In these parables Jesus shows that we are not saved by what we do, or by who we are. We are heirs of eternal life because God has chosen to make us so through the cross and resurrection. To us is left simply the opportunity to say, “yes.”

The Rev. Art Halbardier
Seventh Sunday after Pentecost, Lectionary 17 A
     texts: Matthew 13:31-33, 44-52; Romans 8:26-39

This is the third week we’ve heard parables about seeds, weeds, planting and the like – the stories Jesus told to describe the kingdom. As a result, over the past two weeks we have essentially exhausted the ELW corpus of hymns that sing of planting, harvest, seeds, soil, gardens, and even weed control.

We’re out of hymns, but we’re not done with the parables. Today we have the climax of Jesus’ teaching about “the kingdom.”

Jesus was a master of clear speaking. He frequently astounded the religious leaders with his ability to explain fine points of scripture. Even as a 12 year-old, the temple priests were amazed at his understanding. People said of Jesus, time and again, that he taught with “authority;” he was direct, plain-spoken – not like the scribes and Pharisees.

But, when Jesus taught about the kingdom – the new relationship between God and the creation Jesus was sent to establish – for this, he turned to parables.

The core of that kingdom/relationship we call “grace.” How do you explain the unrestricted, undeserved love of God for rebellious and hateful sinners, whom God still so loves in spite of our arrogance that he sent his own Son to pay the debt of our sins? Such love, such “grace” defies explanation – even for a master of explaining. So Jesus described it in parables . . . in stories. Each parable holds up to us a facet of that grace, to ponder, to wonder. One after another, each brings us a bit closer to understanding, and if not understanding, at least to believing it is true.

Let us retrace our steps. Two weeks ago came the story of the sower. It depicts someone who doesn’t give a fig about agronomy, but it’s a great image of grace. This sower throws seed everywhere. Throws seed on rocks, under thorn bushes, on the hard path – not just the plowed field. Seed covers every square inch, whether it has a prayer of growing there or not.  Rain falls on all the seed; there is hope it will sprout and grow. That’s the way of God’s grace.

Then last week, Jesus told of another farmer. This fellow had paid closer attention during classes at “Ag School”; he plants carefully for a great crop. But, some scoundrel, determined to settle an old score with him, comes along at night and plants weeds in his field. Both weeds and wheat come up healthy as can be. The workers don’t know what to do. Ripping out the weeds would certainly damage the wheat in the process – this was before the advent of selective herbicides.

The farmer decrees, we must let them both grow. At harvest, I, the farmer – of course this is Jesus – I will deal with the problem myself. Which, we can expect, since it is Jesus, will tell us something about divine grace. We’ll find out more about that later.

The disciples of Jesus are embarrassed . . . they don’t get the point of either story. But they save face by waiting until they are in private to ask for an explanation. Jesus explains, but his explanations, as we heard are truly a belaboring of the obvious. As a result, it’s easy to assume that the disciples must have been particularly dense to not have gotten the point.

But, hold it. Flag on the floor! No one, including us, could have gotten the point of Jesus’ parables until after he was crucified and rose from the dead. Only after God’s plan for saving sinners was clear, did the amazing grace in these parables begin to make sense to anyone.

But, I get ahead of myself. Today, we’ve added almost a full “six-pack” of parables to the first two. All seven must be considered together, for the stories are like beads on a string, like facets of a stone, individual pieces of a puzzle.

Today’s stories are brief, one or two sentences each, delivered rapid fire, without a word of explaining. The kingdom is like a “mustard seed,” Jesus says; like “a woman baking bread,” a “found treasure,” a “especially valuable pearl,” “a net.”

After #5, Jesus turns to the disciples, asking, “Do you understand?” These guys who have just asked to have the sower and the weeds explained, now pipe up as one, “Oh, yes, Master! Absolutely!”

RIGHT!

But, eventually they do understand. And, we can, also. When the light of cross and resurrection lights the way. Behind the stories is the knowledge that Jesus gave his precious life for every seed, weed, speck of flour, every saint and scoundrel, the greatest and the worst of us.

But, again, I get ahead of myself.

The kingdom, Jesus tells us first, is like a “mustard seed” – one lone, tiny little seed, lost in a field of tomatoes, bush beans, broccoli, whatever. But this mustard seed has a trait no seed of comparable size possesses – the capacity to grow into a large bush with many branches.

Describing it as a “tree” may be a bit of hyperbole, but certainly the mustard becomes the most prominent plant in the field – its branches large enough to provide a home for birds if they choose – that’s something no brussel sprout or pepper plant can claim. The mustard bush towers over the other plants. The grace of God dwarfs other promises of hope, security, and salvation. This any eye should clearly see.

Hardly taking a breath, Jesus says the kingdom is like yeast which a woman uses to make bread. A WOMAN, mind you! For any of you who wish there were more female images for God in scripture, take note. The woman baking bread is Jesus. He is, after all, the one assembling the elements of the kingdom.

And this is a REAL WOMAN. Forget that little slip of a maiden on our bulletin cover, or a delicate French lady assembling her daily pair of baguettes. THIS WOMAN dumps 3 measures of flour onto the board . . . that’s somewhere between 10 and 16 five-pound bags. It takes a couple of gallons of water to make it come together into dough. Any woman who can knead this mountain of dough into bread is a force to be reckoned with. But, without yeast, all you’ve got is 100 pounds of wallpaper paste.

The kingdom is like the yeast.

The King James Bible says she “hid” the yeast in the dough. Any baker knows, yeast must first be dissolved in water. Water and yeast go in together. Then the kneading begins. Until not a grain of flour is left untouched by the power of the yeast.

