Wednesday June 3, 2009
Seeds and sowers
It looked like snow outside the other day – except that a warm spring sun was beaming down. But there were white flakes drifting in the air, settling into the fresh growing grass, blowing in the wind…
It was, of course, the cottonwood trees, dispersing even more fluffy seeds than the dollars involved in bank bailouts.
Before the cottonwoods, Chinese elms scattered seeds wildly, profligately. And after the cottonwoods, maples will do the same. As will dandelions, milkweed, and who knows what other plants.
It all seems colossally inefficient. You\’d think that if God was smart enough to plan every detail of the universe, as the proponents of intelligent design argue, God would be smart enough to figure out a less wasteful system that would direct seeds to the most productive locations.
The scattering process
I mean, look what happens.
Some of the seeds fall on paved roads, where they cannot possibly establish roots. The cars drive over and crush the seeds; the rain washes them into the sewers; the sun bakes them dry.
Other seed falls on rocky ground, like the gravel beaches along our lake. There\’s water there, but no soil. The seeds germinate, but the sprouts quickly wither in the sun, and wash away when storm waves sluice along the shore.
Still other seed falls among thorns and weeds. The other plants have a head-start. They grab more than their share of the rain; they block the sunshine; they choke out the struggling seedlings.
Only a small percentage of the seeds fall on good soil. Each individual seed sends down tiny roots, gathers nutrients, gains strength, and establishes itself as a thriving young tree. And in time, that tree will flower and form seeds – multiplying its original singularity not just thirty or sixty or a hundred times, but millions of times.
It will scatter those seeds just as indiscriminately, as extravagantly, as its parent tree did – on roads and rocks, among weeds and thorns. Most seeds will fail. But once again, a few seeds will fall on fertile soil, and start the process all over again.
Different implications
What\’s that you say? You think you\’ve heard this story before?
You have. It\’s called the Parable of the Sower, and it\’s told in all three of the synoptic Gospels.
But I think that whoever first wrote down the parable, and later added an explanation, might have missed the point. In the gospels, the explanation comes across as self-congratulation for the disciples and other followers. They saw themselves as the “good soil,” in whom the ideas Jesus planted could produce a rich harvest.
No doubt that\’s true. But even more, I think, the parable is about how God works. God does not dispense favours, one by one, selecting only the persons in whom they will generate the best returns.
Rather, God works like those cottonwood trees. God scatters possibilities wildly, extravagantly, without regard for race or creed, status or gender. And then waits to see where those seeds will take root.
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Copyright © 2009 by Jim Taylor. Non-profit use in congregations and study groups permitted; all other rights reserved.
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Your Turn
In last week\’s column, I mentioned that I had never heard a description of heaven that included people with disabilities. Well, I have now – because Stephani Keer, United Church minister in Gander, Newfoundland, sent me this true story:
I was doing some training with a child from the wheelchair basketball team I was coaching. We didn\’t live far from each other in Guelph and so, we\’d get together during the week for training and to shoot hoops.
We had become friends. He was 8 years old, macho, tough and had faced much bullying. So badly, that he learned to walk and then run on crutches and could win against TAB (Temporarily Able-Bodied – everyone becomes unable at some point in life or death) people. His wheelchair was a disgusting pile of metal that caused him to be unfairly treated until he got into Wheelchair Sports.
With his strength and dedication proven, he was also a star athlete. He knew I was headed toward ministry as a career. As we wheeled, he asked out of the blue one day, "Steph, what do you think Heaven will be like?"
Whether my theology was correct or not, I reflected a moment and suggested, “I think it\’ll be a huge basketball court and everyone will have the finest of chairs and we will all play together.”
"You mean, there will be wheelchairs in Heaven?”
"Only the best!” I said with a grin.
He stops. I eventually notice the quiet and look back. Here\’s this tough youngster stopped dead in his tracks with tears running down his face.
A few moments later, after he gets it back together and begins wheeling again, he stutters, “I used to go to church with my mom, you know.”
"Uh-huh."
"Yeah, but I got sick of people trying to heal me and telling me I\’d be running on my own two legs in Heaven.” He paused, then continued, “People were always telling me I was wrong; God didn\’t like me the way I was. I had to be fixed when I got to Heaven."
I was crying, then, too.
And my words, hopes and expressions of Heaven have been forever changed. Not that Heaven is the perfect place where we get the best of all the things we like.
