Title: Rivers Underneath
Our gospel reading today comes from the gospel of Matthew
Chapter 13, verses 1-9, 18-23.
Let us listen now for the word of the Lord:
That same day Jesus went out of the house and sat beside the sea. Such great crowds gathered around him that he got into a boat and sat there, while the whole crowd stood on the beach. And he told them many things in parables, saying: “Listen! A sower went out to sow. And as he sowed, some seeds fell on the path, and the birds came and ate them up. Other seeds fell on rocky ground, where they did not have much soil, and they sprang up quickly, since they had no depth of soil. But when the sun rose, they were scorched; and since they had no root, they withered away. Other seeds fell among thorns, and the thorns grew up and choked them. Other seeds fell on good soil and brought forth grain, some a hundredfold, some sixty, some thirty. Let anyone with ears listen!
Hear then the parable of the sower. When anyone hears the word of the kingdom and does not understand it, the evil one comes and snatches away what is sown in the heart; this is what was sown on the path. As for what was sown on rocky ground, this is the one who hears the word and immediately receives it with joy; yet such a person has no root, but endures only for a while, and when trouble or persecution arises on account of the word, that person immediately falls away. As for what was sown among thorns, this is the one who hears the word, but the cares of the world and the lure of wealth choke the word, and it yields nothing. But as for what was sown on good soil, this is the one who hears the word and understands it, who indeed bears fruit and yields, in one case a hundredfold, in another sixty, and in another thirty.
This is the word of the Lord.
<Thanks be to God>
Our Genesis passage reads like the beginnings of a high drama. We have twin brothers – each one favored by a parent – one a rugged outdoor type has captured his father’s attention and the other – is a devoted academic that is the apple of his mother’s eye. If this story was told now we could cast it in Downton Abbey terms. The Lord and Lady working to set their heirs up even when they are working against each other.
There is conniving and backstabbing. There are Alliances built and destroyed. There is all Family drama! As fans we would pick sides and have our favorites. We would have fans for team Esau and fans for team Jacob. I mean, this is Emmy award winning material if only we can get Professor Mcgonnagal – I’m sorry – Dame Maggie Smith – to play Rebekah.
You see, This is the great game of houses – encompassing birthrights, blessings, inheritances and power.
But let’s look past the High drama. Let’s look closer.
Isaac is Abraham’s second child, even though we don’t talk about his older brother Ismael that much. Sarah sent them off to the desert to focus the attention on Isaac. That older brother has a part to play in the story, but that’s not until act 4.
Rebekah, like Sarah before her, is blamed as being “barren” – meaning she was childless. Isaac and Rebekah prayed to God for a child, and God answered their prayers with the fraternal twins – Jacob and Esau.
Their story starts before they are even born – while Rebekah is pregnant with the twins – God tells Rebekah that “Two nations are in your womb, and two peoples born of you shall be divided; the one shall be stronger than the other, the elder shall serve the younger.”
Esau is born first, and he comes out red and covered in hair – he is wild and screaming. Jacob is born second and he is grabbing Esau’s heel as if to pull him back in, foreshadowing their future fighting.
There is a good bit of cultural expectation and history that helps us understand why this might be such a big deal.
The social status of these twin brothers is complicated by the Ancient Israelite expectation that the first- born son should be favored. The firstborn son typically takes on his father’s profession
For example, Cain becomes a farmer, like Adam (in Genesis 4), and succeeds his father as the family patriarch, and inherits a larger portion of the family goods than his other brothers (Deuteronomy 21:15-17). These privileges make up the birthright (25:31) and collectively provide a level of social and material security that the younger brother would not enjoy. The younger sibling would have to depend on the mercy of the older brother or make their own way in the world.
So you might understand that for the “younger” brother of a set of twins, this expectation might seem capricious.
Jacob or (ya’aqov), which shares the same Hebrew root as ‘aqav, meaning “heel.” (The same root can also mean “to supplant” or “to cheat.”) you might understand Jacob to be translated as “heel grabber” which is an idiom for “he cheats” – we see this in genesis 27 after Jacob tricks Issac into giving him the blessing reserved for the firstborn, Esau asks Isaac
“Is he not rightly named Jacob? For he has cheated me these two times. He took away my birthright, and behold, now he has taken away my blessing.” Then he said (to Isaac),
“Have you not reserved a blessing for me?”
Like I said, lots of drama.
