Truth XIII

Don: Over the course of several weeks, we have touched upon three passages that might help us understand a bit more about the concept underlying the seed parables. Today we will study them as a group, to try to put them in perspective and see if they help us better relate the three seed parables to the truth about god.

The Parable of the Seed (Mark 4:26-29) is about the mystery of seed:

And He was saying, “The kingdom of God is like a man who casts seed upon the soil; and he goes to bed at night and gets up by day, and the seed sprouts and grows—how, he himself does not know. “The soil produces crops by itself; first the blade, then the head, then the mature grain in the head. “But when the crop permits, he immediately puts in the sickle, because the harvest has come.”

How the seed grows is a mystery; it is a natural process but is beyond Man’s ken. It is both natural and supernatural. Mystery, then, is the first general principle we can deduce.

A second principle can be deduced from Isaiah 55:8-11:

“For My thoughts are not your thoughts,
Nor are your ways My ways,” declares the Lord.
“For as the heavens are higher than the earth,
So are My ways higher than your ways
And My thoughts than your thoughts.
“For as the rain and the snow come down from heaven,
And do not return there without watering the earth
And making it bear and sprout,
And furnishing seed to the sower and bread to the eater;
So will My word be which goes forth from My mouth;
It will not return to Me empty,
Without accomplishing what I desire,
And without succeeding in the matter for which I sent it.

Two notions of truth here are, first, that god’s ways are not our ways—that what god sees as growth and as a harvest is different from what we see; and, second, that seed has the power to transform. Seed, as Jesus said when he unlocked the parable, is the word of god. The transformation nature of seed follows in verses 12-13:

“For you will go out with joy
And be led forth with peace;
The mountains and the hills will break forth into shouts of joy before you,
And all the trees of the field will clap their hands.
“Instead of the thorn bush the cypress will come up,
And instead of the nettle the myrtle will come up,
And it will be a memorial to the Lord,
For an everlasting sign which will not be cut off.”

The truth about god is everlasting, it is timeless. The seed has a purpose, god’s purpose. It is not responsible for where it lands. In the Parable of the Sower, where seed lands on bad soil as well as good, either the sower is reckless or careless, or he is purposeful. It seems that he is purposeful; that it is not by accident that some seed falls on hard, stony ground by the side of the road. It is not by accident that birds eat that seed: It still has a function—it either feeds the birds or passes through them and eventually germinates.

Isaiah tells us that the word does not return empty. So whether the soil accepts the seed or rejects it, the soil is not blamed. God’s purpose is to ensure that his seed—his word—is sown everywhere and transforms everything it touches. The thorn becomes a cypress, the nettle a myrtle. And the transformation is everlasting, eternal. It is a memorial that reminds the future of the past—it is a cause for us to remember the word of god.

A third principle of seed is (as Joyce pointed out so well last week) in Matthew 13:35-6:

All these things Jesus spoke to the crowds in parables, and He did not speak to them without a parable. This was to fulfill what was spoken through the prophet:

“I will open My mouth in parables;
I will utter things hidden since the foundation of the world.”

The principle here is that there is a timelessness to the truth. The parables have more than just an immediate application—they teach us the hidden, misunderstood, yet eternal truths about god.

A fourth immutable principle of the truth about god is that god was, is, and always will be the god of all mankind, not merely of the Jews (as scripture maintained up to that point). Paul revealed this eternal and transformational (to both Jew and Gentile) truth in Ephesians 3:

For this reason I, Paul, the prisoner of Christ Jesus for the sake of you Gentiles— if indeed you have heard of the stewardship of God’s grace which was given to me for you; that by revelation there was made known to me the mystery, as I wrote before in brief. By referring to this, when you read you can understand my insight into the mystery of Christ, which in other generations was not made known to the sons of men, as it has now been revealed to His holy apostles and prophets in the Spirit; to be specific, that the Gentiles are fellow heirs and fellow members of the body, and fellow partakers of the promise in Christ Jesus through the gospel, of which I was made a minister, according to the gift of God’s grace which was given to me according to the working of His power. To me, the very least of all saints, this grace was given, to preach to the Gentiles the unfathomable riches of Christ, and to bring to light what is the administration of the mystery which for ages has been hidden in God who created all things; so that the manifold wisdom of God might now be made known through the church to the rulers and the authorities in the heavenly places. This was in accordance with the eternal purpose which He carried out in Christ Jesus our Lord, in whom we have boldness and confident access through faith in Him. Therefore I ask you not to lose heart at my tribulations on your behalf, for they are your glory.

For this reason I bow my knees before the Father, from whom every family in heaven and on earth derives its name, that He would grant you, according to the riches of His glory, to be strengthened with power through His Spirit in the inner man, so that Christ may dwell in your hearts through faith; and that you, being rooted and grounded in love, may be able to comprehend with all the saints what is the breadth and length and height and depth, and to know the love of Christ which surpasses knowledge, that you may be filled up to all the fullness of God.

