Grow anyway
Matthew 13: 1-9, 18-23
New Ark United Church of Christ, Newark, DE
July 12, 2020
By this point in Jesus’ ministry he’s getting a little frustrated because people aren’t getting his message. The seeds Jesus is sowing are the law and the prophets, the Torah, words of life for kin-dom living, wisdom and truth that not only holds people and community together through the hard times but also leads to transformational change. These aren’t just words but a relationship to all that is holy.
Trouble is, the seeds are falling in places where they are eaten by birds or they grow but not for long—not long enough to bear the fruit that can sustain. The path, the rocky ground, the thorns—these do not change their nature. They do not make room for the seeds to grow and thrive. Jesus wants his listeners to be good soil so that God’s kin-dom can flourish.
But then as now, when living with so much uncertainty and a government with thoughtless regard for human life, people are bound to be pretty thorny and rocky and worn down. It’s not easy being the soft earth, to move ourselves out of the way, open to change, when sometimes you just want to get in the driver’s seat of a bulldozer and do some serious digging. Yesterday after the memorial service, as soon as I stepped out of the funeral home I let out choked sobs of grief and anger. We should’ve been together, all of us in our worship space, singing and praying together, sharing stories and memories of Paul, gathering afterward in Wells Hall with plates of delicious food prepared by loving hands, the hospitality and warmth as solid as gravity.
Don’t get me wrong. It was a beautiful service because we honored a beautiful human being who lived and loved well. Absolutely nothing could’ve changed that no matter what the circumstances. And yet in its own way that restricted gathering with all of us wearing masks and physically distanced from each other, the beauty came through like a wildflower pushing through stones. We had rocky soil and it grew anyway, a rose among our thorny grief.
A couple of months ago on a walk through the woods near our house, I noticed a tall tree that had broken in half, much of its height and limbs laying on the ground. And yet the tree was still alive, with a couple of lower, younger limbs still bearing green leaves. On other hikes through Brandywine State Park and White Clay Creek State Park I purposefully looked for other trees that for all appearances shouldn’t be growing or that had suffered trauma and yet were beautiful all the same.
Recently I learned that trees talk to each other. Their roots go down, down to the earth and connect with a vast mycelium network underground that resembles the neural networks in the human brain. Through these intricate connections, trees signal to each other changes in the environment and transfer nutrients when needed. A tree that was rotten on one side might have died but through that soil filled with fungus, the rest of the forest said, “Not today.”
I know that Jesus is saying that growth doesn’t happen in an inhospitable environment, that the conditions have to be right, but right now conditions are rocky and thorny and worn down and might be this way for quite some time. We can’t just wait it out like a passing storm—the seeds of justice, change, and new life are given no matter what, so why not grow anyway?
Author Sarah Bessey writes, “Hope is subversive precisely because it dares to admit that all is not as it should be. And so we are holding out for, working for, creating, prophesying, and living into something better — for the kin-dom to come, for oaks of righteousness to tower, for leaves to blossom for the healing of the nations, for swords to be beaten into plowshares, for joy to come in the morning, and for redemption and justice.”
We still need to ask ourselves are we prepared for what this new world will ask of us. How invested are we in this just world for all? So far it hasn’t been easy but we’ve also managed to keep our commitments to social justice and worship and care for one another. Will we find ourselves just as steadfast a year from now? We haven’t yet reached our limits, which is where the gospel inevitably leads. When we do, what will we do when we get there?
We will grow anyway because beauty and life and love cannot help it but how? All is not as it should be and yet the hope we hold onto, the hope we offer has been for the most part a white, straight, cisgender elitist hope. The kin-dom is about relationships and that is how we grow. During this fallow, underground time we all need to be nurturing relationships with faith communities and other mission partners that don’t look like us. We can’t do this because it’s the right thing to do or because we should. Faithfulness isn’t about getting it right or avoiding getting it wrong. We do this because it’s what we need in order to truly live and live well. It’s about turning over the soil in our lives and in our life together—how we’ve always done it—and then moving out of the way, sending the abundant resources we have to those whose land was stolen, whose ancestors arrived here in chains, those who have been subsisting. We change the system to one of interdependence—a network, a forest of humanity.
Right now we don’t know how this will happen. Like anything that is alive we will make mistakes. We will fail along the way. We will resist change. We will struggle with Jesus and what is required from us. We will experience pain. But that doesn’t let us off the hook. We will grow anyway. The decision before us is how.
New Ark United Church of Christ, Newark, DE
July 12, 2020
By this point in Jesus’ ministry he’s getting a little frustrated because people aren’t getting his message. The seeds Jesus is sowing are the law and the prophets, the Torah, words of life for kin-dom living, wisdom and truth that not only holds people and community together through the hard times but also leads to transformational change. These aren’t just words but a relationship to all that is holy.
Trouble is, the seeds are falling in places where they are eaten by birds or they grow but not for long—not long enough to bear the fruit that can sustain. The path, the rocky ground, the thorns—these do not change their nature. They do not make room for the seeds to grow and thrive. Jesus wants his listeners to be good soil so that God’s kin-dom can flourish.
Don’t get me wrong. It was a beautiful service because we honored a beautiful human being who lived and loved well. Absolutely nothing could’ve changed that no matter what the circumstances. And yet in its own way that restricted gathering with all of us wearing masks and physically distanced from each other, the beauty came through like a wildflower pushing through stones. We had rocky soil and it grew anyway, a rose among our thorny grief.
I thought of how we can be quick to judge our own imperfections and flaws and those of others and yet the majesty of a forest does not require our opinion. I thought of the wounds we all carry, how trauma is just as enfleshed as holiness, and yet there are trees that look like they haven’t fully recovered from open heart surgery but they reach for the sun anyway.
Recently I learned that trees talk to each other. Their roots go down, down to the earth and connect with a vast mycelium network underground that resembles the neural networks in the human brain. Through these intricate connections, trees signal to each other changes in the environment and transfer nutrients when needed. A tree that was rotten on one side might have died but through that soil filled with fungus, the rest of the forest said, “Not today.”
Author Sarah Bessey writes, “Hope is subversive precisely because it dares to admit that all is not as it should be. And so we are holding out for, working for, creating, prophesying, and living into something better — for the kin-dom to come, for oaks of righteousness to tower, for leaves to blossom for the healing of the nations, for swords to be beaten into plowshares, for joy to come in the morning, and for redemption and justice.”
We still need to ask ourselves are we prepared for what this new world will ask of us. How invested are we in this just world for all? So far it hasn’t been easy but we’ve also managed to keep our commitments to social justice and worship and care for one another. Will we find ourselves just as steadfast a year from now? We haven’t yet reached our limits, which is where the gospel inevitably leads. When we do, what will we do when we get there?
Right now we don’t know how this will happen. Like anything that is alive we will make mistakes. We will fail along the way. We will resist change. We will struggle with Jesus and what is required from us. We will experience pain. But that doesn’t let us off the hook. We will grow anyway. The decision before us is how.
Amen.
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