Bonsai Christianity

By

Reverend Litton Logan

June 18, 2006

Scriptures:

Mark 4:1--34 (NRSV)
¹Again he began to teach beside the sea. Such a very large crowd gathered around him that he got into a boat on the sea and sat there, while the whole crowd was beside the sea on the land. ²He began to teach them many things in parables, and in his teaching he said to them: ³“Listen! A sower went out to sow. ⁴And as he sowed, some seed fell on the path, and the birds came and ate it up. ⁵Other seed fell on rocky ground, where it did not have much soil, and it sprang up quickly, since it had no depth of soil. ⁶And when the sun rose, it was scorched; and since it had no root, it withered away. ⁷Other seed fell among thorns, and the thorns grew up and choked it, and it yielded no grain. ⁸Other seed fell into good soil and brought forth grain, growing up and increasing and yielding thirty and sixty and a hundredfold.” ⁹And he said, “Let anyone with ears to hear listen!”

The Purpose of the Parables

¹⁰When he was alone, those who were around him along with the twelve asked him about the parables. ¹¹And he said to them, “To you has been given the secret^£ of the kingdom of God, but for those outside, everything comes in parables; ¹²in 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.’”

¹³And he said to them, “Do you not understand this parable? Then how will you understand all the parables? ¹⁴The sower sows the word. ¹⁵These are the ones on the path where the word is sown: when they hear, Satan immediately comes and takes away the word that is sown in them. ¹⁶And these are the ones sown on rocky ground: when they hear the word, they immediately receive it with joy. ¹⁷But they have no root, and endure only for a while; then, when trouble or persecution arises on account of the word, immediately they fall away.¹⁸And others are those sown among the thorns: these are the ones who hear the word, ¹⁹but the cares of the world, and the lure of wealth, and the desire for other things come in and choke the word, and it yields nothing. ²⁰And these are the ones sown on the good soil: they hear the word and accept it and bear fruit, thirty and sixty and a hundredfold.”

A Lamp under a Bushel Basket

²¹He said to them, “Is a lamp brought in to be put under the bushel basket, or under the bed, and not on the lampstand? ²²For there is nothing hidden, except to be disclosed; nor is anything secret, except to come to light. ²³Let anyone with ears to hear listen!” ²⁴And he said to them, “Pay attention to what you hear; the measure you give will be the measure you get, and still more will be given you. ²⁵For to those who have, more will be given; and from those who have nothing, even what they have will be taken away.”

The Parable of the Growing Seed

²⁶He also said, “The kingdom of God is as if someone would scatter seed on the ground, ²⁷and would sleep and rise night and day, and the seed would sprout and grow, he does not know how. ²⁸The earth produces of itself, first the stalk, then the head, then the full grain in the head. ²⁹But when the grain is ripe, at once he goes in with his sickle, because the harvest has come.”

The Parable of the Mustard Seed

³⁰He also said, “With what can we compare the kingdom of God, or what parable will we use for it? ³¹It is like a mustard seed, which, when sown upon the ground, is the smallest of all the seeds on earth; ³²yet when it is sown it grows up and becomes the greatest of all shrubs, and puts forth large branches, so that the birds of the air can make nests in its shade.”

The Use of Parables

³³With many such parables he spoke the word to them, as they were able to hear it; ³⁴he did not speak to them except in parables, but he explained everything in private to his disciples.

Sermon:

          The scriptures we’ve heard read this morning are very familiar to most of us.  We find variations of these planting and seed parables in reference to the Kingdom of God in the Gospels of Matthew, Luke, and even in the Gnostic Gospel of Thomas.

          I am sure many of you remember how the various characters and aspects of the parables have been interpreted.  The sower is often identified with God or Jesus.  The seed is the Gospel that portends the Kingdom of God in Jesus’ message.  The various kinds of ground that the seeds fall on are metaphors for how the Gospel is received in the lives of various people.

          There are those people who hear the Gospel and reject it out of hand.  We see a metaphor about people who hear the Gospel and respond to it but lack commitment to the Gospel during times of persecution and hardship.  Then there are people who hear and embrace the Gospel but become distracted by the cares and concerns of this world.  These folks take the anxieties of their concerns into their own understanding and fall away from the faith.

          Lastly, we hear about those who hear the Gospel, respond to it, commit to it, trust God in its adversities, and give witness to the Gospel.  It is in their witness that we find the occasion of the miraculous growth of the kingdom. The Gospel grows producing more and more converts in the Kingdom of God, a kingdom that is here now and yet to be fulfilled.

