Okay, we're still on chapter 4. All about the seeds. We know about the parable of the sower now and the allegorical interpretation Mark makes which is going to be the outline for over half of his book, his story. Mark also pulls together Some other little stories, we don't know what their original context might have been, under what circumstances Jesus might have uttered these things, but He brings them all together because of the unifying theme of, we would say, seed, He would say ground. The smallest one is the one about the mustard seed. We've heard that a lot.

[01:03]

It's only a couple of verses actually. It might have come about, we don't know, but in fantasizing it might have come about because the disciples were curious to have Jesus tell them what He understood by the Kingdom of God. That was part of that one verse message that they're supposed to be preaching. And it didn't have a whole lot of narrative with it, if you recall, so I suspect they're at him periodically trying to get him to give them some sort of definition of this Kingdom of God because, no doubt, people would be asking them and they didn't want to look like fools. We can assume, I guess, that they found an opportune time to ask him for a little more detail. on how he understood the kingdom of God.

[02:04]

And as Mark presents it here, he starts out by saying, with what can we compare the kingdom of God, or what parable will we use for it? I suspect about that point is where they just shook their head and said, there he goes again. I mean, what's wrong with the definition? Why do you always have to do a comparison or a parable because those are worse than anything else? Why don't you just do a noun and a verb, maybe an adjective, and get it over with so that we'd have something to communicate to somebody else? He never does, never does. And in all, Matthew, Mark, and Luke, his primary mode of teaching is through parable, which as we know has an intriguing dynamic of reversal. What you see is not what you get, and what you think you get is not what's going to be there at all. It's something else.

[03:05]

And so all of Mark's gospel, in a way, can be understood as a parable. They're simple little stories taken from everyday common experience that have a tendency to set you on your head. And we can tell that oftentimes the gospel writers themselves were not that familiar with the dynamic of parable because as Luke does quite often, they like to change them into example stories. Good Samaritan, therefore go and do likewise. And that makes it all tame, understandable. But in the parable itself, it's not an example story. It's a story to sort of take you and turn you wrong side out. It says two plus two equals, and you're out there, four. Any dummy knows that. And then Jesus says seven. And you say, how'd you get seven?

[04:06]

He says, simple. I added two and two. And it comes out to seven. Well, not in my experience it doesn't. Well, that's what I told you. We're not dealing with your experience. And there we go. So the disciples are not going to get anything straight from him. So here he's going to use one more comparison or parable. So here's what he says. in reference to the Kingdom of God. It is like a mustard seed, which when sown upon the ground is the smallest of all the seeds on earth. 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." Now, if we were standing there with the disciples when Jesus said this, we'd just have to shake our head.

[05:16]

We know how big a mustard seed is. I suppose it's about the size of a green pepper, so that part he seems to have right. And yet, when the thing grows up, I suppose if you get a good one, it'll get eight, ten feet tall, but they're ugly. Got little yellow flowers come on, I guess, a couple times a year. They're not remarkable. They're the kinds of shrubs you throw your beer cans in and dogs come along and do what dogs do in shrubs. So it's not something you'd want to take your tourist picture of, a great mustard bush, and send it home unless you cleaned it up first. Hardly would it be something that you and I would bring to mind if we were going to describe something as great as the Kingdom of God. And even Jesus, we would think, had trouble putting all these sentences together, you know, and it becomes the greatest of all, and then he comes out with shrubs.

[06:19]

I mean, shrub, by definition, almost defies greatness. Shrub is shrub, you know. Matthew didn't like it at all that he uses shrub, so Matthew says tree. That makes it respectable. Jesus probably said shrub. So that the birds of the air can make nests in his shame. Well, you got birds like sparrows, they might, but real birds, they don't hang out in those bushes. Real birds go to real trees. I mean, only the lowlife birds hang out in mustard bushes. So even if we understand it, we're not going to tell this to anybody else. I mean, people would think we are as ridiculous as we seem if we go and they say, hey, we got this definition of the kingdom. You want to know what it is? Look over there at that mustard shrub. You got it. That's going to help our credibility, isn't it? Now, if he would have asked us, which, of course, as you well know, he never does, but just say a weak moment, and he did.

