I’ve been blessed to participate in a class discussing the parables that Jesus was reported to share in the gospels of the New Testament and Thomas. I was frankly a little concerned at first that this would be my cup of tea, but in fact, have found the practice of “exegesis” or analysis/interpretation of these stories to be quite profound and valuable.

I wrote a paper on the parable of the mustard seed and thought I’d share some of that here as it holds a lesson for all of us as we work through this liminal time between the crumbling and decay of our current world and the hoped-for and worked for redemption and re-creation of a new way of being.

The parable of the mustard seed appears in all three of the synoptic gospels:

How shall we compare the kingdom of God, or with what parable might we put it? It is like a mustard seed, which, when sown upon the ground, the smallest is of all the seeds on earth. And when sown, it rises up and becomes the greatest of all vegetables, and it makes large branches, so that are able under its shadow the birds of the heaven to dwell. Mark 4.30–32 (NRSV)

Like is the kingdom of the heavens to a mustard seed, that taking, some person sowed in his field. The smallest, on the one hand, it is of all the seeds, but when it has grown, greatest of the vegetables it is, and it becomes a tree, so that when come the birds of the heaven, even they dwell in its branches. Matthew 13.31–32 (NRSV)

To what is like the kingdom of God, and to what should I make it like? It is like a mustard seed, which taking, a man casts in his garden, and it grew, and became a tree, and the birds of the heaven dwelled in its branches. Luke 13.18–19 (NRSV)

It is also found in the Gospel of Thomas:
He said to them, “It is like a mustard seed. < It > is the smallest of all seeds, but when it falls on prepared soil, it produces a large plant and becomes a shelter for birds of heaven.” Thomas 20.2-4

We can look at many possible interpretations of this parable, but let’s consider the possibility that Jesus’ lesson was meant to point to the way a common medicinal herb, though the seed is very small when planted in the fertile ground can become a shelter for many creatures.

Perhaps His message was simply that even the most humble and unimposing beginning has the unlimited potential to grow into a place of sanctuary for the most vulnerable among us.

In His ministry, as he was speaking to an audience of the poor and outcast, the message may well have been that they held responsibility for recognizing and acting upon that potential. That even though they came from humble means, they were still of great value medicinally and as an added spice for the sustenance of the message Jesus sought to share. That with that recognition came the responsibility to thrive and grow into a beautiful and protective plant or community that gave sanctuary to all of God’s beloved creatures, both human and more-than-human.

I like this interpretation in its simplicity and its value as a message for our times.

Many of us are feeling the despair and frustration of witnessing the suffering of our planet and our marginalized siblings in these apocalyptic days. That frustration and despair are often accompanied or caused by our feeling that we are too insignificant to make any real change or to arrest the seemingly inevitable destruction.

In this lesson, Jesus offers us the message that even a tiny seed has the potential to grow into a place of refuge. If we take that message seriously, we have the opportunity to manifest that power in our lives by trusting that even our smallest efforts may ripple out and grow into something large enough to afford sanctuary, change, and redemption for our earth and our beloved communities.

My beloveds, consider this possibility.

We have the capacity to hold that potential like the tiny mustard seed in our hearts with faith that it will guide us toward the small work in each moment that will result eventually in vast and comprehensive change toward a new reality – even as we accept that like any tree we plant, we may never harvest the fruit in our lifetimes. By holding that potential with love, compassion, faith, and power we can fulfill the promise Jesus gave us with this parable and truly make a difference to our world and to the world of our children and our children’s children.

May it be so.

This new poetry came to me over several recent wanderings through the Autumn forests here on the Salish Sea. This has been a particularly brilliant season for fall foliage due to our new climate. The blessing of that curse has been these gorgeous displays as the earth prepares for the little sleep of Winter. Enjoy.

Fire of Death – Spark of Life

Fire hued trees of Autumn
Blaze their final
rapturous radiant display

Let go their resplendent leaves.
Fire of death falling, dancing, drifting
Into the pulsing embrace of the welcoming earth

Painting their rain glistened feet
With the blood fire
palate of multi-colored leaves

While beneath that glistening fire
potent, fecund, pulsing
The spark of life is reborn.

2019 ~ by Wakil David Matthews

Practice: Eating One Raisin: Mindful Eating

Because the rubber of transformation meets the road in practice, in actual encounters with real life, I continue to encourage you to try something new: change sides, move outside your comfort zone, make some new contacts, let go of your usual role and attractive self-image, walk or take a bus instead of drive, make a friend from another race or class, visit new neighborhoods, go to the jail or to the border, attend another church service, etc. Without new experiences, new thinking is difficult and rare. After a new experience, new thinking and behavior comes naturally and even becomes necessary. [1]

Today’s practice, Eating One Raisin, encourages us to do something we have probably done hundreds of times but in a new way. It comes from The Mindful Way Through Depression:

Mindfulness is not paying more attention but paying attention differently and more wisely—with the whole mind and heart, using the full resources of the body and its senses.