If it’s wet, it’s leavened. If that suggests baptism to you, that’s points for you. But, that’s another sermon. We have more than enough to deal with today.

Onward we go, for Jesus did. Now he takes a slightly different tack. The kingdom is like treasure hidden in a field. Too great and heavy a treasure to dig up and carry away. But, knowing it’s there, who would not immediately convert all liquid and non-liquid assets to cash and buy that field?

Hardly pausing for a breath, Jesus continues: The kingdom is like a merchant in search of fine pearls. One day, sorting through piles of fake gems and costume jewelry, he finds an exquisite, perfect pearl – the finest he’s ever seen. Immediately, he liquidates his entire inventory of cubic zirconia, rhinestones and resin beads to buy this one incredibly valuable pearl.

Those listening may have wondered: Well, of course he would! What fool would pass up such an opportunity? What fool would not bet the whole farm in order to buy the field with the hidden treasure?

And we, too, are led to wonder: What fool would settle for less than the free gift of God’s grace, or pass it up for a cheap imitation? What fool indeed? But there is unfortunate truth to the saying, “There is one born every minute!”

Finally, just in case anything was left unclear after the story of the sower, or the story of the yeast, Jesus doubles back to this theme, saying the kingdom of heaven is like a net thrown into the sea. Here, we need to pause for a breath. And a brief lesson in Greek. The Greek word for “net” here is a word used only this single time in the New Testament.

Think not of the nets used by Peter, James, and John on the Sea of Galilee, or any other nets mentioned in scripture. Those are two different Greek words entirely. This word used only this once in this parable is a sagéne (sah-gay-nay). A “seine” – a “dragnet” pulled along the bottom of a river, lake, or shoreline collecting everything in its path. Lots of fish, of course . . . but also lots of flotsam, jetsam, rocks, old tires, boots, bottles, and beer cans. All are gather up in the sagéne. Nothing is left behind.

When the net is full, then the sorting begins. The fisherman separates “good” from “bad”. Now what is GOOD? Of the fish, perhaps Chilean Sea Bass? Walleye? Trout? Salmon? BAD may be “trash” species, or fish too small to be worth anything, or are sickly looking. In other words, GOOD is purely in the eye of the beholder, what is judged valuable, pleasing, and useful to the one doing the sorting.

But, maybe there’s more to the image. The sagéne is full of fish, but also whatever other garbage and debris it may have scooped up.

It’s curious that the word “fish” which appears in our English language Bibles, though it may be implied, “fish” doesn’t actually appear in the Greek text. The Greek only says “of every kind” was caught in the net. So who’s to say it’s only fish that the fisherman may deem as GOOD?

A still useful left boot to replace the one that washed overboard last week? That may be good, also. Maybe he thinks that rusty old anchor would look really fine on his mantel if he just cleaned it up?

The point is, be it only fish or more than fish, nothing in the net is inherently bad, just because of who it is, or because it’s not something else. It’s all left to the judgment of the one doing the sorting.

“So it will be at the end of the age,” Jesus says. When we stand before the divine judgment, the one judging us surrounded by angels is our Lord Jesus Christ, the one who gave his own life for the the world and rose in triumph to live and rule.

Before him there will be not one person standing who has not been redeemed by his blood, reconciled by his suffering and dying and rising. All this Judge sees before him is GOOD . . . for he suffered and died to make them so. In the end, the truth is that both heaven and hell will be populated entirely of forgiven sinners. But, the sorting will occur.

Yes, we cannot forget the two middle parables in today’s gospel – the pearl, and the treasure in the field. Despite the fact that no one is left out of being redeemed, that God’s forgiveness is a free gift, there are still those who think faith is foolishness, or who think they are essentially good people and that’s enough.

There are indeed fools for whom selling everything to get the precious pearl or the field with the hidden treasure is just too much. Or, perhaps see the world to be full of pearls just about that precious, and a lot cheaper to boot. Or, who simply don’t like pearls. Who just don’t get what’s so amazing about God’s grace for them.

No wonder, after that final separating of good and evil, there is “weeping and gnashing of teeth.”

This is not pain inflicted by the “furnace of fire,” whatever that is. “Weeping and gnashing of teeth” is misery that springs from within, for there is no greater pain than anguish over the opportunity they spurned, the free gift they trampled underfoot, the Christ they rejected.

We are not saved by what we do, or by who we are. We are heirs of eternal life because God has chosen to make us so through the cross and resurrection. To us is left simply the opportunity to say, “yes.”

Jesus chose parables to describe the new relationship with God created and sealed in his own suffering and death. Because explanations, even for the master of explaining, were simply inadequate.

Now St. Paul was NEVER at a loss for words, and he was certainly a most gifted explainer as well. And, he lived as do we, in full knowledge of the cross and resurrection; its light shines through his many, many words about God’s grace.

Paul’s point in today’s second reading sums up the message of the parables: “We are MORE than conquerors through Christ who loved us.” The threats to that faith in the world are many. Death, life, the ruthless violence of the present, anxiety about what may come, all these threaten and challenge our confidence in that promise.

But, yet, nothing will be able to separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus our Lord. Nothing is greater than the grace of God.

Philip Yancey once summed up the meaning of grace in many fewer words than St. Paul, but no less memorable ones: He wrote, “There is nothing I can do to make God love me more. There is nothing I can do to make God love me less.” Nothing I do can make God love me more…or less.

There’s really nothing more to say beyond that, than, “Thanks be to God!” And, “Amen.”