I know many people with disabilities whom God loves and loves through. God honours their lives and their struggles. How do we reconcile that with our desire for a renewed earth and perfect Heaven? Many other stories of an alternate vision of Heaven come through Jean Vanier, Henri Nouwen, Stanley Hauwerwas and others.
I believe that Stephani herself uses a wheelchair, though I don\’t think I\’ve ever met her personally. I\’m grateful to her for risking her own story – and for showing all of us how our taken-for-granted concepts of heaven can be terribly hurtful to others.
There were two other letters.
Jim Henderschedt wrote, “This was a good article today — one with which I can identify; not because I am a runner, which I am not, but because of a knee and small of the back that reminds me that I\’m not as young as I used to be.
“What will heaven be like? Good question. I like what Eckhart Tolle writes in his book, The Power of Now. He suggests that what we think of as heaven is not something that awaits us at the end as a reward but as something we are experiencing now. The cynical side of me says, \’This is as good as it gets.\’ The hopeful side of me says, \’This IS as good as it gets.\’ Anyway, I hope both heel and knee are not going to give you much more trouble.”
And editor Debra Huron wrote, “Loved your column today and wish to say that in my world, there\’s the possibility for heaven on earth. Heaven on earth means that we agree time is irrelevant. It means we make these kinds of wishes each day:
May today there be peace within.
May you trust that you are exactly where you are meant to be.
May you not forget the infinite possibilities that are born of faith in yourself and others.
May you use the gifts that you have received, and pass on the love that has been given to you.
May you be content with yourself just the way you are.
Let this knowledge settle into your bones, and allow your soul the freedom to sing, dance, praise and love. It is there for each and every one of us.”
To which I could only add, “Amen.”
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About My Paraphrases
Occasionally, I get frustrated by the Bible. Not usually by the message, which is timeless, but by the language and metaphor. Contemporary translations update the language, but not the metaphor, so the text still expects us to respond to images of deserts and tents, camels and droughts, kings and concubines. What we\’ve learned since the Bible was written — about psychology and evolution, about quantum physics and astronomy, computers and fossil fuels – is simply left out.
At such times, I start paraphrasing. I don\’t pretend that these paraphrases rely on new translations of original texts. They are, rather, my way of writing what I think the original writers might have said IF they lived today. Sometimes I stick close to the traditional versification; sometimes I take liberties.
My paraphrase of Paul\’s letter to the Romans attempts to put Paul\’s sometimes convoluted words — and argument — into a contemporary setting. If Paul were writing today, to the Christian church, I\’m not sure he\’d worry as much about the failure of the Jews to follow Christ as about the failure of Christians to follow Christ, so I have rephrased in those terms. I suspect he would also make use of quotations from the Gospels — which of course didn\’t exist when he wrote his letters — rather than using quotations from the only scriptures he had available, which we call the Old Testament.
About 200 people have requested the paraphrase of Romans, as an electronic file.
I now have two new paraphrases available, for Ecclesiastes and Job. Ecclesiastes sticks pretty much to the biblical flow of verses – though with, I hope, some sense of humour. Job cuts 42 chapters down to about three pages. I found the speeches in Job interminable; the only way I could make sense of the various characters\’ verbal meanderings was to turn them into television sound-bites.
I\’m making these available the same way as Romans – on the honor system. You send me an e-mail and request the file you want. I\’ll send it. If you like it, and want to keep it, you send me a cheque for $5 by snail mail. If you don\’t like it, simply erase it from your hard disk and send nothing.
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TECHNICAL STUFF
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PROMOTION STUFF…
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For a lighter look at life, faith, and the lectionary, I recommend my friend Ralph Milton\’s weekly e-newsletter Rumors. You can subscribe to it by sending a note to [email protected].
For other web links worth pursuing, try
- Charlene Fairchild\’s United Online site,
- David Keating\’s “SeemslikeGod” page
- The Canadian Centre for Progressive Christianity home page
- Dan Strizek\’s Gathering Place for Creation Spirituality
- Alva Wood\’s satiric stories about small town attitudes and bumbling bureaucrats are not particularly religious, but good fun anyway; write [email protected] to get onto her mailing list.
- Jim Henderschedt\’s occasional e-zine, Fresh Water, subscribe by writing him, [email protected]
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