[07:21]

And he would say to you and I, what would you compare the kingdom of God to? We'd have an idea. Even using his own imagery of tree, we want to grow up a little bit, we don't like shrub, but we had heard in the past when we went to grade school just the same thing he had heard. in reference to the Day of the Lord. They didn't use the phrase Kingdom of God then, but there was lots of talk about the Day of the Lord and what was going to happen. Oh, it started out early on in the tradition as something nice, and then later on, you know, we know it ended up being something not so nice, Day of Judgment. But we remember being taught from that great prophet Ezekiel. In our books, we find it in chapter 17. He uses an image that if Jesus wants to use tree imagery, why didn't He use this?

[08:25]

Because it makes sense. Everybody would have been familiar with it. All you'd have had to do is kick into this passage and they would have shaken their head because they know what you mean and they would have had great thoughts. It made our work a lot easier. Here's what you find in Ezekiel 17. And this, of course, is God addressing Ezekiel. Thus says the Lord God, I Myself will take a sprig from the lofty top of a cedar. I will set it out. I will break off a tender one from the topmost of its young twigs. I Myself will plant it. on a high and lofty mountain. On a mountain height of Israel, I will plant it in order that it may produce boughs and bear fruit and become a noble cedar.

[09:31]

Under it, every kind of bird will live. In the shade of its branches will nest winged creatures of every kind. All of the trees of the field shall know that I am the Lord. I bring low the high tree, I make high the low tree. I dry up the green tree, and I make the dry tree flourish. I, the Lord, have spoken. I will accomplish it. Now, that's got some meat to it, you know. I mean, anybody can't get into the giant Lebanon cedar. I mean, if Jesus wants to use an image that's got some massive substance to it, get people to sit up and say, oh, well, why didn't you say so? That would have been it. Now, we never saw a cedar because we never get out of town, but we've heard about them. They're over in Lebanon. We heard in our tradition, of course, you remember when King Solomon decided to build a temple and he used that blueprint that probably came from some outline of a Canaanite temple.

[10:39]

He decided early on only the best of material. Of course, we had to pay through taxation and that's ultimately why the kingdom split because we didn't want to pay more taxes just like today. And the next king decided we would. But anyway, Solomon decided the inside of that temple, it's going to be lined with cedar wood. Well, there wasn't any cedar wood around here, so they had to bring people in, send them all the way to Lebanon, and get those cedar trees. And those people, when they came back, they just couldn't say enough. They said, you haven't seen it. You ought to see these things. They're gigantic. They're huge. You could put a whole city in the tree trunk and all over the place. I mean, it's, you've never ever seen anything like it. And that's what we had heard, you know. So from that time on, anytime anybody wanted to talk about, you know, big, massive, terrific, two things they would use, oftentimes the cedar tree and the other thing that was on a mountain.

[11:44]

So when you take a cedar tree and put it on a mountain, you don't get any higher. That's about as far as you can go. Now, why didn't he use that? He heard the same stuff. He went to the same school as we did. Why didn't he use that? I mean, that's impressive, isn't it? And he says, it's like a mustard shrub. Well, it's an interesting question why he didn't use it. There could be an explanation, I suppose. And one explanation might be he didn't use it because he knew that's what we were thinking. He probably knew that we had that right in the tip of our tongue saying, hey, if you're looking for an image, I got one for you. And that was too easy, wasn't it? It's too easy to talk about greatness, massiveness, strength, power.

[12:45]

Religion loves those words. Jesus doesn't use that much though, you know. He hadn't spent a whole lot of time talking about all that stuff. Well, religious leaders do. They did then, they do now, all that sort of thing, but he doesn't. He likes to say, well, now I know you guys got your head in the trees and in the clouds, and I know you think we ought to be up on a mountain and all that sort of thing. Interestingly enough, when they do go on the mountain, they don't have a clue what's there either. So, Jesus, as He typically does, goes the other direction. If you want the Kingdom of God, and of course we would say we do, and they would have said they do, you don't have to find a huge Lebanon cedar. You don't even have to go to a mountain. You can go right... You're persistent with that bell.