 “Goodness is stronger than evil; love is stronger than hate; light is stronger than darkness; life is stronger than death.  Victory is ours, through God who loves us.” – Archbishop Desmond Tutu, An African Prayer Book. [1]

Pr. Joseph G. Crippen
Sixth Sunday after Pentecost, Lectionary 16 A
  texts:  Matthew 13:24-30, 34-43; Romans 8:12-25

Sisters and brothers in Christ, grace to you, and peace in the name of the Father, and of the + Son, and of the Holy Spirit.  Amen

Goodness is stronger than evil; love is stronger than hate; light is stronger than darkness; life is stronger than death.

So writes Archbishop Desmond Tutu.  He would know, having lived through the darkness and evil of apartheid and seen transformation.  But is this truth he speaks still truth?  A passenger plane carrying 300 people is shot down over the Ukraine, and no one knows who did it, and does it matter who?  Nearly 300 schoolgirls in Nigeria who were stolen from their families are still missing; some have escaped, others are rumored to have been sold in marriage, some have been found brutally killed, some may have been moved out of the country.  Children are sent away all by themselves across our southern border by desperate parents, hoping to remove them from violence and death, and are met by adults who wish to drive them back to violence and death and call it defense of our country.  Rockets continue to fly from Gaza into Israel, and Israel retaliates by attacking back.  And children on both sides suffer and die.  On Tuesday a suicide bomber blew up a car in Afghanistan, killing nearly 90, the worst bombing there since 2001.  A new militant religious state is rising in the midst of Iraq and Syria.  And our city’s mayor and police chief continue to urge and plead with us to put away our guns and stop shooting each other.

Perhaps our prayer would better be “Lord, have mercy.  Christ, have mercy.  Lord, have mercy.”

Goodness is stronger than evil; love is stronger than hate; light is stronger than darkness; life is stronger than death.

Jesus told a story of good and evil growing in the same field.  “Master, did you not sow good seed in your field?  Where, then, did these weeds come from?”  Humans have asked this for millennia.  “Did you not make a good world, God?  Where, then, did this evil come from?”

The story looks less than satisfying as an answer.  The Master of the farm urges patience on the workers.  Yes, it was and is a good field, sown with good seed.  Yes, an enemy is sowing weeds in it.  But we’re not going to tear out those weeds just yet.  You can’t easily tell the difference, for one thing; only I, the Master, can really tell.  So I’ll take care of it in the end.  For now, be patient, as I am patient.

The apostle Paul says much the same today.  Yes, there is suffering and decay in this present time.  Even the whole creation groans and longs for fulfillment and healing.  Be patient, it will come.

So we pray: “Lord, have mercy.  Christ, have mercy.  Lord, have mercy.”

Goodness is stronger than evil; love is stronger than hate; light is stronger than darkness; life is stronger than death.

Does “patience” mean “do nothing”?  Archbishop Tutu has also said: “If you are neutral in situations of injustice, you have chosen the side of the oppressor.”  Is that a faithful way to live as disciples of Christ Jesus?

It’s easy to respond to evil, saying, “what can we do?”  That absolves us from responsibility.  “There are just bad seeds out there, and there’s nothing we can do about it,” we say, using this story as support.

But if we do nothing, say nothing, we are complicit, we are culpable.  We may not know what we can do, and in weeks like this it can seem impossible to think of anything.  But if we don’t engage in our city, our state, our country, and our world; if we aren’t a voice for peace and justice; if we don’t seek by our lives and words and work to make this world a safe and just place for all children and adults alike; then we are part of the evil, and hate, and darkness, and death.

Lord, have mercy on us.  Christ, have mercy on us.  Lord, have mercy on us.

Goodness is stronger than evil, love is stronger than hate, light is stronger than darkness, life is stronger than death.

Is Jesus’ interpretation of this parable helpful?  It seems to undergird and support our human desire for vengeance, part of the evil of this world.  Read one way, we could think we are urged to be patient because, in the end, the bad guys will get what’s coming to them.  There will be fire, and the bad plants will be gathered and burned.

It’s true that this story urges us not to judge, to leave it to our Master.  But we do, anyway.  Is the patience we seek as followers of this Christ no different than the bloodthirsty vengeance actively sought by millions around the world every day?  We let God do the dirty work, but our hope is that the dirty work, the judgment and burning and destruction, be done.

So what ever are we to make of this wonder, that in the end, Jesus, who tells this story and this interpretation, doesn’t collect the evil for burning?  He goes into the heart of the fire himself, where the evil is supposed to be sent, and is burned up himself.

Lord, have mercy, indeed.

Goodness is stronger than evil; love is stronger than hate; light is stronger than darkness; life is stronger than death.

The word “patient” comes to us via the Latin, and is related to the word for “suffering”.  So, people in hospitals are called “patients.”  We’ve lost this sense when we speak of patience as a characteristic of our lives, maybe because English has lots of words that sound and look alike but come from different meanings.  Not here.

To be patient is to suffer.  So the Triune God’s word in this story doesn’t mean what we thought.  The Incarnate Son of God, who told this story, was literally patient with evil, with us, with the world.  He suffered in, with, and among us.

He brought the goodness and love and light and life of the almighty and Triune God into the heart of a world sown with the seeds of evil and hate and darkness and death.  And he suffered.  Was patient.  Same thing.

And that is the mercy of our Lord and Christ for which we pray.

Goodness is stronger than evil; love is stronger than hate; light is stronger than darkness; life is stronger than death.

This is what it is for us to be patient as our Patient God is patient. To see ourselves, followers of this crucified and risen Christ Jesus, as people placed in the middle of the field as the goodness and love and light and life of the Triune God.  Not to judge it; we cannot.  Not to secretly hope that God will judge and burn; that is not the way of Christ we have seen.  But simply to stand in the field of the world as good in the midst of evil.  Love in the midst of hate.  Light in the midst of darkness.  Life in the midst of death.

