Wild and Wonderful Weeds! — Saturday Sermons from the Sidelines

The Third Sunday after Pentecost; Read Mark 4:26-34

Mark 4 is the “Seed Section” of that gospel. Today we get two small parables and a conclusion from that chapter. The first parable describes the Reign of God as seed that grows on its own. The second parable describes the Reign of God something that starts small and grows to huge size. The conclusion assures us that the Good News of the Reign of God comes to us as we’re able to hear it.

When we Christians read the Gospel parables, we need to read them with Jesus at the center if the story. When we get a parable with a seed falling into the earth, for example, we need to think about Jesus’ death and burial.

Jesus does that himself in John twelve, verse twenty-four. “Very truly, I tell you,” he declares to us disciples, “unless a grain of wheat falls into the earth and dies, it remains just a single grain; but if it dies, it bears much fruit.”

Jesus “falls” into the ground and dies. No one can see what is happening. Everyone assumes that nothing good can come. But soon he bursts forth, and the harvest of the New Creation begins. That harvest continues in our lives by the power of the Holy Spirit.

Notice just how little control the farmer has over the crop in that first parable. Jesus says, the earth produces the seed “of itself.” The Greek word there is “automateh”—the ancient root of our word, “automatic.” God is in charge of the growth. We get to help with the harvesting.

For forty years, I have been asked in a variety of settings about how to “make the church grow.” That’s been the subtext of every interview with call committees. It was part of my job when I worked for a judicatory and a denomination. It was the overt focus of my longest-term call. It was the agenda of a whole movement early in my ministry career – the “church-growth movement.”

The question was always the same. What’s the technique, method, structure, focus, philosophy and/or product that will produce reliable growth (usually measured in attendance numbers) in a congregation? People have made lots of money and staked themselves to productive careers proposing a variety of answers to the question.

What I learned the hard way is that the answer is easy. Get out of the way. The Holy Spirit wants the Church to grow in any and every way that facilitates the continued coming of the Reign of God. We don’t have to “make” the church grow. There’s no cultivation technique or theological fertilizer or ecclesial gardening tool that offers the magic solution. The Reign of God is like a seed that grows automatically.

If it’s that easy, why don’t we just do it? Join me for a bit in my garden, if you will. I want things to grow on my schedule, according to my specifications, and for my purposes. I want tomatoes and cucumbers and onions and potatoes (and several other things as well). I don’t want little trees and dandelions and bindweed. I certainly don’t want powdery mildew and Japanese beetles. In order to make the garden do what I want, I have to exert force and effort.

It’s anything but automatic.

Now, growing vegetables is a fine thing. The effort is rewarded, most of the time. But I don’t have to exert that sort of effort in our pollinator garden, where we have native plants that do quite well on their own, thank you very much. If those plants were in my vegetable beds, they would be weeds and would quickly be pulled. Same plants – different agenda.

The Church does not grow automatically, because we seek to maintain and manage and monitor the growth according to our specifications. We guard against any changes that might make us uncomfortable. We weed out any nonconforming species and maintain a monolithic monoculture. We provide only the minimum spiritual and financial resources necessary to sustain the organization as it is, and as we like it.

In short, we often do everything we can to make sure that growth is anything but “automatic.”

We are called to relentlessly root out the roadblocks to growth in and through the Church. That will be quite enough work for any faithful church leader.

Then there’s the mustard seed. Certainly, mustard seed is tiny when compared to other seeds. But size isn’t the real issue. Mustard is not something you have to plant and cultivate. You wouldn’t find mustard plants in the local gardens in Nazareth or Capernaum. Mustard is invasive and persistent. Think crabgrass or creeping Charlie or henbit. That’s the kind of plant Jesus describes.

Notice the outcome of this wild and wonderful growth. The mustard plant is really a large bush. It may grow to a height of eight or ten feet. It will be large enough to provide shelter for birds and other animals. If you were watching closely, you may have noticed that this image takes us back to our first lesson.

The ancient prophets described Israel as the great cedar tree that God would use to shelter the nations. We see that image in our first lesson. When God’s kingdom comes, even the least important critters will find shelter. In the gospels, birds are symbols for rather unimportant things. In Jewish thought, many birds were regarded as ritually unclean. In fact, both Ezekiel and Jesus use the image of the birds to refer to the kingdom-outsiders who now rest in the shade of that magnificent bush.

So the growth is not just for us to have more mustard seed. The growth is not just so the church can be a magnificent bush. Instead, the Holy Spirit gives the growth so the outsiders in our lives can find shelter from the storms of life.

The mustard bush is not, however, a proud and magnificent cedar tree. The real work of God’s kingdom will happen in places where we might least expect it. In Ezekiel seventeen, verse twenty-four, the LORD speaks through the prophet. “All the trees of the field shall know that I am the Lord,” writes the prophet. “I bring low the high tree, I make high the low tree; I dry up the green tree and make the dry tree flourish. I the Lord have spoken; I will accomplish it.”