[13:47]

You can go right here. You can find it right there in this scudsy, silly, stupid mustard shrub. And when he says that, we're disappointed. And the reason we're disappointed is because there's no pizzazz. It's ordinary. Regular. It's everyday stuff. You walk by them day in and day out. You don't have any pious thoughts. The only thought you think about is, somebody ought to cut that stupid thing down. Or, somebody ought to clean that thing up. Never do you walk by those things and say, well, I'm going to stop here a minute and just think about the kingdom of God. I'm going to think about God's presence. Never. And that's the point, isn't it? That's the point. I think Jesus is saying, if you are searching for the Kingdom of God, you don't have to go any place else. The Kingdom of God is right here in as full a way as it is any place else.

[14:57]

Yeah, I know if you go to some place where they got huge church and all that grandeur and all that stuff, it's easier to have pious thoughts. It's easier to be overcome with the magnificence of all that, you know. But Jesus says, don't mistake that for the kingdom of God. And then the real catch is, I think he's indicating we walk by the kingdom of God every day and pay no attention to it. When we are encountering the Kingdom of God very often, you know what we see? We see a mustard bush. We see something that's just ordinary and routine, and we say, well, you know, we ought to cut that down. That's got no value. We ought to clean that up. And it gets worse if we get away from things and start talking about people. The Kingdom of God being present in the ordinary routine folks that we see every day, that we live with, that we work with.

[16:07]

There's no pizzazz in that, is there? I mean, wouldn't that be disappointing if Jesus comes down here and says, I'll tell you where the Kingdom of God is. The Kingdom of God is in the guy sitting next to you. And if I'm home and I hear that, I'm going to say, well, you know, Jesus, I was hoping for a little more. I kind of had my sights set, I thought, a little higher. The guy sits next to me in choir every morning, 5 o'clock. Exactly at 5 o'clock, not 4.59 or 5.01. 5 o'clock, he chews his lifesaver. He's been doing that for, I'm sure, 40, 50 years. And in a big church like we got with a marble floor, chewing a lifesaver at 5 o'clock in the morning sounds like you're just rattling a cage. I mean, like a bowling ball hitting, you know. And so I say to myself, of course, Michael, why in God's name do you have to chew that stupid lifesaver at 5 o'clock sitting next to me?

[17:11]

You could go in your room and chew it. You could go outside and chew it. I don't care what you're doing there. Why do you have to chew it here? Now, he would think it would be preposterous for me to say that, and it would, and he wouldn't give me an answer anyway. He would just say, hey, I'm in a routine. I've been doing this before you were even thinking about coming here, and I'll probably outlive you, and I'm going to keep doing it. Now, wouldn't I be shocked if Jesus came along and said, hey, you looking for the kingdom of God? It's right over there in Old Brother Mike. That's the kingdom of God. wouldn't I be disappointed? All I see is a guy irritating me at five o'clock in the morning because he chooses this stupid lifesaver. Which in my arrogance, I think he does that absolutely and totally to upset me. Now that's certainly got a lot of pride that I'm that important that he's going to center his whole life on me. He doesn't know he chooses it, I'm sure. He doesn't even care about me sitting there, you know. He thinks I'm kind of really strange the way I get upset about that.

[18:13]

Well, how many times do you suppose in the course of a day we walk by the reality of God's Kingdom and we don't see anything? We don't hear anything. Just routine, smallness, nothing, regular stuff. Can't wait to have one of those great Maslow peak experiences when we get in some big cathedral or something that's going to really turn us on. There is the kingdom of God. Well, you see, that's the good news. Don't have to go anyplace. Don't have to find any new setting. Don't even have to clean your place up. It's all here. It's all right here. Now that's got some challenge to it, doesn't it?

[19:16]

Now I don't know what the disciples factually, historically thought. I know in Mark's story the disciples wouldn't understand a word of this. And if we ask ourselves, do we understand a word of this? We who by profession claim to be searching out this God. I mean, we're not just happenstance. We claim that our whole life is now focused on this search for God and of all people. Should not you and I have that level of sensitivity to be able to see those manifestations in the most common, ordinary ways that they come about? I suspect that's what the rule of Saint Benedict tries to do, and I'm certainly no expert on that rule or studied it to any great depth, but it just seems to me, while little I do know of it, it appears that it tries to sensitize us to the ordinary, to the common, keeps our feet rooted flat in the human perspective, learn how to live with one another, you know,

[20:33]