Because God chose to give us, the children of God, free will to choose to love or not, to choose to follow God or not, the good field with good seed is sown with evil seeds.  We have sown them, and we, as much as any, are “the enemy” Jesus speaks of in this story.  Each of us has good and bad seeds striving within us, each of us is a field.

But beyond this story, what our Lord has shown us is that when the children of God stand as the good, the field can be redeemed.  Healing can happen, in us, and in the world.  We know this to be true, because we have seen the cross and we have seen the empty tomb.

And Christ our Lord, who has more mercy than we can ever imagine, is risen.  And the field is being made new.

Goodness is stronger than evil; love is stronger than hate; light is stronger than darkness; life is stronger than death.

The truth about the patient Savior, the suffering God, is that the harvest will not be gathered until the end, and that this true patience has the possibility of changing the harvest, of transforming all evil and making it good.  The wisdom of the Son of God is that when goodness, love, light, and life all face their opposites, and are seemingly taken over, each time they thrive in that loss, and grow, and eventually overcome and transform.  They are stronger, yes, but not to defeat; rather to transform and make new.  We have seen this in Christ Jesus in his death and resurrection.  We have seen it again and again throughout history, if we look.  This is how God is working, suffering, being patient in the field.  And one day there will be no need for fire, because the field will be filled with good seed and the world will be whole again.

But it costs, this way, this wisdom.  Look at Jesus.  Look at everyone who’s ever followed him into the fire, including those many who didn’t even know him but did the same.  If we follow Christ Jesus, we follow him to the cross, into the fire of destruction.  We also are burned when we stand as goodness, love, light, and life in a world filled with the opposites.

Because following will mean patience on our part that is like the patience of the Triune God.  Patience in both senses of the word, which are the same.  Patient trust in God.  Patience that is suffering.

But in the crucified and risen Savior we know this as absolute truth about us and about the world:

Goodness is stronger than evil; love is stronger than hate; light is stronger than darkness; life is stronger than death.  Victory is ours through God who loves us.

Victory is the world’s through God who loves all.

In the name of Jesus.  Amen

[1] Copyright © 1995 Desmond Tutu, admin. Random House, Inc. and Lynn C. Franklin Associates, Ltd.  Used in Evangelical Lutheran Worship, no. 721.

Jesus tells parables to open up the secrets, the mystery, of God’s way, a way so different from our way that sometimes only pictures can open the possibility; today is the image of a seed and growing, and God’s promise that this seed will bear fruit in all circumstances.

Pr. Joseph G. Crippen
Fifth Sunday after Pentecost, Lectionary 15 A
texts:  Matthew 13:1-23 (adding back the omitted verses 10-17); Isaiah 55:10-13

Sisters and brothers in Christ, grace to you, and peace in the name of the Father, and of the + Son, and of the Holy Spirit.  Amen

We might have the wrong idea about mystery because of the literary genre that has given birth to books and films and all sorts of stories.  In those, the whole point is to follow the clues and solve the answer – the guilty party, the secret staircase, the hidden history of the family – whatever it is.

The mysteries of faith are quite different.  Understanding, or comprehending the mystery of God’s will and ways is not a puzzle we can sort out for ourselves, even if we follow the clues that God has revealed.  So our goal is not finding a simply packaged answer that boxes God up neatly – for no such answers exist – rather it is finding a deep appreciation of the mystery of God and a willingness to enter into whatever the Triune God has revealed to us.

This is how we can begin to hear Jesus’ parables.  Because without exception, when Jesus told a parable it was because he was trying to convey something of the mystery of the way of God, and the only way to do that was to paint a picture or tell a story or give a simple, earthly example.  There were plenty of occasions when Jesus spoke directly, taught clearly and said exactly what we needed to know.  We have much that is clear truth given to us directly by the Son of God.  We should, therefore, take it seriously that sometimes he didn’t feel direct speech could convey God’s truth, and used the form of a parable instead.

What that means for the next three weeks of Gospel readings, but also for all of our encounters with Jesus’ parables, is that we seek to set aside the idea that there is one “meaning” we can write up that fully explains the parable.  If there were, Jesus wouldn’t have told a parable, he’d have said a declarative statement.  Realizing that, we can begin to see that with these parables Jesus is giving us images and stories that we can live in, ponder, look at from different angles, and see many different riches and truths of God that he is trying to convey.  The parables are extravagant gifts indeed, for they are views into the very heart and mind of God, and through these images we are able to catch glimpses of the beauty and grace of the Triune God Jesus came to reveal to the world.

Today we begin with considering the question of mystery before we look at today’s parable, because that’s what Matthew does.

With this familiar parable Matthew, like Mark and Luke, introduces Jesus as parable teller.  As it is the first story, they all also include Jesus’ answer of why he tells parables in between the parable itself and Jesus’ explanation of it.  The lectionary left out those middle verses, likely because they are a little confusing, but we heard them today for the simple reason that today’s Gospel makes more sense with the verses left in.  We need to understand, before any parables, what Jesus is doing.

And it’s all about mystery, the mystery of the kingdom of heaven, the reign of God.  The difficulty is the question of whether Jesus tells parables to deliberately confuse hearers who are outside his group of disciples, or in the hopes that the outsiders will perhaps understand and follow.

Jesus here says he hopes to help understanding.  He says, “The reason I speak to them in parables is that ‘seeing they do not perceive, and hearing they do not listen, nor do they understand.’” (13:13)  In other words, Jesus is saying here that it is because of the lack of understanding of the crowds that he tells them parables.

