Pentecost 5, Proper 10, Year A
Matthew 13: 1-9
July 13, 2014
You may have noticed that I
stopped reading the Gospel half-way through what was printed in your bulletin. There’s no mistake in the bulletin; the whole
reading is intended to be part of the lectionary reading for today. And I didn’t forget to turn the page. I just don’t want you to hear it. Not yet anyway. For now, I just want you to sit on that
seashore with the water lapping at your feet, taking in the sight of Jesus
bobbing in that boat just a few feet away, listening to the sound of his voice
sharing a story that is so simple and yet is about so many things that your
mind can’t get around it.
“A
farmer went out to sow his seed. As he was scattering the seed, some fell along
the path, and the birds came and ate it up. Some fell on rocky places, where it
did not have much soil. It sprang up quickly, because the soil was shallow. But
when the sun came up, the plants were scorched, and they withered because they
had no root. Other seed fell among thorns, which grew up and choked the plants.
Still other seed fell on good soil, where it produced a crop—a hundred, sixty
or thirty times what was sown. Whoever
has ears, let them hear.”
I
wonder who the farmer might be? I wonder
what the farmer might be using for seed?
I wonder what might be all the different places where the seed
fell? What could the path really
be? What might the birds represent? What might the rocks really be, or the thorns? Where is the good soil, and what makes it
good? What kind of harvest did these
seeds turn out?
And, maybe more importantly,
where are you in this parable, or what part of this story is about you? At the end of the day, I’m more and more
convinced that that is what matters the most.
Sure, we can study the history of
the Bible. We can learn about the time
and place of its writing and what was going on in the world of its writers and
hearers. We can compare stories among Gospels
and translations. Look into the Hebrew
or the Greek. Study all the different
ways commentators interpret different pieces.
And
we can learn a lot studying that way. For
this passage, we’d learn that the answer key (the part I skipped) is almost
certainly a later add-on by the early church who wanted to spin this parable to
encourage believers struggling against persecution to hold fast to their
faith. And we’d learn about the
difficulties of planting in 1st Century Palestine. We’d learn that in Jesus’ day, a good yield
in a harvest would have been about 7 bushels, so the seeds in this parable that
bring forth 30, 60, 100 bushels are miraculously bountiful. We’d learn that and much more.
But
we can also get stuck there. That’s
where I found myself a week ago. I’d
studied the passage, read the commentaries, and gotten myself so mired in the
details that I couldn’t find my way out.
And then I read something completely unrelated. Or at least, as seemingly completely
unrelated as something can be in the context of God’s creation.
I
read Donna Tartt’s beautiful novel, The Goldfinch. It was one of those books that so engages you
in the world of the characters that you find yourself almost unable to interact
with people in your own world. Even with
its 771 pages, it was one of those books that I’d wished I could go on reading
forever.
The
Goldfinch is about a boy, Theo, who is visiting the Metropolitan Museum of
Art with his mother as a teenager.
Theo’s mother, somewhat of an art historian, shows him a small painting
of a beautiful and lifelike goldfinch chained to his perch. She loved this painting since coming across
it in a book as a child. A few minutes
later, while Theo and his mother are in different parts of the museum, a bomb
goes off. In the smoke and confusion of
the moment, Theo rescues the painting of the goldfinch and goes in search of
his mother. He ends up almost
accidentally stealing the painting, and the rest of the book is about what
happens to Theo and the painting.
Along Theo’s way there is
reckless and abundant sowing, and there are stones that impede, and thorns that
choke, and birds that steal. But there
is also incredibly rich soil and miraculous growth. The Goldfinch turned out to be a
parable too, maybe even the same parable that Jesus told, but with very
different words and contexts.
