Gospel Harmony Joy Note 15...

I am going to repeat a bit from my last entry, so that all my harmony of the Gospels thoughts are together.

I have left off reading my beloved A Harmony of the Gospels because the parables were starting. When I read them, I see Law, hear Law, taste Law, become crushed by Law. My first thought is: Okay, what is this parable telling me that I should be doing? That is how I learned them. That is how I learned nearly all of the New Testament: Jesus, the new and improved Moses.

Because this was going to be a hard day for me anyway and I was struggling to sleep, I cracked open the book. Immediately, I found myself floundering and worried ... very worried. What soil am I? Surely I am either the dirt on the side of the road (because Satan plucks the Word from me so very easily) or I am the thorns (because the cares of my life choke out the Word). Maybe I am both. Surely I am both. Alas, I have failed at being soil, being good soil, being the receiver of the magnificent, powerful, truly awesome gift that is the Word of God.

I emailed my friend Mary, the gentle Gospel giver, my despair. She emailed me back Jesus. Jesus is the soil.

Now, why didn't I think of that?

I mean, have I not learned that Christianity is a life of reception, that the very faith I have is that which I have received from Jesus Christ through the Holy Spirit as He works in Word and Sacrament?

I actually did not receive her email before my pastor came by to bring me the gifts of Christ. The gifts I was rather almost certain he should not be bringing me, given the struggles I have been mired in of late. I mentioned my despair of soil and he asked me what the parable was about. Without thinking, I answered, "the Word of God being sown." Jesus. Again.

The parable is not about soil, but about the Living Word taking root and bearing fruit, which is promised to do and to do so in those who are His sheep.

So, the parables. SIGH.  I must be brave, right?  Not fear them so?  I must, with the example given, try really hard to see Jesus in them, not Moses.  I must at least try ... and then send my frenetic emails to Mary.

So, I left off at Matthew 13: 1-23, Mark 4:1-25, and Luke 8:4-18

Soil.  If the parables are about the Living Word, then of course the soil is Jesus.  We receive faith, His faith.  But what else did I notice as I continue to read.

"He who has ears to hear, let him hear." (Matthew 13:9, Mark 4: 9, and Luke 8: 8)

Of course, you know, this calls to mind the Psalter.  Have the Word in our ears, in our mouths, on our tongues, falling from our lips.  All about hearing.  Hearing because faith comes through hearing.  

The thing that has long bothered me and distressed me is that terrible habit of encountering a bit of Scripture and set about figuring your place in it or, to put it in current terms, to determine its life application for you.  

Jesus is not the new Moses.

Jesus is not the new Moses.

Jesus is not the new Moses.

If He is not the new Moses, then the message is about Him, about who He is, why He has come, and what that means.

I laughed at the disciples question:  "Why do You speak to them in parables?"  Me, I'm there right with them. 

But in the middle of this—literally and figuratively since Mark is in the middle column in the parallel presentation—in verses 21-22, Jesus says, "A lamp is not brought to be put under a peck-measure, is it, or under  bed?  Is it not brought to be put on the lamp stand? For nothing is hidden, except to be revealed; nor as anything been secret, but that it should come to light."

Of course there, already, is Jesus.  There is the promise that His Words will be revealed, that He will not remain hidden.  But, for me, what flitted through my mind was the song "This Little Light of Mine" and all the terrible pressure behind chastising folk about keeping their lights hidden about cajoling folk to go shine their lights for others.  We are not the light. We are not the light.  We are not the light.  Jesus is.

Ah, that beautiful, fantastic Psalm 18 again!  [You know, I have had people tell me that they do not like Psalm 18!  How could that possibly be??]  Jesus is the light of our lamps.  Look right there in Mark, is says so again.  Not me, not my faith, not my obedience.  Jesus.

So after the soil and sowing, is lamps giving light and those who will hear and those who will not.  

Then comes Mark 4:26-29, which, to me, emphasizes the work of the Holy Spirit.  By this I mean, we read that "the soil produces crops by itself; first the blade, then the head, then the mature grain in the head."

Following that is Matthew 13:24-30, which is about the tares growing in with the wheat.  It struck me that the slaves inclination was to go rushing in and get rid of the tares, get rid of the bad things.  It made me think about how quickly we make judgments about bad things, bad influences, bad people.  It is not that being around the wheat, growing up amongst it was going to change the tares, but if I am focusing on Jesus, then the parable would remind me that Jesus is the Lord of the Harvest.  

That one, at least, I believe I read through the lens of the Gospel for Matthew 13: 36-43, which in the parallel Gospel comes a bit later, tells us that the field is the world, the tares are the sons of the evil one, that the enemy sowed them, and that the harvest will come at the end of the age.

In between, whilst I was thinking about those slaves, are two parables about the kingdom of God, the parable of the mustard tree, which confused me for I only remember verses about faith and mustard seeds, and the parable of the leavened loaf, which I understand not at all.  But at the end of the latter parable, in Matthew 12: 35, Jesus quotes: "I will utter things hidden since the foundation of the world." Paul told those people (who I cannot remember) that Jesus was the hidden God.  

Mysteries.  Paul also wrote that they were the stewards of the mysteries of God.  I've written before what solace I find in that.

If there are mysteries of God, then there are things of God that we will never know, in this world.  We are not meant to know them.  It is not needful for us to know them.  We know what is good to know.  That does not mean that we know all from the beginning or that the Holy Spirit will not reveal the things to faith to us, but it does mean that not every answer to all things is for us to know.  There is rest in that. There is peace in that. There is refuge in that.

The section finishes with the parables of the hidden treasures, the pearl of great price, the dragnet, and the householder.  The parable of the dragnet is like the parable of the tares, separating the children of Christ from the sons of evil at the end of the age.  I do not understand the others. 

In fact, at the end, Jesus asks the disciples if they understood everything and they said,"Yes."  I sighed, and thought, Good for you!

But is is good.  I read the first section of parables (are there more to come) and saw some Jesus and did not focus on what I should be doing, how I can be more faithful.  I wonder ... could reading the Gospels again and again and again and again, the way that I have the Psalter, help me to see Jesus and not Moses, the way that I see Jesus all throughout my beloved psalms?

Jesus came.

Jesus came to serve.

Jesus came to be our soil.

Jesus came to sow the Word of God.

Jesus came to teach.

Jesus came.

For me.

Lord, I believe.  Help my unbelief!