The Senior Sermon of Linda Amerault, Class of 2008 from the Diocese of Los Angeles, given on February 20, 2008, in Christ Chapel

Genesis 42:18-28; Psalm 72; Mark 4:1-20

Blessed be the Lord God, the God of Israel , who alone does wondrous deeds! Amen.

 How many times have you heard this parable? While it may be one of the most widely known of Jesus’ parables, it is interesting to note that it is not found in our lectionary for any year. Yes, year B skirts around it but this parable is found only in the daily office.

As with so many of Jesus’ parables, this one also paints a picture from everyday life. We all are familiar with the basic concepts of growing things from seeds, whether it is in a small backyard garden or that of a multi-acre farm.

N. T. Wright suggests that this picture is one that shows God “sowing Israel again in her own land after the long years of exile.” It shows God making his people fruitful again after too long a time of barrenness and oppression.

Isaiah tells us in chapter 40, “The grass withers and the flowers fade; but the word of our God will stand forever.” I suggest this parable is a story about the word of God that produces a harvest for everyone to share. The grass may wither and the flowers may fade, but God is always steadfast.

The harvest for everyone is the love of God, made manifest through his only begotten Son, Jesus. We are all children of God. He is our Creator, our Redeemer, and, our Sustainer. God is the one who gives us the gifts that we are to share with the world. God is the one who equips us with the necessary abilities to do the work he has called us to do.

The abilities I am referring to are like the seeds in this parable. When we are little children, our seed packets do not contain many seeds. We need to learn how to do the very simplest of skills first. We need to learn to walk, talk, feed ourselves, and dress our selves. As we continue to grow we learn many other skills and abilities. We learn to read and write, do math, add, subtract, multiply and divide. We might learn a second language or how to make our own clothes.

All of these can be considered or thought of as the seeds that we gather to put into our seed packets. We can rely on these seeds to help us learn other skills we need to grow up into adulthood. Unfortunately, along the way, we pick up some seeds that we might consider today as being tantamount to thorns, thistles, or weeds.

These bad seeds might be learned behaviors such as swearing, hitting, gossiping, abusing others, and prejudice. Last week we commemorated the life of Absalom Jones, who was the first African-American priest in the Episcopal Church. This was back in 1802. James Thomas told us Jones’ story in his homily on Friday.

Here is an abbreviated version of the story of Absalom Jones. He faced prejudice in the church he had belong to and after he and Richard Allen greatly increased the black membership of this church, the vestry decided to segregate them. During a Sunday service the blacks were instructed to occupy the upstairs gallery of the church. They were indignant about this edict that had been made out of fear. They left that church and formed the African Church of St. Thomas .

In 1794, the Episcopal Diocese of Pennsylvania agreed to admit this church into it fold. This body of Christ asked for and received certain conditions; “they were received as an organized body; that they have control over their local affairs; that Absalom Jones be licensed as lay reader, and if qualified, be ordained as minister.”(Lesser Feasts and Fasts) So be it. Jones was ordained to the deaconate in 1795 and as priest on September 21, 1802 .

Today, we look back on this event and probably say to ourselves, Wow! Aren’t we progressive? We have really come a long way since then.” It is true. We have come a long way. But I hate to disappoint you because we still have a long, long way to go until we all are living out our baptismal covenant. Some of us do better than others. We still seem to be hoarding the seeds that God has given us over the years.

We need to ask ourselves, and this is perhaps more important now, during the Lenten season, to reflect on just what we are doing, or not, to “seek and serve Christ in all persons, loving your neighbor as yourself,” and to “strive for justice and peace among all people, and respect the dignity of every human being.”

One of the first things I noticed about these last two parts of the covenant is that we do not get to choose who we see Christ in, who our neighbors are, who we are to respect the dignity of – there is not an ounce of choice. It is everyone – black, white, gay, straight, Arab, Israeli, Arian Brotherhood members, Christian, Muslim, the guy down the street who plays his awful music every weekend into the wee hours of the morning, those with tattoos all over their bodies, those who are homeless, the rich, the sick, old, young, blond, those with green eyes, those who are short or really tall. The list goes on and on. We do not get to choose who we seek, serve, love, respect and strive for.