Let’s go back to our text –
When the boys grew up, Esau was a skillful hunter, a man of the field, while Jacob was a quiet man, living in tents. Isaac loved Esau, because he was fond of game; but Rebekah loved Jacob. Once when Jacob was cooking a stew, Esau came in from the field, and he was famished. Esau said to Jacob, “Let me eat some of that red stuff, for I am starving!” Jacob said, “First sell me your birthright.” Esau said, “I am about to die; of what use is a birthright to me?” Jacob said, “Swear to me first.” So he swore to him, and sold his birthright to Jacob. Then Jacob gave Esau bread and lentil stew, and he ate and drank, and rose and went his way.
Scripture tells us this is how Esau despised his birthright.
I’m not convinced that Esau is completely at fault here. Yes – he bargains away his birthright for a bowl of stew and he seems more interested in immediate gratification than understanding his place in the community. However, it is worth noting that up until this point, God had been extending God’s promises through the Abrahamic line – that includes Issac, Esau, Jacob even Uncle Laban were all listed in the text as recipients of the divine blessing. God shows up to talk to pretty much everyone at different times. The text tells us that God spoke to twice to Isaac, six times to Jacob, and at least once to Rebekah and once to Laban. So as you can tell, The divine presence and the divine blessing are strong in this family.
So when we consider that in that context with the Israelite understanding of the firstborn, Esau might be overconfident and convinced that he will be the recipient of the birthright and of his father’s blessing. The text tells us that he was the favorite of his father. There is good reason – historical and cultural – to think that he is assured of the birthright and Isaac’s blessing. Why wouldn’t he receive both?
Jacob was the favorite of his mother, and tradition tells us that he was devoted to academic pursuits. But Rebekah knew something for a fact – Remember back to where God talked to Rebekah – God said you have two nations in you, and the elder will serve the younger. She knew this – God had already spoken it to her. She yet gets painted as conniving and manipulative. Jacob, and I think rightfully so, is portrayed the same. But here’s the thing, I’m not interested in the traditions that paint them as greedy, or as conniving. The question that bothers me is how messed up was the relationship between Esau and Jacob that Jacob thought that trickery and lies – even if they were legal – were the right way to go about securing the birthright and the blessing?
There is a lot going on here – the relationship between Isaac and Rebekah, the relationships between Esau and Isaac, Esau and Jacob, Esau and Rebekah, and Rebekah and Jacob and finally, the relationship between God and each one of them.
We know that God had told Rebekah how that part of the story would end, and still she works with Jacob to trick Isaac. To me it begs the question – why didn’t either one of them trust what God had said?
There is the temptation to read this story as the divine director in motion, moving the pieces to give us a great story, but that reduces God to nothing more than a hack director and removes any accountability that Jacob or Esau has for their actions.
It is important to note that Jacob and Esau bear the weight and responsibility of their actions. Jacob ends up leaving home to hide from Esau because Esau has decided to murder him as soon as their father is dead. Jacob leaves his family and everything he has ever known and ends up in indentured servitude to his uncle for 14 years. He then serves another 6 years willingly. So for 20 years – Jacob serves as a servant in his Uncle’s house. After all of that time, finally there is the opportunity to meet and reconcile with Esau.
Yet as we see in scripture, God continues to show up and work through these situations as God does in all situations – even when we make decisions that run counter to the divine will, God continues to show up. However, just because God is faithful to God’s promises and God shows up, That doesn’t mean there are no consequences to our actions – people’s feelings get hurt, relationships are destroyed, families and communities are torn apart. We bear the responsibility of our actions.
I believe there is a lot of fear in Jacob’s story. I don’t think all of it is his own. I think Rebekah fears that what God has told her won’t come true. I think that Esau is angry at how his relationship with his father was abused and how his own mother turned against him in favor of her younger son. Reading it is painful.
Imagine living it.
Hold that pain for a moment and listen as we move to Matthew 13 and into the parable of the sower. This is one of the few Parables where Jesus tells us what he means in the telling of the parable. Using the message paraphrase, let us listen as Jesus explains the parable to us:
“Study this story of the farmer planting seed. When anyone hears news of the kingdom and doesn’t take it in, it just remains on the surface, and so the Evil One comes along and plucks it right out of that person’s heart. This is the seed the farmer scatters on the road.
“The seed cast in the gravel—this is the person who hears and instantly responds with enthusiasm. But there is no soil of character, and so when the emotions wear off and some difficulty arrives, there is nothing to show for it.
“The seed cast in the weeds is the person who hears the kingdom news, but weeds of worry and illusions about getting more and wanting everything under the sun strangle what was heard, and nothing comes of it.
“The seed cast on good earth is the person who hears and takes in the News, and then produces a harvest beyond their wildest dreams.”
