If

Sermon on Mark 4:26-34 offered to the people of the Church of the Redeemer in Bryn Mawr, Pennsylvania.

In 1895, Rudyard Kipling offered some paternal advice in the form of a poem entitled “If.” The poem covers a whole range of topics: “If you can wait and not be tired by waiting…If you can dream—and not make dreams your master…If you can meet with Triumph and Disaster…If you can talk with crowds and keep your virtue.” This long series of increasingly challenging antecedents ends with Kipling saying, “then you will be a man.” Though this poem has become standard fodder for graduation cards, it has a wistful quality. These four stanzas articulate a nearly impossible standard; it is as though Kipling is saying, “I wish I had been able to do all this; perhaps you can.” This attitude tends to prevail whenever we ask “what if” questions. Invariably, we are asking them because we wish things had turned out differently, because we wonder where we went wrong, or because we know that nothing about our lives can really change.

This morning, we hear Jesus asking some “what if” questions while using one of his most well-worn teaching techniques. While parables were not an uncommon way to get one’s point across in the ancient world, Jesus raises them to an entirely new level in the gospels. Indeed, in the passage we read this morning, Mark tells us that Jesus speaks to certain audiences only in parables, that all of his teaching is packaged in these cryptic stories. The ubiquity of these parables has some interesting consequences for the way we interpret them. For the most part, we tend to read the parables of Jesus as allegories: we try to figure out who each character in the story is supposed to be. Origen, the great third century theologian, takes this way of reading parables to its logical extreme. In his allegorical interpretation the parable of the Good Samaritan, for instance, Origen suggests that the man who was going down the road is Adam, Jerusalem is paradise, Jericho is the world, the robbers are the hostile powers, the priest is the Law, the Levite is the prophets, the Samaritan is Christ, the wounds are disobedience, the pack animal is the Lord’s body, the inn is the Church, you get the idea. While this wooden way of interpreting parables can be interesting, even fun, I think that it misses the point of what the parables of Jesus are supposed to accomplish. The word parable comes from the Greek words for “toss alongside.” A parable is something we hold up next to a situation in order to see what unexpected truths might be revealed. The parables of Jesus, in other words, are not allegorical stories that describe the world as it is; they are lenses through which we can see the world in an entirely new way.

This is particularly true in the seed parables from the fourth chapter of Mark. Jesus himself indicates that these images are meant to be held up alongside the subject we are considering. “With what can we compare the kingdom of God?” he asks. “What parable will we use for it?” Jesus’ tone is intriguing. Rather than articulating definitively what the kingdom of God is like, Jesus offers propositions, asking his audience,“What if the kingdom of God is like this?” Now the kingdom of God is one of those biblical images that has become somewhat muddled since the time of Jesus. Most of us assume that it is simply shorthand for “heaven,” which of course, has become shorthand for “the place you go when you die.” The kingdom of God, in other words, is not something that we think about with any regularity. For Jesus and his hearers, however, the kingdom of God was an ever present reality, the hope of every faithful Israelite. It was the promise that God would break the yoke of oppression and rule with justice and equity. More than a few zealots attempted to bring the kingdom of God into being on their own, only to be violently thwarted by the Roman occupiers. “Kingdom of God,” in other words, was a loaded term that connoted rebellion and sweeping social change. So in many ways, the prosaic images Jesus uses to describe the kingdom of God are unexpected, even shocking. First, he wonders aloud if the way that seeds germinate and grow overnight can help us think about God’s reign. With this parable, Jesus invites us to consider whether the arrival of God’s kingdom is something that happens without our knowledge or influence, much to the surprise of Israel’s violent rebels. Jesus further ponders whether the kingdom of God can be compared with a mustard seed, which though very small, produces a significant shrub. Most gardeners consider mustard to be a weed; once mustard takes root, it is incredibly difficult to remove. By using this image, Jesus asks us to consider both the tenacity and the ordinariness of God’s kingdom. What’s interesting is that Jesus uses these examples not to make concrete statements about the nature of God’s reign, but to fire our imaginations, to help us envision how God is working in the world.