Rather commonsensical, but that's part of what learning about the kingdom is. Don't take your knife to bed with you. Because you get mad or whatnot, you might just slit the other guy, so just don't take your knife to bed. And you say, that's dumb. Well, it's not really dumb, because most of us live on that kind of a level. Now, we don't take knives, do we? We have tongues. Who needs a knife when you got a tongue? You know, I've done more with my tongue than I can do with a barrel of knives. But it's just that thought. Could it be that simple? Could it be that simple? It must be more complex. I mean, look at all the theology books written telling us all these. It has to be more complex than this. Well, I don't know. I don't know. All I know is I think Jesus is telling us that everything we're looking for is here. And the issue is how we open our eyes. Now I think Saint Mark understands a lot of this.

[21:38]

And I think that's why he uses that allegory of the ground, the different kind of ground, because depending on which kind of ground we are, will have a lot to do with the kind of sensitivities we have. And of course, for Mark, as for, I think, probably all the Gospels, you know, seeing is believing. Because it's through those eyes of faith that you really see what's going on. And for people in the Gospel of Mark, those little people that get healed, and the demon, all those kinds of people, They seem to manifest that kind of faith that allows them to see, in some of these interesting perspectives, who He really is. They see who He is. The disciples, on the other hand, who are representative of this rocky ground, and it's interesting that the word used for that rocky ground is very similar to the Greek word used for Peter.

[22:52]

But they don't ever catch on, do they? They're looking for, like that Lebanon cedar, they're looking for the great, they're looking for fame, power, all of that stuff. And so they never really see much. They never really understand much. They like to be around Jesus when there's lots of pizazz. They love the show of the miracle. They love the crowd. But when they're out by themselves, they're a little nervous. They don't like that. Not much happening, you see. They don't see anything going on. You see, these are the hand-picked folks. And so as Mark sets this up for us, mind you, you know, he's still asking us all the time to examine carefully which kind of ground we are. Do we see? Do we hear? Right after this, Jesus quiets a storm. You know, just following all these seed parables.

[23:58]

On that day when evening had come, He said to them, let's go across to the other side. And leaving the crowd behind, they took Him with them in a boat just as He was. Other boats were with Him. A great windstorm arose and the waves beat into the boat so that the boat was already being swamped. But he was in the stern, asleep on the cushion. And they woke him up and said to him, Teacher, do you not care? We are perishing. Interesting. Of course he cares. He's cared from day one, but they didn't understand it. He woke up and rebuked the wind and said to the sea, Peace, be still. Then the wind ceased, and there was a dead calm. He said to them, Why are you afraid? Key phrase, Why are you afraid?

[25:01]

Have you still no faith? That dichotomy of fear and faith. And they were filled with great awe, and said to one another, Who then is this that even the wind and the sea obey him?" But you see, faith is not great awe. We can all have great awe. But don't mistake that for faith. Why are you afraid? And it's an interesting thing about Mark's portrayal of Jesus. Isn't it interesting? He can take the forces of wind and storm and with one word or a gesture, He can calm it. But He can't get His own followers to believe in Him. He can't get His own followers to believe in Him.

[26:04]

We see as we extend this, of course, we are those followers. We are those followers. And we'll watch this move on. If you read these miracle stories that happen as they go along here, they move on. When you get to chapter 6, you get the rejection and in 6 and 8 have this interesting sort of bread basket section. You get one miraculous feeding of the 5,000, and of course it's in the wilderness, the great theme of wilderness, precariousness, and literarily we know that that story of the feeding of the 5,000 is to bring to mind Exodus 16 and all of that with God miraculously feeding the chosen people in the desert when they're complaining and weeping and whining and saying, you know, this is crummy living. I'd rather be back home in Egypt.

[27:09]

I'd be incarcerated, but three squares a day would be better than out here with nothing. And finally, God intervenes and miraculously feeds them and saves their life. And of course, Jesus, precarious situation, no food. He, miraculously, is going to feed these people. But they're not sure where the food's going to come from. The disciples are not. And so then you get this interesting thing with a few loaves and some fish, and he feeds all these people, 5,000. These 5,000 men, and so they had probably more than that. And then they had baskets left over, twelve baskets. Now the disciples are there, they watch it all. And so two chapters later, what happens? Same setting, precariousness, late at night, nothing to eat.