I hear this parable and I think Jesus is talking to us about fear. We might call it a lack of trust or disbelief, and it may be those things, but at its core, I think it’s fear. Fear keeps us from trusting each other. Fear keeps us from trusting God.
I know. I keep talking about fear. Fear that we might have to change. Fear that God’s promises are true. Fear that change means we don’t know what the future looks like.
It’s hard to admit that we might feel fear. We are culturally conditioned to never admit fear. We are told always to press forward, never mind the consequences. Never mind if are destroying our neighbors in our rush to help God fulfill God’s promises.
Now Church – tell me – what is the good news?
We just said this in the declaration of forgiveness a few minutes ago – what is the good news?
In Jesus Christ we are forgiven.
Can I get an Amen?
And yet – we hear the good news and we get bound up in Weeds of worry. Illusions of getting more and wanting everything under the sun.
Even when we know the promises of God, we can’t seem to trust God to keep God’s promises. Even when it means stealing from our brother, or never taking the time to talk to our neighbors, or not keeping our word as a peacemaker, we seem to feel the need to help God keep God’s promises.
I believe that It’s fear that Jesus is talking about. I think it’s fear that convinced Jacob and Rebekah to trick Isaac and to steal from Esau.
Church, this isn’t how it has to be.
I was talking with a group the other week and the conversation of church attendance came up.
They shared that they were seeing fewer and fewer people join the church. Why was their church different than the ones down the street that seemed to be bursting at the seams.
I don’t know the answer to that question, but I do know it is a common question in Presbyterian circles. There is an unhealthy amount of fear about numbers. Talk to any group of pastors and numbers will come up. Don’t believe me? The next presbytery meeting is in November. Go listen.
So I was talking with a group of fellow believers, and they asked the question “Why is it that all the churches around us seem to be overflowing from their parking lots to the point of needing traffic control on Sunday mornings and we are never more than half full? We used to have more. But this year we’ve had more funerals than weddings or baptisms.”
Like I said, I don’t have answers to those questions about numbers, so I asked other questions. Questions like “why do you stay? What is it about this place that keeps you coming back? What do you want to share with other people?”
Everyone of them said it was the people. It’s the community that keeps bringing us back. We want to be in relationship with these people. We want to share this hope that we have with other people.
Church, That is amazing. They care enough about each other and about their community to dream about how this thing that has nurtured them and given them life might outlive them. They dreamed about how they might share their joy and the joy they feel in that place not only with each other, but with other people.
Sure, there was fear in that conversation. Fear that they wouldn’t be successful and that this community which they love might not outlive them. But what i saw that tempered the fear was hope. Hope for what could be – even if they don’t know what that looks like yet. Hope because they were willing to hear God’s voice saying “Listen, I am making all things new.” These words are trustworthy and true – write them down. Believe them. I am making all things new.
God keeps God’s promises. God is making all things new. Church – We might be living in a Holy Saturday moment, but we claim resurrection and we believe that we are an Easter people. Believe God’s promises. Live like you believe God’s promises.
I shared with these fellow believers that one of the things that I love about the Presbyterian church is our commitment at the highest levels to ensure that all voices are heard. Even the voices that make us uncomfortable or the ones that we don’t like because they think or process differently than we do. It’s easy to hear these words and dismiss them as being problems that other people have. It’s easy to judge and say there were the rocky soil or they just don’t understand. It’s harder to turn that same introspective eye on ourselves.
But church, That is the challenge – To see what’s in the rivers underneath the surface. And From outside – our communities can look calm and if you only stay at the surface and never engage, it will look calm. But if you get in the water and actually engage with people – Community is hard. Careless words and actions damage relationships. Thoughtless actions destroy communities and relationships. Jacob saw that. But – we are called to be in relationship with each other. That means we need to overcome fear. It means we need to trust each other. It means engaging in uncomfortable conversations. It means thinking through how our actions will affect the community, not just in the short term but in the long term. It means listening to the voices that challenge us and considering what gifts those voices bring to and add to the community. It means trusting God to keep God’s promises, even when we think we know best.
If I can leave you with one last thing –
If you remember nothing else I’ve said – hold onto this:
We are called to build the kin-dom of God. Engaging in lies and backbiting, avoiding the difficult conversations and talking around each other isn’t building the kin-dom. Gossip and intrigue tear down the kin-dom.
Do the work of being in relationship and building relationships. Love each other enough to Have the hard conversations. Be a reflection of God’s love and grace. Build the kin-dom.
Amen.
Matthew Messenger 