          Preachers and Sunday School lessons often tend to focus on the actual or implied characters or the kinds of ground in the parable and neglect what I believe is the true focus of these parables—the seeds and their miraculous produce.

          These seed parables point to the certainty of the divine harvest.  These parables tell us of the coming fullness of the Kingdom of God, which begins in the insignificance of a very small seed.  A dry, seemingly lifeless, piece of organic matter under the right conditions breaks forth with new life and produces the fruit or re-seeding of its own kind.

          The parables further tell us that the inherent miracle of the seed and its reseeding processes does not exempt the disciple of Christ from his or her responsibilities for preparing the soil and planting the God-Kingdom-Seeds.  The disciple is to work to prepare the hearts and minds of the people of the world by proclaiming the Good News of God’s salvation and its eternal hope.  The disciple of Christ is to give witness in word and deed to the kingdom presence in their life and in the world in the here and now.

The seed parables tell us that the coming fullness of the kingdom of God from insignificant beginnings is in truth the results of the mysterious and miraculous work of God. So many Christians try to convert people by the weight of persuasion or argument rather than presenting the Gospel in word and deed and trusting God to do God’s saving work.

The Kingdom of God is like a mustard plant, a troublesome weed, which comes from one of the smallest of seeds and can grow and take over a field in no time at all.  The mustard plant is such a robust plant that birds can build their nest in it and raise their young.  From something, seemingly insignificant, comes something mighty and troublesome, which provides a home for the birds of the air as well as cover and shelter for the creatures of the field.  God’s kingdom is to be understood as a place where even the most insignificant of people can find a sheltering, protective, spiritual home.

          Jesus was well aware of the various ideas about the Kingdom of God in circulation during his lifetime.  He would have understood that  the Kingdom of God was the hoped for and longed for rule of God’s will and ways that would bring peace, justice, mercy, and compassion to all peoples.  Jesus would have also understood that the Kingdom is present wherever people acknowledge and live by the ways of God. Jesus certainly saw the Kingdom as present, but rapidly coming to fruition through his ministry as his message anticipates that time in the future when the eternal fullness of God’s Kingdom comes on Earth.

          In summary, these parables imply that the disciple is to go out into the world, proclaim the Gospel, and thereby prepare the hearts and minds of people to receive the words of God and stand by; watch God’s miracle of reproduction and reseeding.  Then the disciple is to participate in harvesting the miracle of the seed.  Bring the fruit—bring those who long for the peace, justice, and the unconditional love of God into God’s storehouse. Welcome with respect and love those who receive the Gospel and commit themselves to its kingdom citizenship even if some of them are the most insignificant and strangest of birds, who have sought shelter and a home in our mustard tree plant.

♦

          Having lived in rural Oklahoma in a farming and ranching community, I am somewhat aware of many of the difficulties and vagaries of planting and harvesting wheat.  I fully understand the metaphor of seeds falling on good soil, putting down strong, deep roots, and enduring the caprice of the weather.  However, one day I saw a very peculiar thing among a stand of wheat that had taken root in good soil and was ready for harvesting. This peculiar thing I saw became a paradigm for understanding why the kingdom of God seems to be so stunted in our world today.  The stunting of the kingdom is especially ironic given that 1/5^th of the world calls itself Christian.

♦

            One day as Ward Powers, one of the elders in my church, and I sat in his pickup watching the custom harvesters cut his wheat; I looked out the truck window and down on to a corner of an un-harvested field.  I noticed a small area of wheat that was stunted.  The stunted wheat bore full heads of miniature wheat.  I thought bonsai (bone-sigh) wheat.  The wheat seeds had fallen into good soil, had taken root, endured the summer, and were headed out and ready for harvest but in miniature.  What had happened? Why hadn’t this wheat grown as tall as the surrounding stalks of wheat?  There could be various reasons.  The wheat might not have gotten as much fertilizer. It was in a low place near a drainage ditch, water ran off, and it didn’t get an adequate share of moisture.  It could have been planted to deep and it took longer for it to reach the top and sunlight.  Whatever, it looked like bonsai wheat to me. 

