Once again this week Jesus speaks to us in parables... multifaceted gems that once tumbled around in our hearts and ruminated upon, yield unbelievable insights into the Reign of God. While the disciples certainly preferred straightforward answers...Jesus obviously preferred parables. Maybe Jesus preferred parables because they are less “black and white” and more open to interpretation, much like our experiences of life!
Of the comparisons of the reign of God to a field, a mustard seed or the leaven in bread...I have always liked the comparison of the mustard seed and the Reign of God. This tiny, tiny little seed grows into a great bush...so large that the birds of the air make their nests in it. If you take the parable at its face value it all seems quite lovely. However there is a dark side...farmers know well...the mustard bush is an invasive plant, it grows wildly and rapidly, quickly overtaking a garden...ruining the plants that had been planted with care...reducing their yield, if not completely choking them out.
Mustard bushes are uncontrollable and rapidly spread across a farm if not quickly uprooted before going to seed. Surely this reality was not lost on Jesus...nor on those who heard him tell the parable.
So it seems to me that perhaps Jesus is presenting an image of the expansion of the Reign of God as something uncontrollable, invasive and fast growing! Looking through the lens of this im- age...the Reign of God is not something that can be domesticated or controlled...by its very nature it grows uncontrollably and burst forth offering refuge.
I believe that most of us though would prefer something that we could contain and control...domesticate! But the truth is that the Reign of God is just that...”God’s Reign”...not ours. We are part of it by our baptism and we are called to help water it so that it continues to grow and “invade” every crevice and furrow of this earth...but we don’t get to tame it.
Two thousand years ago Jesus’ vision of the bursting forth of the Reign of God was nothing less than radical ....and it still is to- day. We are called to be part of that radical vision...to feed the hungry, shelter the homeless visit the sick and imprisoned, to welcome the stranger...to love one another as Christ loves us and to reach out and to care for “the other.” We are called to proclaim the deep and passionate love of God for all peoples! And wasn’t it just this radical vision of the reign of God that Jesus preached that got him crucified... as his disciple just how radical of a life am I willing live?
In a world “Christian churches” proclaim a “gospel of personal prosperity”...tax cuts for the rich at the cost of healthcare cuts for the poor, in a nation where overt acts of racism are on dis- play daily across the country, in a nation that our congress does not have backbone to pass far reaching legislation that would have huge positive impacts on the poor and middle class. We live in a nation where our government blocks and arrests the poor seeking asylum or immigrating looking for a better life, and puts them into detention centers, a government that has violently dispersed peaceful demonstrations for racial justice... to what lengths am I willing to go in building up this radical vision of the Reign of God that Jesus preached, where all people are “seen and valued”? What concrete action can I take today to “water” the Reign of God? Where and how do I see the Reign of God bursting forth in imaginative and radical ways?
Blessings,
Fr. Tim
Of the comparisons of the reign of God to a field, a mustard seed or the leaven in bread...I have always liked the comparison of the mustard seed and the Reign of God. This tiny, tiny little seed grows into a great bush...so large that the birds of the air make their nests in it. If you take the parable at its face value it all seems quite lovely. However there is a dark side...farmers know well...the mustard bush is an invasive plant, it grows wildly and rapidly, quickly overtaking a garden...ruining the plants that had been planted with care...reducing their yield, if not completely choking them out.
Mustard bushes are uncontrollable and rapidly spread across a farm if not quickly uprooted before going to seed. Surely this reality was not lost on Jesus...nor on those who heard him tell the parable.
So it seems to me that perhaps Jesus is presenting an image of the expansion of the Reign of God as something uncontrollable, invasive and fast growing! Looking through the lens of this im- age...the Reign of God is not something that can be domesticated or controlled...by its very nature it grows uncontrollably and burst forth offering refuge.
I believe that most of us though would prefer something that we could contain and control...domesticate! But the truth is that the Reign of God is just that...”God’s Reign”...not ours. We are part of it by our baptism and we are called to help water it so that it continues to grow and “invade” every crevice and furrow of this earth...but we don’t get to tame it.
Two thousand years ago Jesus’ vision of the bursting forth of the Reign of God was nothing less than radical ....and it still is to- day. We are called to be part of that radical vision...to feed the hungry, shelter the homeless visit the sick and imprisoned, to welcome the stranger...to love one another as Christ loves us and to reach out and to care for “the other.” We are called to proclaim the deep and passionate love of God for all peoples! And wasn’t it just this radical vision of the reign of God that Jesus preached that got him crucified... as his disciple just how radical of a life am I willing live?
In a world “Christian churches” proclaim a “gospel of personal prosperity”...tax cuts for the rich at the cost of healthcare cuts for the poor, in a nation where overt acts of racism are on dis- play daily across the country, in a nation that our congress does not have backbone to pass far reaching legislation that would have huge positive impacts on the poor and middle class. We live in a nation where our government blocks and arrests the poor seeking asylum or immigrating looking for a better life, and puts them into detention centers, a government that has violently dispersed peaceful demonstrations for racial justice... to what lengths am I willing to go in building up this radical vision of the Reign of God that Jesus preached, where all people are “seen and valued”? What concrete action can I take today to “water” the Reign of God? Where and how do I see the Reign of God bursting forth in imaginative and radical ways?
Blessings,
Fr. Tim
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