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1 Samuel 16:1-13; Mark 4:26-34 June 14, 2009 I have now accomplished
it all in world travel: I have been to the West Edmonton Mall and the Mall of
America in West Edmonton Mall, opened
in 1981, now has over 800 stores, 23,000 employees, and 28.2 million visitors
each year. The Mall of America
opened in 1992, has a mere 520 stores, 12,000 employees, but 40 million
visitors per year. The Mall of
America, therefore, draws more visitors than Disney World, Graceland, and the
Why do you go to these mall
of malls? Are there stores there
you cannot find elsewhere? When
we went to Mall of America, the same company had three identical stores open
on different levels. Both of them
have huge amusement parks in their middle, Why do we go? Because they are big. Really big and we love being awed by
bigness. Sad to report, West
Edmonton is no longer the biggest mall in the world - there are two in Is this a parable? In a way, but there were no mustard
seeds used in the making of this parable or these malls. Could one actually buy mustard seeds
in either mall, or are these seeds just too small? Jesus starts his
parabolic initiative by throwing around seeds. A farmer in a rather undisciplined way
just strews them out and different things happen to the seeds. By the time he gets around to mustard,
the smallest of seeds he believes, have we figured out his point that seeds
are pretty small and inconsequential except that they harbour incredible
possibilities? Jesus seldom talks
big, but instead talks about the things right before our eyes that we see and
hear, but never really see or hear.
We’re stuck on big. The evangelist Mark
states that Jesus never spoke to the crowds without a parable, but explained
all his parables privately to the disciples. That still seems to be the method, for
much of what Jesus said is incomprehensible to those in the big world and
often in the church as well. We
are so convinced that large numbers, large budgets, huge facilities are what
define success and salvation that we can no longer perceive the way it really
works. A small parable is
required in which the momentous emerge out of the inconsequential. The people of The genie was out of
the bottle, Samuel went, but he had
a reputation that preceded him.
Samuel was not just a man of God’s words, but God’s
actions as well and had slain more than his share of God’s enemies. The town elders came out to meet
Samuel, trembling in their boots, but he was here peacefully for a big
worship service, to which they were invited. Meanwhile, as the
worshipers assembled, Samuel was checking out the Jesse boys, attempting to
discern which could be the one.
The oldest Eliab looked pretty impressive, but before Samuel could
think another thought, God whispered to him, “Don’t look on the
appearance or his height, because I have rejected him. The Lord doesn’t pay attention
to outward appearances, but looks on the heart.” How quaint, how unworldly! Instead of the magnificent tree, look
for the homely seed. Jesse appears to have
figured out what was going on, so he parades other sons before the prophet -
Abinadab, Shammah, seven sons in all, and none awakened a hint of recognition
in Samuel. Aren’t there more,
Samuel inquired? Well,
there’s the youngest out tending the sheep, Jesse replied. There’s nothing symbolic about
eight sons in Biblical numerology, and if the youngest is just a shepherd,
the lowest of jobs, then nothing was impressive about him. When David shows up all
the previous talk about outward appearances seems cast aside - David is
described as ruddy, beautiful eyes and just downright handsome. “Get up, Samuel, and anoint him,
for he’s the one.” One
didn’t crown kings then, one smeared oil on their heads, so David was
now the Messiah, “the anointed one.” It’s easy to take
this story for granted as an almost obvious coronation. A few chapters earlier, David had
killed Goliath, but the narrator here seems to know none of that. God looks upon the heart, but David
was nevertheless impressive on the outside. Yet he was the right person, for the
Spirit of the Lord came mightily upon David from that day forward. David wasn’t the obvious one,
nothing impressive about him, yet once one realizes the inner qualities it is
amazing how beautiful and handsome one looks on the outside. Can you see the mustard seed that will
change everything? I knew a Susan Boyle
before this, but she was my age, therefore a good bit older and only
interested in singing hymns in St. Thomas Aquinas Church along with everyone
else. This Susan Boyle in
question appeared not before Samuel but Simon Cowell on the American/Canadian
Idol spinoff, Britain’s Got Talent. It was one of those mean-spirited
segments when a candidate who is in over her head tries out, and everyone is
snickering and trying to keep a polite straight face. Susan is not by many definitions an
attractive person, a single Scottish woman at home with her cats. She was obviously nervous and did not
make small talk that gracefully.
The instant she opened her mouth singing, “I Dreamed a
Dream” from Les Miserables, she blew everyone away, especially
Simon Cowell. Was this a
parable? No one sings as she does
without something in her heart and then everyone saw her beauty. What we are here for
every week is to worship God who doesn’t bother with our impressive
features and examines our hearts instead, and shows us how to look inside as
well. Not just to look at the
seeds of love in another person’s demeanour, but just as importantly
how to realize what kind of seeds are in us. Sometimes we puff up our outside
because we don’t believe we have anything really worth
contributing. We are too addicted
to big to see our own mustard seed just waiting to be planted. Preached by Robert Kitchen Knox-Metropolitan United Church June 14,
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