Holding
First, take a [single] raisin and hold it in the palm of your hand or between your finger and thumb. Focusing on it, imagine that you’ve . . . never seen an object like this before in your life.

Seeing
Take time to really see it; gaze at the raisin with care and full attention. Let your eyes explore every part of it, examining the highlights where the light shines, the darker hollows, the folds and ridges, and any asymmetries or unique features.

Touching
Turn the raisin over between your fingers, exploring its texture, maybe with your eyes closed if that enhances your sense of touch.

Smelling
Holding the raisin beneath your nose, with each inhalation drink in any smell, aroma, or fragrance that may arise, noticing as you do this anything interesting that may be happening in your mouth or stomach.

Placing
Now slowly bring the raisin up to your lips, noticing how your hand and arm know exactly how and where to position it. Gently place the object in the mouth, without chewing, noticing how it gets into the mouth in the first place. Spend a few moments exploring the sensations of having it in your mouth, exploring it with your tongue.

Tasting
When you are ready, prepare to chew the raisin, noticing how and where it needs to be for chewing. Then, very consciously, take one or two bites into it and notice what happens in the aftermath, experiencing any waves of taste that emanate from it as you continue chewing. Without swallowing yet, notice the bare sensations of taste and texture in the mouth and how these may change over time, moment by moment, as well as any changes in the object itself.

Swallowing
When you feel ready to swallow the raisin, see if you can first detect the intention to swallow as it comes up, so that even this is experienced consciously before you actually swallow the raisin.

Following
Finally, see if you can feel what is left of the raisin moving down into your stomach, and sense how the body as a whole is feeling after completing this exercise in mindful eating. [2]

[1] Adapted from Richard Rohr, “The Eight Core Principles,” Radical Grace, vol. 25, no. 4 (Center for Action and Contemplation: Fall 2012), 44-45. No longer in print. See cac.org/about-cac/missionvision.

[2] Mark Williams, John Teasdale, Zindel Segal, and Jon Kabat-Zinn, The Mindful Way through Depression: Freeing Yourself from Chronic Unhappiness (Guilford Press: 2007), 55-56.

” Be still and listen to the voices that belong
to the streambanks and the trees and the open fields. “

It is hard to have hope. It is harder as you grow old,
for hope must not depend on feeling good
and there is the dream of loneliness at absolute midnight.
You also have withdrawn belief in the present reality
of the future, which surely will surprise us,
and hope is harder when it cannot come by prediction
any more than by wishing. But stop dithering.
The young ask the old to hope. What will you tell them?
Tell them at least what you say to yourself.

Because we have not made our lives to fit
our places, the forests are ruined, the fields eroded,
the streams polluted, the mountains overturned. Hope
then to belong to your place by your own knowledge
of what it is that no other place is, and by
your caring for it as you care for no other place, this
place that you belong to though it is not yours,
for it was from the beginning and will be to the end.

Belong to your place by knowledge of the others who are
your neighbors in it: the old man, sick and poor,
who comes like a heron to fish in the creek,
and the fish in the creek, and the heron who manlike
fishes for the fish in the creek, and the birds who sing
in the trees in the silence of the fisherman
and the heron, and the trees that keep the land
they stand upon as we too must keep it, or die.

This knowledge cannot be taken from you by power
or by wealth. It will stop your ears to the powerful
when they ask for your faith, and to the wealthy
when they ask for your land and your work.
Answer with knowledge of the others who are here
and how to be here with them. By this knowledge
make the sense you need to make. By it stand
in the dignity of good sense, whatever may follow.

Speak to your fellow humans as your place
has taught you to speak, as it has spoken to you.
Speak its dialect as your old compatriots spoke it
before they had heard a radio. Speak
publicly what cannot be taught or learned in public.

Listen privately, silently to the voices that rise up
from the pages of books and from your own heart.
Be still and listen to the voices that belong
to the streambanks and the trees and the open fields.
There are songs and sayings that belong to this place,
by which it speaks for itself and no other.

Find your hope, then, on the ground under your feet.
Your hope of Heaven, let it rest on the ground
underfoot. Be it lighted by the light that falls
freely upon it after the darkness of the nights
and the darkness of our ignorance and madness.
Let it be lighted also by the light that is within you,
which is the light of imagination. By it you see
the likeness of people in other places to yourself
in your place. It lights invariably the need for care
toward other people, other creatures, in other places
as you would ask them for care toward your place and you.

No place at last is better than the world. The world
is no better than its places. Its places at last
are no better than their people while their people
continue in them. When the people make
dark the light within them, the world darkens.

~ Wendell Berry ~

(This Day: New and Collected Sabbath Poems)

Practice: Generosity

Giving brings happiness at every stage of its expression. We experience joy in forming the intention to be generous; we experience joy in the actual act of giving something; and we experience joy in remembering the fact that we have given. — Siddhārtha Gautama, The Buddha [1]

Those who pray learn to favor and prefer God’s judgment over that of human beings. God always outdoes us in generosity and in receptivity. God is always more loving than the person who has loved us the most! God does not shame us but loves us even more deeply than we could ever know or love ourselves.

