We Do Not Know How

Mark 4:26-34

²⁶ [Jesus] also said, “The kingdom of God is as if someone would scatter seed on the ground ²⁷ and would sleep and rise night and day, and the seed would sprout and grow, he does not know how. ²⁸ The earth produces of itself first the stalk, then the head, then the full grain in the head. ²⁹ But when the grain is ripe, at once he goes in with his sickle because the harvest has come.”

³⁰ He also said, “With what can we compare the kingdom of God, or what parable will we use for it? ³¹ It is like a mustard seed, which, when sown upon the ground, is the smallest of all the seeds on earth, ³² yet when it is sown it grows up and becomes the greatest of all shrubs and puts forth large branches, so that the birds of the air can make nests in its shade.”

³³ With many such parables he spoke the word to them as they were able to hear it; ³⁴ he did not speak to them except in parables, but he explained everything in private to his disciples.

 

Beloved of God, grace and peace to you in the name of Jesus.

The kingdom of God is as if someone would scatter seed on the ground and would sleep and rise night and day, and the seed would sprout and grow, he does not know how. 

I do not know how.

We do not know how.

Now, certainly we could open a science textbook and read about seed coats and radicle roots, embryos and enzymes.  We could describe the process of germination.  We could claim to have a fairly decent grasp on what happens as seeds sprout and grow.

But how?  It seems like there’s a whole lot of mystery that remains in the how.

Every year, I am surprised anew by life.  The daffodils rise up out of the spring ground.  Sunflowers, marigolds, and even random tomato plants spring up where their forebearers were planted the year before.  The ferns on the north side of the house, mowed down every fall, come back each spring stronger than ever and, I imagine, would take over the entire yard if left to their own devices.

I do not know how.

What I do know is that it does not depend on me.

I can support the growth.  I can weed (maybe!), water, and mulch.  I can do what I have the capacity to do.  But I’m not underground in the deep, dark earth coaching roots to dig deep and those first little sprouts to stretch upward.  I’m not telling the daffodils that the time is right for them to reemerge.  I’m not in charge of that tiny green fern unfurling and standing tall.

All of that happens without me–without my energy, without my input, without my worrying, even without my witnessing.  The sprouting and the growing happen outside my watch.  They happen while I’m sleeping, while I’m working on other things, while I’m not even paying attention.

I do not know how a seed sprouts and grows.  It’s beyond my ability to fully grasp and certainly beyond my ability to control…

…just like the kingdom of God, Jesus tells us.

We don’t know how something so small becomes a place of expansive welcome, a tree with branches enough for all creatures of the Creator to nest and to rest in the shade, a space for all to call home.

We don’t know how hope, mowed down daily by forces intent on evil, continues to spread.

We don’t know how a world at war becomes a world where peace prevails, how hatred and hunger become justice and joy.

We walk by faith, not by sight.

We don’t know how faith takes root and grows in our own lives, let alone in the lives of others.  We can’t see what happens in the deep, dark earth of our inner being as God’s relationship with us unfolds.  We can’t see what’s going on when our faith feels stagnant, when we feel distant and disconnected from our Creator.  We can’t see how those experiences of grief and loss, transformed by God, ultimately nurture and strengthen us.

We don’t know how the fruits of the spirit ripen in ourselves and in our communities:  love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, generosity, faithfulness, gentleness and self-control.  We don’t know how it is that seasons of drought make way for an abundant harvest.

There’s a lot of talk lately about how the church is dying.  It’s incredibly easy to look around and see nothing but scarcity–not enough people in the pews, not enough children in Sunday School, not enough volunteers to keep things running, not enough clergy to fill all these open pulpits.  But we can’t see what’s happening in the deep, dark earth of this grave.

The church is not ours to save.  This church is the church of Jesus Christ, the one whom God raised from the dead, the one who spent three days in the deep, dark earth of the grave freeing the whole world to live.  To live free from fear.  To live free from the bonds of sin and death.  To live free to love with abandon, not as a marketing scheme to draw people into the church and keep this whole thing afloat.  No, to love because God is love.  To love because we know what it is to be loved by God, and our heart’s desire is for everyone we encounter to experience this same love, and acceptance, and welcome, and freedom to be exactly who they are.

Maybe the church isn’t dying.  Maybe the church already died, united with Christ in the waters of baptism and buried with Christ in the deep, dark earth.  Maybe God is breaking open that buried seed shell and coaxing us to stretch upward toward the light.

I don’t know.

We don’t know how God makes all things new.

But God does.

We pray in the Lord’s Prayer, your kingdom come, your will be done, on earth as in heaven.  And Martin Luther writes so succinctly and powerfully, “God’s kingdom comes on its own without our prayer, but we ask in this prayer that it may also come to us.  God’s good and gracious will comes about without our prayer, but we ask in this prayer that it may also come about in and among us.”

It’s not our job to save ourselves, to save our neighbors, to save the church, to save the world.  It’s not our job to grow the kingdom of God.  It’s not our job to worry, to wring our hands, to manufacture hope.  It’s not up to us.

God is God.  God’s good and gracious will comes about without our prayer.  We pray that we might see it, that we might experience it, that we might be a part of it.  We pray that we might water, weed, and mulch, supporting the growth of God’s kingdom, as a response to God’s amazing grace.

And even though to do so would be to recognize that we are not in control (and that is so hard to do), we pray that we might celebrate the work and will of God in the world, especially when it leads to changes that we would not choose. 

God is growing the kingdom to become a place of belonging for all God’s beloved children.  We might just end up on a branch, nesting next to someone we would never dream might become our neighbor.  We might just end up out on a limb, trying something that came to us not by our own power, but by the inspiration of the Holy Spirit.

God is God.  We are not.  The creature is invited to respond to the Creator’s love.  We who have experienced the freedom of life in Christ have good news to share.  There is watering and weeding and mulching to do, certainly, but resurrection is God’s work. 

Salvation comes through the life-giving work of Jesus.

We get to stand in awe as the miracle unfolds.

Thanks be to God.