Word to the Wise
Saturday, September 19, 2020 - Saturday in the 24th Week in Ordinary Time
[1 Cor 15:35-37, 42-49 and Luke 8:4-15]"What you sow is not brought to life unless it dies. And what you sow is not the body that is to be but a bare kernel of wheat, perhaps, or of some other kind." [1 Corinthians] "The seed is the word of God......But as for the seed that fell on rich soil, they are the ones who, when they have heard the word, embrace it with a generous and good heart, and bear fruit through perseverance." [Luke]
In both of today's scriptures the image of a seed as a symbol of transformation is presented to us. In St. Paul's First Letter to the Corinthians, the transformation is from the human person on earth to the resurrected person after death. In the Gospel According to Luke (as well as Matthew and Mark), the transformation is in the person who hears the word of God and puts it into practice. The image from St. Paul keeps theologians and preachers busy with explanations of all kinds. Jesus' own resurrected body may be our best guide.
The second image always resonates with me from my years of preaching in campus ministry settings and in parishes around the country. The parable seems to make it all depend on the condition of the soil in which the seed falls! Today's modern farmer can have his soil tested. In Jesus' day, it was a kind of broadscale, come-what-may, process on a given area without modern plows. A preacher in a regular parish is sowing in much the same area year after year. Campus ministry and itinerant preaching presents a continuing change of field without a lot of time to "test the soil." Jesus warns the disciples that their preaching will achieve mixed results but they must persevere in the task. I don't always get to see the long or short term effects of my preaching, but I see enough to keep me motivated 50+ years of doing it. AMEN