Now to Him who is able to do far more abundantly beyond all that we ask or think, according to the power that works within us, to Him be the glory in the church and in Christ Jesus to all generations forever and ever. Amen.

Note the oblique reference to seed through the phrase “rooted and grounded”.

Peter amplified this concept, again using the imagery of seed. 1 Peter 1:17-25:

If you address as Father the One who impartially judges according to each one’s work, conduct yourselves in fear during the time of your stay on earth; knowing that you were not redeemed with perishable things like silver or gold from your futile way of life inherited from your forefathers, but with precious blood, as of a lamb unblemished and spotless, the blood of Christ. For He was foreknown before the foundation of the world, but has appeared in these last times for the sake of you who through Him are believers in God, who raised Him from the dead and gave Him glory, so that your faith and hope are in God.

Since you have in obedience to the truth purified your souls for a sincere love of the brethren, fervently love one another from the heart, for you have been born again not of seed which is perishable but imperishable, that is, through the living and enduring word of God. For,

“All flesh is like grass,
And all its glory like the flower of grass.
The grass withers,
And the flower falls off,
But the word of the Lord endures forever.”

And this is the word which was preached to you.

Finally, Paul again talked about this everlasting truth, using seed-planting and watering imagery, in 1 Corinthians 2 and 3: and 3:2-7:

1 Corinthians 2:6-8: Yet we do speak wisdom among those who are mature; a wisdom, however, not of this age nor of the rulers of this age, who are passing away; but we speak God’s wisdom in a mystery, the hidden wisdom which God predestined before the ages to our glory; the wisdom which none of the rulers of this age has understood; for if they had understood it they would not have crucified the Lord of glory….

[The passage goes on to say that the “wisdom” is the unsearchable love of god and the depth of his compassion for us.]

1 Corinthians 3:2-7: …I gave you milk to drink, not solid food; for you were not yet able to receive it. Indeed, even now you are not yet able, for you are still fleshly. For since there is jealousy and strife among you, are you not fleshly, and are you not walking like mere men? For when one says, “I am of Paul,” and another, “I am of Apollos,” are you not mere men?

What then is Apollos? And what is Paul? Servants through whom you believed, even as the Lord gave opportunity to each one. I planted, Apollos watered, but God was causing the growth. So then neither the one who plants nor the one who waters is anything, but God who causes the growth.

In other words: What happens to seed once it has been sown is the responsibility of god. It is subject to god’s plan.

To summarize the eternal principles:

• The growth of seed is a mysterious mixture of natural and supernatural.
• God looks at his harvest differently from the way we look at harvests.
• The indiscriminate broadcasting of seed is purposeful, to ensure it reaches everywhere where it can be transformational.
• God is the god of all mankind.
• God’s plan rules all mankind.

What does all this mean?

Jay: The fact that Jesus spoke so often in parables—in mystery—highlights the principle of the mystery of the kingdom of heaven. To us, mystery is somewhat negative—we want to resolve it, to conquer it, to turn it into something positive, into something we can grasp. Mystery is not such a bad thing. It makes us ask “Why?” Why does god throw seed on barren soil? Why does he not let his farm laborers weed the wheat field?

When we do not ask “Why?” it is because we think we know the answer. But we cannot know the answer. When we think we know the answer, we develop a sense and behavior of exclusivity—we think we know more than others about the kingdom of heaven and about god, and if those others do not accept our explanation of the truth, then we dismiss them, we exclude them.

This is a major message from Jesus. Not the only one, to be sure; but a very important one, and especially give the time—when Jews thought they were the Chosen People and had developed a set of rules and regulations to exclude Gentiles. Mystery mitigates against exclusivity, provided we appreciate the mystery.

Don: In a good mystery novel, is the mystery solved in the end, or unsolved? Is one preferable to the other?

David: I have read good mystery novels with solved endings and good one with unsolved endings. My main thought about this issue is that it is very Daoist! We have no choice but to go along with the Way, the Dao, with god. But the Way, god, is a mystery, as the very chapter of the Dao De Jing (the main Daoist scripture) says (in J. Legge’s 1891 translation):

The Tao that can be trodden is not the enduring and unchanging Tao. The name that can be named is not the enduring and unchanging name.

(Conceived of as) having no name, it is the Originator of heaven and earth; (conceived of as) having a name, it is the Mother of all things.

Always without desire we must be found,
If its deep mystery we would sound;
But if desire always within us be,
Its outer fringe is all that we shall see.

Under these two aspects, it is really the same; but as development takes place, it receives the different names. Together we call them the Mystery. Where the Mystery is the deepest is the gate of all that is subtle and wonderful.

This is Isaiah 55 all over again! We have no hope of understanding it, so accept it. To accept it is wonderful.

Jay: Yes, answers are illusions. When we accept that we have no answers, then we naturally embrace the Way—god—and all his creation. We include, rather than exclude. Once we think we know it all, we deny entry to those who won’t subscribe to our knowledge. That is the fundamental message and essence of parable, of mystery.

