Daily Mass readings on Wednesday and Thursday of the 16th Week in Ordinary Time, in even-number years, Jeremiah 1:1, 4-10; Matthew 13:1-9/Jeremiah 2:1-3, 7-8, 12-13; Matthew 13:10-17 , are about Jesus’ Parable of the Sower (Matthew 13:1-23) and Jeremiah’s commissioning with the word of the Lord (Jeremiah 1:1-19) and the Lord’s instruction to Jeremiah on prophesizing against God’s people who had forsaken Him and His word (Jeremiah 2:1-13).
The word (dabah)
of the Lord (Yahweh) came to Jeremiah
(Jeremiah 1:4; 2:1) to install him as His prophet. It means that the Lord chose
Jeremiah to carry His word to His people, the Israelites, who had abandoned His
word and drifted away from Him to sin. Through Jeremiah, the Lord wanted His
word to be sown to the hearts of the Israelites. But, first, the word of the
Lord must be “sown” in the heart of Jeremiah.
The word of the Lord is expressed through a metaphor
of a seed in Jesus’ Parable of the Sower (Matthew 13:1-23//Mark 4:1-20//Luke
8:4-15). And its apocryphal meaning is knowledge of the mysteries of the
kingdom of heaven only granted to the disciples of Jesus (Matthew 13:11). Some
people are able to understand this mystery through the word of the Lord while
others are not. First, Jesus spoke about the word and its recipients through
the Parable of the Sower to the crowd (Matthew 13:3-9). Then he explained the
parable only to his disciples in regard to their mission and privilege in
serving as “sowers” of the word (Matthew 13:11-23).
In this parable, Jesus put four types of recipients of the word: those whose
hearts are like the path, those whose hearts are like rocky ground with shallow
soil; those whose hearts are like the thorn bush, and those whose hearts are
like the fertile soil.
Those whose hearts are like the path, just as a seed sown on the path is easily taken by a bird (Matthew 13:4), the word of the Lord given to those whose hearts are like the path is not received but the evil one snaps it away (Matthew 13:19). What a waste! Their hardened hearts let the word sown by the Lord be wasted.
The seed sown on the rocky ground may sprout quickly
but it withers and dies fast because it cannot spread roots (Matthew 13:5-6).
So, those whose hearts are like the rocky ground may hear the word with delight
but they can easily lose their faith in the sower of the word, namely, the
Lord, when tribulation comes to them (Matthew 13:20-21). They hear the word but
not necessarily listen for its meaning.
Those whose hearts are like the thorn bush may hear
the word but they are prone to anxieties and distracted by worldly materialistic
affairs, thus letting the word lost to their psychological disturbance (Matthew
13:22) – just as a seed sown to the thorn bush will be choked by growing thorns
(Matthew 13:7).
The fertile soil is idealistic for a seed to sprout
and grow to bear manifold fruits (Matthew 13:8). Likewise, those whose hearts
open to receive the word, as they listen to it and understand its meaning –
mystery of the kingdom are bound to bear abundant fruits, the fruits of the
effects of the word (Matthew 13:22). For this, they must be securely attached
to the Lord, the sower, as the fruitful branches are connected to the vine for
the complete joy shared with the Lord over abundant fruition (i.e. John 15:1-11).
The fruit of the effect of the word gown in a
recipient’s heart, upon listening and understanding its meaning, is an outcome
of doing the work of the Lord on apostolic mission (i.e. John 14:12).
So, when the word of the Lord came to Jeremiah –
sown to the heart of Jeremiah, what was his heart like? Was it like the fertile
soil?
No.
By saying, “I
do not know how to speak. I am too young!”(Jeremiah 1:6).
He was too anxious to receive the word, which tells
him that its sower, the Lord, had already appointed him to serve as His prophet
even before he was conceived in his mother’s womb (Jeremiah 1:5).
Why was Jeremiah so anxious?
Because he knew how difficult it was to serve as the
Lord’s prophet.
The initial anxiety of Jeremiah in response to the word
of the Lord was making the condition of his heart like the thorn bush. But God
did not let Jeremiah’s thorns (anxieties) grown and kill His word on him. He
had to let the word be received into his heart and let it grow so that he would
be able to serve as His prophet despite the hardship.
So, the Lord fortified Jeremiah’s heart with His
word (Jeremiah 1:7-19). And His word further began to give him specific
instruction as to how he would prophesize against the Israelites’ sin of being
like the path for not receiving the word, being like the rocky ground for not
letting the word spread its roots in their hearts, and being like the thorn
bush for letting the word get lost in their obsession with secular culture of
materialism and pagan devotion (Jeremiah 2:1-13).
When the word of God comes to you, in other words,
when the Lord sows His word on you through His Son, Jesus, or through the Holy
Spirit, as the words out of Jesus’ mouth are the Holy Spirit and life (John
6:63), how would you respond?
Do not worry. Even Mary was at first greatly
troubled when the word of the Lord came to her through Gabriel, messenger of
the Lord (Luke 1:29). But Mary did not close her heart to the word. She did not
let her heart’s initial disturbance become the growing thorn to kill the word.
She listened and accepted as it is – with her fiat to serve as the Lord’s
handmaid so that the His will be done through her according the word (Luke
1:38). So, the Word was incarnated to
dwell among us (John 1:1, 14) in her womb and the Lord’s word can come to us
through Jesus, who was born of her, to reveal the apocryphal meaning of His
word, the mystery of the Kingdom – so that the Kingdom will be established on
earth as it is in heaven.
The Lord strengthens us as He did to Jeremiah so that thorns in our hearts, namely, anxieties, are under control. And the seed sown by Him, the word, contains not only the mystery of the Kingdom but all we need to know in serving His will. So, let us receive the word of the Lord, by listening. Let us understand and make the word the life of ours so that it grows into abundant fruition through our work of faith!
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