Sermon for the Third Sunday After Pentecost | The Rev. Dr. Peter Sipple | June 13, 2021
SERMON – Proper 6, June 13, 2021 – Trinity, New Haven
Most students in theological seminaries who are seeking ordination take a course called homiletics. We learn how to give homilies and sermons on the road to becoming effective preachers. You may think that the profound insights and crisp elocution emanating from this pulpit each Sunday result naturally from the innate brilliance of the speakers. But no: as with any other skill, we have had to practice, then preach, then practice more. Our early attempts were critiqued by fellow students and a homiletics professor who sent us scurrying back to our Bibles, commentaries, and imaginations to prepare the next draft.
Among the guidelines passed along in homiletics classes is the recommendation that sermons draw on stories and anecdotes to illustrate the point and bring it home to listeners. Moments taken from “real life” help distinguish a sermon from a lecture. If I’d begun a few moments ago by trying to explain the theological import of this morning’s Gospel, you might not be with me now. Perhaps you’re not anyway. But if I can find a story or happening that illustrates the Gospel’s intent, you may be better able to connect it with some related event in your life.
We shouldn’t be surprised to learn that our Lord Jesus was brilliant at homiletics. Can you think of anything he said or is reported to have said that you find tedious or irrelevant? I don’t think so! Jesus’ insights are engaging because he relates his teaching to the activities of his listeners’ everyday life. Consider the great stories found in Luke’s Gospel: the Prodigal Son, the Good Samaritan, and Zacchaeus to name three; the events and characters described in these stories are readily believable, both in Jesus’ day and ours. We know people who behave as these characters do.
In the Gospel passage we just heard, Mark sets forth another reason why Jesus’ teaching is so enlightening: it has to do with his use of parables. In fact, Mark not only yokes various parables together that likely came to him from different sources, but he also takes pains to explain the nature and purpose of the parables themselves. We modern listeners no doubt assume that Jesus drew on parables because, as simple and vivid stories, they help illustrate Jesus’ teaching, making it easier to understand and remember.
But curiously enough, St. Mark has a different purpose in mind. He thought these stories were intended to obscure Jesus’ teaching, to prevent it from having its full effect on those not meant to be enlightened by it. Mark seems to view the parables as a kind of code that Jesus will unlock for his immediate followers when the time is right, but meanwhile will use to baffle the curious everyday folk who come to hear him. Listen to Mark a few verses earlier in Chapter 4 after setting forth Jesus’ parable of the seeds: “When he was alone, those who were around him along with the twelve asked him about the parables. And he said to them: ‘To you has been given the secret of the Kingdom of God, but for those outside, everything comes in parables; in order that they may indeed look but not perceive and may indeed listen but not understand; so that they may not turn again and be forgiven.’”
Well, that seems counter-intuitive, doesn’t it? So what’s going on here? We should sort this out, since something very like this passage exists in all three Synoptic Gospels. It seems the parables were meant to increase the understanding of some while remaining opaque and confusing to others. The parallel passage in Matthew provides a hint: addressing the Disciples who asked why he speaks in parables, Jesus answers: “To you it has been given to know the secrets of the kingdom of heaven, but to them it has not been given.”
This explanation of Jesus’ use of parables is mysterious and even disturbing; we assume that Jesus teaching was meant for everyone with ears to hear. But the Synoptic Gospels may reflect an ancient influence: based on one interpretation of Old Testament theology, listeners were divided into those predestined to understand God’s word and those for whom it was to remain opaque. It seems that in Mark’s rendering, Jesus is explaining that parables, as a form of teaching, enable him to preserve a divinely willed division among his hearers. Those on the inside it will enlighten; others will find it hidden.
We’re likely to be unhappy with the idea that God ordains some to get the gist of the parables while seeing that others remain clods. A more rational explanation is that those who are already inclined to accept Jesus, believing what they see and hear, are better prepared to understand the meaning of each parable as it comes along. Doubters and skeptics will find the parables’ meaning harder to uncover. As one scholar puts it: “All truth is clear, self-evident, and compelling to those who have seen the point, and mystery to those who have not. It is hardly surprising that Jesus should have spoken of the secrets of the kingdom of God. It was not that he deliberately veiled the truth from the many and disclosed it to the chosen few. His secret…was open for everyone to see and hear, but even an open secret remains a secret from those who do not wish to learn it.”
So in this morning’s Gospel lesson, Jesus lets us in on two aspects of the realm he invites us to live in, and both draw on natural imagery. Just as a farmer has faith that seeds once planted will grow and produce a harvest, so the patience of the faithful will be similarly rewarded as we wait upon the coming of the Kingdom. Similarly, we should not be discouraged by the apparent insignificance of our efforts to bring about the Kingdom. Like a small seed, our mission planted and nurtured can grow into something earth-changing. In other words, don’t judge the significance of results by the size of their beginnings.
You and I attend worship, read the Gospels and Epistles, sing hymns and pray in order to learn more about the Lord Jesus Christ so that we may apply his teaching to our lives. The parables provide a key to learning, a way to increase our understanding of what it means to live into God’s Kingdom. The more open our hearts and minds to that teaching, the greater will be our Lord’s presence in our lives. AMEN
P. W. Sipple