To underscore this, Jesus quotes Isaiah 6, about the people’s hearts being dull, their ears hard of hearing, their eyes closed, so that they aren’t able to be reached by God.  But Jesus turns Isaiah around.  In Isaiah, the prophet is told to speak in a way that makes the people dull and deaf and blind.  Jesus flips it over, and says that the people’s blocking of God’s ways is the reality, and that he is telling parables to try and crack through that veneer, to reach people who have made themselves unable to see or hear or know God’s Word.

And that is the way of the world, isn’t it?  We want things to be as we see them, as we make them.  God’s ways are radically different, so we close ourselves off to them.  Rather than be changed to see or hear or know differently, we pretend we cannot even understand God.

So Jesus gives us God’s mysteries in stories and pictures, hoping to sneak past our defenses, climb over our walls, unlock our back doors, and show us God’s true intention for us and for the world.

And as Jesus says, once we’re open to the reality of the mystery of God’s ways, more and more we’ll be able to see how this is truth and life.  “To those who have, more will be given,” he says.

But the more we close ourselves off to our own way, and try to force God into that, the less we’ll be able to understand God.  “From those who have nothing, even what they have will be taken away,” he says.

That’s reality.  And he’s giving parables to us, to the world, in an attempt to change that reality, and invite everyone into the mystery of God in the world.

With that in mind, let’s look at this story of a farmer throwing seeds all over the place.

There is much we could say about this story.  However, since we’re not looking for “the one answer,” let’s just turn this jewel in the light and look at one of the glimpses of God it provides.

This is one of only two parables where an explanation by Jesus of the parable’s meaning is provided by the Evangelists.  Even so, the explanation Jesus gives only serves to help us find entry into his original parable.  It doesn’t give a final, declarative conclusion.

So the seed is “the word of the kingdom,” Jesus says.  But that could mean Jesus – the Word of God incarnate – is the seed; it could mean that Jesus is the sower and the seed – the Word – is his teaching.  It could mean that we are the sowers and the seed – the Gospel – is what we are spreading.  Do you see?

But keeping in mind Jesus’ explanation of the four soils, what happens if we look at this story with open minds and new eyes to the mystery?

What I notice this time is that we’ve sometimes assumed that Jesus is describing a permanent, final situation for all the seeds.  But what if he’s only describing the reality of the world?  That is, what if he’s not saying that at the end of this parable we have the final answer for all of these seeds, all of these plants?

That yes, there are some people whose faith is hindered by not understanding, and any good news from God falls away without impact.  And yes, there are some people whose faith is deeply challenged by persecution and trouble that following Jesus might bring.  And yes, there are some people whose faith is deeply challenged by worries about life, or anxiety that leads to grasping for false security such as wealth.  And yes, there are some people whose faith seems to root deeply and grow and produce fruit.

But nothing here says that’s the final situation for any of these people.

And what if he’s not saying that people are classified in only one type of soil?

That, yes, there are lots of ways faith is challenged, and he’s described them well, but that perhaps any of us at any time might find ourselves in one place or the other.  That is, at some times in our life the thorns might threaten us, at some times we seem to struggle to deepen our roots, at some times we simply don’t understand at all, and at some times it all makes sense to us.

Nothing here says that we cannot find ourselves in various kinds of soil in our lives.

If this is so, then what if Jesus is tying this parable to all the rest of his teaching and ministry (a good biblical interpretive principle), and is inviting us to participate in the growing of God’s Word in the world?

Jesus knew his Isaiah well, and certainly knew and believed our words from Isaiah 55 today, that the seed of God’s Word will always grow and accomplish what God intends for it.

The sower practices horrible agricultural techniques, throwing the seed into all sorts of inappropriate places, wasting a precious resource of seeds for planting.  Even in Jesus’ day a farmer would prepare soil and only put seeds into the prepared place, which had weeds already removed, and rocks taken away, and never on a hard path.

The only way this planting method makes sense is Isaiah 55: the mystery of God is that God desires the Word to go everywhere, even in places we’d usually assume were a waste of time and space, simply because God will make sure the Word will take root and grow.

It will do what I want it to do, God says.

Which leads us to consider the possibility that the status of the seeds and the soils and the growth is not a final status but an in-between one.  That just as we often find ourselves as different kinds of soil, we also are able to change our soil, or have it changed for us.  Nothing in this parable says that the farmer can’t or doesn’t break apart a path or pull up weeds or remove rocks.

So what if that’s something Jesus would like us to consider?  What if he’d like us to think not about our final status but about our gardening and farming skills?

The fruits of life in Christ he calls out in us are always love of God and love of neighbor.  Perhaps part of the mystery of the kingdom of God is that within the kingdom those who are growing well and bearing the fruit of love of God and neighbor can be helping those who are in a time of thorns or rocks, or feel as if their minds are as thick as concrete sidewalks.

Bearing thirty, sixty, and a hundredfold fruits of such love would be shown to the world in our willingness to help our neighbors with their patch of ground.

To lovingly help those struggling to understand by listening to their confusion and sharing what we’ve seen.  To lovingly help those struggling with the anxieties of the world, the misplaced priorities of a wealthy society, by walking alongside them in a different way, showing how it is a way of life to live in trust of God for all things.  And to lovingly help those who keep hitting rocks in their attempt to deepen in faith by gently helping them remove the barriers and obstacles that are hindering their faith, by digging out rocks with them.
Suddenly this jewel of a parable reveals the beauty of a community of believers who help each other grow and deepen in the Word, in faith.

Of course, the scary part is when we find ourselves struggling, because it will take a great risk to admit to others the weeds and thorns and rocks and hard paths in our hearts and lives, and more, to let our sister or brother help us with them.

