7/14/2020 US Census
What exactly is a parable? In C.H. Dodd’s book, The Parables of the Kingdom, he defines a parable as “a metaphor or simile drawn from nature or common life, arresting the hearer by its vividness or strangeness, and leaving the mind in sufficient doubt about its precise application to tease it into active thought.” In today’s gospel the Parable of the Sower from Matthew would have been contemporary to a Jewish farming culture. Dry, rocky or thorny soil would have been understood as foolish for a favorable future harvest. This parable of the soil teaching by Jesus was offered to the inquiring or non-believing “large crowds because they do not see and hear and do not listen or understand” his prior teachings that the revelation of the Kingdom of God was at hand. If we “tease” today’s parable into “active thought” we need to ask ourselves are we too part of the “large crowds” Jesus was speaking to who did not see or hear, listen or understand him? Or are we truly a disciple of Jesus encountering him and living his teachings in good soil of our own lives? Maybe we find ourselves at one moment being an inquirer in the “large crowd” and at another time an active disciple living in Jesus. Contemporary times for us present different types of challenging “soil” to be tilled with good seed. Contemporary dry soil may be our growing and enveloping secular and materialism culture or the challenge of living a life filled with the rocky soil of anxiety, busyness, loneliness, and siren songs distracting us from balance, solitude and silence. Thorny soil abounds with challenging political and cultural divisions, civic unrest, collapse of families, injustices in education, health and economics, and least we forget a pandemic with many deaths and the social and economic effects of the lock down.
Dear Friends, Like so many Americans, in the past few months, I've felt confused, fearful, sad, and outraged related to the recent black deaths, peaceful protest being met with police violence, and violent protests causing destruction in major cities across the United States. I've engaged in conversations with family members and friends about the anxieties that we are carrying. During one conversation, my niece stated, "It's different for you. You have Jesus!" To which I wanted to balk and ask, "What difference does that make?" Instead, I took a deep breath and let her continue talking. At that time, I had no idea that the text for this Sunday included these words of Jesus: "Come to me, all you who labor and are heavily burdened, and I will give you rest. Take my yoke upon you and learn from me, for I am meek and humble of heart, and you and you will find rest for yourselves. For my yoke is easy, and my burden is light." During the past few weeks, I've thought about the words my friend said to me, "It's different for you." I've asked myself what Jesus' words about our anxieties and burdens mean in the context of the world of coronavirus and civil unrest. Today's gospel begins with Jesus praising His Father for revealing to little ones what remains hidden to the wise and the learned. He adds a declaration that the Father has delivered into His hands all power, authority, and judgment. He knows all our weaknesses and that sometimes the little strength we have can fail us. Therefore, He invites us to offload all our problems on Him and in return, He will give us His yoke, to learn from him, which is easy to bear and light. Jesus tells us that in Him, we will find rest. Don't we all seek this deep-down sense of peace, of healing, of rest and refreshment? Why do we struggle along with so many things? We often do, though. We forget to pray. We forget to turn to Jesus and give Him our cares and concerns, our worries, our heartaches. We carry them like weights sometimes on our shoulders, disturbing the peace of our hearts. Jesus said, "learn from me", and this is excellent advice. His life was founded in prayer. We, too, need to revive our prayer life. In a single moment, God can impact the grace we need to handle the things that cause us the most heartache if we only give him half a chance.
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