The Reverend Carolyn Estrada

And Jesus spoke the word to them, as they were able to hear it…

Sickles. Mustard Seeds.

Sickles? Mustard Seeds?

What are we hearing today?

Is he speaking the word to us as we are able to hear it?

This morning we have the language of planting and harvest; but it is not uncommon for us to hear of sheep and goats, fishing boats, figs, staffs, wineskins, wells, Samaritans, donkeys, stables…

Jesus populates his speech with the images of his first century Palestinian listeners, with the ordinary things of their lives, of their common experience.

And he tells them stories.

Oh, we’ve all heard the stories.

The words are familiar to us, and in our rhythmic three year lectionary cycle we know of swine, hurling themselves into the water; of nets, empty or teeming with fish; of lepers being healed; stonings being adverted…

But do we understand the message?

Are these words that we are able to hear?

The author George O’Brien points out that "A God who travels only on camels may end up as a subject only for tourists, not for life’s daily commuters."

A subject only for tourists, not for life’s daily commuters.

It IS easy to be a tourist in Christendom, to pull out our "guidebooks" and turn the pages of Scripture or the Prayer Book and "dip into" the Word, on Sunday mornings,

Maybe make a few journal entries.

And then file it all away until our next trip.

But most of us are here today, not because we want to be tourists, getting an overview and a few mementoes of the Christian people and their spiritual geography, but because there is something about being a Christian that calls us to live more fully in this place.

We are "commuters" in George O’Brien’s words.

We want more than the curiosity of a foreign country; we want to live there, to work and play as Christians. We want the heart of the experience to shape our journey and to sustain us in our daily lives.

We want the Jesus who speaks to us in words that we can understand.

This morning we begin what is often known as "the long green season" – that season after Pentecost which stretches all the way until the beginning of Advent in late November

It is also a season known as "Ordinary Time."

Ordinary Time.

The way that all of us live most of the time.

The birth, the death, the resurrection of Jesus are behind us, and ahead stretches those days of simply LIVING his Way, his Word.

The "high’s" and "low’s" of life – the mountain top experiences, and the abysmal pits of despair; the giddy sense of being newly in love, and the devastation of betrayals, the excitement of discovery and the extraordinary turn-one’s-life-upside-down events give way to the day-by-day reality of routine, demands, even boredom…

And into such ordinary time, Jesus spoke to his followers 2,000 years ago in the words of ordinary things: mustard seeds and harvest; sheep and fig trees.

And to us, as his followers today…?

In our season of ordinary times, how does Jesus speak to US in words that we can understand?

What are our mustard seeds and harvest, sheep and fig trees?

Where can we find his words in the ordinary stuff of our lives?

Frederick Buechner, a Presbyterian minister and author, pointed out that "the word God speaks to us is always an incarnate word – a word spelled out to us not alphabetically, in syllables, but enigmatically, in events."

Sometimes those words are easy to see or hear: most people speak of finding God in nature, or sunsets, or the birth of a new baby: an event breaking into their ordinary lives or routine, an event rendered extraordinary because it somehow communicates God in its very being.

But I’m also struck by how often most of us don’t recognize God’s presence in our daily lives except in hindsight. Looking back, we can see God here and here and there and there, moving through the people and places that have shaped us.

Perhaps it’s a matter of attention.

Perhaps we don’t recognize God in the present because we aren’t LOOKING for God in the present.

I’m remembering that exchange between Sherlock Holmes and his partner, Watson. Sherlock has just solved the crime, and is explaining it to Watson, and Watson remarks, "Well, Holmes, I was with you the entire time. How did you see all this?" To which Holmes replies: "My dear Watson, we saw the same things, I simply observed them differently."

We saw the same things; I simply observed them differently.

In this season of Ordinary Time, I think we are challenged to see things differently.

We are challenged to see God in the stuff of our own lives, to allow God to speak to us in the sights and sounds and things of our days; in words we can hear.

Oh, we may say: We KNOW the teachings: the abundant love of God for all creation; the way God reaches out in and through God’s creation to touch and heal and sustain.

We learned them in Sunday School. We’ve heard them preached from the pulpit. We’ve "translated" the imagery in our own minds – we’re smart, after all, and we can "do" metaphor and cultural context....

Why worry about hearing God in our own context? What could be different about looking for God to speak to us "in words we can hear?"

We hear the words of Scripture just fine!

I think the difference can be the difference between knowing – up here! – and knowing – in here!

It can be the difference between seeing a picture of the beach – and having the experience of feeling the sand on your bare feet, smelling the salt air, hearing the sound of the waves…

It can be the difference between hearing a story – and claiming the story as your own.

I can’t think of anyone who became a Christian because they were moved to do so by studying theology and hearing an explication of the Nicene Creed.

We are Christians because we have an experience of God, not a knowledge of God.

The story becomes our own.

The great thing about stories, of course, is that they don’t stop with us; they aren’t private: a story is a relational activity! The whole point of a story is to tell it, to share it!

Something happens, and God speaks the word to us in a way that we hear!

We hear God here – not simply know God here!

The story becomes our own!

We hear – and we share!

We take our experience of God, the Christian story that is our own, and we share it.

St. Francis’ classic admonition is to "Share the Gospel at all times; if necessary, use words."

Share the Gospel at all times.

Share our stories.

And, I would say, don’t be afraid to use words!

I read recently of an Indian tribe whose territory was pocked with large pits, circles dug into the ground. They were called "story holes" and were dug at significance sites – places where important events had occurred – and whenever people passed, they would sit in the story hole and relive the event, activating it again in their memory.

I think about it now. I think about how our own lives are pocked with story holes, and how important it is for us to sit in our story hole pockets, and relive the events; how important it is for us to tell our stories, and to invite other people into our story holes, to share with them why these stories are so important to us, so that perhaps they, too, can hear…

Where is God speaking to us in our lives today?

Where are we able to speak God’s word to others that they might hear?

Amen.