July 16 2017
Is 55:10-11; Rom 8:18-23; Matt 13:1-23
Longview
“A sower went out to sow.” Jesus’ familiar parable is based on an image from first-century farming. In the first century, farmers plowed the fields to loosen the soil, and sowed the seed. When I plant my garden, I usually plant individual seeds along a row, or else plant seedlings. But farmers planting wheat in the first century would have a big sack of grain, grab a handful, and strew it out over the field. I imagine they got fairly good at covering the ground relatively evenly. Of course, they didn’t deliberately waste seed on bad soil. Still, this was a wholesale method of scattering seed. The birds would get some while it lay on top of the plowed soil, and some was bound to fall on hard packed ground or into weeds.
Today’s Gospel passage talks about the meaning of the parable. The seed is the “word of the kingdom.” In explaining the parable Jesus says, “The seed sown on the path is the one who hears the word of the kingdom without understanding it, and the evil one comes along and steals away what was sown in his heart.” But how does this apply to us? Jesus’ basic message was that the kingdom of God is “at hand”—that is, the kingdom or reign of God is within reach. The word of the kingdom means spreading God’s reign. It’s all about starting to live God’s reign right now and spreading the word about it.
How do we let people know about God’s reign? I used to think it was by telling them. I’m a very word- and book-oriented person. The teachings of the church and the words of scripture speak to me, and I thought they would speak to everyone. But Saint Francis was a lot smarter than I am. He said, “Preach always. If necessary, use words.” We let people know about God’s reign by living like Christians, by kindness, by loving our neighbor—and yes, by sometimes talking about it.
Pope Francis is a wonderful example of this kind of preaching to spread the word of the kingdom. Remember when he kissed the severely deformed man who suffered from neurofibromatosis, the elephant man disease? He washed the feet of prisoners and a Muslim woman. His actions tell us better than many words could what the kingdom of God is all about. He supplements his actions with words, of course—for example, to argue the importance of reverence for God’s creation and of sympathy for refugees and people who try to enter this country illegally.
What Jesus tells us in the gospel reading today is not how to preach. He tells us, first, that we need to spread the kingdom of God, as the farmer spreads the seeds, because we are disciples, and mission is our business. Remember that Jesus is speaking to a large crowd, not just to priests and professional religious, but to anybody who will listen. The kingdom of God is our business. We are the sowers.
Second, Jesus tells us to sow generously, even profligately, the way the farmer scatters his seed. Yes, some of it will be lost. We may try to encourage a despondent neighbor to have hope and be told to mind our own business. We may give to a charitable cause and later find out that it was a scam. Not every seed takes root or bears fruit. The farmer has to take such losses in stride, and so do we. Nor does he know which seeds will yield a bumper crop—thirty or fifty or a hundredfold.
I’m on a list serve for people who have a rare and aggressive form of uterine cancer. Members report their successes and their defeats. One member reported recently that she was dying, after a long struggle with the disease. In such situations, other members often send encouragement and promise to pray for the person, but this woman warned us not to encourage her to fight because she was ready to die and not to pray for her because she didn’t believe in prayers or an afterlife. I wrote to thank the dying woman for the extraordinary contributions she had made. Others wrote to wish her well; some notes were very specific and touching. Unfortunately, one woman wrote to say she would pray for the dying woman to find Jesus and take him as her savior. This led to a nasty exchange between some believers and non-believers, with some insisting on the need to turn to Jesus and others denouncing all religion. We all know that’s not how the kingdom of God is supposed to work.
God’s word, for which the first reading uses the metaphor of life-giving rain, is about kindness and freedom, about justice and mercy. Let us spread that word in deeds, and use words if necessary.