Sermon Preached by the Rev. Sam Frazier, Vicar

Saint Andrew’s Episcopal Church, Haw River, NC

June 14, 2009

Proper 6, Cycle B

In the Gospel this morning, we heard the parable of the Mustard Seed, which is about the tiny.  A tiny seed is planted.  It is watered, and it grows into a huge bush.  This is a parable about growth. Now, we know from the history of the Church that Christianity has grown from that small band of 12 disciples to what it is today.  We ourselves are almost 2000 years removed from the ministry of Jesus, but with time that ministry has grown stronger than ever.
We know that it took 300 years for Christianity to prevail in the Roman Empire, and centuries more to reach northern Europe.  In Africa and in the Orient, most Christian missionary work did not begin until well into the 19th century.  So when we hear this parable of growth today from the Gospel of Mark, we think of a slow development of Christianity to the point at which we stand today.

With the Gospel writers, and the people for whom they wrote, that was not the case.  They could not imagine looking ahead 2,000 years!  In contrast, the ancient Aztec civilization devised a calendar that looked ahead 300,000 years!  But the early Christians were much more near term in their thinking.  They did not anticipate that the world they knew could endure for much more than a generation.  You see, they were people in a hurry.  They were in a hurry, because they expected the final Divine Judgment to take place within a few years, or perhaps even within a few months.  Thus they frantically sought to reach as many converts as they could before that judgment fell upon their world.  Jesus understood that such calculations were human speculation rather than Divine revelation.  So He warned his followers that no one on earth knew the day or the hour of the Devine Judgment - not the angels in heaven, not even the Son himself.  The time is known to the Father alone.
The Gospel this morning is saying that growth belongs to God.  Growth is not brought about by we who participate in God’s work.  We may plant the seed in the ground.  We know that it will require moisture to germinate, so if rain does not come, we devise a system of irrigation.  And we may mix in fertilizer.  But we do not know how anything actually becomes alive.  We plant the seed, and when the grain is ready, we harvest it for our own benefit.  But God gives it life and makes it grow.  Our research chemists can tell us that they have observed some connections between the concentration of amino acids and the fact that living organisms appeared on earth  about a billion years ago, but that is as far as we have been able to go in explaining God’s creation of life, pure, beautiful life.

Today there is so much controversy about the creation of life, and it is a complete surprise to me.  I had thought that when the supporters of Darwin’s Theory of Evolution won what was called the Scopes Monkey Trial in Tennessee in 1925, that the matter was settled once and for all.  But that was not to be.  In the summer of 1958 I was enrolled in Summer School at the University of NC in Chapel Hill.  I had been raised as a Southern Baptist, but on a whim one Sunday I attended Eucharist at the Chapel of the Cross Episcopal Church.  I was blown away, blown away by the beauty of the liturgy, but even more remarkable to me was the sermon preached by the Rector that Sunday.  The point of his sermon was that Darwin’s Theory of Evolution was a very believable statement of how God created the universe and all life on this earth, how God started with simple one-celled creatures that evolved into complex human beings.  Coming from a very restrictive Southern Baptist culture, this sermon was a breath of fresh air to me.  That very day I decided to join the Episcopal Church!
The parable of the mustard seed is not about farming; it is about the growth of the Kingdom of God.  It is about starting with smallness and growing into hugeness.  And the secret is that KINGDOM GROWTH IS NOT IN OUR POWER.  It is totally beyond our control.  It does not respond to willfulness, or New Year’s resolutions, no matter how determined we are or how lofty are the resolutions.  You see, we do not control the results of the Kingdom.  God does!  What matters is our availability to being grown by the Holy Spirit.  It means being present to God and wholeheartedly open to RECEIVING the Kingdom.  We do not build the Kingdom.  THE KINGDOM BUILDS US.

Have you ever seen a mustard seed.  It is so small, about the size of the head of a pin.  You can barely see it!  And this fact points to an essential aspect of the reality of the Kingdom of God in our lives.  It is this: SMALL IS LARGE.  This is a truth that is so much at odds with our culture today.

Today we are in love with BIGNESS.  From mega-stores to mega-churches to mega-deals, to mega-SUV’s, our culture goes for the large.  And tragically what happens is that we nearly dismiss the small.  Can you imagine pulling up to the window at McDonalds and ordering “one Tiny Mac?”  Or can you imagine a Burger King ad which reads: “The home of the itty - bitty?”  Think about it.  A tiny infant, born to virtual nobodies in a cave, becomes the Savior of the world.  5 loaves and 2 fish feed more than 5,000 people.  Zaccheus, who is the size of a pygmy, reveals Gospel grace the size of Texas.

We experience this paradox of size daily.  Often a small gesture makes the largest impression.  A small phrase - such as “I do” - can and does have lasting impact on a marriage.  A small gift can frequently convey the most wondrous love.  A small idea like Apple computers beginning in a garage, can grow into a worldwide computing revolution.  The way that the small becomes large is when it REACHES BEYOND ITSELF.  When it moves from being a seed to being a bush.  When MUSTARD SEED FAITH moves from being an interior thing to an exterior reality, then we see the small becoming large.
We are reassured that the Kingdom’s power and glory are not our responsibility, but rather the Lord’s responsibility.  We can let go and let God.  But this is not to say that we might as well shrug our shoulders and sit back and let God work.  What we have been given, and what grows mysteriously within us, MUST BE GIVEN AWAY.  As recorded in the 10th Chapter of Matthew, Jesus told his disciples as he sent them out into the world to preach the Gospel: YOU RECEIVED WITHOUT PAYMENT; GIVE WITHOUT PAYMENT.

The growth of the Kingdom has been evolving for 2,000 years, and there are no limits to future growth.  We need to understand that Saint Andrew’s Church is a vital part of that growth.  We are all mustard seeds, and what is small will become large.  For those disciples 2,000 years ago the Gospel has spread so much more than they ever dreamed possible.  And for you and for me as well, the Gospel will spread beyond our wildest dreams.  The various ministries of Saint Andrew’s Church will grow.  You and I are planting the seed.  My friends, you and I ARE the seed!  We are giving ourselves, we are giving what God has given us, and God will make it grow.  Thanks be to God!  AMEN.