The Wild Kingdom

 

Mark 4: 26-34

Such a large crowd gathered around Jesus that he got into a boat and began to teach them using many parables. He said, ‘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. The earth produces of itself, first the stalk, then the head, then the full grain in the head. But when the grain is ripe, at once he goes in with his sickle, because the harvest has come.’  He also said, ‘With what can we compare the kingdom of God, or what parable will we use for it? 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.’  With many such parables he spoke the word to them, as they were able to hear it; he did not speak to them except in parables, but he explained everything in private to his disciples.

.  See that dot? The one right at the beginning of this paragraph? That’s the approximate size of a mustard seed. Most of you know that the mustard seed is miniscule but if you’re thinking that this tiny seed grows into a huge tree like a stately old oak with generous leafy branches spreading out to offer shelter to birds and animals, you may be in for a surprise. You’ll note that Jesus didn’t say that the mustard tree was the greatest of all trees; he said it was the greatest of all shrubs. It’s a fairly large and tall shrub but not an impressive or valued tree. It was actually considered an invasive weed in Jesus’ day.

So, what’s Jesus’ point here? If he was trying to paint a picture of the greatness and glory of the Kingdom of God, something that starts small and then spreads throughout the earth becoming great and mighty, he didn’t choose a very good example. Perhaps for good reason.

In the first parable of the growing seed, Jesus said, “[the farmer] would sleep and rise night and day, and the seed would sprout and grow, he does not know how. The earth produces of itself, first the stalk, then the head, then the full grain in the head.” Then Jesus goes on to liken the Kingdom of God to the mustard tree. Again, he speaks of mystery, of the wonder of how a seed so tiny can grow quickly into a large invasive shrub. ‘Invasive’ means it will reproduce without any input from human beings. 

Whenever Jesus told a parable, he was shaking up common perceptions and trying to get people to go beyond what they thought they knew. He was moving the people towards repentance or metanoia: a complete change of mind and heart. The term ‘metanoia’ derives from the Greek words ‘meta’ (meaning "beyond" or "after") and ‘noeo’ (meaning "perception" or "understanding" or "mind"). The mind change he was inviting people to was more than a surface shift from one familiar option or idea to another. He was inviting the people to go beyond what they commonly thought and, quite often, he challenged people to change their whole perception of what it meant to have faith and what it meant that the Kingdom of God was within them. Today he still challenges us to metanoia. No matter who we are and where we are on the faith journey, we are continually called to have our minds, hearts and assumptions radically changed.

The parables of the growing seed and the mustard tree were far more than simple little stories illustrating the need to plant our tiny seeds of faith and trust in God to provide for us, although that’s a good beginning. They’re more than snapshots of how a church grows and develops. What we tend to lose sight of is that neither the grain nor the mustard shrub were created by humans and both had the astounding capacity to develop and grow without human understanding and without human intervention and control. God can take something that to us seems insignificant, inadequate, unattractive or relatively useless and create whatever he wants out of it. Not only can he create whatever he wants but he can use it however he wants.   

One natural historian, Pliny the Elder (AD 78), noted that the mustard shrub, which was considered a malignant weed, “is extremely beneficial for the health. It grows entirely wild, though it is improved by being transplanted: but on the other hand when it has once been sown it is scarcely possible to get the place free of it, as the seed when it falls germinates at once," and “a real mustard plant is unlikely to attract nesting birds.”  There are some contradictions here. It is considered a malignant weed but beneficial to health. It grows entirely wild but is easily transplantable. Once planted you can hardly get rid of it so it was never deliberately planted in proper Jewish gardens. It’s not a plant that’s easily controlled. And Jesus seemed out of touch with reality by indicating that birds of the air could make nests in its branches. Birds weren’t naturally attracted to it. But in the Kingdom of God, what we often assume is right, natural and logical isn’t always the supernatural reality.

How would I describe the Kingdom of God? It’s a mass of contradictions. The Kingdom is a mystery that defies all our efforts to neatly define it. We cannot paint a tidy little picture of this Kingdom that is wholly contained within us yet is rampant and invasive, inherently unattractive yet entirely hospitable. It is a Kingdom of love peace and joy and at the same time it is one of tension, struggle and grief. It is a Kingdom where the balm of healing flows out of the agony of crucifixion. If we insist on orderly definitions, if we need precepts that stay in one place and if we expect garden friendly seeds of life that we can understand, put in order and completely control, we will constantly be foiled and frustrated.  The Kingdom of God is within us…but it’s not ours. It’s not under our tight control and was never meant to be.

The Kingdom of God is like a trek into the vast unknown. We are not called to know; we are called to go. In one moment the Kingdom is a precious pearl. Then it’s a wild weed. At other times it’s a grain of wheat, a lost coin or a measure of yeast. One moment it’s a dying grain and the next it’s an abundant harvest. The Kingdom is pristine symmetry encased in wild chaos. Faith, then, is not the possession of a precisely laid out map against which you can measure your progress and judge your journey; it is a leap into the unknown where what’s around the next bend can never be predicted. It is a present moment walk with a present moment God. The walk must be with him because you will never figure out on your own where you are, let alone where you’ve been or where you’re going.

Metanoia: to go beyond your present perceptions and assumptions. To strike out into the unknown, understanding that your small definitions, preconceived ideas and long held images most likely have nothing to do with the powerful reality of God's spiritual landscape .

The Kingdom is like that.