Douglas Abrams reflects on a conversation with the Dalai Lama and Archbishop Desmond Tutu:

In generosity, there is a wider perspective in which we see our connection to all others. . . . There is an acceptance of life, in which we do not force life to be other than what it is. . . . There is a gratitude for all that we have been given. Finally, we see others with a deep compassion and a desire to help those who are in need. And from this comes a generosity that is “wise selfish,” a generosity that recognizes helping others as helping ourselves. [2]

Writer, yoga teacher, and queer activist Jacoby Ballard notesthat generosity is an important practice in LGBTQIA communities:

I see collective houses sharing, providing for one another. I see partners taking care of each other, friends showing up for childcare for queer families, . . .  community putting in incredible effort to create beautiful commitment ceremonies. I see our communities supporting the organizations that support us. This is so beautiful, and I think this is a human quality for survival. Every community that survives does it together—we can look to so many other communities to see this. Generosity is a response to injustice. We rely on one another out of necessity, but also because we know in our hearts that there is a different way to be, a different way to live. Our generosity with one another is indeed resistance to the greed and fear that oppresses us. We provide for one another out of love for each other and love for ourselves. When we give, we acknowledge that all beings want to be happy. [3]

Here is a contemplative practice to cultivate generosity from mindfulness teacher Amy Love:

Sit in a position that feels stable yet comfortable.

If it feels right for you, close your eyes. If it feels better to keep you[r] eyes open, gently gaze down in front of you. [Settle] into this moment by noticing your breath.

. . . Bring to mind a time when someone was generous toward you, a time when someone did something nice for you. Bring that time to mind in full color, reflecting on who was there, where you were. . . . How did it make you feel? Where does that feeling live in your body? Really feel into what this time was like for you.

If your mind begins to wander, that’s okay. Gently escort your attention back to feeling the time when someone did something nice for you.

Now . . . bring to mind a time when you were generous with someone, a time when you did something nice for someone else. Again, really [sink] into this memory by recalling who was there, where you were, and what was happening. How did it make you feel to be generous in this way? Where do you feel that in your body? What are the sensations of generosity like in your body?

[End] this short contemplation by resting back in your breath for a moment. [4]

I pray that recalling experiences of generosity, both given and received, will allow each of us to carry that spirit to all living things, especially those who challenge our overly-simplistic ideas of what it means to be a human being, made in the image and likeness of God.

[1] As quoted in Surya Das, Awakening the Buddha Within: Eight Steps to Enlightenment: Tibetan Wisdom for the Western World (Broadway Books: 1997), 207.

[2] His Holiness the Dalai Lama and Archbishop Desmond Tutu with Douglas Abrams, The Book of Joy: Lasting Happiness in a Changing World (Avery: 2016), 275.

[3] Jacoby Ballard, “Queer Sangha, Fearlessness, and Generosity,” Decolonizing Yoga (December 19, 2013),  https://decolonizingyoga.com/queer-sangha-fearlessness-generosity/.

[4] Amy Love, “Generosity vs. Giving. What Does It Mean to Be Generous?” Mindful Schools (December 10, 2018), https://www.mindfulschools.org/personal-practice/what-does-it-mean-to-be-generous/.

Adapted from Richard Rohr, Following the Mystics Through the Narrow Gate. . . Seeing God in All Things (Center for Action and Contemplation: 2010), CD, DVD, MP3 download.

As we witness the last of the blazing fire-colored leaves released to the welcoming earth, this poetry by Safire Rose felt perfect and appropriate.

She Let Go

by Safire Rose

She let go.

She let go. Without a thought or a word, she let go.

She let go of the fear.

She let go of the judgments.

She let go of the confluence of opinions swarming around her head.

She let go of the committee of indecision within her.

She let go of all the ‘right’ reasons.

Wholly and completely, without hesitation or worry, she just let go.

She didn’t ask anyone for advice.

She didn’t read a book on how to let go.

She didn’t search the scriptures.

She just let go.

She let go of all of the memories that held her back.

She let go of all of the anxiety that kept her from moving forward.

She let go of the planning and all of the calculations about how to do it just right.

She didn’t promise to let go.

She didn’t journal about it.

She didn’t write the projected date in her Day-Timer.

She made no public announcement and put no ad in the paper.

She didn’t check the weather report or read her daily horoscope.

She just let go.

She didn’t analyze whether she should let go.

She didn’t call her friends to discuss the matter.

She didn’t do a five-step Spiritual Mind Treatment.

She didn’t call the prayer line.

She didn’t utter one word.

She just let go.

No one was around when it happened.

There was no applause or congratulations.

No one thanked her or praised her.

No one noticed a thing.

Like a leaf falling from a tree, she just let go.

There was no effort.

There was no struggle.

It wasn’t good and it wasn’t bad.

It was what it was, and it is just that.

In the space of letting go, she let it all be.

A small smile came over her face.

A light breeze blew through her.

And the sun and the moon shone forevermore…