11th Sunday in Ordinary Time

Readings: Ezekiel 17:22-24; 2 Corinthians 5:6-10; Mark 4:26-34

VIDEO

“With many such parables
he spoke the word to them.”
So, what exactly is a parable?
Well, it is kind of hard to say.
We typically think of a parable as a story
that is supposed to teach us something. 
And certainly some of the most famous 
parables of Jesus are stories,
like the good Samaritan or the prodigal son.
In the Gospels, however, some things 
that get called parables
are not really stories at all,
but more like proverbial sayings:
“if one blind person guides another, 
both will fall into a pit.”
And sometimes, as in today’s Gospel
a parable is a simple comparisons:
the kingdom of God is like 
how a tiny mustard seed
grows into a large plant.

Moreover, what exactly it is 
that the parables are supposed to teach us
is not always clear.
In the Gospels, 
one thing all the parables seem to share
is that they confuse their hearers.
This is true even of the parables that seem
to convey clear moral lessons.
We might think that 
the parable of the good Samaritan
is telling us to come to the aid 
of those who are in need,
but to Jesus’ Jewish audience
the very idea of a good Samaritan
would have been baffling 
and even scandalous,
like a story about a good terrorist.
And a seemingly clear bit of advice—
don’t let blind people 
lead other blind people around—
prompts his followers to say,
“Explain this parable to us,”
perhaps because they were wondering
who it was that were supposed to be blind leaders.
And even today’s parables about growing seeds
seem to cause some sort of confusion,
since Jesus has to explain them later 
to his disciples in private.

One commentator I read stated,
“Each parable… contains one main point 
that is its basic message.”
But this is clearly wrong.
Parables seem to invite 
multiple interpretations,
even conflicting interpretations.
Rather than delivery devices 
for a basic message,
the parables of Jesus serve 
as instruments of perplexity,
mean of making us ponder,
ways of revealing to us 
just how little we understand
about God and the ways of his kingdom.
They are less likely to make us say,
“Oh, now I get it”
than to prompt us to ask,
“Do I really understand 
what is going on at all?”

Today’s Gospel reading
explicitly calls our attention 
to the limits of our understanding:
the farmer doesn’t know 
what hidden process
leads the tiny seed under the earth
to sprout and grow into such a large plant.
It prompts us to ask:
if the power of a seed to grow 
is hidden from us,
how much more hidden 
is the power of God’s kingdom?
If we are startled by the contrast 
between the smallness of the seed 
that we put in the earth
and the greatness the plant that grows from it,
a plant in which 
the birds of the sky can find a home,
how much more startling is the contrast
between the dead body of Jesus, 
planted in the tomb,
and the immensity of the kingdom 
that springs forth from it in his resurrection,
a kingdom of people drawn 
from every land and nation,
every culture and way of life?

The mind cannot comprehend such mysteries.
Those who await the fulness of God’s reign
must learn how to live 
with perplexity and mystery,
must learn, as Paul put it, 
to “walk by faith and not by sight,”
to trust in Jesus to lead them 
through the darkness of unknowing
into the light of the Kingdom.
Parables show us just how much
we do not know,
how constricted our imaginations are,
how much we must walk 
by faith and hope and love
and not by sight,
how much we must rely on Jesus 

to guide us through the darkness. 

Speaking for myself,
I find that the more I ponder 
God’s ways in the world
the more perplexed my mind becomes,
the more I realize how much

I don’t know about by own life,
where it comes from and where it is going.
Our lives are a parable 
that God is telling,
and as with the parables in the Gospels,
we at best half-understand them.
In our lives we are often perplexed
as to what God’s point is,
what God is up to,
where God is leading us.
Why is there so much hatred 
and violence in the world?
How in the midst of violence and hatred
are people still capable of great acts of love?
Why have I lost someone I love to death?
What have I ever done to deserve
such faithful friends and family?
Why have my hopes and dreams
not come to pass?

The Gospel today tells us,
“to his own disciples 
he explained everything in private.”
Perhaps in this life
we will never find answers
to the questions that perplex us.
But in the midst of perplexity and unknowing
Jesus speaks to those who follow him
in the secret recesses of their hearts,
and if we turn to him in prayer
we will receive,
if not always an explanation, 
at least a word of consolation,
a word of encouragement,
a word that can strengthen us
to continue to follow him on the way.
For he is the way,
and our life is a seed we have been given,
a seed we have been asked to plant in faith,
a seed that must die with Christ 
and be buried with him, 
so that something that is
beyond our power to imagine
can grow from it.
We walk by faith and not by sight,
but we walk with Jesus,
and he will lead us.
So let us pray that God,
who is merciful,
would have mercy on us all.

