June 14, 2015
Mark 4:26-34
Introduction
In the fourth chapter of the Gospel of Mark, Jesus used figurative stories called parables* to teach people about the Kingdom of God. According to John Wesley, parables are “a kind of instructive speech, wherein spiritual things are explained and illustrated by natural [means]….” (Note on Mark IV:2, Notes Upon the New Testament). Furthermore, a parable has two layers: 1) the proverb, which is “the literal sense”; and 2) the interpretation, which is “the spiritual [thing] resting in the literal sense”.
Jesus taught using parables to speak the Word “to them as they were able to hear it” v. 33); i.e., according to their level of understanding. Earlier in the chapter Jesus said, “To you [i.e., the disciples] it has been given to know the mystery of the kingdom of God; but to those who are outside, all things come in parables” (v. 11). Jesus did not use parables to blind the people from the truth, but to show how unperceptive they have grown to be—if they understood, they would have understood the message of the parables.
Today’s Gospel reading contains a “twin” of parables, the Parable of Growing Seed (4:26-29) and the Parable of the Mustard Seed (4:30-32). (The Parable of the Mustard Seed is also told in the gospels of St. Matthew and St. Mark and is the more well-known one. The Parable of the Growing Seed in only told in the Gospel of Mark.) Both parables use the imagery of a seed. What can we learn about the Kingdom of God from these parables?
I. The Parable of the Growing Seed (Mark 4:26-29)
In the Parable of the Growing Seed, we can see the mystery of how a seed grows. A certain man scattered some seed on the ground. Then he went about his daily routine—sleeping by night and rising by day—while the seed grows—how, he does not know (v. 27). But soon the seed grows into a plant and produces grain; and when the grain ripens it is harvested (v. 28).
There are many people who are obsessed with “church growth” as if it was a matter of numbers, without acknowledging that there is a mystery behind it. People believe that by implementing this outreach activity or that discipleship program, the church will grow—and if these fail, they feel frustrated. We fail to understand that church growth involves a synergy (in Greek, συνεργέω, sunergeō, ‘working together’) of two things: the work of man and the work of God.
On our side, it is our duty to sow the seed; that is, the Word of God (see Mark 4:14). We cannot harvest if we do not sow because grain does not automatically grow on fields where it was not sown! But on the other side there is the work of God, who makes the seed grow. If you think about it, there is something wonderful and mysterious about the growth of a seed. John Wesley wrote,
For as the earth by a curious kind of mechanism, which the greatest philosophers cannot comprehend, does as it were spontaneously bring forth first the blade, then the ear, then the full corn in the ear: so the soul, in an inexplicable manner, brings forth, first weak graces, then stronger, then full holiness: and all this of itself, as a machine, whose spring of motion is within itself. Yet observe the amazing exactness of the comparison. The earth brings forth no corn (as the soul no holiness) without both the care and toil of man, and the benign influence of heaven. (Note on Mark IV:26)
There are people who believe that talking and singing to plants makes them grow better. But no amount of talking or singing can make a plant grow! It is a mistake to think that we can make seeds grow through our own efforts. It is our duty to sow seeds; it is God’s work to make them grow.
In his first epistle to the Corinthians, St. Paul dealt with an issue about factionalism in the church in Corinth. Some were for Paul, others were for Apollos, and some claim they were for Christ! St. Paul wrote, “I planted, Apollos watered, but God gave the increase. So then neither he who plants is anything, nor he who waters, but God who gives the increase” (I Corinthians 3:6-7 New King James Version).
St. Paul “planted” the church in Corinth (Acts 18:1-11) and apparently Apollos (a Grecian Jew from Alexandria, Egypt) continued (“watered”) the work Paul started there (Acts 18:23-28; esp. v. 27). But for Paul, it was not important to know who is more important. He and Apollos both did their part; but the growth of the church in Corinth can be credited to neither of them. In His mysterious way, it was God who “gave the increase”.
