Able to Hear
“Able to Hear”
Ezekiel 17:22-24 Psalm 92:1-4, 12-15 Mark 4:26-34
Third Sunday after Pentecost, Year B, June 13, 2021
First Presbyterian Church, Sandpoint, Idaho
Andy Kennaly, Pastor
The imagery from this morning’s readings are amazing and they point to larger truths that we sometimes forget or overlook as we get caught up in noisy or familiar patterns. In Ezekiel God takes “a sprig from the lofty top of a cedar.” God sets it out. God breaks “off a tender one from the topmost of its young twigs.” Here you have an old tree, foundational, established, and set as its roots run deep. This tree produces small opportunities, sprigs. The old gives birth to the new. God takes this new, emerging, tender growth, and nurtures it, plants it on a mountain. Not just any mountain, but a “high and lofty mountain.” The high top of the old cedar is described as lofty, and now this is mirrored as the mountain is described as having a lofty top. It’s a long way from the bottom to the top in this tall description; lofty. An older definition of “lofty” is “exalted” or “spiritually high.”
A mountain in biblical imagery is a place where God is experienced or revealed. Spiritually high, exalted, blessed; this cedar grows from encounter with God! “On the mountain height of Israel” is another description. “Israel” is a name that comes from Jacob after wresting with God’s angel all night to receive a blessing. It seems that in wrestling with God, experiencing God’s presence, new creations are meant as a blessing for the world.
The imagery continues, talking about all the birds that will live in those branches, “winged creatures of every kind.” The expansive, inclusive, affirming vision of equality is behind every tall thing made low and low things made high, the dry made wet and the wet dried. In the blessing of God every thing is on the same level, a unified oneness, and God brings this about.
Tucked into these verses is a short little sentence that bumps us out of our Anthropocentric ruts, our human-oriented perspectives. “All the trees of the field shall know that I am the LORD.” “All the trees…shall know… I am the LORD.”
One evening this last winter I went cross-country skiing up on the mountain. It was a bit stormy, getting late, and the entire time I only saw one other person. On a particular trail there’s a tree I like to ski to and when I reach it, I tend to stop and just be with the tree. That tree has had a rough life, it’s roots and trunk are thick, the top crashed off years ago and has rotted away, but a new top sprouted so the tree is still alive. Brother tree has perseverance.
As I shared a few moments of silence and watched the branches wiggle in the breeze, I realized I have limited perspective. I was stood there, faced the tree and my eyes are on the front of my face, like predators have evolved. (Species that are typically prey have eyes on the sides of their face to give more field of view as a defense). Human beings, with eyes on the front, can only face one direction at a time. This affects our perspective at any given time. To experience something from multiple perspectives at the same time, like Picasso’s art masterpieces, is not part of our normal thinking.
We are also mobile, and I skied to that tree, and in few minutes, I would continue, and travel wherever my feet took me. That tree, however, is rooted, stays in the same place, and somehow, as an Earth creature created by God, experiences life from one position on the planet. Yet that tree’s perception is very different than that of a human. I wondered what it would be like to be a creature that relates at every moment to every direction? One side of brother tree doesn’t take precedence over another side; all sides simultaneously interact with his surroundings, and even his roots are in communication with the subterranean world and the other creations living around him.
“All the trees of the field shall know that I am the LORD.” What this “knowing” looks like, or how it works, is very different than human, rational, mental thought. But the truth remains, trees know, in their own way, that God is God, and they participate in this great equality as God helps the world evolve as new creations grow from old roots.
The verses in Psalm 92 also shake us loose from the shackles of cognitive thought. You’ve heard of right brain and left brain, and how each side controls different types of thinking. The logical, analytical, linear and objective thinking of the “left-brain” is contrasted with the artistic, creative, rhythmic, and imaginative feelings of the right hemisphere of the brain. The digital left handles information differently than the analog right. Although not from a scientific viewpoint, the Psalmist points out, “It is good to give thanks to the LORD, to sing praises to your name, O Most High.” How the psalmist does this is by music. Declaring steadfast love in the morning and faithfulness by night, the psalmist uses “the music of the lute and the harp…the melody of the lyre.”
Like the Ezekiel passage mixing generations of cedars as God does a new thing, the instruments of the psalmist, the harp, lyre, and lute, are all stringed instruments, one evolving from the other. The harp comes from a basic, musical bow, now more sophisticated, large, and resting on the floor. The lyre is a smaller, portable version that can sit on your lap. It is like a harp in many ways as you pluck the strings. The lute is fretted, so you make your own tones, and this later gave rise to what we know as a guitar. In a variety of forms, music unites. It draws out creativity and improvisation, even as established songs can be repeated and passed on from one generation to another. Music invites us, like the trees of the field, into a different way of knowing, not just a brain thing. Music can be a full-body experience as the brain, the heart, the depths of the soul move the body to create an opening to the very Source and Origin who lives through each note, and in the silence between the notes.
This is the flow of Life the psalmist recognizes, the work of God that bring a response: “at the works of your hands I sing for joy. The righteous flourish like the palm tree, and grow like a cedar in Lebanon.” Echoing the trees in Ezekiel’s passage, the righteous in Psalm 92 “are planted in the house of the LORD; they flourish in the courts of our God. In old age they still produce fruit; they are always green and full of sap.”
The Gospel lesson from Mark chapter four reflects God’s actions and intent. “The Kingdom of God” is described through the image of seeds and planting. Evolution as a biblical fact is shown right here as “The earth produces of itself,” first this, then that, then another. The story goes on about the roots, the stem, the head of grain, each one giving itself to the other, and all are important and connected. The kingdom of God only needs a small opening, like a mustard seed, to create that which is beneficial for so many, like birds making nests in the shade of the branches.
Jesus speaks in parables, story form that shares at many levels through images and actions. Parables are like time bombs, ruminating in the heart of the listener until someday, they explode with awareness and the “ah-ha” of new discoveries as perspectives broaden and shift and loosen their grasp. But a final look at one of those subtle lines invites us to pay attention. Mark says, “With many such parables he spoke the word to them, as they were able to hear it…” Jesus only speaks in parables to the crowds and explains things in private to his disciples. As metaphorical language, this is an invitation to contemplation, to allow Jesus to speak to our hearts and inform us of deeper truths as we experience life. “As they were able to hear it” is the part that jumps off the page, because in order to hear and know and respond, we’ve got to unlearn, not know, and stop reacting. “As they were able to hear it” shows us that there is more to the story than first meets the eye, more than we can comprehend with the limitations of thinking, and we depend on faith, hope, and love to prayerfully help us receive what God is doing in our midst, both all around us and within. This is more than a software update or a paradigm shift, this is a New Creation in Christ, an evolutionary leap into the Creativity of God, coming from old roots but still forming.
Getting clipped can feel abrupt, and I doubt that sprig enjoyed the severing from the ancient base it grew from as God removes it and brings it up on a high, lofty mountain. But whether it’s on the first tree or planted in the heights, the loftiness remains, the spiritual exaltation of God is the common factor, the restful presence, the assuring action. Like a seed put into the ground, sometimes we need to trust the darkness as a place of regeneration, of necessity, and of provision. Our lives, hidden in God with Christ, are rooted in the never-ending love of God, through Christ.
This week, be attentive to whatever it is that God is doing to get your attention, to pull you out of yourself and set patterns and perspectives. Allow the inner Observer to help you to “be able to hear it” as the Jesus stories are lived through you. God be with us as we learn new ways of knowing that bring greater connection, equality, and liberation to the glory of God. As Jesus humbly shares through vulnerability the depths of God’s love, may God be glorified, now and forever. Amen.