversion like you say, why didn’t Paul just tell Christian slave owners to free their slaves? Why didn’t he command husbands to stop treating their wives as property?”

It’s an honest question. And it deserves an honest answer.

The answer reveals something profound about how God’s Kingdom actually works—and why so many of our attempts to force change have failed.

The Problem With Force

Here’s what I’ve come to understand: You cannot bring God’s Kingdom through the wrong kingdom’s methods. It just doesn’t work.

Think about what would have happened if Paul had commanded all Christian slave owners to immediately free their slaves, or if he’d told Christian wives to rebel against their husbands’ authority. In the Roman Empire of the first century, such actions would have triggered violent responses.

Rome had crushed slave revolts before. Violently. Horrifically. The slaves always lost. After the revolt led by Spartacus, Rome crucified six thousand slaves along the Appian Way as a warning. Their bodies hung there for months.

Using violence to achieve justice only empowers the very system you’re trying to overthrow. When you pick up the sword, you become like those who wield it against you. The means matter as much as the ends.

Jesus understood this. That’s why He said, “Do not resist an evildoer. But if anyone strikes you on the right cheek, turn the other also” (Matthew 5:39, NRSV). Not because He wanted His followers to be doormats, but because He knew that meeting violence with violence only creates more violence.

The Kingdom comes through a completely different power—the power of self-giving love. The power of choosing to serve even when you’re not required to. The power of going the second mile when the law only demands one (Matthew 5:41, NRSV).

That second mile? That’s where transformation happens. Because that’s the part you choose freely.

Yeast in the Dough

Jesus gave us the key to understanding how Kingdom transformation works: “The kingdom of heaven is like yeast that a woman took and mixed in with three measures of flour until all of it was leavened” (Matthew 13:33, NRSV).

Yeast works slowly. Quietly. Almost invisibly at first. You can’t rush it. You can’t force it. You just have to knead it into the dough and wait. But given time, it transforms everything.

That’s exactly what Paul was doing. He was kneading Kingdom yeast into the dough of Roman culture. And the early church gatherings? Those were the practice ground.

Think about what it meant for a woman in the first century to walk into a church gathering and discover she could prophesy there. She could pray aloud. She could teach, like Priscilla taught Apollos (Acts 18:26, NRSV). She could serve as a deacon, like Phoebe (Romans 16:1-2, NRSV). She could even be recognized as an apostle, like Junia (Romans 16:7, NRSV).

For the first time in her life—for the first time in generations of her family’s life—she operated in power she’d never known. She had a voice. She had authority. She was seen as fully human, fully gifted by Holy Spirit, fully empowered to build up the body of Christ.

One day a week, she got to practice being free.

The same was true for slaves. In the church, they were brothers and sisters with equal standing. Paul tells Philemon to receive Onesimus back “no longer as a slave but more than a slave, a beloved brother” (Philemon 1:16, NRSV).

Can you imagine what that did to their hearts? To taste equality, even if only in the gathered assembly? To be treated with dignity, to have their gifts recognized and celebrated?

That experience was yeast. And over time, it began to transform everything.

The Irony We’ve Lived

Here’s what breaks my heart about church history: We took Paul’s accommodation to the world’s systems and made it the church’s standard.

Paul would never—never—have tolerated slavery within the church. In Christ, “there is no longer slave or free” (Galatians 3:28, NRSV). That wasn’t just a nice sentiment. It was the operational reality of the early church.

But somehow, over the centuries, we reversed it. We took what Paul said about living under Rome’s oppressive systems and made it the standard within the church.

We stood for “biblical truth” by insisting the church must be led by men. That women can’t preach or teach men. That wives must submit to their husbands as the ultimate authority in the home.

And in doing so, we became worldly. We imitated Rome’s hierarchies. We brought the very power structures Paul was trying to subvert into the one place he kept them out of.

The church became worldly in its suppression of women. We took the yeast of hierarchy and kneaded it into the dough of God’s Kingdom, where it never belonged.

The irony is devastating.

Social Justice’s Slow March

If you look at history, the most successful movements for social justice have followed this same pattern of slow, patient transformation.

The abolition of slavery didn’t happen overnight. It took generations of people kneading the truth into culture—through preaching, writing, art, conversation. Hearts changed slowly. Minds were renewed gradually. The yeast worked its way through the dough.

