Matthew 13 is the third "discourse", the third teaching of Jesus, in this book meant for a new church learning how to be the church. Here, in parables, Jesus unfolds for his listeners and readers (including us!) many images and pictures of what the Kingdom of God is like. What does it look like, what happens, where God dwells and moves?
First of all, there's choice: will we be the rocky path, or will we allow the cares of the world to overwhelm us, or will we let the Word be planted in good soil that is fertilized, watered and cared for? God loves us enough to leave the choice up to us.
The Kingdom of God is about growth and expansion....but not without our involvement and effort; we are to be agents of the Kingdom, working toward its breaking into the world.
There's abundance. Of course, we can choose to go a different path and have nothing, but God provides abundance.
This choosing by us, God's people, does lead to different outcomes in life (weeds or wheat?), but notice that it is not humanity who does the reaping or the separating. That's God's work. "Let both of them grow together until the harvest;"(Matthew 13:28)
Today's Psalm is one most of us can totally relate to: How long, God, how long until I see and know Your goodness? Consider me, Lord, consider me. A wonderful thing about the Psalms is that we can hear our voices in the voices of those who have gone before. Their words become our words as we pray to God. Humanity's relationship with the divine is a river that winds throughout time, and we have been called to dive in and immerse ourselves in that life-giving water.
In today's readings from Genesis, we are reminded that these texts--which are so nicely bound and polished in our hands--have already passed through many hands and editors. Look at chapter 37--do the brothers sell Joseph to the Ishmaelites? Because the Midianites draw him out of the pit (vs. 28) and they sell him to Ishmaelites, but then at end of chapter it's the Midianites, not the Ishmaelites, who sell Joseph to Potiphar. Yet in Chapter 39, it's the Ishmaelites who brought Joseph to Egypt. What! All these discrepencies reveal the editing and redacting that has been done, but also, that this is not an important detail to get right. What is? Joseph's brothers' pride and jealousy prodded them to sell their younger brother out and strip him (the coat) of his favoritism. Unfortunately, here is a reality we can understand....even today.
And Chapter 38 is a story that you will not hear read on a Sunday morning; it doesn't make the lectionary. And it's an interruption to the Joseph story...so it must have some truth that we are to notice. What do you hear in the story of Tamar and Perez, two women who show up in Jesus' genealogy?
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