We tend to prefer being the helper, and resist admitting we need help from others.  But compassion runs in two directions, and we need to be able to receive as much as to give.

Perhaps Jesus tells this parable, which so easily makes sense to our own experience of thorns and rocks and concrete in our lives, to encourage us to see that we’re in the same field as our sisters and brothers and we need not be too proud to let them help us with our patch of grain once in awhile.

It’s a beautiful thing to consider.  And it all comes from this simple story of planting seeds.

Next time we pick it up, and turn it around, perhaps the jewel of this story will shine something else for us.  It’s how Jesus’ parables tend to work.

For now, we have this mystery, that even when we seem to see no life, dead seeds stuck in bad soil, God promises it will grow and bear fruit.  And in this story, God’s given us the task of being a part of that promise, being a part of that growing that God most certainly will accomplish.

And what a privilege that is, to work the garden alongside the God who is with us always.  We remain in mystery about how God will do all this.  But what we know for certain is that this seed God has planted in us, in the world, will grow and bear fruit.  That is a promise.

In the name of Jesus.  Amen

The call to come to Jesus and take up his yoke is not easy, but it is good and will bring joy because he is with us and is what we and the world most deeply need. 

Vicar Emily Beckering; Fourth Sunday after Pentecost, Lectionary 14 A; text: Matthew 11:16-19, 25-30.

In the name of the Father, and of the + Son, and of the Holy Spirit.  Amen.

“Keep, ancient lands, your storied pomp!” cries she
With silent lips. “Give me your tired, your poor,
Your huddled masses yearning to breathe free,
The wretched refuse of your teeming shore.
Send these, the homeless, tempest-tossed to me;
I lift my lamp beside the golden door!” [1]

These are the last words of Emma Lazarus’ poem engraved on the pedestal of the Statue of Liberty. On this holiday weekend, we celebrate Lady Liberty’s words as though this is what America is all about: offering a world-wide welcome to the exiles, the poor, the hungry, the down-trodden and then melting them all together for success and freedom. In actuality, that is the exact opposite of our nation’s history.  Each wave of immigrants in every part of the country and anyone who looks or thinks differently is often met with suspicion and resistance, sometimes even to the point of violence. This poem sings a golden depiction of our nation that is as shiny as it is fabricated. Despite best intentions, Americans have proven these words false time and time again and offered empty promises for hundreds of years.

Jesus’ words today are not unlike those of Lady Liberty’s when he says, “Come to me, all you that are weary and are carrying heavy burdens, and I will give you rest,” but unlike our engraved image, Jesus exposes our true reality. We are like the crowds who heard Jesus and John the Baptist, but refused to listen.

Today, Jesus promises that he will provide rest for our souls and that the yoke—the way of life into which he invites us—is life-giving.

Sometimes, we may look at the condition of the world around us and at our own lives and reject Jesus’ words because all that we can see is death. When all that you can see is death, then only a funeral seems to carry the weight of the loss that we experience in this life. Only a funeral allows us to name pain, hurt, and disappointment:

Those whom we love still get sick. Our children, our spouses, our friends and those most dear to us still die.

We continue to struggle with our relationships and with ourselves; we still carry the burden of what we have done and what we have left undone, or as Paul says, we continue to be unable to do the good that we want, but do the very things we hate.

When we are weighed down by all of this, we may find ourselves protesting Jesus: we do not want to be comforted with words that deny the depth of our pain or the brokenness of this world.

When we feel like calling Jesus’ promise into question and dismissing his words as cheerful, pie-in-the-sky optimistic fluff that doesn’t hold enough weight for the real cares and worries of this world, then we are like the children in Jesus’ parable who want to play funeral, accusing Jesus, “we wailed and you did not mourn,” as if he doesn’t understand what life is really like, what it really feels like to suffer.

And yet, there are also times when we yearn for Jesus’ words to mean that if we just surrender to him enough, believe in him enough, then he will protect us from anything unpleasant or painful, that we will no longer hurt people or be hurt by them, that once we are his, everything really will be rose-colored.

Sometimes, it really would just be nice to escape everything, to not have to deal with it all.

Wouldn’t it be relaxing to live without a yoke, to be free of any responsibilities, any work?

We may even resent Jesus’ call to discipleship as too demanding. Instead, we long for safety, rescue, and relief: to cherish in our hearts the good news that Jesus loves us and forgives us, and let that be the end of it.

I will confess to you that this is where I was this past week and this is what I wanted to preach today, so much so that I even asked Cha before she printed the service folder for today, if on the cover art she could white-out the cross in Jesus’ hand. Then we could just have an open-armed Jesus without any call to the cross. Cha was a little uneasy with that and offered some objections. And indeed she was right.

When we find ourselves feeling this way, then we are like the children in Jesus’ parable who only want to play wedding, complaining, “Play the flute. We just want to dance!” In other words, “Lighten up, Jesus! We hear enough gloom and doom on the six o’clock news. Give us some good news to celebrate!”

The truth is that we can’t separate one from the other because Jesus’ call to him is always a call to the cross.

We have been hearing this summer of what our Lord requires of us. It is the cross, and it is anything but easy:

Two weeks ago we heard, “Do not think that I have come to bring peace to the earth, I have not come to bring peace, but a sword. For I have come to set a man against his father, and a daughter against her mother.”  (Matt. 10:34-35)

And earlier this spring we heard, “Be perfect as your heavenly Father is perfect.” (Matt. 5:48)

And we will soon hear again: “If any want to become my followers, let them deny themselves and take up their cross and follow me. For those who want to save their life will lose it, and those who lose their life for my sake will find it.” (Matt. 16:24-25)

If we hear these words and feel overwhelmed, then it is because even God’s good gifts and call for our lives can be distorted into a burden from which we also long for relief.