We may be looking at the great trees for great things. God, on the other hand, works through the wild weeds of the wilderness to bring about wonders of growth. So, for example, a small congregation should never feel bad about being small. This is where the Holy Spirit does its best work.

Jesus doesn’t point to the noble cedar, as does Ezekiel. Instead, this kingdom parable points to “something more ordinary, and yet also something more able to show up,” Matt Skinner proposes, “to take over inch by inch, and eventually to transform a whole landscape.” What a humorous and hopeful image in a world awash with stories of pompous prats who cannot deal with their own fraudulent failures.

The Reign of God among us may well crowd out our own planned church crops and reach out to fowl we wouldn’t welcome on our own. The mustard seed is growing, for example, outside the walls of our church buildings and the boundaries of our worshipping communities, whether we like that or not. Will we chuckle or grumble in God’s garden? Will we regard that extravagant and spontaneous growth as Good News or as weeds to be pulled?

Then, there’s the “conclusion” to the text. Our text points, perhaps, to the reality that the emergence of the Reign of God from mystery into meaning, from darkness into light, will create discomfort and disturbance for the status quo. The seed of the Reign of God grows automatically and with astonishing productivity – if we don’t resist it. That seed grows in places we would not choose, thank God! And the more we do to open ourselves to that wonder, the more of the mystery will become meaningful to us.

When we understand that the bursting forth of the Reign of God from the ground and into the open means trouble for some folks, we may get a clearer sense of how Mark, chapter 4, is finally structured. The Ruler of this world, in all sorts of disguises will storm and threaten to frighten us into retreat. But we are not to back down.

Uncovering the past disrupts the present and challenges the status quo. That sounds like a storm to me. We know that our communal histories as a nation and as church bodes hide unacknowledged stories of abuse and trauma that continue to shape how we act and react as such communities. Surfacing those stories is painful, and necessary, and filled with conflict and violence.

When things come up that have been long submerged, stuff is going to happen. When it happens, Jesus is right there in the boat with us. More on that next week.

Now reflect on the past week. Where did you see the Holy Spirit working in wild and unexpected ways? As you think, prepare your eyes for this week’s harvest. Get ready to look for the work of the Spirit in you and through you. And get ready for a week of wild and wonderful weeds!

Text Study for Mark 4:26-34 (Pt. 4); 3 Pentecost B 2021

4. Unwanted Growth

Lately Brenda and I have been re-watching a BBC crime drama series entitled “New Tricks” (as in “you can’t teach old dogs…”). It is the ongoing story of the Unsolved Crime and Open Case Squad (UCOS), a fictional division of the London Metropolitan Police Service tasked with re-investigating unresolved cases. The UCOS team is made up of a Detective Inspector (the character named Sandra Pullman) and three retired (male) detectives who bring their experience and eccentricities to bear on some fascinating cases.

I enjoy the characters and their interactions. The cases are intelligent and creative, and each of the characters has a back story which has the flavor of an unsolved case about it as well. The program has the character of a “drama-dy” with lots of by-play among the characters, highlighting the backlog of dysfunction, misogyny, racism, and mental instability which moved the “old dogs” into retirement in the first place. Part of the subtext of the series is that even in the midst of this interpersonal mess, as a team they can produce remarkable results and actually grow as human beings.

Old dogs can learn new tricks, and it’s great fun watching.

I mention this series in connection with the gospel text because the series has this flavor of hidden things coming to the surface and secret things coming to light. Many of the cases UCOS takes on are unresolved because it is in the interest of perpetrators and/or the powerful to leave the cases, the victims, and their families in the dark rather than to deal with the uncomfortable and inconvenient truths that are typically part of these cases.

When something new is unearthed – sometimes a body or a document, sometimes new evidence or the potential for a DNA test (pretty new stuff twenty years ago), things change, and people get upset. It’s not unusual for the UCOS team to have to choose between the expediency of leaving things buried, and the desire to unearth the truth for the sake of justice.

Our text points, perhaps, to the reality that the emergence of the Kingdom from mystery into meaning, from darkness into light, will create discomfort and disturbance for the status quo. The seed of the Kingdom of God grows automatically and with astonishing productivity – if we don’t resist it. The Parable of the Sower is not about preparation but rather about resistance, about things that get in the way of the “natural” growth of the Kingdom among us. That explains the use of the Isaiah 6 quote in verse 12 and the warning in verses 24 and 25.

When we understand that the bursting forth of the Kingdom from the ground and into the open means trouble for some folks, we may get a clearer sense of how Mark, chapter 4, is finally structured. The relationship of “The Calming of the Storm” (Mark 4:35-41, next week’s gospel pericope) to the surrounding material is an open question.

