Sermon: In Plain Sight

Pentecost 3B

June 17, 2012

The Rev. Marguerite Alley

 “In Plain Sight”

 One of the shows I like to watch these days is called In Plain Sight. The story line is about two federal marshals who help protect people in the  “Witsec” program. The Witsec program is a witness protection program for people identified by or testifying in a federal criminal case, and who are in danger as a result. Once they testify they are moved to a new city, given new names and  “start their lives over” so to speak, as different people. The stories each week focus on the challenges of letting go of our past. The title of course, comes from the notion that the best place to hide people is “in plain sight”..in other words, they become different people, but people just like you and me. We have often joked with each other about things lost and found in plain sight, so clearly this is a common human phenomenon.

Jesus is at the beginning of his ministry when he shares this parable. There are four things that kind of stand out about Jesus and his teaching. First, he is claiming to be the messiah. He actually mentions this in the first chapter as he says “the time is here”. Clearly, he has accepted his role and wants his followers to understand it as well. Second, he only trusts his followers with that info. He does not intend it to be shared publicly yet. Third, the vision of God and the kingdom that Jesus is offering the world is radically different from the established religious practice of the time. What he is offering doesn’t feel like an organized religion at all to his audiences. Fourth and finally, Jesus has this unusual fondness for being indirect…or to put a finer point on it, to speak of two things at once. “I will make you fishers of men”…….relating a business with which his audience is well familiar to something that will challenge them is a good example.

 The gospel for today is a bit puzzling. We are only in the 4^th chapter of Mark at this point. If this were the only gospel (and we assume the writer thought he was doing something novel) then we have had very little time to get to know Jesus, to ruminate on his unusual teaching style and to digest the import of his message. For us here at Emmanuel, we are going to spend the rest of the summer and a good part of the fall hearing stories and getting to know the real Jesus, not the Hallmark Jesus we have at Christmas and Easter. But now, we arrive here in the 34^th verse of the 4^th chapter  and we are told that Jesus never spoke plainly to people. He always taught in parables and then explained them privately to his disciples. I have often wondered at this. Since his disciples were with him everyday we would presume that they, of all people, would “get” his teaching and that he would only need to explain it to his other audience. Instead we are told, he never explained it to his larger audience. So either Jesus is a terrible teacher, or he feels that we are smart enough to get it on our own and the disciples were dufus’s…or there is some other explanation….hidden in plain sight, or kept in secret like the mustard seed.

It is important to note that in this and all the other parables about seeds, growing and sowing  the kingdom is what is sown….not the result. Like the kingdom is not a flower or a head of grain…but is the seed that sits in the dark earth, waits to be watered, needs the sun to grow and the kingdom itself is what produces the fruit or the grain….it isn’t the fruit or the grain. This is an important distinction.

Now if we examine this TOO closely and too scientifically we know there are seeds smaller than the mustard seed, and bushes that grow larger. It is not the point. The real point of this parable is the amazing difference between the seed hidden deep in the earth and the amazing living thing it becomes.  Frankly, I am surprised that he never used the baby being conceived in secret, growing inside unseen by the world and bursting forth, a new and living thing as a metaphor for the kingdom. Perhaps that is because of cultural considerations or because of how women were viewed. Imagine how that image would have turned their thinking upside down….women giving birth to the kingdom! A seemingly lifeless seed becomes a miraculous and useful living entity…all in “secret”. Actually, he does use this comparison in a later metaphor! This “in secret” thing is another image that Jesus is fond of . Interesting how the church picks up on some of that….”the mystery of the word made flesh”, “from you no secrets are hid”, but not on  his other images like non-violence (turn the other cheek) and doing unto others as you would have them do unto you.

Well I, as a teacher, am particularly interested in this notion of why Jesus only uses parables. It would certainly be a lot easier if he were more direct and just said what he meant in plain language. Just tell us what to do, how to act what to believe and so forth….the world would be a better place, don’t you think? If anyone is “qualified” to speak about God and the kingdom, to explain it to us, it certain must be Jesus..and yet he uses all these confusing little stories and quips and makes comparisons between things that are un-related, at least on first look. He intentionally hides the meaning in a sense. Is he trying to be abstruse? Is he trying to confuse us? If you are going to start a new religion, then for goodness sake just tell us what we are expected to know and do to belong! It really is exasperating!

I certainly don’t pretend to know the mind of Jesus. Perhaps our traditional interpretation of this parable is correct….if you have even a tiny seed of faith, you can grow to become something really useful and spectacular, like saving pennies or putting money away for a rainy day and not realizing how those little deposits have added up….but that seems a bit too obvious, given what we know about Jesus. What my reading tells me is that a more authentic interpretation of this leads us to the idea that there is nothing we can do, that the kingdom is already within us, waiting to be discovered; that our faith is the result not the impetus. The seed is in ground, no one can see it until it breaks ground and grows in plain sight. Even then, we have to really look at it, acknowledge it, tend and nurture it or it remains hidden in plain sight. Once we begin doing this, it grows out of control!

The last thing I want to say about this is about how we sometimes find great stuff in ordinary things. Like a rare book in a used book store, or a Stradivarius violin in a yard sale. Often, the thing of great value is found in the most ordinary places. I suspect that another reason Jesus doesn’t make things very plain or obvious is to remind us that sometimes we are surrounded by great treasures in our ordinary lives and we fail to recognize them. If we cannot recognize them here, we aren’t likely to be able to find them anywhere else. We are where the mustard seeds are sown and what we become as a result is the kingdom.