The Rev. Jennifer Whipple
The Congregational Church of Brookfield (UCC)
July 29, 2007
The Seed
Mark 4:30-32
Prayer: May the
words of my mouth and the meditations of all of our hearts gathered here this
day be acceptable in your sight, O Lord, our rock and our redeemer.
Amen.
This is perhaps less a sermon than
it is a story…a story about growth, positive change – a story about opening
up, sharing, and allowing God to do the rest.
I have found that there are moments in ministry when it feels like all of
the forces have come together to create if not a perfect, then a nearly perfect
moment. I had a few of those moments
this year on our
senior youth fellowship mission trip to
Pipestem,
WV
.
I realize now that this story began Sunday night, as soon as we arrived at the
Appalachian South Folklife Center and received our assignment for the week. But
I am going to begin this particular story a little closer to its ending.
You see one of the things we do on mission trip is split into chore
groups. The groups are assigned each
day to one or more of the tasks that we were required as a group to fulfill –
everything from the cooking to cleaning the bathrooms to planning the
evening’s devotions...some of which you can imagine were more desirable than
others in the eyes of our young folks. Because
of the way the chores and groups were divided, my chore group had to plan our
devotions on Friday night. It was
our last day of work, our last day in
West Virginia
, so we needed to make them extra special.
Now when you have a group of youth planning devotions for their peers it
is not always easy to get them to take the task seriously…so as I pulled my
crew away from the rest of the group at the end of an intensely heated Ultimate
Frisbee game on Friday evening, I thought – “Oh gosh, I hope this goes
well.” And much to my surprise,
the conversation went something like this.
“Okay, guys, tonight is our last night of devotions, we need to make it
special. What would you all like to
do?” I asked. Only a very few
brief moments of silence passed when…
“How about we use that scripture passage about the seed…you know the
one where the small seed grows into a large bush or tree or something,”
replied Lisa, “That way we can talk about the ways that everyone has grown
this week.”
“BINGO!” I thought. And
the angels started singing. “That
sounds great, now how would we like to go about this?
Who will lead what parts?”
“Well, I’ll read the scripture passage,” said Kyle.
“I’ll explain a bit about what it means and why we chose it,” said
Lisa.
“I’ll ask the question,” said
Brittany
, “Something like – in what way have you seen yourself or someone else grow
this week? Sound good?”
“I guess that leaves me to pray, “said Andy, “I don’t have a
problem with that as long as I can begin my prayer with a quote from Optimus
Prime in the movie Transformers.
‘Without sacrifice, there is no victory’.” (Which I must admit at
the end of a week away from home and families, working in the hot
Appalachian Mountains
, seemed a quote that was relatively appropo.)
How excited was I in that moment? Not
only did these young folks whom I had pulled away from a group of their friends
decide in a matter of minutes what it was that they were going to do for their
devotions. It sounded great too!
And I didn’t even have to do anything.
What was even better – it went off without a hitch. That
night everyone shared something about how they had grown or seen someone else
grow throughout the week – everything from learning a new skill, to opening up
to new people within our group, to realizing how much we take things like
bathrooms and running water for granted. The
Spirit was there in our planning and was truly there among us that last night as
we talked about what the experience of a week away working in
West Virginia
meant to each of us. It meant the
opportunity to learn those new skills – to dig holes and create the foundation
for a new room attached to the trailer home we worked on.
It meant the opportunity to use skills that perhaps some parents don’t
even know exist in their teenagers here at home – things like cooking,
cleaning, and grocery shopping. It
meant the opportunity to open ourselves up to one another and also to the family
whose home we worked on in the service of God and discipleship to Jesus Christ
– to challenge ourselves to accept the tasks at hand and to share the Good
News with a group of folks who didn’t know us from Adam & Eve.
“The
Kingdom
of
God
is like a mustard seed,” it says in the Gospel of Mark.
“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.” That mustard seed
grows when tended to – with air, water, sunlight.
The
Kingdom
of
God
grows when tended to as well – God is the gardener planting seeds of faith
and hope amongst folks throughout the world.
And we are the ones who are to take those seeds and tend them – to add
the study, the prayer, the praise, to share the gospel with others in word and
deed, to show others what an amazing thing it is to accept God into our lives
and to allow God to work within us and among us – blessing us, giving us
strength for the rocky parts of the journey, building community with friends and
strangers alike.
The
senior youth fellowship mission trip participants were commissioned from this
place and sent out as ambassadors – sent out as disciples to spread the Good
News both with their words and their actions.
And that is just what they did…the seeds were planted before we arrived
in
West Virginia
, but our young folks tended to them, and we were able to watch them grow.
Nowhere was this more apparent then in the lives of the family we served.
The sensitivity warning that Shelli, the Director of the Appalachian
South Folklife Center (or ASFC), gave us the night we arrived was that we were
going to a trailer home where a mom, dad, and three daughters lived…that just
the week before a group had gone in and cleaned two inches of cockroaches from
the corners and some of the floors of the rooms in their trailer.