Granted that the chapter and verse numbers are later additions, the question still remains. Is “The Calming of the Storm” the end of the seeds discourse or the beginning of the next section of the gospel? The answer to that question will tells us something about the discourse as well as about next week’s reading.

Timothy Milinovich argues that “The Calming of the Storm” is the conclusion to the preceding discourse. The Calming text is certainly a transition from one section of the gospel account to the next. However, Milinovich suggests, the connections with the preceding material are much stronger in narrative literary terms than with the succeeding material.

He notes that chapter four continues an “instruction/demonstration” pattern found in the first three chapters as well. He also points to over a dozen linguistic connections between the Seeds Discourse and the Calming miracle. Third, he points to parallels between the structure and emphasis of the Parable of the Sower and the Calming miracle. Thus, these two texts form the outer ring of the chiastic structure of Mark 4 and mutually interpret and reinforce one another.

“The purpose of the parables in Mark 4:1–34 is to express in narrative form the paradox of Christ’s Sonship and death on the cross as a saving activity for humanity,” Milinovich concludes. “It is the person of Christ, God’s Son, by whom God is present with his people, and through whom God effects his plan for salvation,” he continues. “The ministry of Christ already reveals this paradox for those who are willing to hear and see with faith and understanding,” including, Milinovich says, Mark’s community of believers under duress in Rome.

Now, what does story of the Calming miracle have to do with the preceding? Milinovich offers some detailed work that we may review next week. The point I want to make is somewhat different. I wonder if Mark is communicating to his audience that when the seed appears (when the mystery of the gospel is revealed), the faithful should expect storms rather than calm.

Just as the unearthing of new evidence was often disruptive in the stories told in “New Tricks,” so the Good News of Jesus Christ, the Son of God, challenges the status quo of power, position, privilege, and property in the first century and the twenty-first century. I wonder if Mark wants us to understand that the revelation of the mystery of the kingdom will cause problems rather than produce comfort.

This leads me to reflect on the things that arise “from the ground” that we in the dominant culture want to resist and suppress. For example, the bodies of 215 Indigenous children have been found on the grounds of a former boarding school. It has taken time and the wait has produced inestimable agony, I assume, on the part of those whose children were “lost.” Yet, the seed of truth lay in the ground awaiting the conditions that would allow it to spring forth.

I imagine there are a number of people who wish that this truth had remained buried in the ground. The harvest of justice for the victims will produce a harvest of consequences, I pray, for the perpetrators.

Another example. I am part of a group in our judicatory reading and studying Jemar Tisby’s How to Fight Racism. He encourages us to explore and write out our personal, congregational, and institutional histories with race and ethnicity. I find that white people resist that idea for themselves and the organizations of which they are a part.

The purpose of such writing is to answer the question, “How did things get this way?” What has transpired historically that has produced all-white congregations on stolen land? Uncovering the real history of our lives, our places, and our communities – for white people – requires a number of reckonings with our past and how that plays out in current realities. Specifically, we must come face to face with the real and conscious decisions on the part of our forebears that have resulted in slavery, genocide, white supremacy, and all the ways we continue to benefit from the injustices produced.

Uncovering the past disrupts the present and challenges the status quo. That sounds like a storm to me.

We know that our communal histories as a nation and as church bodes hide unacknowledged stories of abuse and trauma that continue to shape how we act and react as such communities. Surfacing those stories is painful, and necessary, and filled with conflict and violence.

We can look at the Perpetrator Induced Trauma Syndrome and the multi-generational crimes of white supremacy and genocide that only now are really coming to light, as described by Mark Charles and Soong-Chan Rah in their book, Unsettling Truths. We can research, examine, and acknowledge the economic inequities of colonial and imperial systems that continue to oppress much of the world’s population right here and right now. We can demand to learn the real truth behind the January 6 insurrection, where the blood of the victims cries out from the ground unheard.

The uncovering, the unearthing, the surfacing also applies to things happening among us now. In my own ELCA, the currents of justice and the counter-currents of white supremacy, homophobia, colonialism, imperialism, classism, and ageism clash in storms that often don’t get to the surface of general awareness. But it doesn’t take much reflection to see that our social statements and messages, however well-intentioned, rarely receive the policy support, the judicatory enforcement, and the financial backing required to make the statements more than performative gestures.

When things come up that have been long submerged, stuff is going to happen. When stuff happens, Jesus is right there in the boat with us.

Text Study for Mark 4:26-34 (Pt. 3); 3 Pentecost B 2021

3. Seeing and Hearing

Pericope preaching always contains the peril of missing the larger point. We get the two smaller seed parables in the second half of Mark 4. Each of them has more than enough fodder to feed a sermon every three years. But the seed parables are not stand-alone units. Nor is it enough, even, to put them together in some sort of additive analogy. They are part of a larger discourse that moves the plot of Mark along.