Most of the time Christ choose to hang out with those who were considered less than stellar company - the sick, the lepers, the tax collectors, the homeless, the poor, and the sinners. Those were the ones for whom he said, “Truly, I tell you, just as you did it to one of the least of these who are members of my family, you did it to me.” The ‘it’ in this case is feeding, clothing, welcoming, and visiting with the marginalized. Jesus chose these people because of their need for love, compassion, and social justice.

The marginalized have the same needs today as then. We, as Christians, whether we are to be ordained or not, need to continue with the work Jesus started. We need to plant the seeds in those around us so that they may also see the need to care for and love all of our brothers and sisters.

We have made some progress over the years since Jesus walked among us. But there is so much more to be done and I shutter think about how many people there are in this world who still want to put the ones who do not reflect them in the mirror on the periphery.

Sometimes the injustice done to others is subtle and sometimes not. There was a young woman and her husband that were looking for an apartment. They had been married for a couple of years and she was pregnant. They wanted to get a place that would provide a little more room for this little gift from God. This young woman had made arrangements to look at an apartment on this particular afternoon. She arrived a few minutes early and the manager showed her around.

She really liked the way the apartment was configured so at the encouragement of the manger she started to fill out the application. Then her husband arrived. The manager took one look at him and said, “Gee, I just remembered that I already promised this apartment to someone else. Sorry for the inconvenience.”

On the surface, that may not have been a problem. However this young woman’s husband is black. It was pretty obvious why the manager said what he did. I have knowledge that this story is true. You see, this event happened to my daughter, Aimee, and her husband, Dwayne.

To make matters worse, Aimee knew this man as the head of a foundation that works in Haiti to plant churches! I guess to him, blacks were okay to be around for short periods of time to get them on the right track to salvation but he sure wasn’t going to rent one of his apartments to one of them!

But there is also another side to the blindness of people to love and care for each other. Aimee told me the other day that there is a black woman she knows in the inner city of Denver where she and her family live. This woman’s children go over to Aimee and Dwayne’s house frequently to spend time with them. They, Aimee and Dwayne, love to have Tevon and LaTaya over for bible studies or to just hang out. It seems that their mother, Lorraine , is hassled quite often by her neighbors for allowing her kids to ‘hang’ with a white woman. So it goes both ways.

Injustice is not solely about color. There are more injustices against humans than I could possibly list here. The seeds of injustice can be ugly and degrading. These injustices go against everything we are taught in regard to loving our brothers and sisters in Christ.

When we keep silent about the injustices we see occurring not only in the United States , but also around the world, we are ignoring our covenant. I understand that we cannot fight all the fights; we can use the gifts God so abundantly and lovingly gave us to choose one or two to focus on. I suggest that you might use some of your Lenten reflection time to decide where you might put your energies to help those who cannot help themselves.

During our time here at seminary and especially when we leave, my dear companions on this journey, let us be aware that we are charged with upholding our baptismal covenant each and every day of our lives, not just when it is convenient for us.

We are the sowers of the seeds God has given us. The seeds that need to be planted and nurtured with those we meet in our congregations, on the streets, in the grocery stores, in every facet of our lives. We need to spread the light of Christ everywhere.

We need to spread our love and knowledge of God as if it is some wonderfully infectious bug, like a love bug. We need to try hard to see the face of Jesus in every person we meet. We need to look beyond what they might look like at first glance. Beyond the color of their skin, or their eyes, or their hair. Beyond their sexual orientation or their political persuasion. Beyond their nationality or their choice of clothing.

I would like to invite you to turn to the person next to you. Allow yourself to see this person as Jesus would. Really look into their eyes. Try to envision Jesus there. Do you recognize him? He is there, inside each and every one of us. This might be a good place to start sharing your seeds.

Do you remember the reason the cross was erected outside this chapel? It is a reminder that we are to go outside of the church and minister to those who need us most and those who are our neighbors. Remember your baptismal covenant to ‘seek and serve Christ in all persons, loving your neighbor as yourself.’ And to ‘strive for justice and peace among all people, and respect the dignity of every human being.’

Go out into the world and plant the seeds of God’s love. Amen.