Jesus himself raised the question: “If it is possible, let this cup pass from me.”  (Matt. 26:39) Yet, that cup—the call to love the world to such an extent that he would lay down his life for all—that cup could not pass from him because that kind of love is God’s way.

The cross is always at the center and always held out in Jesus’ hand because the world is what it is: broken, and Jesus is who he is for that world. The self-giving love shown on the cross is the very nature of God, for the Lord is gracious and merciful, slow to anger and abounding in steadfast love.

Grace, compassion, forgiveness, and persistent, unwavering love: that is what the Triune God bestows on us.
This is the yoke that Jesus invites us to place on our shoulders: grace, compassion, forgiveness, and relentless love.

A more helpful translation of the word, “easy” is, in fact, “good, loving, kind, pleasing.” With the promise of this life, Jesus neither brushes our cares aside nor offers us empty words to pacify us.

He does not say to us, “Pretend that everything is right in this world,” and we don’t hear, “Take everything on and try to fix it yourselves,” but instead, “Come to me, and I will give you rest.”

This is the invitation that we are given because this is what we and the world most deeply need.

As Jesus laments over Jerusalem, so he also yearns to gather us and the entire world under his wings: he invites us into relationship once again, to know his love and care, and then to go out refreshed in order to offer that same love and comfort to all people by living in such a way that people know what it’s like to rest and be comforted when we are with them.

Jesus not only invites us, however, he actually makes this life possible by promising to be with us always, to help us do what he asks of us, and to bind us together in love as two oxen are bound in one yoke so that we can share the load together. What we cannot do by our own understanding or effort, the Holy Spirit can work through us.

We know this from our life together here at Mount Olive. When we pray for each other, call each other, take the time to listen intently to one another’s joys, struggles, and fears, wrap one another in prayer shawls, fill each other’s weekends with laughter, feed the hungry, and forgive when it hurts the most, then we bear one another’s burdens and the load really does feel lighter. We really do experience joy and fulfillment even in the most unexpected places.

God’s love is no longer something that we just talk about; it becomes a love that we hear from one another’s lips, feel when we are together, miss when we are apart, and see in the eyes of everyone who walks in those doors or is waiting on the other side of them.

When Christ makes this yoke—this way of life—evident in us, then he brings the Kingdom of God among us. Living in this way is not easy, but it is good, kind, loving, pleasing, and it will lead to joy because it is this for which we have been created. There is a cost to following Jesus, but it is far less than the cost of not following him. We are, as we prayed in the prayer of the day, restless until we rest in our God.

Whereas centuries of our ancestors and we ourselves have failed to protect the weak, to welcome the poor and the hungry, and to live as God intended, Jesus has never and will never fail those who need him. In him, there are no empty promises, no false notions of what this life is all about, and no offers to escape reality. Instead he offers an invitation to face ourselves, one another, and this creation for what we really are: broken, then to enter into that brokenness with him and with our sisters and brothers tied to us on every side, and watch how the greatest love ever known will flow from him through us to heal it. So come here to the table all who are weary and carrying heavy burdens where we find the One—the only one—who can give rest and joy.

Amen.

[1] Emma Lazarus, “The New Colossus,” 1883. http://www.statueofliberty.org/Statue_of_Liberty.html

As he did for St. Peter and St. Paul, Jesus calls us to follow him so that we—imperfect and flawed though we may be—may witness to his forgiveness and the love of God.

Vicar Emily Beckering; St. Peter and St. Paul, Apostles; texts: Acts 12:1-1, 9:1-18; John 21:15-19; 2 Tim. 4:6-8, 17-18.

In the name of the Father, and of the + Son, and of the Holy Spirit.  Amen.

It might be rare, especially for congregations in the ELCA, to celebrate the festival of St. Peter and St. Paul this Sunday. So why do we join with the greater church throughout the world today in remembering these saints? Is it to learn from their example? To hear of their faith in order that we might imitate them?

We are mistaken if we focus solely on what the apostles did, for their very lives witness to what the Triune God did through them. We do not keep the feast only to honor their names, but in order to attend to how God worked through them for the sake of the world so that we can hear and see and know Christ’s call for our own lives.

Jesus’ call to them is the same that he gives to us today: to follow him.

Part of these apostles’ witness is that often before we can follow Christ, we must first turn back from where we have been going, from harmful ways that we have been living.

Jesus’ first word to us today is an invitation to turn around, to change. 

This is how Jesus begins his work in the apostles: by calling Peter and Paul to turn around. He asks Peter, “Simon son of John, do you love me?”

It is likely that Peter could not but help remember denying his Lord as Jesus asked him three times if he loved him. Jesus, however, does not scold him or punish Peter. Instead, he asks this question, and with it, he calls Peter back to his side. Peter is called back from the fear that caused him to deny Jesus, and even more, back from the fear and shame of this betrayal so that he may once again follow him. The three questions and commands that Jesus speaks to Peter are an absolution: Peter is forgiven. Jesus has not given up on Peter, but rather is calling him back into relationship and putting him to work.

When Jesus first called Peter to follow him, he put down his fishing nets and left them behind in order to fish for people. Now, Peter must put down his failure in order to follow once again.

Jesus also brought about a change in Paul through a question. We recall from the book of Acts that on the road to Damascus, Jesus asked, “Saul, Saul, why do you persecute me?” In order to follow Jesus, Paul had to turn from killing the sheep to feeding them. Christ did not destroy Saul, even though he has so grossly misunderstood God’s will and work. Instead, Jesus calls Saul by name, forgives him, and gives him a new purpose.