Yes, there was eventually a war. But that war only succeeded because the groundwork had been laid. The cultural transformation had already begun. Without that preparation, the violence would have just created more violence.

The civil rights movement followed a similar pattern. Years of nonviolent resistance. Patient endurance of suffering. Appeals to conscience and moral law. Art and music that changed hearts. Sermons that renewed minds.

Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. understood this. He knew that using violence would undermine the very justice he was fighting for. So he chose the harder path—the path of suffering love that refuses to retaliate.

That’s Kingdom methodology. That’s yeast leavening the dough.

Even in Jesus’ own ministry, we see this pattern. He didn’t forcibly overthrow the temple system, even though it had become corrupt. He gave them a whole generation—forty years from His death to the temple’s destruction in 70 AD. Time for hearts to change. Time for the yeast to work.

Because everything in the Kingdom takes time.

Why Kingdom Transformation Is Worth the Wait

I know this is hard to hear. When you see injustice, when you or people you love are suffering under oppressive systems, waiting feels impossible. You want change now. You want to force the issue.

I get it. I really do.

But here’s what I’ve learned through my own journey: Transformation that comes through force doesn’t last. It creates resentment, backlash, and often just shifts the power to new oppressors.

But transformation that comes through love—through patient, persistent, self-giving love that refuses to use the world’s weapons—that kind of transformation goes deep. It changes hearts. It renews minds. It creates lasting freedom.

Think about what Paul was asking slaves and women to do. He was asking them to release Kingdom power into their situations by choosing to serve beyond what was required. Not because they had to, but because they got to.

That shift from “have to” to “get to” is everything. Because when you serve out of obligation, you’re just operating in the world’s power structures. But when you serve out of free choice, motivated by love? That’s when the Kingdom breaks through.

That’s when yeast begins its transforming work.

And yes, it’s slower. It’s harder. It requires more of you, not less. It means suffering without retaliation. Serving without guarantee of reciprocation. Loving your enemies instead of destroying them.

But friends, it’s the only way that actually works. It’s the only way that brings the kind of transformation that lasts.

The Yeast Is Still Working

Here’s the good news: The yeast Paul kneaded into the dough two thousand years ago is still working.

Yes, the church got it wrong for centuries. We brought worldly hierarchies into the place they didn’t belong. We suppressed women’s voices and gifts. We proof-texted Paul’s letters to justify the very oppression he was working to undermine.

But the truth has a way of breaking through. More and more believers are recognizing that in Christ, there really is no male and female (Galatians 3:28, NRSV). More and more communities are embracing mutual submission as God’s design. More and more women are finding their voices and stepping into their full gifting.

The yeast is still working. The transformation is still happening. And we get to be part of it.

Not by force. Not by manipulation or power plays. But by choosing to love freely. By serving beyond obligation. By releasing Kingdom power through submission that subverts—submission freely chosen, not demanded.

This is how the Kingdom comes in the world through you and me: through love, not power. Through yeast that leavens the whole lump, slowly, quietly, inevitably.

It might not look like much at first. Just like a little bit of yeast mixed into three measures of flour doesn’t look like it could possibly transform the whole batch.

But give it time. Have patience. Trust the process.

Because the yeast of God’s Kingdom always—always—leavens the whole lump.

Your Part in the Story

So what does this mean for you?

It means you get to choose. Every single day, you get to choose whether you’ll operate from the world’s kingdom or God’s Kingdom.

Will you demand your rights, or will you freely lay them down in love?

Will you fight for position, or will you serve from strength?

Will you use force to try to bring justice, or will you trust God’s slower, deeper way of transformation?

I’m not saying this is easy. I’m not saying it won’t cost you something. Paul’s way—Jesus’ way—is always the harder path in the short term.

But it’s the only path that leads to lasting transformation. It’s the only path that releases the Kingdom. It’s the only path that honors both the means and the ends.

So be the yeast. Let Holy Spirit knead Kingdom truth into your heart. Practice freedom in the gathered assembly. Then go into the world and release that freedom through love—not force, through submission—not subjugation, through strength—not domination.

And watch what God does. Watch how the yeast leavens the whole lump. Watch how love transforms everything it touches.

Blessings,
Susan 😊

Have you seen this yeast-like transformation in your own life or community? How has patient, persistent love created change where force failed? Share your stories in the comments—I’d love to hear them.