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I thought it was so magical.
As the story goes, Jack was on his way to sell his cow at the market when he happens to bump into an ancient man who gives him some magic beans in exchange for the cow. (What the ancient man saw in the cow, nobody knew - because the cow had run out of milk to give, apparently.) Jack's mom wasn't at all pleased when he returned with magic beans instead of money. Furiously, she sent him to bed without supper (which happens to most of the naughty children we read about in British storybooks) - and the magic beans were ditched outside their cottage - where they happened to fall on good soil.
In the dark and quiet of the night - while everybody was either sleeping or sulking - the magic beans germinated and shot upwards into a crazy sky-scraper beanstalk - which connected earth to a land of giants (somewhere in the sky). Astounded the next morning, Jack decided that he would climb up the beanstalk. He arrived at a giant's castle - where the giant's wife was kind and hospitable enough to give the weary boy some much-needed nosh. The giant returned much later, sniffed the air in sadistic delight - and went:
Fee-fie-foe-fum,
I smell the blood of an English man.
Be him alive or be him dead,
I'll grind his bones to make my bread.
(A poem I loved as a child - till I was old enough to realise how gory it sounded.)
The giant's wife hid Jack till she was certain that her man was asleep. Jack escaped with a bag of gold - went back down the beanstalk and arrived home, unscathed. I can imagine how gobsmacked his mom must have been. She should have cooked Jack a feast to make up for last night's no-supper! "You are brilliant after all," she should have said. Since then, Jack had returned to the giant's castle twice. The first time, he returned with a hen that laid golden eggs - and the second time, a magical harp that could play by itself (can't remember if it was golden). He wasn't quite so lucky the second time though. The giant chased him down the beanstalk. Fortunately for Jack, he reached home in one piece and was able to chop down the beanstalk with an axe - just in time! The poor giant fell and died. Jack and his mom lived happily ever after - rich and satisfied.
Now that I'm all grown up, I feel sorry for the giant's wife. She must have wondered why he did not return home that night... and the next night... and so on. Had he walked out on her forever?
What a story!
Anyway, I was pondering on Mark 4:26-29 today, when I suddenly remembered those magic beans.
"26 He also said, “This is what the kingdom of God is like. A man scatters seed on the ground. 27Night and day, whether he sleeps or gets up, the seed sprouts and grows, though he does not know how. 28All by itself the soil produces grain—first the stalk, then the head, then the full kernel in the head. 29As soon as the grain is ripe, he puts the sickle to it, because the harvest has come."
OK, perhaps the seed that the man scattered on the ground did not grow as fast as those magic beans did. But like those magic beans, the seed's growth was a mystery to the sower. The sower had sown the seed on good soil. His hands had done all the work they could do. He had played his role. But the life of the seed lay in a much greater pair of hands - that of the sovereign God. The germination, growth and maturing of the seed into grain could only happen in God's time. The secret of the seed's growth was only known to God, who enabled the harvest.
There was nothing the sower could do to help God - when it came to growth. The victory owed to fruitfulness belongs to God and God alone.
In this parable, Jesus reveals beforehand, what He intends the simple story to illustrate - i.e. what the kingdom of God is like. (The story could illustrate many other things too - for example growth and breakthrough in a person's life - because, ultimately, all good growth is God-enabled.) In essence, Jesus points His listeners to a simple fact: there is only so much we can do to build God's kingdom. We prepare the soil well, sow our seed and wait on God. We preach the Gospel, we meet needs, we build churches, we disciple and we encourage one another. However, we also need to trust in God's timing and wait prayerfully. Even when nothing seems to be budding, growing or moving. Even when ears seem shut, eyes are yet blinded and hearts remain unbroken. Even when we are mocked. Even when growth seems to plateau (or sometimes regress) despite all we do. Even when our own dreams and ambitions have to be packed up and buried 6-feet underground. Let us wait on God and have faith.
The glory of God's kingdom belongs to God. We can yet anticipate this with hope.
Thy Kingdom come, Thy will be done on earth as it is in Heaven.
1 comment:
thanks for this.
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