Sunday, July 12, 2020

Given a vision of abundance. July 12, 2020 The Rev. Kathleen M. Sturges



Is the glass half full or half empty? Even though we all see the same thing people can come to different conclusions. Like optimists, the thinking goes, see the glass half full while pessimists view it as half empty. Who’s right? Are either of them? Maybe there’s another way to look at the glass? Well it all depends on your perspective.
Which makes me curious, what is your perspective on our reading from the gospel of Matthew? Good news or bad? A sower went out to sow, Jesus begins, and this sower ends up scattering a copious amount of seed everywhere - on the pathway, on rocky ground, among thorns, and on good soil - all with varying results. Then comes the explanation. The seed, Jesus says, is the word of the kingdom sown in the soil of a person’s heart. And depending upon the condition of one’s heart whether it’s beaten down, rocky, distracted or receptive, the seed either takes root or not and yields a great harvest or nothing at all.
So is this good news or bad? Judgement or joy? If what we hear is primarily a story about bad soils and, therefore, bad hearts, then this becomes a parable of judgment - on us and on others. And from that perspective we may think that what we should be doing is going around judging ourselves or others as good or bad, right or wrong, open to the word of the kingdom or closed. But this point of view in no way produces good fruit or a bountiful harvest which should be our first clue that that is not what Jesus wants us to hear. He never says, “Therefore, I tell you, be of good soil!”
He doesn’t say that because the good news, the hope we have is not found in the condition of the soil, but in the character of the sower. The sower who scatters seed everywhere. Instead of judgement, there is joy and delight in the image of this carefree, extravagant, generous sower that has an abundance of seed and holds none of it back. A sower that we can identify as God. For God is always sowing seeds - the word of the kingdom, the Word that is Christ, the word of life and love and mercy and grace. God is always sowing those seeds into our lives and into our world.
But seeds, by their very nature, take time. And they are easily overlooked. Nonetheless, seeds are powerful as they push their way through dirt, rocks, and other obstacles. They are also persistent, working night and day to grow and flourish. Seeds do all this work out of view until the time of harvest comes and we can actually see what’s been there all along.
And the harvest, Jesus says, turns out to be thirty, sixty, even a hundredfold. Which would have been the real shocker for those who first heard this parable. Back in Jesus’ day, a seven or eight
fold yield from one seed was considered quite good. Ten fold was great. Anything more was simply unheard of. To talk about an increase of thirty, sixty or one hundred fold, that was more than being optimistic, that was talking about a whole different way of seeing the world. Seeing with a hope, a vision, a confidence which can only come from the perspective of the Kingdom of God.
But in this kingdom, God is not the only generous sower of these powerfully determined seeds. We, who are created in the image of God, are made to be sowers too. To likewise be carefree, extravagant and generous in our sowing because we have been given this vision of abundance, both in seed and in harvest. But that’s not to say that we look reality in the face and deny it. Hardly. Right now the whole world is reeling from all the fallout of this pandemic. Death, suffering, loss, uncertainty and anxiety abound. And yet in the midst of all this there are also seeds and harvest. Countless people sacrificing for the sake of others, a growing movement for racial justice, a new appreciation for the simple things, those, to name a few, are both the sowing of seeds and the reaping of harvest. For when we look through the lens of God’s kingdom we see the seeds of God’s life and harvest of God’s love everywhere.
Because, when you really look at it, the glass is not half empty, but neither is it half full. There is more there than meets the eye. Water is in the bottom half. The top half is filled with air. From that perspective the glass is not simply full, but like the kingdom of God, it is overflowing.

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