[28:09]

And what do the disciples do? Well, how are we going to feed these people? What are we going to do? Now, scholars spend a lot of time, write lots of books over why you have two feeding stories. Well, were there two actual events, or is there one story told twice, and they go on and on and on, you know? It's kind of interesting, but, you know, I don't recommend reading all that. I think if you'd ask Mr. Mark, why do you have two stories here? And he'd look askance at us and say, well, did you read them? Oh, yeah, we read them. Well, then you probably know. Oh, yeah, we know. Second story, what happens? Diminishment, right? First story, 5,000. Second story, 4,000. First story, 12 baskets. Second story, 7 baskets. Between the first story and the second story, watch what takes place. Miracles happen, tougher to do. Jesus a couple times has to even try a second time.

[29:13]

Miracles get fewer. Faith gets sparser. The disciples in the same situation two chapters later, what would they normally have done? Well, you would think normally they would have said, Jesus, we got a problem the same problem we had a couple chapters ago. We're going to need you to do now what you did then. They act like they were never at the first feeding. They act like they have no clue who He is, what He can do, what He has done, and what needs to be done. They have no single insight. And so Mark is going to start the downhill swing because of lack of faith. It's going to get tougher. It's going to get tougher. They're going to get tougher in their obstinacy. Miracles are going to get scarcer, tougher to do.

[30:16]

And it's all going to go down until chapter 11, when it's just going to stop. And you'll take up a different thread. They are the rocky ground. The rocky ground. Well, we need to ask always what this has to do with us. And of course, you know, we know what it has to do with us because we can put ourselves in the story. Now, we would like, I think, I would like to pride myself a little bit and say, well, I don't think I'm as dumb as these disciples, I'll tell you. Well, we're not as dumb in this story as these disciples, but the other thing to keep in mind, too, we ought not be as dumb as they are because we know a whole lot more than they know. And remember that little subtle thing that Mark is doing as we read this thing.

[31:20]

He's not trying to make us feel smart. He's loading up for us. He's going to get us to a position where we've got no comeback, you see, because unlike these disciples, maybe they weren't exactly at everything. The disciples didn't hear the first line of the story. The disciples didn't hear the voice come out of the sky. So, you know, the only thing they heard, of course, Peter, James, and John is there in chapter 9 where they blow it again. A real strange story, the transfiguration, where you see, you know, the whole thing unfolding in front of them. And you've got Elijah, the prophets, Moses, the law, the prophets, the law, the fullness of Scripture for themselves, Jesus in the center, the fullness of all this. And the only thing Peter can say is, man, this is neat, let's build some houses.

[32:27]

Let's hang on to it. Let's localize this. It has nothing at all to do. He has just seen, as has James and John, who Jesus really is. And very interesting, at the end of that scene, as they were coming down the mountain, He ordered them to tell no one about what they had seen until after the Son of Man had risen from the dead. Well, that's a safe one to tell them because they're not sure what they had seen. Now notice, so they kept the matter to themselves, questioning what this rising from the dead could mean. Then they ask him, why do the scribes say that Elijah must come first? He said to them, Elijah is indeed coming first to restore all things. Then how is it written about the Son of Man that He is to go through many sufferings and be treated with contempt?

[33:32]

But I tell you that Elijah has come, and they did to him whatever they pleased as it is written about him." Of course, he's referring there to John the Baptist. He is the Elijah in this story. But they don't understand. They don't understand. But do we understand? That's the only people we have to ask. Do we? Understand. Because we have been to the mountain. We know who Elijah is in this mountain scene. We know who Moses is. We know who Jesus is transfigured. In a sense, Mark has kind of told us the end of the story before it's happened. But it fits right here. The only thing that blocks our vision is fear. And that's what the gospel wants us to confront, our own fear, our own fear.

[34:36]

And we confront that with our own faith. And so every time we read these passages, those are the things we have to set up. Fear, faith, fear, faith. And does our faith win out? Does our faith win out? And of course, each one of us has to ask that question. The next big section, of course, is going to be chapters 8 through 10. And that's where Jesus talks about the three passion predictions. And there's lots of interesting stuff there, too. So we'll look at that the next time. Glory to the Father, and to the Son, and to the Holy Spirit. I think it's time that we show this world.

[35:30]

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