June 18, 2006
(Second Sunday after Pentecost; Proper 6)

Finishing Rich

  by The Rev. Canon Linda Yeager, Canon Deacon

Ezekiel 31:1-6,10-14  •  Psalm 92 or 92:1-4,11-14  •  2 Corinthians 5:1-10  •  Mark 4:26-34
(From The Lectionary Page)

When I was on a plane flight recently, a young couple across the aisle was assiduously studying a book together. I noticed their intense interest and glanced at the title. The name of the book was Smart Couples Finish Rich. Smart Couples Finish Rich. Hmmmm. That title conjured up all kinds of images for me, so when I got home, I clicked on Amazon.com* and found information about this book. As you might have guessed, this is a book on financial planning, and the author, David Bach, who has also written such books as Smart Women Finish Rich and The Automatic Millionaire, is well known these days, so well known that if you want to know more about him, I discovered, you can watch him on Oprah in July.

I admit that I was troubled a bit by the title of the book. Certainly, I believe that financial planning is not only helpful but also scriptural; nevertheless, I’m not sure that I like the idea that wealth should be our goal or even that financial success and being rich equate. Anyway, I had this on my mind as I planned for today’s sermon. This is a Sunday, indeed “rich” in opportunity. Not only is it Father’s Day and the Sunday of General Convention, our church’s triennial meeting to plan and discuss issues and events of the Episcopal Church, but we also have a baptism at our 10:15 service this morning. In a way, all these events are related to one another and to today’s scripture selections.

First, let’s take a brief look at the Ezekiel passage and its beautiful description of a majestic tree. Judah has been defeated, its leaders sent in exile to Babylon. The future looks bleak. In the midst of its hopelessness, however, comes this passage of hope. The message is allegorical, of course, and the tree represents earthly magnificence, specifically Assyria in this case, a world power. The tree looks distinguished and impenetrable: it is large, towering, and offers allure, abundance, comfort even, much as the lures of our life offers us. The message, of course, is that this imposing tree, this great nation, is not independent and cannot live on its own resources. Unless the roots are deep and strong, they do not gather sustenance and they do not provide a foundation for this mighty structure. The proud tree in the latter part of the passage is laid low. Assyria falls. Magnificence--appearance alone--does not offer ultimate shelter. It is the strength of the roots that offers strength for the journey. And this strength does not come from worldly devices.

I find, of course, this message applicable to all the issues we are considering today. For fathers and mothers in the nurturing of their children, for the church as if faces the issues it is dealing with at Convention this week, and for those who are responsible for the life and nurture of little Timothy Jackson, who will be baptized, worldly lures present themselves. Wealth, possessions, power, prestige, pleasures, and self-interest constantly entice us away from what truly sustains our roots. We are tempted to take refuge in the easy way, the comfortable way, the acceptable way. We want to fit in, to be part of the culture, to gain acceptance from our peers and from society. Yet we are pledged through our faith and the promises we make in our Baptismal Covenant to “proclaim by word and example the Good News of God in Christ,” to “seek and serve Christ in all persons, loving your neighbor as yourself,” and to “strive for justice and peace among all people, and respect the dignity of every human being.” How can we serve Christ in all persons, love our neighbors as ourselves, strive for justice and peace and respect the dignity of every human being when life is so unbalanced, when so many of us have so much and so many more of us have so little? How can we proclaim by word and example the Good News of God in Christ when we are too busy building our own fortunes? The decisions we make as Christians are rooted in the vows we make in our baptismal covenant.

We listen to Paul in his second letter to the Corinthians: Paul believes that what is unseen has more validity than that which is seen. He tells the Church in Corinth, “We walk by faith, not by sight . . . we make it our aim to please (Christ).” Paul encourages the Corinthians and us to be “in Christ” even while we are in the world. Try as we might, we cannot be “in Christ” when we are self-serving, when we find fault with the brother or sister who disagrees with us and so become estranged from one another, or when we give in to what we truly don’t believe when the pressure gets too intense.

Mark also gets agricultural in the gospel passage, referring to the tiny mustard seed that grows into a great bush. This is the most encouraging of all the passages today, for it gives power to those who often feel powerless. God works through families and individuals and those who walk with Christ and in Christ, no matter how little the world acknowledges or honors them or their actions. Think about how encouraging this passage was to those in the early church. Who would have believed that those faithful few who were believers in the beginning, after Christ’s death, resurrection, and ascension, could take the message of God’s love through Christ and spread the good news so that it would take root and grow and spread throughout the world and throughout the ages? What courage did it take for them to resist the temptation to give in to the culture of the times and to face persecution and even martyrdom for their beliefs? They pursued because of the strength of their beliefs and the fervor of their hearts. And that power is available to us, too.