Today, Jesus also asks us a question, “Do you love me?” With this question, we too are invited to turn from harmful patterns, from everything that holds us back from following our Lord, from all the ways that we have failed to feed the sheep, and thus failed to reflect Christ, the Good Shepherd.

Jesus calls us back from feeding ourselves, our desires, our interests by insisting on our own way, from feeding the hungry only when it is convenient for us, from not binding up the injured by ignoring the wounds of our neighbors and the wounds that we ourselves have inflicted, from not bringing back those who have strayed because we are afraid of telling the truth, from seeking the lost with force instead of carrying them in love, from all the times that we are nudged by the Spirit to reach out to someone, and ignore it because of what we think it might cost.

If we are to follow him, then we must leave all of this behind.

Yet, with the command to feed his sheep, Jesus not only turns us from harmful patterns, but restores our relationship with him and with one another. In response to all the ways that we have not reflected him or his love, Christ proclaims to us today, “You are forgiven.”

With this forgiveness, Jesus calls us back from worrying that we won’t be able to recognize him or the Spirit’s work in our lives. In our first reading, Peter didn’t recognize how God was at work for him through the angel until after he had already been rescued from prison. We don’t always need to know—and we won’t always know—how God is at work in us for our neighbors or in our neighbors for us. But the witness of the lives of Peter and Paul is that even in prison, in rejection, in failure, in denial, in death—in all the places where it is most difficult to see it—Christ is still at work leading us and all people back to the Triune God.

With this forgiveness, Jesus also calls us back from the fear that because we have failed before, we have lost value in his eyes, and from the fear that we have messed things up beyond the point of repairing, that we won’t be able to do what he asks or that we don’t have what it takes to follow him, to love as he loves. Even before Peter learns to feed the sheep, Jesus already welcomes him in and entrusts the ministry to him.

In response to our tendency to fall down, to fear, to wander away from where God would have us go, Jesus does not cast us out into the outer darkness, but turns us around, forgives us, and invites us to follow again saying, “Feed my sheep.”

Through him, we see the very heart of God; the God who refuses to lose any one of us. The God who yearns to have relationship with us and all people. Rather than force us into that relationship, however, God has chosen to invite us into it, to transform us and the world through love: a love that is shown through imperfect disciples. 

Because Jesus’ command to Peter to tend the sheep follows Peter’s denial, we know that Jesus’ choosing of Peter has nothing to do with Peter’s own abilities. There is no special worthiness on his part. He witnesses and cares for the church because Christ calls him and strengthens him to do the work to which he was called.

Likewise, as Paul testifies to us in his second letter to Timothy, the strength of his witness, his ability to fight the good fight, to finish the race, to keep faith all rests solely on Christ, who stood by him and gave him strength so that through him the message might be fully proclaimed. We are promised that as was done for Peter and Paul, the Lord will stand by us and give us strength so that we too might witness to Christ’s love.

The choice of Peter and Paul demonstrates God’s working through the weak things of this world. God chooses what is foolish, weak, low, and despised so that anyone who boasts may boast in the Lord.

This, in fact, is how God has always worked.

The entire narrative of scripture is full of broken people. God created a nation to bless all nations through Sarah, who laughed at God’s promises, and Abraham who continually tried to take matters into his own hands because he couldn’t trust. God rescued all of Israel from slavery through Moses, a murderer who would spend his life speaking God’s word even though he couldn’t speak well on his own. God led a rebellious nation through David who committed adultery and killed the innocent. God called the Ninevites and set them free from sin through Jonah, who resisted God’s call and resented God’s mercy. God saved all of creation through the Son whom we rejected. God used the witness of these two flawed saints to build the church and to bring us to faith. And now the Triune God will love the world into believing—into relationship—by loving them through us, we who are weak and broken.

We celebrate the festival of the Apostles Peter and Paul because we need to be reminded what discipleship is and isn’t, what it does and doesn’t look like to follow Christ. 

Following Jesus is witnessing to his love and mercy with our very lives.

This means time and time again to turn from saying, “Look at me,” and instead pointing and saying, “Look at Christ” when we see him at work in our lives and in the lives of those around us. Discipleship does not mean doing everything perfectly, but watching for how God’s perfect love is at work around us and through us. Discipleship is not having all the right answers or knowing where we are going, but trusting that the Holy Spirit will strengthen us to follow Christ.

We know what we are to do, how we are to witness; we have heard it three times today from our Lord, and he will continue to whisper it to us day after day and year after year as he walks with us, leading us: “Feed my sheep.”

We are to follow in Christ’s footsteps and do for one another and for this world what Christ has done for us.

Sometimes when we follow our Lord, we will be led out of prison. More often, however, Christ will lead us to give ourselves away. The death that Peter and Paul died glorified God because they reflected God’s very nature. If we follow Christ, then we will offer forgiveness when we are hurt, love when we are insulted, and seek relationship again and again even when it seems that all hope is lost. This is what it means to lay down our lives for one another, to feed the sheep, to love. By this witness, by our love, Christ will make himself known.

On this day, through the Apostle Peter and Paul, we are reminded just what God can do with the weak and broken. The Triune God takes imperfect people with tempers and thorns in their flesh who murdered and doubted and denied and uses them to invite all people into God’s work of redeeming the world. Today we are asked to do the same so that by our witness, others may come to know God’s love, forgiveness, and call in their lives.

To those of us who feel as though we have never heard him before, to those of us who have fallen away or are tired of walking, to those of us who have heard him many times, and many ways, the call is the same. Jesus says to us, “I have called you by name. You are mine. Follow me.”

Now, what will we leave behind, and who through our love will we tell?

Amen.