Seemingly Unimportant
Christopher B. Harbin
Mark 4:26-34
We are easily awed and amazed by shiny things. We pay attention to wealth, power, fame, disaster, and violence. We look to monuments of human creation, whether pyramids, Stonehenge, or the Charlotte City skyline. Our heads turn for glitz and glamour, for a pretty face. We make heroes of the wealthy or powerful. We place leaders on pedestals. We value people as to wealth, income, status, or address. Jesus does not match up with any of those things which turn our heads and capture our attention. Can what passes as unimportant to us really have much value? Could those things we view as important be only seemingly so in light of what Jesus proclaimed about God's Reign?
Jesus did not go looking for crowds. He did not send advance teams to drum up interest like the circus coming to town. He did not advertise on Facebook or even TikTok. He did not purchase full-page ads. From everything we know about gathering a following, he did it all wrong. He did not even go to the larger towns and cities where he might find a larger concentration of people. He went to the small, out-of-the-way places and people came out to find him. They followed him into the hills. They gathered around whichever house he was in. They converged upon him at the shore.
Part of our problem is Jesus did not seek the people with influence and power. He mostly stayed away from population centers where the wealthy and politically connected had the most influence. He stayed away from the trappings of religious authority. Then he began speaking about the things of daily living. He did not begin his sermons with Scripture, except when he was invited to read at synagogue. My upbringing says he did it all wrong. He turned to the insignificant, mundane, overlooked, daily drudgery of life and related them to God's Reign.
In today's passage, we hear him speaking of scattering seed on the ground. That's not how my Granddaddy did it. Granddaddy to ...
Christopher B. Harbin
Mark 4:26-34
We are easily awed and amazed by shiny things. We pay attention to wealth, power, fame, disaster, and violence. We look to monuments of human creation, whether pyramids, Stonehenge, or the Charlotte City skyline. Our heads turn for glitz and glamour, for a pretty face. We make heroes of the wealthy or powerful. We place leaders on pedestals. We value people as to wealth, income, status, or address. Jesus does not match up with any of those things which turn our heads and capture our attention. Can what passes as unimportant to us really have much value? Could those things we view as important be only seemingly so in light of what Jesus proclaimed about God's Reign?
Jesus did not go looking for crowds. He did not send advance teams to drum up interest like the circus coming to town. He did not advertise on Facebook or even TikTok. He did not purchase full-page ads. From everything we know about gathering a following, he did it all wrong. He did not even go to the larger towns and cities where he might find a larger concentration of people. He went to the small, out-of-the-way places and people came out to find him. They followed him into the hills. They gathered around whichever house he was in. They converged upon him at the shore.
Part of our problem is Jesus did not seek the people with influence and power. He mostly stayed away from population centers where the wealthy and politically connected had the most influence. He stayed away from the trappings of religious authority. Then he began speaking about the things of daily living. He did not begin his sermons with Scripture, except when he was invited to read at synagogue. My upbringing says he did it all wrong. He turned to the insignificant, mundane, overlooked, daily drudgery of life and related them to God's Reign.
In today's passage, we hear him speaking of scattering seed on the ground. That's not how my Granddaddy did it. Granddaddy to ...
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