Mark 4:1-34 is clearly intended to be viewed as a unit. Verses 2 and 34 serve as the bookends for this set of parables and explanations. In that light, we need to pay some attention to the whole chapter in order to understand the appointed Gospel reading. That would be all well and good if the whole unit were about seeds and soil, planting and harvesting, growth and grace. But it’s not. Right in the middle of all the agricultural imagery is the imagery of the unhidden lamp (Mark 4:21-25). Unless Jesus is talking about some sort of first-century growth light, the connection is not obvious to us.

The writer of Mark’s gospel is fond, as we have noted of structural sandwiches. On closer examination, these sandwiches are often chiasms, a central point or story surrounded by concentric circles of related images, illustrations, and parables. That appears to be the structure of Mark 4 as it was the main structure of Mark 3 (keeping in mind that the chapter and verse divisions are later features of the text, added by scribes in succeeding centuries). The question in a chiasm is, where is the center?

Scholars propose a variety of chiastic arrangements for the text, each with its own virtues. The one I find most convincing puts the “Unhidden Lamp” section of verses 21-25 at the center of the discourse. This means that our text for the day in verses 26-34 is intended to illustrate, expand, and comment on those verses. That’s why it’s worth spending some time figuring out what those verses mean in order to fully and fairly exegete our assigned text.

“He said to them, ‘Is a lamp brought in to be put under the bushel basket, or under the bed, and not on the lampstand? For there is nothing hidden, except to be disclosed; nor is anything secret, except to come to light. Let anyone with ears to hear listen!’” (Mark 4:21-23, NRSV). In a gospel famous for keeping secrets, Jesus declares that the purpose is to reveal everything. Nothing that is “encrypted” that shall not be made apparent. Nothing that is a secret shall remain so.

Jesus comes to reveal the mysteries of the Kingdom of God. The seed may be planted and grow in the secrecy of underground life. But it will come out of the ground and become visible. Not only will it manifest itself, but it will be a riotous growth and magnificent harvest. The light coming into the world will not be under an opaque shade. It will be uncovered for all to see. Jesus is revealing that mystery to the disciples so that they can share the light with others.

That inside information comes by seeing and hearing. Pay attention to that throughout Mark’s gospel. It’s no accident that a number of Jesus’ miracles in Mark have to do with healing the blind and deaf.

“If anyone has ears to hear, let them hear,” Jesus promises in verse 23. He expands on that in verse 24. He said to them, “See what you hear!” That’s the literal translation of three Greek words. The sentence has the sense of “Pay attention to what you are hearing!” Stop, look, and listen closely. That close attention is paid off by deeper understanding, “the measure you give will be the measure you get, and still more will be given you. For to those who have, more will be given; and from those who have nothing, even what they have will be taken away.’” (Mark 4:24-25).

Klyne Snodgrass describes “A Hermeneutics of Hearing Informed by the Parables with Special Reference to Mark 4” (what did I do before Google Scholar, Academia, and JSTOR?). “Jesus’ parables were intended to enable hearing and elicit a response,” he writes. “They assume a hermeneutics of hearing, one that calls for depth listening and includes a hermeneutic of obedience,” he continues. Snodgrass notes that the Greek word for hearing includes “a range of at least eight nuances…: literally to hear a sound; to understand a language; to understand in the sense of grasping meaning or significance; to recognize; to discern; to pay attention; to agree with, accept, or believe what is said; and to obey.”

Snodgrass suggests that God seeks a hearing for the mystery of the gospel that “hears correctly, discerns, affirms, and responds with obedience to what God speaks.” Mark uses the verb for “to hear” 13 times in Mark 4:1-34. In Mark’s gospel, Jesus uses the parable to assist people to come to that sort of hearing. Snodgrass points us to verses 33-34, where the narrator says that Jesus spoke “the word” to the people in parables “just as they were able to hear.” “The parables were intended to meet people at their level,” Snodgrass writes, “and draw them to the deeper message.”

This is the weight of verses 21-25 as well. These verses “must be understood as commentary on the teaching of the parables,” he argues. “The statement that a light is not to be hidden but is to enlighten and the parallel statements that nothing is hidden except that it should be revealed refer to the parables,” he proposes. “Nothing is hidden in parables but that it should be made clear. This is the nature of parables,” he concludes, “they hide in order to reveal…”

For Jesus in Mark’s gospel, however, there is hearing, and then there is hearing. There is seeing, and then there is seeing. Pay attention to what you are hearing. There is more than meets the ear here. What you put into the dialogue is what you will get out of it, Jesus says in verse 24. “The way people respond to the parables,” Snodgrass writes, “determines whether additional revelation is given. Those who respond with real hearing receive added revelation,” he continues. “For those who respond with superficial hearing,” he argues, “even what they have heard is of no effect.”