What
stopped me in my tracks particularly about this book as I read it in parallel
to thinking about this Gospel passage were Theo’s thoughts at the end as he looks
back over his life. As Theo says about
the painting that captures his heart: “Scholars might care about the innovative
brushwork and use of light, the historical influence and the unique
significance in Dutch art. But not
me. As my mother said all those years
ago, my mother who loved the painting only from seeing it in a book she
borrowed from the Comanche County Library as a child: the significance doesn’t
matter. The historical significance
deadens it. Across those unbridgeable
distances – between bird and painter, painting and viewer – I hear only too
well what’s being said to me, a psst
from an alleyway… across 400 years of time, and it’s really very personal and
specific.” (767)
Add another 1600 years for the
parable’s time lapse to reach us, but the intention is the same. Jesus wants this story to whisper to us,
personally and specifically. To capture
our hearts and our imaginations. For us
to incorporate it into something that matters for us. If we’re serious about this being the living Word
of God, a Word that continues to speak and be relevant, we have to listen and
let it do its work. And then we have to
stand back and accept the sometimes frightening proposition that how this
speaks and what it means to me might be very different from how it speaks and
what it means to you. What Word does God
have for you in this reading today? What
might God be calling you to do or be based on what you hear?
It
may not be immediately obvious. And it
may not be comfortable. That’s part of
how Jesus works. Jesus uses parables not
to simplify or to teach some piece of information, but to enlarge the
possibilities and to prepare us for our work in bringing about the Kingdom of
God. Jesus wants there to be doubt about
how this story applies. Jesus wants us
to think about it, play with it, mull it over, be changed by it. A blog I read wrote this “rule of thumb” for
reading one of Jesus’ parables: “If I interpret it in such a way that there is
nothing surprising or shocking or for me about it, it’s time to go back and
read it again.” Parables seek not to
inform us, but to transform us as we wrestle with them.
The way Theo thought about the
transformation his painting worked upon him sounds a lot like what I’m pretty
sure Jesus has in mind for all of us in this parable: “You can have a lifetime of perfectly sincere
museum-going where you traipse around enjoying everything and then go out and
have some lunch. But if a painting
really works down in your heart and changes the way you see, and think, and
feel, you don’t think, ‘oh, I love this picture because it’s universal.’ ‘I
love this painting because it speaks to all mankind.’ That’s not the reason anyone loves a piece of
art. It’s a secret whisper from an
alleyway. Psst, you. Hey kid. Yes you. An individual heart-shock… You see one painting, I see another, the art
book puts it at another remove still, the lady buying the greeting card at the
museum gift shop sees something else entire, and that’s not even to mention the
people separated from us by time – 400 years before us, 400 years after we’re
gone – it’ll never strike anybody the same way and the great majority of people
it’ll never strike in any deep way at all but – a really great painting is
fluid enough to work its way into the mind and heart through all kinds of
different angles, in ways that are unique and very particular. Yours,
yours. I was painted for you.” (758)
So listen again to another
translation of our parable: “Listen!
What do you make of this? A
farmer planted seed. As he scattered the
seed, some of it fell on the road, and birds ate it. Some fell in the gravel; it sprouted quickly
but didn’t put down roots, so when the sun came up it withered just as
quickly. Some fell in the weeds; as it
came up, it was strangled by the weeds.
Some fell on good earth, and produced a harvest beyond his wildest
dreams. Are you listening to this? Really listening?”[1]
This is a Godly play staple and
I’ve used this story and its wondering questions with adults too. The ways people have seen it are incredibly
diverse, and incredibly beautiful. One
person saw himself as the Farmer, called to be loving and giving to everyone
around him. For him this was a reminder
to persevere in a frustrating relationship.
Another person saw herself as the entire path, sometimes not yielding
fruit but sometimes wonderfully open to the love of God, and she was comforted
that the current dry time would pass.
Another mentioned that even something as seemingly unhelpful as the
birds of the air that stole the sowed seeds could also be another avenue of
spreading the seed in a new and unexpected place. For her, this pointed to the ways that bad or
disappointing things can sometimes lead to joy and grace. A child suggested that he was the seed and
brainstormed some ideas for growing.
So, sure, you can go ahead and
read yourself the end of the Gospel reading for today if you need to. But don’t let the writer fool you into
thinking that is THE answer, or even the answer for you. It’s an answer, sure, and maybe even a
perfectly fine one. But don’t let it
dictate or limit the possibilities of this parable for you.
Don’t just get close to the
mystery of God and enjoy it and then go out and have some lunch. Let the mystery work down in your heart and
change the way you see, and think, and feel.
Open yourself to God speaking something new, something surprising,
something extraordinary … to you.
Through this parable, maybe, or through whatever other beautiful seeds
might be recklessly and abundantly thrown your way. Amen.
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