Kiran: When I began my Christian journey I was influenced by the Old Testament’s exclusionary ethos. The OT is very much “us” vs. “them”; god protects “us” and kills “them”. I used to think that most people were doomed and that only the select few (including me!) would be saved; but it troubled me nevertheless.

Now, I recognize that my thinking was childish. The mystery of the bible drives us to learn more about god—including the fact that god is not exclusive after all. If he were, he should be raining down destruction on the non-chosen people. But his grace is all-inclusive, and I am glad that it included me.

David: We seem to be arriving at the conclusion that we cannot ever know the answer to the mystery, yet here we are trying to find it!

Chris: The beauty of the mystery is that it makes us try. The only danger arises when we think we have solved it. Seed is always productive of something. Study is always productive of something. We may not understand it all, but it leads us to outcomes, hopefully of goodness and truth.

Jay: Over the past ten years, my spiritual journey has changed from trying to figure out the mystery to figuring out how to live my life. The transition began when it dawned on me that I could never know the answer to the mystery. I cannot predict whether I, or anyone else, will be saved. I cannot predict the future—that’s god business. I have to live with that. Jesus’ message is that I ought not to be trying to understand god’s business—I ought to focus on loving my fellow Man.

Kiran: We all judge other people, whether we are spiritual or not. It is part of our survival mechanism. It probably arose from eating the fruit of the tree of knowledge, which enabled us to discern good and evil. Jesus warned us not to use this knowledge when he said: “Judge not, lest ye be judged”. But he also knew that we would not be able to resist the temptation, and redeemed us anyway.

Joyce: When we think we know it all, we lay down the law for others. At least, that is observably the case with those personality types that like to lead. And they usually find different personality types who are willing followers. In a sense, they are the lucky ones. Life is black and white for them. The people who don’t want to lead or follow tend to be beset with doubt and uncertainty.

It is our job simply to love others, to find that something good that exists in everyone.

David: Last week, I mentioned that darnel grass, which is generally accepted as the weed described in the seed parables as “tares”, has an alcoholic effect when people eat bread made from wheat that has been milled together with darnel seed. Perhaps we judge people on how drunk they are on tares while ignoring that they have a sober side as well.

Don: Those ill effects of darnel explain why the servants were so eager to weed the tares from the field.

Jay: Darnel seed is much smaller than wheat seed, but this is only apparent at harvest time. Hence god’s instruction to his servants not to weed the wheat while it was growing.

Robin: What happens if we do not acknowledge that god’s ways are not our ways and instead we insist that they are. Galatians 6:7-8:

Do not be deceived, God is not mocked; for whatever a man sows, this he will also reap. For the one who sows to his own flesh will from the flesh reap corruption, but the one who sows to the Spirit will from the Spirit reap eternal life.

Then, Ephesians 3:1-9 explains the mystery:

For this reason I, Paul, the prisoner of Christ Jesus for the sake of you Gentiles— if indeed you have heard of the stewardship of God’s grace which was given to me for you; that by revelation there was made known to me the mystery, as I wrote before in brief. By referring to this, when you read you can understand my insight into the mystery of Christ, which in other generations was not made known to the sons of men, as it has now been revealed to His holy apostles and prophets in the Spirit; to be specific, that the Gentiles are fellow heirs and fellow members of the body, and fellow partakers of the promise in Christ Jesus through the gospel, of which I was made a minister, according to the gift of God’s grace which was given to me according to the working of His power. To me, the very least of all saints, this grace was given, to preach to the Gentiles the unfathomable riches of Christ, and to bring to light what is the administration of the mystery which for ages has been hidden in God who created all things;…

Don: Is a parable intended to be seen differently by different people? Is that one of the attributes of this method of teaching? Is Truth, like the elephant in the Three Blind Men of Hindustan poem, in the eye of the blind observer? Is it whatever each individual perceives it to be?

Our seemingly desperate need to know the Truth seems to outweigh any recognition of the value of letting Truth speak for itself; it seems we would rather put our “truth” into god’s mouth. When applying for a job, we expect to be given all the details—what exactly does the job entail, what is the salary, what are the working hours, what benefits come with it, and so on. We would not be satisfied with a job offer that contained none of these elements. We want to know what is expected, what are the guidelines and parameters for the job?

The Truth about god is always there and not there. Its fundamental face value is discernible, but its basis, its derivation, its provenance are hidden. Does such discernment that we can have depend upon our different personalities?

Joyce: God is all things to all people. Different personalities have different ways of learning. Some follow their hearts when they follow the lessons of the church. Some ignore the rules of the church but reach out to others with love. Love should be the first step, but church insists on rules first.

David: I hope we can return to discuss the notion of the Blind Men of Hindustan but with reference to the whole of scripture, and not just the parables.

Don: The Jehovah’s Witnesses offer great certainty of what the Truth is, and many people find great comfort in that.

Kiran: It helps them avoid “failure”.

Don: More on all this next week.

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