How Would Jesus Garden?

July 10, 2005 (Eighth Sunday after Epiphany - Proper 10)

By The Rev. Benjamin J. Newland

- Isaiah 55:1-5,10-13
- Psalm 65:9-14
- Romans 8:9-17
- Matthew 13:1-9,18-23

(From The Lectionary Page)

I like gardening. I like the idea of gardening: of taking a fixed space and by honest, hands-on labor making it into a platonic ideal of nature. I love the idea of a quiet, ordered place in which to relax and gaze upon the beauty of wild things acting politely to one another because I have convinced them to do so. If I could live in a home surrounded by colorful flowers, organic vegetables, and soft pebbled paths leading past cool miniature waterfalls I would be very happy indeed.

Unfortunately, I'm not very good at gardening. I can keep houseplants alive as long as they aren't too particular. I enjoy watering things in the morning, and the occasional weekend of good hard work. The problem is that I'm far too inconsistent to make a good gardener. The one weekend of work is great, but I may not get the urge to garden for then next couple weeks, and by then the weeds have very nearly won. I like watering the plants on a cool, unhurried morning after my jog, but there really aren't that many cool, unhurried mornings in the end, and the plants want water regardless. I like gardening, it's just that it's too far down my priority list for me to be good at it.

I'm not worried though, because Jesus wasn’t very good at gardening either. One of the most popular contemporary tretises on theology can be summed up in four letters: WWJD. This stands for “What Would Jesus Do?” and serves to make people feel like they have an answer for whatever comes their way. If you like gardening though, I recommend that you avoid this particular theology. Let’s say you were in your yard and wanted to plant some carrots. You have the seeds in your hand and are about to place them carefully in the neatly laid out and labeled rows you’ve prepared in your vegetable patch. But then you look down at your hand and see that nice new WWJD ring your friend gave you. “Well,” you think, “what would Jesus do?” Then you toss all the carrot seeds up in the air and walk down the street to the bar to find some sinners to drink with. Sure, some of the carrots seeds fell in your vegetable patch and will probably sprout up later. But half the seeds landed on the patio for the birds to eat, and a bunch fell on the grass where the weed and feed will kill them, and a goodly few went over the fence so your neighbor will get to eat those. Thanks a lot Jesus.

In a remarkable feat of lectionary synergy, even the psalm in this week’s lectionary is about gardening. The psalmist goes on and on about the abundant earth, and grain and soft ground, the endless waters of God. Fields are made rich for grazing and meadows cloaked in flocks and grain. The agricultural exuberance is nearly overwhelming.

Paul seems to have missed the boat though. He’s still going on and on about death in his letter to the Romans. I can only imagine how the Romans must have felt getting this letter. Having not met Paul yet (he sent the letter ahead of himself) they must have wondered why he was so obsessed with death. They’d no doubt already heard about the Christian practices of cannibalism rumored on the streets of the Empire’s capitol. They probably figured Paul was working on a recipe book for filleted Roman citizen in a nice béchamel sauce.

It’s not really death that Paul is obsessed with though. Paul is obsessed with life, and an abundance of life unprecedented in his experience. He walks through his world in stunned amazement at the incredible truth he has perceived. Jesus died, sure, but we are alive! Now more so than ever.

The lectionary readings are not about gardening at all, of course. It makes for a witty bit of writing, but I’m afraid I've been a bit misleading. Abundance is the word of the day, and in this case Isaiah says it better than Jesus. “Everyone who thirsts, come to the waters; and you that have no money, come, buy and eat!” The poet abandons the normally cloaked speech of prophecy and speaks plainly for once. If you are hungry, have a bite. If you are thirsty, take a drink. The bar is free and the buffet always open. When God invites you to a party (and you were invited), there will be plenty of refreshment and entertainment for all. The word of God goes out into our lives, and it will not return empty handed. If you refuse to come to the party, ten street people will be invited in your place. Only they were already invited too, so just come along, will you?

The message here is plenty. Life is not a zero sum game. You can have more, and so can everyone else. There is no limit to the amount of life available, so take all you want. Even economists will occasionally try this idea out, saying that while resources on this planet may be limited, wealth is not, as it is created by our work and our impression of value. This works only so well in economics, where we are all pretty much convinced that in order to have more money someone else has got to have less. But the concept works wonders for God. Live it up: life is bottomless. Free refills, on the house.

That’s what Jesus meant with the whole sower parable too, I think. It’s not good advice for gardeners, so it must have been meant for a wider audience. The point is not the seeds that get eaten, or strangled, or dried out. The point is the seeds that grew, and multiplied, and became an abundance. God has plenty of seed. There is no need to worry about supply shortages, or a bit of waste here or there.

The thing is, as Jesus explains to the disciples later, the seeds are the word of God and the ground is our hearts. And we all have stony places in our heart where the seeds cannot thrive. And we all have hearts that will, on occasion, refuse to listen. And we all have a thorny part to our heart, where greed and hate and despair can choke even the word of God. It doesn’t matter though, because we also have good soil in there somewhere, and the seeds of God will find a place to root, and grow strong and plenteous. And Jesus has plenty of seeds. He’ll keep tossing them your way, until something takes root. That’s “what Jesus would do.” Just don’t ask him to help plant your vegetable garden. AMEN.