♦

I think most of us no about bonsai plants.  Bonsai, which means “planting in a tray”, is the art and discipline of cultivating ornamental, artificially dwarfed trees and shrubs.  Bonsai plants first appeared in China over a thousand years ago. For many enthusiasts, bonsai cultivation is more than the cultivation of dwarf trees for novelty sake.  Rather, bonsai is a meditative discipline of pruning, caring, and intentionally stunting and shaping a plant wherein the practitioner must develop the virtues of patient, forethought, and intentionality. One also comes to appreciation the miracle of the creative, life-shaping processes of the universe as well as to see life struggle to be what it is regardless of its environment.  One in miniature experiences and participates in nature as a thoughtful, patient, and caring; yet, decisive and shaping force.

Although bonsai originated in China, Japan adopted it as an art form around the 8th century. One Japanese scroll says that, “To appreciate and find pleasure in curiously curved potted trees is to love deformity”.  For many to cultivate and shape bonsai plants is to see the grandeur, beauty, and uniqueness of creation in the very small and even in the deformed, the strange, and the insignificant.

Western interest in bonsai only developed in the 20th century, but the hobby has increased in popularity in the West over the past 20 years.

          Many of the bonsai flowering shrubs and fruit trees produce flowers and fruit.  The flowers are just as beautiful and fragrant as the normal sized plants. The fruit of the miniature is equally as tasty as the full sized fruit.

          However, you certainly can’t provide a lot of shade with a bonsai tree.  You couldn’t feed very many people from a bonsai fruit tree. Birds and squirrels can’t build their nests in a bonsai tree. You couldn’t make a very impressive funeral spray from bonsai flowers.  One may participate, experience, and revel in the mysteries of the universe as a personal, spiritual, or meditative discipline from the art of bonsai. This discipline may help a person find a meaningful self-center, which produces patients, caring, and a profound appreciation for the mysterious forces of nature.  However, the benefit beyond a person’s psycho-spiritual self in the discipline of bonsai is only in the novelty of the plant.  The practical aspects and purposes of the plant are, shall we say, diminished.  The bonsai plant cannot produce the reseeding of itself as a miniature. 

♦

          As much as we Christian disciples need to learn from the parables and metaphors of the planting of seeds, the soils of the Gospel, and the harvesting of God’s-Kingdom-Seeds from scripture, we also need to learn the lessons of the bonsai, especially as it relates to our Christianity. 

We may take the seed of the Gospel into ourselves, revel in its joy, its simple beauty, and earthly and eternal joy.  We may spend disciplined-hours upon disciplined-hours reading, studying, and wondering at its mysterious beauty, symmetry, or asymmetry.  It may bring us hours of meaningful self-involvement and joyous and hopeful imaginations of what will be one day. 

          Nevertheless, if our Christian faith does fulfill its intended and practical purposes it becomes nothing more than a novel form of selfishness.  If we take our faith and joy of what God has done for us and intentionally hide it under a basket of selfishness—purposely stunt it--we defraud and grieve the spirit that first brought us to the knowledge of God’s saving grace. 

          In our selfishness, we will also participate in stunting, “bonesai-ing” the Kingdom of God.  Look at the world around us and realize that the last thing this world needs is the kingdom of God growing in a wee tray. The world needs a full sized Christianity that welcomes and shelters all the people of the world.

          As disciples of Christ, we must study the life and teachings of Jesus to optimize our understandings and relationships with one another and God, but we also must participate in proclaiming the word of God so the miracle of God’s kingdom may find its opportunity in the lives of others.  We cannot give the growth, only God can do that, but we can prepare the soil and then marvel and take joy in the miracle of other people coming to a personal relationship with God through Jesus the Christ.  Then we must insure that there is a place and a community of believers properly prepared and outfitted to receive and welcome even the most insignificant and strangest of birds, who seek to build a nest in our mustard tree plants.

          I fear too often Christians have become fascinated and preoccupied with the kingdom in miniature within their own lives and have forgotten the greater needs of the world for the Gospel they cherish and tend so lovingly inside themselves.  I know that we Christians are preoccupied with our small kingdoms of parochialism at the expense of a greater evangelistic efforts to the willfully lost, the spiritually ignorant, the heart-sick, the lonely, and the hurting of this world.

          Let us not reduce the kingdom of God to a small tray nor hide its beauty, grandeur, and hope in the miniature kingdoms of our selfishness.  That which is in us is powerful as well as troublesome.  That which is in us is the only real and lasting hope this world has.  Please, don’t bonsai your relationship with God.