This brings me back to the problem of Smart Couples Finish Rich. I think that smart couples can finish rich, as can smart fathers and mothers, and smart churches. Semantics are the issue here. To be smart, at least by one dictionary definition, is to show quick intelligence or ready mental capability. So, if one has been gifted by God with a sharp mind, then one certainly can plan one’s life with specific goals in mind. And if one goal is to finish rich, I suggest that the richest people I know are those who have lived their lives with Christ and in Christ and who have resisted and rejected temptations to worldly goods and current trends, who have set their goals with the baptismal covenant in mind.

Tim Russert, managing editor of Meet the Press, has recently published a book of excerpts from letters he has received from daughters and sons speaking of their fathers. The book is called Wisdom of Our Fathers: Lessons and Letters from Daughters and Sons. It’s a very readable book of true family stories, and one of the stories seemed pertinent to today’s lessons. It is called “The Mail” and I offer it in abridged form. It is the story of a father who was a rural mail carrier in southwestern Michigan. He worked faithfully and lovingly in this job, ministering to his patrons. For example, one lady who was nearly blind had no mailbox, so he took the mail in to her every day and read it to her and helped her pay her bills. On Thursdays, he read the local paper to her. He would take deliveries from one patron to another and once buttons in exchange for stamps. His son speaks of returning to his home town at the time of his father’s death. The postmaster stopped by the house to offer condolences and said, “What are we going to do about the letters this Christmas?” “The letters?” the man’s son asked. The postmaster responded, “Remember, when you were a kid and you would put your letters to Santa in those green and red boxes on Main Street? It was your dad who answered all those letters that the kids wrote every year.” The seeds of love that were planted by this man’s father took root in the lives of those he served, and we cannot know the growth of this planting. We can never be daunted by small beginnings. With patience and participation, small kindnesses can change the world.

If you go into Haden Hall, you will see some exciting new activities for our children—in addition to our new playground. The children’s education coordinator and her team have set up in Haden Hall a miniature Kansas City Community Kitchen and a little Maison de Naissance, the birthing center we help sponsor in Haiti, complete with babies and food and all the accessories that go with these outreach missions. I pray that as the children explore these centers and pretend that they are serving in these outreach opportunities, they can be encouraged by all of us to find the joy that comes from walking with Christ and in Christ, that kind of joy that will help them want to share with others all their lives. (And I pray that little Jackson’s parents, godparents, grandparents, family, and friends will remember the promises they make today—that all of us make today in the baptismal covenant—and encourage Jackson to have the opportunities to grow in Christ and with Christ and to find the joy that this kind of life brings.) And I pray that our church, which has at its heart the good news of Christ’s love for all, will have the courage and determination to walk with Christ and in Christ as they make decisions for us and elect a new Presiding Bishop—that the business of the church can reflect the mission of the church. And I encourage each of us to pray for families, for children, and for the church with sincerity and hope. If we plan our lives with those goals, we will all finish rich.

* (Links were added by the Webmaster for your browsing convenience, not as an endorsement of the books or anything else.)

---

A Seed of Hope

by The Rev. Carol Sanford, Curate

Jesus says, “With what can we compare the kingdom of God, or what parable will we use for it?”

Before having a look at how Jesus answers that question, I’d like to mention an exercise in communication that some of you may be familiar with. It goes like this:

Using words only, explain to someone who has never heard of baseball how it is that a person swings a bat and hits a ball.

The first time I heard this, I tried it. I stood, with my arms at my sides, and began trying to describe the action of swinging a bat. Let’s see, you pick up the bat and raise your arms about chest high with the bat sticking out in front of you, and then move your arms over to the right in a straight line then tilt the bat up at the end and…. No, wait, first I have to describe the bat. OK, a bat is a long, rounded piece of wood that has a sort of knob on one end, and, oh yes, someone throws an orb covered in leather toward you and …

It didn’t take long for me to give up on trying for the verbal descriptions and to long for the ease and freedom of demonstration. I could say that baseball is sort of like hockey played in the air and expand on that, but I can do a better job teaching baseball in one moment of demonstrating a swing than I could with hours of explanation. It is infinitely better if I can show you a swing and then hand you the bat.

It’s hard work, describing the indescribable.

It’s the work of journalists on the front lines in war, and of novelists seeking to tell us about life in a particular time and place, and it is the work of poets and artists and musicians.