That we were not to judge them in any way, but just go about carrying out
the tasks we were assigned – to build a floor for a room addition for their
youngest daughter, to lay a new floor in the kitchen and to clean out their
appliances, to build a roof over the new porch, to repaint the entire outside of
the trailer, and to get to know the family.
No short order for certain, especially for a group of young people who
had just begun their summer vacation!
When we arrived on the Widener family compound we saw a dog with a death wish
– who played chicken in the driveway with our vans everyday – an outhouse, 5
trailers (3 of which were in use), an old school bus, and lots of land.
Trailer number one was inhabited by grandma & grandpa, while trailer
number two belonged to one of the sons, his wife, and two children (Dakota &
Heather). Trailer number three was
where we were assigned, the trailer of another son (Rob), his wife (Jennifer),
their daughter (Janet), and Rob’s two older daughters who lived with them only
on weekends. The Wideners are very
much an Appalachian Family. They are
proud of their land. They are proud
of their families. They were a wee
bit leery of the young folks who in 5 minivans stormed their compound and came
to change things. They value the
simple life. They had worked as
itinerant fruit pickers traveling in the old school bus out west before settling
on their 18 acres in
West Virginia
. They value the little they have in
their homes, and they value one another. So
for us, a group of strangers, to enter onto their compound was certainly no
small thing.
Within minutes after exiting our vans, we were set to work digging holes,
cleaning up the yard, pulling apart the old porch, moving appliances out of the
kitchen, and entertaining three small children.
No sooner did we get there then Dale, our construction supervisor, warned
us not to go too close to the other trailers because they weren’t too happy we
were there. You see, it took a lot
for Rob and Jennifer, full of their Appalachian Pride, but both with medical
issues, to reach out to ASFC for help and to let us not only work outside their
home but to invite us inside as well. Their
extended family was less than happy about the circumstances, so the first day we
kept our distance.
Little
by little throughout the week, though, the rest of the family began to hang
around, to see how much fun our youth were having spending a week of their
summer vacation serving God and God’s people, and asking questions about ASFC
and the projects that could be done on their homes.
By the end of the week, the seed that God had planted in Jennifer’s
family had been tended to. Both of
the other families – both of whom, as you may recall, were not happy about
having us there in the first place – had called ASFC by Friday and scheduled
much needed work to be done on their places.
The kids, Dakota, Heather, and Janet who were either too violent to play
with or too shy to utter a word the first day we were there, by the end of the
week had become helpful – helping carry ladders and buckets -- and opened up
– playing and spending time with our youth blowing bubbles, playing tag, and
talking about school. That small
seed had certainly grown into an amazing thing.
The Good News was shared in conversations with the Widener family, in
conversations with the young folks who were able to go on the trip, and through
the actions of all who worked together that week to make a positive difference.
Being able to serve others, to watch our youth in action working and
playing around the Widener Family compound, to see the difference made in the
home we worked on…it was a small seed that had been planted right here at CCB
for our youth, and one that had been planted in the lives of the Wideners in its
own way, just growing and growing.
The passage in the gospel of Mark is similar to one in the Old Testament
Book of Daniel, which speaks of a small seed growing into a large tree.
“Its foliage was beautiful, its fruit abundant, and it provided food
for all,” it says in Daniel. “The
animals of the field found shade under it, the birds of the air nested in its
branches, and from it all living beings were fed.”
It is amazing to think that something so small as a mustard seed can grow
into a huge bush that provides food and housing for many of God’s creatures.
Faith, my friends, is much like that seed.
It can start out so small, with just a simple word or thought, but with
some tending to – joining together in worship and fellowship, praying,
studying, applying our faith to the issues that we see facing our world today
– our faith grows into something that feeds us and gives us hope.
God’s promise of the kingdom grows from that faith.
We envision a place and time where people find radical equality in Jesus
Christ, when people choose love for God and one another above the competing
interests and claims that are made in our modern day lifestyles and cultures.
If we hope and believe that God cares for all of us and all of creation,
and that God will use us as agents of change, then there is no end to how large
the
kingdom
of
God
can become. But it starts with
small acts – small seeds that with some attentive tending bear great fruit.
The gospel of Mark was written at a time of persecution of the early
Christians. It provided a theology
of hope for them in difficult times – and continues to provide one for us
today. “In order to view a glimpse
of the Kingdom of God,” one commentator wrote, “you just have to look at the
Good News we find in the actions of Jesus—the healer, teacher, [friend],
crucified and risen one.”
St. Paul
took the Good News in the Gospels one step further in his letters explaining
that service to God means service to one another and to our neighbors throughout
the world. In this light – faith
inspires each of us to “pay it forward.”
As we have received love and care from God, we are to share that love and
care with others whom we encounter—family, friends, and strangers alike.
“How about we use that scripture passage that says something about a
small seed growing into a really large bush,” she said.
“That way we can talk about the ways we have all grown and seen others
grow this week.”
Truer words have rarely been
spoken. Thanks be to God for these
words, for a kingdom that continues to grow, and for the good news we continue
to receive through the life and teachings of Jesus Christ.
Amen.