I’m going to take the opportunity to go on a bit of a rant at this point. I have lost count of the number of times I’ve heard from parishioners (my own and others) something like, “I just don’t get anything out of” a sermon, a worship service, a class, or a congregation. “I have to go somewhere else where I can be fed,” is the conclusion to that story. For some years I responded by trying to do more, do better, improve technique and content in order to provide a better product. None of that was wasted effort for my pastoral improvement, but it never kept one dissatisfied customer from looking elsewhere.

What I learned through repeated failure and subsequent reflection was that at least half of the issue was in the hearing rather than in the speaking. Some got nothing out of the content because they simply weren’t listening. Balancing the checkbook and catching up on email are not behaviors that facilitate good comprehension. Some got nothing out of the content because they weren’t prepared to receive the transmission. Biblical and theological illiteracy are tremendous roadblocks to growth in faith, hope, and love.

Some got nothing out of the content because they didn’t like me or the congregation or the denomination. The subtext of their lives drove the listening far more than the text of the moment. Some, in fairness, were traumatized by life in and out of the church – and it’s a wonder they even showed up. And then there were some who simply disagreed with what they heard. They knew the “right” answer, and they weren’t getting it from me. So hearing was not really an option.

If you were listening, you would notice that I just told my own version of the Parable of the Sower in Mark 4:1-9. That parable is followed by a quotation from Isaiah 6 that mourns the hardness of heart of those who look but do not perceive, those who listen but do not understand. Isaiah’s explanation of this perceptual failure is that they are not willing to repent – to turn toward a new perspective, a new way of seeing and hearing, a new way of thinking.

The Sower sows the Word. The Word brings a whole new universe of meaning – the Good News of Jesus Christ, the Son of God. This is the mystery of the kingdom, and that mystery will turn everything upside down and inside out (or right-side up and outside in, to use Richard Swanson’s understanding). If we can allow ourselves to be opened to that revolutionary message of newness, we will hear even more. If we harden ourselves into old ways of seeing and hearing, we will remain blind and deaf to the Kingdom.

We will see this process of seeing and hearing work out again and again in Mark’s gospel. And we see it working out again and again in the church. For example, it’s Pride Month. We’ve had a nice proclamation from our ELCA bishop in that regard. That proclamation means squat, however, as long as our welcome of all people is a constitutional option which most of our congregations refuse to exercise.

There’s no point in making declarations when the system is structured to keep eyes and ears closed.

References and Resources

Robert Farrar Capon. Kingdom, Grace, Judgment: Paradox, Outrage, and Vindication in the Parables of Jesus. Kindle Edition.

David Schnasa Jacobsen. https://www.workingpreacher.org/commentaries/revised-common-lectionary/ordinary-11-2/commentary-on-mark-426-34-5.

David Lose. http://www.davidlose.net/2015/06/pentecost-3-b-preach-the-truth-slant/.

Sharon Ringe. https://www.workingpreacher.org/commentaries/revised-common-lectionary/ordinary-11-2/commentary-on-mark-426-34-2.

Matt Skinner. https://www.workingpreacher.org/commentaries/revised-common-lectionary/ordinary-11-2/commentary-on-mark-426-34-4.

Snodgrass, Klyne. “A Hermeneutic of Hearing Informed by the Parables with Special Reference to Mark 4.” Bulletin for Biblical Research 14.1 (2004) 59-79.

Timothy Wenger. Luther’s Small Catechism.

Text Study for Mark 4:26-34 (Pt. 2); 3 Pentecost B 2021

2. A Small Invasion, But Spicy

Jesus seems in a thoughtful mood in our text. “What’s the best image of the Kingdom of God that has drawn near and is now at work among you?” he seems to wonder. Perhaps the seed growing automatically captures one aspect of that new regime, but there’s much more to say, apparently. “What’s another picture we can draw to make the point?” Jesus asks rhetorically.

“Perhaps it’s like a mustard seed,” he muses. You put it in the ground as the smallest of seeds. And yet, when it grows, it becomes the biggest bush on the block. It gets so big and bushy that little birds build their nests in its branches and find shelter in the shade. Yes, perhaps that’s a good image of this coming reign of God among us.

How, precisely, is the Kingdom come near like the mustard seed? On the one hand, commentators note the small size of the seed. Hunziger (TDNT VII:289-291) notes that here in Mark 4 and in the “faith like a mustard seed” texts of Matthew 17 and Luke 17, the stress is on the size of the seed.

He writes that this element of the seed was proverbial in Palestine at the time. According to this source, the seed in question is the black mustard seed which works out to about seven hundred seeds to the gram. Perhaps not the smallest seed on earth, but tiny enough indeed.