11th Sunday in Ordinary Time

Readings: Ezekiel 17: 22-24; 2 Corinthians 5:6-10; Mark 4:26-34

“We walk by faith, not by sight.”
St. Paul’s reminder to the Christians at Corinth
is a reminder to us as well.
In part it is a reminder that all of us
navigate our day-to-day lives 
on the basis of things we believe to be true
although we cannot prove them:
that our parents have given us an accurate account 
of where and when we were born,
that our spouses are faithful and our friends honest,
that our 401k accounts will still have value when we retire.
These beliefs are more than simply 
unfounded convictions about what is true;
they are convictions that grow 
from a judgment of trustworthiness:
that our parents are reliable reporters 
of events we cannot remember,
that our spouses and friends 
are the people that they present themselves to be,
that people in general will behave in such a way
that societal collapse will not happen in our lifetime.
Without this kind of trust, we simply cannot function
on a day-to-day basis.

But Paul here is speaking not about this day-to-day trust
that we depend on in walking through life,
but about a trust that can take us to the very edge of life,
a faith by which we can pass over from this life 
to our destiny in God’s kingdom,
destination to our journey that we cannot see
but in which we believe 
because we trust Jesus,
who came into our world 
proclaiming the news of God’s reign.

We walk by faith and not by sight,
not simply because our sight is defective—
limited by our finitude and wounded by our sin—
but because the destination toward which we walk
is so surpassingly glorious, 
so dazzling in beauty 
that our minds are blinded by its light.
We can use terms like “heaven” 
or “eternal life” or “kingdom of God,”
or, if we really want to sound impressive, 
“beatific vision,”
but the fact is that we don’t have clear sight
of exactly what those terms might mean,
so far does the reality of which they speak 
surpass our ordinary experience.

In the parables in today’s Gospel, 
Jesus underscores both 
the hiddenness of God’s kingdom
and its surpassing glory.
In the first parable, the growth of God’s kingdom
is compared to the growth of plants
that begins beneath the earth, 
out of our sight
and, above all, out of our control.
If Jesus were preaching in Baltimore today,
he might have spoken about the Brood X cicadas,
which lie hidden in the earth,
only to emerge with shocking suddenness after 17 years.
But whether cicadas or plants the point is the same:
we must trust that the reign of God is growing, 
even if we cannot always see it,
even if we cannot control it,
and that we must make ourselves ready
for the day of its appearing.

In the second parable, 
Jesus compares the kingdom of God
to the mustard plant that grows from a small seed.
For most of us, a seed is a seed,
and tells us little about the plant that it will produce.
The size of the seed does not correspond 
to the size of the plant that will grow from it,
so you need to know more about the seed
than what your eyes can tell you
in order to know that the mustard seed 
will become a plant that “puts forth large branches,
so that the birds of the sky can dwell in its shade.”
If, however, those that you trust 
to know more than you do about plants
assure you that such a thing will come to pass,
you should believe it 
even if you can only dimly grasp 
the reality they are describing.

To walk by faith is to put your trust Jesus,
the Word of God made flesh,
when he tells you God’s reign 
is both hidden and glorious.
For he alone has seen the eternal kingdom
that will spring from the seeds of faith
that he has planted;
he alone walks by sight 
and can lead us to that glorious destiny,
a destiny we cannot control or even imagine.
We have no map we can look at
to give us an overview
of the way we must walk 
to God’s kingdom.
But we do see Jesus, 
who is the Way that we follow.

In planting a seed, you surrender it to the soil,
and hand over control of its development.
The promise is that the plant that grows
will be unimaginably greater than the seed,
but only if you first consign the seed 
to the hidden places of the earth.
On the journey to God’s kingdom
we surrender ourselves to Jesus,
the one in whom we trust.
We let our lives be hidden in Christ;
we hand over control of our lives in faith,
the faith that Jesus is the Way
that leads to a life far surpassing 
the tiny seed of faith from which it grows.
Let us walk with Jesus to the reign of God,
walk by faith and not by sight,
and may the God in whom we trust 
have mercy on us all.