If this is what these parables are meant to do, we cannot stop there. If Jesus is asking “What if the kingdom of God is like this?” the implicit next question is “what difference would that make?” In other words, if these parables are meant to give us a new way of looking at the world, we have to ask ourselves what it means for us to see the world in this new way. What if the kingdom of God is like the sprouting of a seed? What if the kingdom of God is like an invasive plant species? How would that change the way we think about God? How would that change the way we live our lives? Would we be more attentive to the thousands of tiny ways that God’s glory is revealed to us? Would we look for signs of the kingdom in places we would not normally expect? Would we trust that God is working God’s purpose out? Would we be more confident that the earth will be filled with the glory of God as the waters cover the sea?

Human beings tend to be creatures of habit. We like to find a routine and stick with it. We move through this life assuming that everything will essentially stay the same, that there is nothing new under the sun, that nothing about our lives can really change. For us, asking “what if” questions is generally an exercise in nostalgia. With these parables, however, Jesus challenges us think about how our “what ifs” can become reality. Jesus invites us to dream of a world that radiates the glory of God. He encourages us to wonder whether the most uninteresting moments of our lives can somehow be signposts for God’s kingdom. Jesus asks us to ponder how the world can change if we just look at it differently, if we see it not as a hopeless place of despair and suffering, but as a beautiful place that is charged with God’s grandeur. Jesus invites us to look for beauty in unlovely places, to claim joy in desperate moments, and to celebrate life even the face of death. Jesus invites all of us to wonder: what if the kingdom of God was like you and me challenging expectations and revealing God’s glory to the world?

Bearing Fruit

Sermon on Matthew 21:23-32 offered to the people of the Church of the Redeemer in Bryn Mawr, Pennsylvania.  Audio for this sermon may be found here.

In the backyard of the house where I grew up, there was an enormous pear tree.  Regrettably, this did not mean I got to eat fresh pears regularly.  Since the tree was so large, the fruit it produced was completely out of reach until it dropped from the branches to the ground.  Unfortunately, once the pears hit the ground, they either rotted almost immediately or were consumed by squirrels.  Thus, around this time every year, my family had to collect these inedible pears and throw them away.  This task had no redeeming qualities whatsoever.  The air would be redolent with that sickeningly sweet smell of rotting fruit, we would stoop until our backs ached, we would tenuously pick up those squishy pears so that the rotting flesh wouldn’t explode all over our clothes, and we would throw the woebegone fruit into battered aluminum trash cans that became so heavy they required three people to move them.  Picking up pears is easily the most thankless, uncomfortable, and mind-numbing chore that I remember from my childhood.

It goes without saying that my younger brother and I dreaded the day we had to pick up pears.  We dealt with the arrival of this day in different ways.  My brother, who is more confrontational by nature, tended to shout something like, “I’m not picking up another pear as long as I live,” at breakfast, only to drift outside by midmorning in order to be helpful.  I, on the other hand, would dutifully acquiesce to my parents’ instructions, saying something like, “Of course; it is my joy to serve you,” only to fritter away the day procrastinating.  By the time I would emerge from the house, my exhausted family would point to the trash barrels full of pears, while I had nothing to show but my empty promises.

Expeditus, patron saint of procrastinators. His feast day is April 19th, or whenever you get around to it.

Given my history of procrastination when it comes to household chores, today’s gospel reading resonates with me.  In fact, the parable that Jesus tells was a favorite of my father, especially on days when I was particularly lazy.  In his interpretation, I was the son who said “I go, sir,” but did not go, whereas my brother was the defiant, yet ultimately obedient son.  It would seem that my father’s use of this parable was effective; I still feel pangs of guilt when I hear this passage from Matthew’s gospel.  But I wonder whether there was a level at which we both missed the point of Jesus’ parable.  Our understanding of this story assumed that it was akin to one of Aesop’s fables, that it had a self-evident moral.  Fables, however, are very different from parables.  While fables tend to be literally minded and focused on proper behavior, parables hold a mirror to our lives.  Parables expose something about who we are rather than how we should behave.  Jesus uses parables not only to illuminate and expand his teaching but also to reveal to us something about the character of God.