In Matthew and Luke, the mustard seed parable is yoked with the parable of the leaven. In that pairing, the emphasis is primarily on the growth. Hunziger notes that here in Mark and in the Coptic Gospel of Thomas, the two parables are not connected. The focus in Mark (and Coptic Thomas), therefore, he suggests, is on the smallness of the beginning. The end product is hardly what one would expect from such miniscule start.

Robert Farrar Capon points out that what is sown is the Kingdom, “not something that results from the sowing of a seed other than itself” (Kindle Locations 1201-1202). “The real point of the parable,” Capon writes, “is the marvelous discrepancy between the hiddenness of the kingdom at its sowing and the lush, manifest exuberance of it in its final, totally successful fruition” (Kindle Location 1214). And in light of the previous parable, this “manifest exuberance” does not need our help.

Not only does the Kingdom work in secret and on its own, as noted in the previous parable. The beginnings are hidden from all but the eyes of faith. The Kingdom is present in the work of Jesus, even though that may not be obvious to all. In fact, it is quite easy to mistake the work of the Kingdom for that of Satan, as we saw in last week’s reading.

Jacobsen suggests that the image in the parable shows that the seed’s astonishing growth appears and spreads “all of a sudden.” He notes that one of Mark’s favorite words, “euthus” (immediately) shows up in verse 29. “Mustard seeds have the beautiful quality of being small,” he writes, “but with the ability to spread and take over a field—in Mark’s text, sprawling enough to include shade for all those gentile birds of heaven, too!”

The growth of the mustard bush into a veritable “tree” has political and apocalyptic reverberations as well. “Along the way, the eccentric comparison to a mustard plant provides a little prophetic edginess,” Jacobsen writes, “few powerful nations liked to compare themselves to mustard bushes, but rather to impressive, great cedar trees.” In fact, we find an allegory of the cedar tree in Ezekiel 31 (as well as mention in Ezekiel 17). And in Daniel 4, Nebuchadnezzar dreams of a world tree in the midst of his mental imbalance.

“The mustard seed decolonizes by comparison to mighty cedars,” Jacobsen writes. “The mustard plant is short, scruffy, and small; but it is also in Mark’s sanctified imagination sprawling and sufficient for shade—just like this mysterious Kingdom of God.” Short, scruffy, and small – that’s a description of many Christian congregations these days.

Matt Skinner notes that smallness, sudden growth, and unexpected size are elements of the parabolic point here. The hidden beginning becomes a “public and grand” display, Skinner notes. And the result is not merely an exhibit in God’s horticultural gallery. Rather, he suggests, “creatures will find that it provides them shelter and security.”

Skinner leads us further into the world of the parable. “Those are all important points,” he argues, “but they cannot capture the real energy in this parable. The parable’s punch comes in at least two funny things Jesus says.” Skinner notes that most people would not sow mustard seed as a cash crop. It shows up quite nicely on its own. It has stubborn staying power. It is useful in a variety of ways, but it competes with other crops. “Better be careful what you pray for,” Skinner wars, “when you say, ‘Your kingdom come…’”

The second part of the “joke” in this little parable, according to Skinner, is the description of the result as largest of all the garden shrubs. “At this point, some of his auditors probably snorted and blew milk out of their noses,” Skinner suggests. “Google brassica negra and judge for yourself,” he urges. “It can grow dense, but it is hardly magnificent. Jesus must be grinning as he speaks. He is not aiming to impart insights about the relative worth of shrubberies,” Skinner concludes, “but to shock people into a new way of perceiving greatness.”

Jesus doesn’t point to the noble cedar, as does Ezekiel. Instead, this kingdom parable points to “something more ordinary, and yet also something more able to show up,” Skinner proposes, “to take over inch by inch, and eventually to transform a whole landscape.” What a humorous and hopeful image in a world awash with stories of pompous prats who cannot deal with their own fraudulent failures.

“The reign of God will mess with established boundaries and conventional values,” Skinner observes. “Like a fast-replicating plant, it will get into everything. It will bring life and color to desolate places. It will crowd out other concerns. It will resist our manipulations. Its humble appearance will expose and mock pride and pretentiousness like a good burlesque show.” This will not be welcome news to those who are invested in cedar tree empires. “As a result,” Skinner suggests, “some people will want to burn it all down in a pointless attempt to restore their fields.”

Another element I find compelling in this parable is by and large rejected by scholars. I am struck by the invasive nature of the plant in the parable. That reflects my own farm experience of chopping wild mustard out of our cultivated rows during the summers of my youth. I became well-acquainted with our own variety of the plant and did not appreciate any aspect of it.

