Message of Abbot Paul - Friday - 26th January 2024

​As we follow the Benedictine Calendar at Belmont, today we celebrate the feast of the Holy Founders of the Cistercian Order, Saints Robert, Alberic and Stephen. As a result, it’s tomorrow that we keep the feast of St Paul’s two great friends and protégés, Saints Timothy and Titus.

 

​Today’s Gospel passage from Mark, (Mk 4: 26-34), presents us with two short parables based on the sowing of seed. Again, Jesus is speaking with the crowds. “This is what the kingdom of God is like. A man throws seed on the land. Night and day, while he sleeps, when he is awake, the seed is sprouting and growing; how, he does not know. Of its own accord the land produces first the shoot, then the ear, then the full grain in the ear. And when the crop is ready, he loses no time: he starts to reap because the harvest has come.” These are two parables of the kingdom, with Jesus comparing the kingdom of God to a seed. In this first parable it is the action of the sower that is emphasised. He sows the seed. Once he has done that, the seed is on its own, Day and night, the seed goes through the various stages of growth until the corn is ripe and it’s time to reap the harvest. What is Jesus telling us to do? Not to worry about that part of the seed’s life over which we have no control, rather to concentrate on sowing the seed. As Christians, all we can do is sow the seed of God’s kingdom. We should not become disheartened if growth is slow or negligeable. That is God’s work, not ours, and God will prevail.

 

​The second parable is similar, but this time it’s a mustard seed. “What can we say the kingdom of God is like? What parable can we find for it? It is like a mustard seed which at the time of its sowing in the soil is the smallest of all the seeds on earth; yet once it is sown it grows into the biggest shrub of them all and puts out big branches so that the birds of the air can shelter in its shade.” Here the emphasis is on the smallness of the seed and the size of the shrub or bush produced. That is the dynamic of the kingdom. Just as Jesus could feed the five thousand with five loaves and two fish, so we are simply requested to sow a seed as small as a mustard seed for God, by his grace, to produce a bush so vast that even the birds can build their nests there. Again, the message is not to worry about that part of the enterprise which is in God’s hands. Our task is to sow the seed: God will do the rest.

 

​This is a great lesson especially for those who worry about the Church’s failure to evangelise the modern world and fret over empty churches and whole families who have apparently given up on the faith. Keep sowing the seed: God will do the rest. But do we have faith still to sow the seed? That’s a question only you or I can answer. Finally, Mark tells us that, “Using many parables like these, he spoke the word to them, so far as they were capable of understanding it. He would not speak to them except in parables, but he explained everything to his disciples when they were alone.” It would be fascinating to know what the crowds made of the parables of Jesus, but what is really important now is what we make of them. Jesus meant them to help us grow in faith and hope, that we might experience God’s love and learn to love him more. Lord, may your parables help us grow in faith and may they guide us into your kingdom. Amen.