So, what is it that Jesus is trying to illuminate with this parable?  He relates this story in the midst of an exchange with the religious authorities, who begin by asking Jesus, “By what authority are you doing these things and who gave you this authority?”  Keep in mind that the “thing” they are referring to is the Temple incident, when Jesus turns over the tables of the moneychangers.  Their question about Jesus’ authority, in other words, is not entirely unreasonable or unwarranted.  “Who do you think you are?” is essentially what the chief priests and elders are asking.  But in typical fashion, Jesus answers their question with a question of his own: “Did the baptism of John come from heaven, or was it of human origin?”  His point is clear: well, where did John the Baptist derive his authority?  Like the good politicians they are, the chief priests and elders plead ignorance.  As a result, Jesus refuses to tell them where his authority comes from and continues with an apparent non sequitur, telling his audience a story about two brothers who are sent to work in the vineyard.

Though Jesus seems to change the subject, however, there is one key detail about this parable that connects it to the rest of the exchange.  Notice that the two brothers are sent out to work in a vineyard, to cultivate and bear fruit.  And remember that in Matthew’s gospel, the theme of bearing fruit comes up over and over again.  For instance, John the Baptist’s charge to those who gather by the Jordan is to “bear fruit worthy of repentance.”  Then there’s the moment the moment when John sends his disciples to ask Jesus if he is indeed the one who is to come.  Instead of saying “Yes, absolutely; I’m the Messiah,” Jesus points to the fruit his ministry has borne: “the blind receive their sight, the lame walk, the lepers are cleansed, the deaf hear, the dead are raised, and poor have good news brought to them.”  So by telling this parable of two brothers sent to cultivate a vineyard, Jesus affirms that his authority is derived from the fruits of his ministry.  Ultimately, this is Jesus’ response to the initial question of the chief priests and elders.  He explains that his authority emanates not from his title or his lineage, but from the fact that the disobedient, the tax collectors and prostitutes, have turned from their sinful ways and have reoriented their lives in relationship to God.  This authority that is derived from bearing fruit is set up in contrast to authority of the chief priests and elders.  The traditional religious authorities assume that their position of power is unassailable, that the mere accident of birth empowers them to mediate between God and humanity.  Jesus challenges this assumption, insisting that true spiritual authority is derived from the fruit we bear.  Just as I thought the empty promise of labor would cement my status as the obedient son, the chief priests and elders imagine their membership in a particular family guarantees their authority.  And just as my brother actually showed himself to be the obedient son with that full barrel of pears, Jesus demonstrates his true authority by pointing to those whose lives have been transformed by the gospel proclamation.

Now, it might seem that the message of this parable is that one must accomplish a certain set of tasks, that one must bear a certain amount of fruit in order to be considered spiritual.  Remember, however, that the primary purpose of Jesus’ parables is to reveal something about the nature of God.  And just as the authority of Jesus is made known in the fruit he bears, in the lives he transforms, God’s nature is made known in the fruit God bears, and that fruit that is ultimately revealed to us in the death and resurrection of Jesus Christ.  In the cross and empty tomb, our God experiences the beauty and pain of human life, but also promises that there is hope even in the midst of despair.  Thus, as a people who have been redeemed by Christ’s death and resurrection, a people renewed by the fruit of God’s redemptive love, we are called to bear fruit that is shaped by the reality of the resurrection, to recognize that there is always hope, to build for the kingdom even in the midst of devastation, to insist that joy can conquer despair.  Our lives are meant to be signs that point to the power of God’s resurrection love.  In the end, we are meant to be the fruit by which others may know the promise of God’s redemption.