Scholars do not find the “invasive” nature of the mustard plant as a proverbial reference in ancient literature of the time. Smallness, yes, but aggressiveness, no. The plant was valued, within limits, for medicinal purposes and as a condiment. While it wasn’t necessary to plant and tend mustard as one would grapes or olives or wheat or barley, it was still useful and was harvested in limited quantities. For all these reasons, scholars suggest that it could not have been regarded in Jesus’ time as an invasive weed.

I think that’s too limited a perspective, as well as an argument from silence. We noted last week that the “invasive” character of God’s Kingdom (as in “home invasion,” for example) is part of Mark’s subtext at least through the Temple Incident. I would suggest that this is sufficient warrant to look for the emphasis here as well.

In addition, we have several useful plants in our vegetable and pollinator gardens that would quickly be regarded as weeds if we did not keep them carefully boxed in. We keep chives and bee balm and phlox in containers. If we didn’t, they would gradually take over large parts of our garden plots – places we have reserved for other species. A weed is a plant “out of place.” We exercise care to keep some plants in their proper places.

What if this is part of the image Jesus uses in the parable? The Kingdom does not stay put. It invades and gradually takes over. In John’s terms, the Wind blows where it wants to blow. The plants grow where they want to grow. In our desire to manage and control our lives, we are often in danger of trying to box in the kingdom and keep it limited to its “proper place.”

I find Sharon Ringe’s words in her workingpreacher.org commentary interesting at this point, although she is focusing on the size and growth potential of the seed. “The almost predatory ability of the mustard plant could crowd out the planned crops of the Romans, even sheltering birds that could be trusted to gobble up more of the carefully planted seeds, no doubt gave a chuckle to people delighted by subverting the economic enterprises supporting Rome’s imperial agenda. Good news: God’s empire has many ways to carry the day over powers bent on their own profit and power!”

The Kingdom among us may well crowd out our own planned church crops and reach out to fowl we wouldn’t welcome on our own. The mustard seed is growing, for example, outside the walls of our church buildings and the boundaries of our worshipping communities, whether we like that or not. Will we chuckle or grumble in God’s garden? Will we regard that extravagant and spontaneous growth as Good News or as weeds to be pulled?

References and Resources

Robert Farrar Capon. Kingdom, Grace, Judgment: Paradox, Outrage, and Vindication in the Parables of Jesus. Kindle Edition.

David Schnasa Jacobsen. https://www.workingpreacher.org/commentaries/revised-common-lectionary/ordinary-11-2/commentary-on-mark-426-34-5.

David Lose. http://www.davidlose.net/2015/06/pentecost-3-b-preach-the-truth-slant/.

Sharon Ringe. https://www.workingpreacher.org/commentaries/revised-common-lectionary/ordinary-11-2/commentary-on-mark-426-34-2.

Matt Skinner. https://www.workingpreacher.org/commentaries/revised-common-lectionary/ordinary-11-2/commentary-on-mark-426-34-4.

Timothy Wenger. Luther’s Small Catechism.

Text Study for Mark 4:26-34 (Pt. 1); 3 Pentecost B 2021

Mark 4:26-34

It’s Automatic

Two weeks ago, our big maple tree in the front yard joined thousands of its relatives in releasing millions of “helicopter” seeds on to our lawns, flower beds, and gardens. Now I remove several dozen little trees every day from said plots. On the one hand, it’s a bit maddening to deal with the proliferation of seedlings. On the other hand, it’s quite marvelous to see this process up close.

The seeds are perfectly designed for their function. As they are released, they flutter out in concentric circles away from the parent tree. If there’s sufficient wind the little helicopters can travel a great distance. Many of them land nose down and tail up, with the growing point of the seed jammed into a bit of loose earth.

The growth process begins almost immediately. Some seeds are lost to squirrels and other rodents who feast on the sylvan manna from heaven. But the sheer number of seeds, the extravagance of the process, ensures that at least some of the progeny will get a chance to grow.

Even as I labor to grow vegetables and flowers and grass – with cultivation, feeding, regular watering, and grudging weeding, I note that these little trees need no such nurturing assistance. They seem to grow quite well, all on their own. Good news for them – and bad news for those of us who have other plans for the dirt.

In “The Parable of the Growing Seed” (Metzger’s title for the section), we read that the Kingdom of God is “as a man who might throw seed upon the earth.” The man then goes about his other business, sleeping and rising night and day. The seed sprouts and grows tall. And the man is not aware of the process, occupied as he is with other things.

Verse twenty-eight captures my interest here. “Automatically the earth bears fruit,” Jesus says, “first the stalk of grain, next the head of grain, next the full head of the grain.” The earth puts forth the fruit of the harvest on its own, without the nurturing attention of the man who sowed the seed. It’s just like those accursed little helicopters who do their work so well.

The word the NRSV translates as “on its own” is “automathe.” Indeed, we get our English words, “automate, automatic, automation,” from this Greek term. We apply the words to machinery in our culture. But in our text, this is the description of seeds, and of the Kingdom of God.

