[Propertalk] A rare reflection for this Sunday 17 June 2018

[Allison Dean]

A very rare offering as normally I don't preach however our hospital chapel
service is being broadcast live this Sunday so patients and staff can
listen in.  I hope it makes sense.  Many thanks to all of you for your
contributions each week.  I read them avidly and the seeds provide much
food for thought as I work with patients, carers, and staff.  Many thanks
to James Eaton for his homily which provided some insights as to how
Palestinian farmers would have grown crops.

Allison

Allison Cline-Dean,

Lead Chaplain, Colchester General Hospital,

Colchester, Essex, UK



As I was writing this reflection indoors, a freshly cut rose was scenting
the air around me.  Since moving to the UK I have developed severe hayfever
which I never had in Canada so it is with trepidation that I bring anything
in from the garden.  However I could not resist cutting this beautiful red
rose to grace our table.  Don’t ask me the name of the rose as I don’t know.
The fact that it is still growing is a small miracle in itself but it has
happened due to the care that it has been given over the past few years.  It
started out a spindly bush pulled up and thrown on a rubbish heap by
someone re-doing their front garden.  It had been out of the earth all day
in the hot sun.  I noticed it and asked permission to take it and plant it
which was granted.  I had my spouse soak the bare-root bush for 24 hours in
water and prepare a place for it in the garden, ensuring that there was
bonemeal and fertilizer in the hole before we carefully put the rose in
place.  A week later we were told that the house had been sold and we would
need to move so we dug up the rose and put it in a pot and it has moved
with us in two subsequent moves.  It has been re-potted twice, pruned and
fertilized many times, and sprayed for aphids frequently.  The year after
we put it in a pot, we had two blooms.  Last year we had a few more blooms.
This year there many blooms in just these first few weeks.  Reading this
week’s readings reminds us that small things can have a large effect,
particularly when we walk in faith.

As I considered the readings and read commentaries by others what keeps
coming back to me is that we need to trust that God has it all in hand and
that things won’t always go the way we want it to happen.  Fr. Richard Rohr
wrote “There is a future that is created by God, and much bigger than our
own efforts.”

Palestinian farmers in Jesus day would appreciate what Fr. Rohr said.  A 21
st century farmer tills, ploughs and discs his fields before he sows his
seed.  That’s not what happened in Jesus’ day.  Fr. James Eaton writes

Palestinian farmers sowed before they plowed so there was no way to know
just what was under the soil. The field wasn’t prepared; it was just sown
and only then plowed and fertilized. Over the winter paths got packed down,
fields tossed up rocks, vines and thorns took over. Jesus mentions these
things. “Yes, I know, “they mumble. Some of the seed falls on just these
kinds of places. The birds eat up what lays on the surface; the sun
scorches what falls on rocks and the thorns and weeds choke out some of the
rest.

The farmers listening to Jesus would have understood exactly what he was
saying.  Even modern-day farmers know the risks of sowing a crop.  Some
years there will be insufficient rain so there is not enough crop to make
seed to sow the next year.  Yet our lives are the same.  We make plans,
save money, get married, start a business.  Yet someone becomes ill, a
partner leaves, the economy crashes, we discover we have an addiction to
something that harms ourselves and our family.  These are the weeds that
are in shallow ground, that wind themselves around us just as what starts
as a tiny vine winds itself around the roses in the garden and becomes a
stronger and thicker, gradually sucking the life from the good plant,
unless I pull that weed when it is small.  We wonder why do these things
happen?  Why me?  Maybe we should be asking “What now?  The answer to “what
now” is to “keep the faith”!

I know many of you are saying “keep the faith”!  You have to be joking
Allison.  Everything is breaking down in my life and you say “keep the
faith”.  Yes because it is the seed that has been sown in good ground that
takes root and goes deep.  The seeds of faith that have been planted by
others as we have journeyed through life that give us strength and keep us
going.  It is the quiet little miracles that give us hope.  The moments
when someone quietly comes to you and says “thank you for listening and
being there for me – it has made a difference”.  The moment when a child
hands you the first dandelion of the season and says “I love you”!  The
moment when your child graduates from primary school, or secondary school,
or university, comes up and gives you a hug.  It’s those random acts of
kindness that are done on the spur of the moment which affect the life of
one person, maybe more, and which go on sowing seeds of hope and light in a
world which is full of much darkness and fear.  It’s about being channels
of God’s grace and God’s hope and God’s peace, spreading the beautiful
scent of Jesus all around us and touching the lives of many people, just as
that single beautiful red rose has scented my dining room.

It won’t always be easy.  There will be times when we fail yet we take the
next step in faith believing in God’s grace, sowing the seeds of God’s
peace, hope, and wholeness in each person that we encounter and then
letting God do the rest.

I don’t know how many of you know of Fr. Mychal Judge.  I have never met
him nor have many others, yet he has touched the lives of many people,
including my own.  He was a Roman Catholic priest, a recovering alcoholic,
a man with a quick wit who struggled with trying to be all things to all
people – eventually realizing that it was not all up to him, he needed to
let God do much of the work.  He was also the chaplain to the New York
firefighters and the first victim of 9/11 – killed when a piece of rubble
from one of the falling buildings hit his helmet as he gave Last Rites to a
dying person.   He had a favourite prayer that he hand-wrote on the back of
his cards which he gave to each person he encountered and which is posted
in my office where I can see it as I work.  It seems to be the right way to
end this homily about seeds of hope and faith.  Let us pray:

Lord, take me where You want me to go; Let me meet who You want me to meet;
Tell me what You want me to say, and Keep me out of Your way.  Amen
-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: <http://stsams.org/pipermail/propertalk_stsams.org/attachments/20180616/7db08e01/attachment.htm>