Most of us become interested in stitching only when a button falls off ten minutes before we plan to get out of the house for a reception. Then we discover that the sewing kit contains twelve colors of thread, none of which matches with the outfit I am wearing now, and a needle whose eye appears to have been designed only for angels. After several attempts, some people sew the button back. Others decide the jacket over it looks more contemporary and stylish.
Yet one of the greatest achievements in human history depended upon women who knew exactly how to guide a needle. When Neil Armstrong walked on the moon in 1969, the world saw the astronaut, the rocket, and the American flag. Almost no one saw Hazel Fellows and the other women who helped construct the Apollo spacesuits. These women came from the International Latex Corporation, associated with Playtex, a company better known at the time for manufacturing ordinary clothes than spacecraft.
The engineers could design the suit, but the women had to make it hold together. They cut, glued, shaped, and stitched its many layers by hand. A needle puncture in the wrong place could make the suit useless. A seam slightly out of position could restrict an astronaut’s movement. Their work had to be so exact that a human being could step into a place with no breathable air and return alive. The Smithsonian Museum has since documented their largely uncelebrated contribution to the Apollo program.
The astronaut received the applause. Those women made the applause possible. That gives us a fresh way to hear Jesus speaking about the mustard seed and the yeast. He is not merely praising small beginnings. He is revealing God’s affection for hidden contributions.
Yeast does its work anonymously. Once the bread is placed on the table, nobody raises a slice and says, “Let us recognize the yeast.” It has vanished into what it helped create. The mustard seed also disappears. To become a place where birds can rest, it must first surrender its small, neat identity and enter the darkness of the ground.
We often want to do good and be seen doing it. We would like to be humble, provided someone notices how well we are managing it. Even at home, we sometimes perform an act of service and then provide regular updates: “I emptied the dishwasher this morning.” By evening it has become, “As you know, I have always carried this family.”
But much of God’s Kingdom is built by people whose names never appear on a program. It is built by the grandmother who prays for a family that thinks it is surviving by its own intelligence. It is built by the spouse who absorbs a sharp word and refuses to send another one back. It is built by the teacher who sees promise in the child everyone else has labeled difficult. It is built by the parishioner who quietly straightens the church pews after everyone has gone home.
These may look like small stitches. But heaven knows what depends upon them. Perhaps God will not ask how many people applauded us. Perhaps he will ask who could breathe because of our patience, who could stand because of our encouragement, and who made it safely home because we held one fragile seam together. The Kingdom of God is often stitched by hidden hands. And some of the holiest people in the world are quietly holding together lives that others assume were made by machines.