{"id":898,"date":"2020-07-16T14:12:39","date_gmt":"2020-07-16T13:12:39","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/uniofglos.blog\/chaplaincy\/?p=898"},"modified":"2020-07-16T14:12:39","modified_gmt":"2020-07-16T13:12:39","slug":"noticing-the-abundance","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/sites.glos.ac.uk\/chaplaincy\/2020\/07\/16\/noticing-the-abundance\/","title":{"rendered":"Noticing the abundance"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Here’s the reading and reflection from today’s Communion service, starting with a very familiar story from Matthew\u2019s Gospel:<\/p>\n\n\n\n


Jesus left the house and went to the lakeside, where he sat down to teach. The crowd that gathered round him was so large that he got into a boat and sat in it, while the crowd stood on the shore. He used parables to tell them many things. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cOnce there was a man who went out to sow corn. As he\nscattered the seed in the field, some of it fell along the path, and the birds\ncame and ate it up. Some of it fell on rocky ground, where there was little\nsoil. The seeds soon sprouted, because the soil wasn’t deep. But when the sun\ncame up, it burnt the young plants; and because the roots had not grown deep\nenough, the plants soon dried up. Some of the seed fell among thorn bushes,\nwhich grew up and choked the plants. But some seeds fell in good soil, and the\nplants produced corn; some produced a hundred grains, others sixty, and others\nthirty.\u201d <\/p>\n\n\n\n

And Jesus said, \u201cListen, then, if you have ears!\u201d <\/p>\n\n\n\n


When you think about this well known parable, I wonder what you focus on. The rocky ground? The unhelpful birds? The choking weeds? <\/p>\n\n\n\n

It\u2019s a bit like me in my garden. A couple of weeks ago we\nbought a few new plants to put in, including a lupin, which looked lovely when\nwe bought it. Predictably, the slugs and snails have had a wonderful feast, and\nnow there are only sad remains. And that\u2019s what I can notice first when I look\nround the garden – the decimated lupin – instead of noticing the other things\nwe bought that are doing well, or the wonderful sunflower that\u2019s grown from a\nseed I planted as a sign of hope at the beginning of the lockdown…<\/p>\n\n\n\n

We seem to be hard wired to focus on the negative –\nespecially in other people and in ourselves – which means we miss the gift of\nall that is good. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

My wonderful tutor when I was learning to learn to teach RE used\nto say that the point of this parable wasn\u2019t failure and disappointment but the\noverflowing generosity of God, which never gives up. As he put in one of his\nsongs \u2018The man who was sowing just kept right on going\u2019. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

In the latest sermon posted by one of our favourites, Nadia\nBolz Weber, she says much the same thing. This parable isn\u2019t about the judgment\nof the soil, but about joyful generosity. \u2018Again and again, in the middle of\nthis thorny and rocky and good world, God still is sowing a life-giving word.\nJust wantonly and indiscriminately scattering it everywhere like God doesn\u2019t\nknow the rules.\u2019<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Maybe God isn\u2019t too bothered, as it were, that one of his\ngarden centre purchased gets eaten up – because he\u2019s too busy growing\neverything else and rejoicing over it all. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Maybe he is less bothered about the faults that appear so\nhuge when we look at ourselves – because he\u2019s more interested in the places\nwhere we are growing – and helping us to do just that. I came across this\nprayer this morning: <\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u2018May you learn to see yourself with the same delight, pride\nand expectation with which God sees you in every moment.\u2019<\/p>\n\n\n\n

When we look beyond ourselves,  there is certainly plenty of terrible news to focus\non if we want to, but that can easily take our attention away from the good\nnews stories of growth and generosity and flourishing. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

A couple of months ago I mentioned the amazing initiative\nstarted by Tom Herbert and others called the Long Table – volunteers cooking meals\nto be frozen and then delivered on a pay as you can basis across Gloucestershire.\nThe people who pay subsidise the meals for others. From a seed of an idea, a\nnetwork of kitchens has now provided over 31,000 meals – 81% given for free to\nthose who would otherwise struggle to feed themselves and to NHS workers.\nTalking about his original vision, before the lockdown changed things, Tom said\n\u2018I\u2019ve known in my bones the joy and transformative power of gathering people\naround food.\u2019<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Joy isn\u2019t the most obvious aspect of many of the news stories\nin the last months – but you can find it if you look. And joy isn\u2019t necessarily\nabout escapism – look at Desmond Tutu, a fearless opponent of injustice and a\nman overflowing with joy. The joy of generosity and giving is a much more\npositive motivation for service than a sense of duty or guilt – it means we can\nserve with a warm heart and a smile on our face.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

There is an unstoppable movement towards generosity and\ngrowth in many of Jesus\u2019 parables, echoing the words of Isaiah that he would\nhave known so well: <\/p>\n\n\n\n

For as the rain and the snow come\ndown from heaven,<\/p>\n\n\n\n

and do not return there until they have watered the earth,<\/p>\n\n\n\n

making it bring forth and sprout,<\/p>\n\n\n\n

giving seed to the sower and bread to the eater, <\/p>\n\n\n\n

so shall my word be that goes out from my mouth;<\/p>\n\n\n\n

it shall not return to me empty,<\/p>\n\n\n\n

but it shall accomplish that which I\npurpose,<\/p>\n\n\n\n

and succeed in the thing for which I sent it.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

What is this \u2018word of the Lord\u2019? Not necessarily something\nspoken by clerics and preachers, says Nadia. \u2018I am persuaded that the word of\nthe Lord is anything that brings good news to the poor, and comfort to those\nwho mourn. Whatever heals the broken hearted. Whatever opens prisons. Whatever\nbrings freedom to slaves… and former slaves… and the descendants of former\nslaves. And God\u2019s word is scattered all around us… joyfully scrawled on\nprotest signs and heard in newborn\u2019s cries, and seen in city streets and county\nfairs and shopping malls. The word of the Lord is written on the broken tablets\nof our hearts, it is falling like rain in the tears of the forgiven, it is\nharnessed in the laughter of children.\u2019 <\/p>\n\n\n\n

So let\u2019s move our focus away from the lupin, and towards the\nsunflower. Let\u2019s notice the abundant goodness and generosity of God all around\nus. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

We can begin by spending a few moments reflecting for ourselves…<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Where have we seen \u2018the word of the Lord scattered\u2019? Where\nhave we witnessed the abundant generosity of God? Out in the world, or closer\nto home…<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Where have we been part of the scattering, or the growing, in\nsome way? How does remembering that make us feel?<\/p>\n\n\n\n

And when have we had a sense of God generously scattering his word on us, despite of – or maybe through – our rockiness and weediness and slugs and snails – because God knows that underneath there is the good soil?
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