Growing Toward Understanding
Elaine Poproski Download: Audio
Scripture: Mark 4:1-20
Again he began to teach beside the sea. Such a very large crowd gathered around him that he got into a boat on the sea and sat there, while the whole crowd was beside the sea on the land. Read more…
Looking to Sunday
by Elaine Poproski
One of my favourite stories is that of King Arthur and the knights of the Round Table. I’ve lost count of how many movie adaptations I’ve watched over the years. I’ve read countless stories and was even a chorus member in my high school musical adaptation of Camelot. It’s highly unlikely that this legendary time and place and people actually existed. But the possibility that it may have existed in some forgotten time pulls at my imagination. So do the stories of Atlantis and of the Amazons and of Robin Hood.
I think what I love most about these stories is the possibility, however faint, that they may be based in reality. Because if they’re based in reality, even just a little bit, then there’s a possibility that everything wonderful about those stories can also be true about our stories in our time and place. Maybe a kingdom founded on honour and justice is possible in our time. Maybe women can be strong and independent. Maybe the underdog can win and the powerful can be held to account.
On Sunday we’re going to be reading a story about possibility. It’s a story told by Jesus about planting seeds and how they do or don’t grow depending on where they’re planted. (You can read the story here.) It’s a story that has a lot in common, in my mind, at least, with the parable of the mustard seed we read last week. In both stories, growth is something of a mystery. It’s not in our control. We plant and we reap, but the growing is on God. This week we’ll be reminded that as mysterious as the growing might be, it’s not random and we aren’t inconsequential. Think about it this way: the growing thing is God’s kingdom and He alone knows how and determines if it will grow; we who are the church are the soil in which the kingdom is planted; and as with all growing things, the health of the soil matters. We matter.
As you prepare for Sunday, I invite you to go for a walk (physically distanced from other people, of course) and pay attention to the flowers and shrubs and trees and weeds you encounter. Look at the soil they’re in. Of all the growing things you see, which one can you imagine as our little bit of God’s kingdom? What’s the soil like? Are there things choking out the roots? Is the soil deep or is it littered with concrete? What is your part in ensuring the best possible soil for our best possible bit of God’s kingdom? Yes, the growth itself remains a mystery only God understands and only God oversees. But the soil… Perhaps we bear some responsibility for the soil.