What I learned the hard way is that the answer is easy. Get out of the way. The Holy Spirit wants the Church to grow in any and every way that facilitates the continued coming of the Kingdom of God. We don’t have to “make” the church grow. There’s no cultivation technique or theological fertilizer or ecclesial gardening tool that offers the magic solution. The Kingdom of God is like a seed that grows automatically.

“The inevitability and mystery of the seed’s maturation into a plant that eventually is harvested (an allusion to judgment, characterized as a sudden event by the word euthus in Mark 4:29) provide a vital counterpoint to the more famous parable that dominates Mark 4, a parable about sowing seeds in various soils,” Matt Skinner writes in his workingpreacher.org commentary.

“In that parable, so many seeds fail to bear fruit that one might question God’s commitment to seeing the reign of God blossom,” Skinner continues. “Likewise, as the disciples stumble throughout Mark, one might worry that the wrong people have been entrusted with access to divine knowledge (see Mark 4:11, 33-34).” That describes me and every church I’ve ever been part of.

“But this simple parable offers a counterbalance and reassurance in the face of such concerns,” Skinner observes, “it is the nature of God’s reign to grow and to manifest itself. That’s what it does. As a lamp belongs on a lampstand (Mark 4:21-22), God’s reign, like a seed, must grow, even if untended and even if its gradual expansion is nearly impossible to detect.”

If only we will get out of the way and let the growth happen.

It’s anything but automatic.

In short, we often do everything we can to make sure that growth is anything but “automatic.”

I appreciate David Lose’s words here. The Parable of the Growing Seed “might be about the wonder of faith or the need to be ready to bring in the harvest.” That’s all right as a reading, but it’s probably too comfortable for us by half. “Or,” Lose continues, “it might be about our complete inability to control the coming kingdom, to dictate whether we (and others) believe (or not). This second possibility is uncomfortable because it leaves us vulnerable.”

Now Dr. Lose has moved from preaching to meddling. “God’s kingdom comes apart from our efforts, cannot be controlled or influenced, and can only be received as a gift. In this sense, faith is apparently a lot more like falling in love than making a decision,” he suggests. “Because kingdom-faith, like love, is something that comes from the outside and grabs hold of you, whether you want it to or not.”

Lose reminds me to re-read Luther’s Small Catechism on the Second Petition of the Lord’s Prayer. “In fact, God’s kingdom comes on its own without our prayer,” Luther writes, “but we ask in this prayer that it may also come to us.” Luther urges us to wonder how this happens and then responds to that wondering. God’s Kingdom comes “whenever our heavenly Father gives us his Holy Spirit, so that through the Holy Spirit’s grace we believe God’s holy word and live godly lives here in time and hereafter in eternity” (page 36, my emphasis).

I don’t know if Luther was thinking about this little parable as he wrote the Catechism. The language that I emphasized above is the same in his translation of Mark 4:28 and the meaning of the Second Petition. He is clear that this “automatic” growth, i.e., the coming of the Kingdom of God, is the work of the Holy Spirit in us, among us, and through us (we are in the Sundays after Pentecost, remember).

Lose notes that this may be good news especially for those who don’t fit our preconceived categories of the “right sort of people” who ought to come to our churches. Many of those over the years who came to me begging for the magic bullet of church growth were also those in favor of such growth as long as the new people were like the existing folks and the new people brought with them no demands for destabilizing change.

No church will grow under such conditions. “We who have achieved a relative amount of education and position and income and status don’t like much to think about this,” Lose reminds us, “but the original followers of Jesus were, in the eyes of the culture, all pretty much losers – lowly fishermen, despised tax collectors, prostitutes and criminals, lowlifes loathed by the religious establishment. Maybe that’s the way the followers of Jesus have always looked to the rest of the world,” he concludes, “those people desperate enough, lowly enough, to find hope in Jesus’ message of the kingdom.”

Of course, I am – if I would for once tell myself the truth – among those desperate enough, lowly enough, to find hope in Jesus’ message of the kingdom.” That’s the beginning of the mystery. After that, perhaps, it’s automatic.

References and Resources

Robert Farrar Capon. Kingdom, Grace, Judgment: Paradox, Outrage, and Vindication in the Parables of Jesus. Kindle Edition.

David Schnasa Jacobsen. https://www.workingpreacher.org/commentaries/revised-common-lectionary/ordinary-11-2/commentary-on-mark-426-34-5.

David Lose. http://www.davidlose.net/2015/06/pentecost-3-b-preach-the-truth-slant/.

Matt Skinner. https://www.workingpreacher.org/commentaries/revised-common-lectionary/ordinary-11-2/commentary-on-mark-426-34-4.

Timothy Wenger. Luther’s Small Catechism.