Seeds, Words and Their Growth

Message from Fr. Jose Koluthara, CMI

Lord Jesus, help us accept the seed, your Word, take it home with us and lovingly tend to it.   Amen.

My Dear Brothers and Sisters,

One much-loved teacher gave everyone in a first grade class a lima bean along with an explanation that each of them would be solely responsible for what became of it. With the bean and the explanation, they were also given a paper towel and a small Dixie cup and were instructed to moisten the towel, wrap it around the bean, put it in the cup and place the cup near a window or other light source. After a week or so, the teacher invited them to bring their sprouting beans to school. Some of them were ashamed to say that they had lost the bean or “the dog ate it”. Others had forgotten to keep the bean moist and its growth was stunted. Some forgot about the light source and the bean sprouted but withered. Still others among them were proud to show off a relatively tall and healthy sprout with a hint of a leaf here and there.

Since all of us can, in some small or large way, relate to seeds and growing things, the scripture texts for today, especially Isaiah (55:10-11) and Matthew (13:1-23) are particularly significant. Both the prophet and the evangelist prompt us to compare the word of God to a seed, planted anew in us each week. Like a much-loved teacher, the church provides, through the liturgy, both the seed and the wherewithal to allow the seed to germinate, to grow and thereby to transform our lives. But in order for growth to occur, we must accept the seed, take it home with us and carefully, lovingly tend to it while allowing it also to tend to and care for us. While Jesus lived and walked and worked among us, he planted the seed of the Word in the form of parables. Then Jesus challenged, “Anyone who has ears should listen!” and so does Jesus continue to challenge his listeners today.

Listening to Jesus means understanding and accepting that the seed of the Word is portable, that is to say, it may not be left hanging in the air, intermingled with the smell of candles, flowers and incense. But in order to be portable as well as translatable into every aspect of the human experience, the Word must germinate within the good soil of the human heart and mind and, ultimately, the human will. If the Word we hear does not germinate in us and then travel with us across the threshold of the church and on into the rest of the week, it cannot accomplish its God-intended purpose – to achieve the end for which God spoke it into the world and into each of our lives (Is 55:11).