Sunday, June 17th, 2012
Trinity Anglican Church, Bradford, ON
The Rev. Daniel F. Graves
“With what shall we compare the kingdom of God…”
-Mark 4:30
Life has its little ironies, and one of them is that one of
Ontario’s great agricultural communities should find itself saddled with a
priest who knows less than next to nothing about farming. Even more troubling, is that when you
consider that when our Lord speaks in parables about the kingdom, he not
infrequently resorts to agricultural metaphors to describe it. One might think your clergy might take a more
active interest in agricultural matters if only to truly and fully appreciate
our Lord’s preaching about the kingdom.
This is probably why I have always found the writings of Paul so
attractive, for you see, St. Paul was a city boy. When he talked about the church and about his
faith he used urban metaphors, the sort of thing I can get my head around a
little bit more easily. But this is the
wonderful thing about the gospel, is it not?
The gospel is universal; we can understand it through employing images,
metaphors, parables and illustrations from our varied contexts. It is not for one race or nation, for one
socio-economic group, or one demographic.
It is for everyone. Its message
is timeless and its purpose is the conversion of hearts in every place.
When Jesus preached, he knew his audience. When he preached to fishermen, he talked of
casting nets and making fishermen into disciples by making them fishers of
people. When he talked to vintners, he
spoke of vines and branches. When he
talked to farmers he talked of sowers, sowing and reaping. In Mark 4 he is speaking to this latter
group. “What is the kingdom of God like?”
he asks. He could have just as easily
talked about fishing, but these were not a sea-faring people, these were people
of the land. The kingdom is “as if
someone would scatter some seed on the ground, and would sleep, and rise night
and day, and the seed would sprout and grow, he does not know how.” Now I don’t know much about farming, but I do
know that when you plant a seed, in good time it sprouts and grows. It is wise to tend the growing plant because
nature can play tricks on us, there can be too much rain, or not enough rain,
there can be pests and weeds. The good
farmer knows where to plant something, and in which soil. It is amazing though, that even if none of things
are in order, how often a plant will still grow without human assistance and how resilient a plant can be, even when
untended. Nature has a cycle all its
own. We can manipulate, tend, and intervene, but ultimately the process is a
natural one, and it takes time. Jesus
underscores this point when he speaks of the farmer sleeping and rising, night
and day, and the plant growing, we know not how. The farmer sows and the farmer reaps, and
while there may be much tending in between, he is involved in waiting game of
sleeping and rising til the harvest comes: “The earth produces of itself,”
Jesus adds, “first the stalk, then the head, then the full grain in the
head. But when the grain is ripe, at
once he goes in with his sickle, because the harvest has come.”
No how is any of this an illustration of the kingdom of
God? Of course, this is a challenge for
a city boy like me to understand, but let me give it a go. The first thing is that we have very little
control over the growth of the seed. To
be sure, we can make interventions, we can observe and control some of the
conditions, but so many things are out of our control. Ultimately, we can do everything we can, but
the success of the crop is beyond our control.
So it is with the kingdom. God is
in control. We can run church programs,
we can do everything in our power to bring success to our mission, but really,
it is God who will bring the seed that has been planted to the point of harvest. Sometimes we forget this. Sometimes we think it is all about us and
what we can do to make the church and its mission a great success. Clergy are particularly vulnerable to this
temptation, and when we fail, it is a humbling experience, especially when
someone reminds us, well, it was never really about you, was it? It is about God. God is
in control. It is his kingdom. It is his church. It is his seed. It is his harvest.
So what are we to do?
We are to sow the seed. We are to
reap the harvest. But what of the time
in between? The thing the farmer must do
is be faithful to the seed that was planted and have hope and faith that the
seed will bear fruit. One commentator
puts it this way about the disciples, “they cannot control the manifestation of
the Kingdom of God, nor force it, but neither should they be impatient or
discouraged. They are only to proclaim
it.” Oh, how impatient we are, and oh,
how discouraged we become at times. The
seed doesn’t grow as quickly as we like or yield fruit in our time, yet, we
must let God be God. Our role is to proclaim
hope in the seed that has been planted.
Our role is to wait patiently and in our waiting to share the good news
of the coming harvest. And what, we may
ponder, is the seed that was planted that we proclaim? It is that in Jesus
Christ incarnate, crucified, risen and glorified, God is transforming our lives
in new and glorious ways. He is
forgiving our sins, redeeming us from slavery, restoring broken relationships,
and leading us into everlasting life. When we see the seed begin to sprout,
when what appeared a lifeless thing begins, even in the smallest way to burst
forth in life, we have a tiny glimpse of what the final harvest will look like,
and we live in hope. We are encouraged,
and in our encouragement we proclaim that hope to others.
This led Jesus to another parable, to another metaphor, or
more precisely, a simile, about the kingdom: with what can we compare the
kingdom of God? It is like a mustard seed.
Thankfully, for one like me who has never seen a mustard seed, Jesus
gives us a little lesson, “it is the smallest of the seeds when sown on earth,
yet when it is sown it grows up and become the greatest of shrubs.” Even to the agriculturally challenged this
parable is fairly clear, from little packages come great things. I suppose this is one of the truisms and joys
of farming and gardening. It is so gratifying to see something wonderful come
from practically nothing, from the most meagre of beginnings. God
takes what seems lifeless and gives it life.
God takes what is small and makes something great of it. Most importantly, though, God give it purpose,
for you note that he does not end the parable simple with the growth of the
mustard seed into a great shrub.
No. He tells us that it is a
place in which the birds of the air make a home and find shelter in the
shade. It calls to mind another of Jesus’
sayings, “come unto me all that are weary and carrying heavy burdens and I
shall give you rest.” Or perhaps
another, “abide in me as I abide in you.”
God give purpose to the kingdom.
The kingdom of God is a place where we can find rest for weary souls,
succour in our discouragement, a home when others turn us away.
It is interesting that he uses the metaphor of a shrub,
though. The Old Testament prophets often
spoke about the coming messianic age as the restoration of the great cedars of Lebanon. Now that is a majestic image. Instead, Jesus
has a little fun with the metaphor. The
kingdom is not a mighty cedar, but rather a shrub. It is the greatest of shrubs, mind you, but a
shrub none-the-less. Perhaps this should
give us comfort when we realize the church seems to be so far from attaining
the ideal of the Kingdom – we need not be a might cedar, perhaps it is okay to
be a shrub, for even the birds of the air kind build a nest in the shrub and
find shade and rest in our branches.
Have I done justice to these agricultural parables? I hope in some small way I have understood
them as best as a city boy can. The
kingdom of God is like a seed. It takes
time to grow, but grow it will. We can
nurture the seed but we cannot control its growth, God alone does that. We must be faithful to the seed that is
planted and live and proclaim the hope that the harvest will come. The seed may be small, but great things will
come. And in the abundance of the
harvest we shall find our true purpose, and granaries overflowing with
abundance and grace for the feeding, healing, and redemption of the nations.
c. 2012, the Rev. Daniel F. Graves
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