This attempt to describe what can only be understood through experience, is also the work those who want to communicate about God, people like hymn writers and theologians and liturgists and organists and, of course, the writers of our Holy Scriptures.

The Bible shows us a Jesus who understands that story is better than description, demonstration is better than story, and trying it ourselves is more effective than just watching someone else. This is as true in our life with God as it is in baseball.  Jesus told parables, but he lived the life he was telling about, and then he told us to go and do likewise.

In our gospel tonight, he goes straight to metaphor and parable; straight to story. The kingdom of God, he says, is like a tiny mustard seed which, when sown, grows up and puts forth large, sheltering branches where birds can nest.

Ancient texts used the imagery of great trees as symbols of powerful nations, as with the cedars of Lebanon. I didn’t know this as a child when I looked at the tiny yellow speck of mustard seed encased in a small plastic ball that someone had given to me. I knew that it represented big things growing out of small of seeds, but I really thought of it as some kind of weird religious good-luck charm.

In Jesus’ day, a mustard seed would not have been a favorable token. In fact, Jesus may have been using a bit of humor to get his point across in this parable of the Kingdom of God. He used the standard tree language of a powerful kingdom of overarching dominion and sheltering provision, but with a twist.

In Jesus’ day, mustard was often considered a weed, due to its tenacity. If a mustard seed fell into your field, you would be hard pressed to get rid of it. The parable in our day might sound something like this: The kingdom of God is like a dandelion seed that grows and sends out great branches that shelter the birds in their nests.

So, where is the good news in comparing the realm of God to a flourishing dandelion?

The good news is that the kingdom of God is not easily eradicated, and that it will sneak in even where it is unwanted and where efforts have been made to keep it out.

The kingdom of God can also be like an annoying weed when it gets in the way of our plans. It can be disturbing and challenging and frustrating in its intrusiveness because it can, like dandelions and mustard plants, crowd out and take over what we are trying to cultivate. Recently, I was cultivating my delight in long, air conditioned road trips when the thought sneaked in that I was contributing to global problems.

Perhaps I’m growing my loyalty to a TV show, but then I remember a family member who could use some help. Or maybe I’m just flat out cultivating self-centeredness, and I get diverted talking to someone new to our parish. That pesky God stuff can be very intrusive but is, surprisingly, much more nourishing than much of what we have cultivated in our efforts to stay fed.

So, Jesus comforts and cautions us with his parable of the mustard seed. God’s kingdom shelters and shades, and God’s realm intrudes and annoys. And always, the realm of God grows and matures.

The 75th General Convention of the Episcopal Church, now in session in Columbus, Ohio, has as its theme, Come and Grow. This afternoon, the House of Bishops elected Catherine Jefferts Schori, Bishop of Nevada, as the twenty-sixth Presiding Bishop of the Episcopal Church; the first woman ever to be so elected anywhere within the Anglican Communion. Her election was confirmed by the House of Delegates.

We will continue for some time to hear about and respond to this and to the other activities and decisions of the Convention.

Regardless of our opinions on various outcomes, we can be proud and heartened that our particular tradition invites and embraces the vulnerabilities, tenacity and resulting strength of ongoing growth and change. As individuals and as a parish, as the Episcopal Church and as the Anglican Communion, we are sowers and earth and seed.

The mustard seed is a symbol of hope. Many of us are tired of worrying about the price of gas and we are weary of wars and of being afraid to walk out of our doors at night. We wish the controversies in our church would just settle down for awhile. We walk by faith, not by sight, but maybe picturing that tiny, but subversive seed, falling unnoticed into rich earth and unexpectedly taking root, can reassure us in our faith that God is present, that all is not lost, and that, however bitterly the world tries to squash the love and light of God, it will grow and flourish and multiply. After all, here we are, two thousand years after the crucifixion of Jesus, determined to bring resurrected life to each other and to our community.

With what can we compare the kingdom of God? With nothing really, for it is incomparable. But if we listen to Jesus in Mark, we might compare the kingdom of God to something that is beyond our understanding, yet provides for us and shelters us and nourishes us. We might compare it to something tenacious and unsettling and so abundant, that no effort to eradicate it can succeed. We might compare the kingdom of God to love so great that it pours out over us in all circumstances and gives us life out of its own life.

We learn the story best by living it, and we then become a living parable for others.

Let’s try telling the parable this way: The Kingdom of God is like many persons coming together as a cathedral, where outsiders are welcomed in and children are loved and God is celebrated and people are fed and …and what?

You decide.