II. The Parable of the Mustard Seed (Mark 4:30-32)
Mustard seeds in Israel. (Image from Dqhall59.com)
The second parable, the Parable of Mustard seed, tells us of the mystery of how something small can grow to be something big. A mustard seed is only about one to two millimeters in diameter; hence, in the Bible, the mustard seed is proverbial for something very small (as in faith the size of a mustard seed (Matthew 17:20 and Luke 17:6). But when sown, the mustard seed can produce a tree** (generally considered to be the black mustard, Brassica nigra, which is common in the Mediterranean region) which can grow from seven to up to nine feet tall.
The General Sherman, one of the biggest trees in the world. (Image from Wikimedia Commons)
One of the biggest species of trees in the world is the giant sequoia (Sequoiadrendron giganteum). The largest specimen is found in California and named the “General Sherman”; it is 275 feet (83.8 meters) tall, 25 feet (7.7 meters) in diameter, and has an estimated age of 2,500 to 2,700 years. The surprising thing is the size of a sequoia seed: It is only one millimeter long and a wingspan of four to five millimeters wide. Because of its wing and small size, the seed is carried away by the wind. Yes these seeds can produce trees hundreds of feet that can live for more than three thousand years. Big things come is small packages.
The seed of the giant sequoia. (Image from A Life Without Borders)
In the book of Zechariah the Prophet, the LORD said, “For who hath despised the day of small things?” (4:10, Jewish Publication Society). During the time of Zechariah, the Jewish people had a problem. A few years before, they have just returned from the Babylonian Exile. They began to rebuild the Temple, which was destroyed by the Babylonians 70 years before, under the leadership of Ezra and Nehemiah. But by the time of Zechariah, the people have had grown complacent and stopped rebuilding the Temple. Thus, the LORD showed Zechariah several visions in order to inspire the people to rebuild the Temple. One of these visions was of their governor Zerubabel holding a plumb line, a measuring instrument used in building. God is telling the people: Do not let get discouraged with what you have begun, no matter how small.
Guess what this is. (Image from Ship of Fools)
Often small churches envy the big churches; some traditional churches envy “megachurches” in the malls, & c. We try to imitate their methods, such as bright lights, upbeat music, and entertaining sermons. But these are methods of the world and the world will always be better than the Church in these matters. If people want to be entertained, they can just watch TV or go to a concert. But if they want to go to church, they will go to church!
The altar of Salcedo Central United Methodist Church.
We are often frustrated of why our churches here in Cavite are often small. I once went on a retreat with some pastors in Ilocos Sur and we visited some of our churches there. There were churches in nearly every barangay and many of them are big and magnificent. One church, Salcedo UMC, was even bigger than the neighboring Roman Catholic parish and the locale of the Iglesia ni Cristo. Most of the churches here in Cavite are around twenty to thirty years old—but many of the churches in Ilocos Sur are more than a hundred years old! If we want to harvest something in a few months, let’s plant a squash; if we want to harvest fruit for years to come, let’s plant a tree!
Conclusion
Jesus used parables to communicate the mysteries of the Kingdom of God. In a seed we can see the mystery of how something that appears to be lifeless can sprout into something that has life. In a seed we can see the mystery of how small things can grow into big things. It is our duty as citizens of the Kingdom to sow the seed of the Word; and let God, in His mysterious power, to make it grow in people’s lives. Amen.
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* In Tagalog, the word parable, in Greek παραβολη, parabolē, is usually translated as “talinhaga”; as in the Ang Biblia (1901; revised 2001), the Magandang Balita Biblia (Tagalog Popular Version, 1985; and Revised TPV, 2005) and the Ang Salita ng Dios version (2010). But in Tagalog, “talinhaga” means ‘figure of speech’ in general. A parable is just one of the many figures of speech (the others being: simile, metaphor, personification, paradox, irony, & c.). Hence, this author prefers the loan word parabula.
** The mustard “tree” is actually a shrub. The expression used in the Bible is that it is “greater than all herbs” (Mark 4:32; in Greek, λάχανον, lachanon, literally, ‘vegetable’ or perhaps also 'herb' or 'shrub'). St. Matthew uses the expression “it is greater than the herbs (λάχανον, lachanon) and becomes a tree (δένδρον, dendron; ‘tree’)” (Matthew13:32).
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