Humble yourselves, therefore, under God’s mighty hand, that He may lift you up in due time. 1 Peter 5:6.

I loved this today in Hearing God by Dallas Willard, so appropriate for our chapter: “The voice of the Lord causes the oaks to whirl, and strips the forest bare; and in His temple all say, “Glory!” The Lord sits enthroned over the flood; the Lord sits enthroned as king forever. May the Lord give strength to His people! Psalm 29:9-11 NRSV. Psalm 29 shows how the natural order is unified with God’s redemptive community under the word of God. Here God’s voice causes trees and water to behave in certain ways. Still the Lord sits enthroned, giving strength to His people! The physical and spiritual are not isolated from each other. This same unity is exhibited in the life of Jesus. He could turn water into wine, calm the billowing waves with His word and walk on them as on a pavement. But He could also place the word of God’s kingdom rule into people’s hearts, where it would bring forth fruit a hundredfold or sixtyfold or thirtyfold (Matthew 13:23). This is the word of God and the Son of God united in the ordering of the cosmos. Reflect: How is your understanding that the word of God is so closely tied to nature? How do you respond to the idea that oaks and floodwaters respond to the voice of God and that when Jesus said, “Quiet! Be still!” the Sea of Galilee knew He was talking to it and responded?”

And so in our chapter, Mark 4, the parables and lessons continue…Again Jesus began to teach by the lake. The crowd that gathered around Him was so large that He got into a boat and sat in it out on the lake, while all the people were along the shore at the water’s edge. He taught them many things by parables, and in His teaching said: “Listen! A farmer went out to sow his seed. As he was scattering the seed, some fell along the path, and the birds came and ate it up. Some fell on rocky places, where it did not have much soil. It sprang up quickly, because the soil was shallow. But when the sun came up, the plants were scorched, and they withered because they had no root. Other seed fell among thorns, which grew up and choked the plants, so that they did not bear grain. Still other seed fell on good soil. It came up, grew and produced a crop, some multiplying thirty, some sixty, some a hundred times.” Then Jesus said, “Whoever has ears to hear, let them hear.” For people sowing seeds in this time they would have understood this idea of the farmer scattering seed and would have dealt with the resulting growth of some seed while other seeds failed to grow and thrive. To the disciples, Jesus explained, “The secret of the kingdom of God has been given to you. But to those on the outside everything is said in parables so that, ‘they may be ever seeing but never perceiving, and ever hearing but never understanding; otherwise they might turn and be forgiven.’ (Isaiah 6:9-10). v. 11-12. I have always been stumped by that Scripture reference. It felt like a secret club that only a few could know about. But it’s describing the world we live in and why we can’t see or hear and understand. Then Jesus said to them, “Don’t you understand this parable? How then will you understand any parable? The farmer sows the word. Some people are like seed along the path, where the word is sown. As soon as they hear it, Satan comes and takes away the word that was sown in them. Others, like seed sown on rocky places, hear the word and at once receive it with joy. But since they have no root, they last only a short time. When trouble or persecution comes because of the word, they quickly fall away. Still others, like seed sown among thorns, hear the word; but the worries of this life, the deceitfulness of wealth and the desires for other things come in and choke the word, making it unfruitful. Others, like seed sown on good soil, hear the word, accept it, and produce a crop – some thirty, some sixty, some a hundred times what was sown….Do you bring in a lamp to put it under a bowl or a bed? Instead, don’t you put it on its stand? For whatever is hidden is meant to be disclosed, and whatever is concealed is meant to be brought out into the open. If anyone has ears to hear, let them hear. Consider carefully what you hear…With the measure you use, it will be measured to you – and even more. Whoever has will be given more; whoever does not have, even what they have will be taken from them.” v. 13-25. Do we listen carefully to the word of God, to lessons in nature, to God’s still small voice speaking to our spirit? Do we consider the way of this broken world and what it is doing to our spirits? God’s kingdom is all around us. He also said, “This is what the kingdom of God is like. A man scatters seed on the ground. Night and day, whether he sleeps or gets up, the seed sprouts and grows, though he does not know how. All by itself the soil produces grain – first the stalk, then the head, then the full kernel in the head. As soon as the grain is ripe, he puts the sickle to it, because the harvest has come….What shall we say the kingdom of God is like, or what parable shall we use to describe it? It is like a mustard seed, which is the smallest of all seeds on earth. Yet when planted, it grows and becomes the largest of all garden plants, with such big branches that the birds can perch in its shade.” v. 26-32. And then the living example for them of the power of Creator God…That day when evening came, He said to His disciples, “Let us go over to the other side.” Leaving the crowd behind, they took Him along, just as He was, in the boat. There were also other boats with Him. A furious squall came up, and the waves broke over the boat, so that it was nearly swamped. Jesus was in the stern, sleeping on a cushion. The disciples woke Him and said to Him, “Teacher, don’t You care if we drown?” He got up, rebuked the wind and said to the waves, “Quiet! Be still!” Then the wind died down and it was completely calm. He said to His disciples, “Why are you so afraid? Do you still have no faith?” They were terrified and asked each other, “Who is this? Even the wind and the waves obey Him!” v. 35-41.

With all of the above in mind, I read from You Are The Beloved by Henri Nouwen this morning, and it resonated. I’ll share parts for brevity: “The state of the world suggests to me the urgent need for a spirituality that takes the end things very seriously, not a spirituality of withdrawal, nor of blindness to the powers of the world, but a spirituality that allows us to live in this world without belonging to it, a spirituality that allows us to take the joy and peace of the divine life even when we are surrounded by the powers and principalities of evil, death, and destruction. I wonder if a spirituality of liberation does not need to be deepened by a spirituality of exile or captivity. I wonder if a spirituality that focuses on the alleviation of poverty should not be deepened by a spirituality that allows people to continue their lives when their poverty only increases. I wonder if a spirituality that encourages peacemaking should not be deepened by a spirituality that allows us to remain faithful when the only things we see are dying children, burning houses, and the total destruction of civilization. May God prevent any of these horrors from taking place, may we do all that is possible to prevent them, but may we never lose our faith when “great misery (descends) on the land and wrath on this people…”

The “gospel of health and wealth” is not the true gospel of the good news of the Kingdom of God. May we pray that our spirituality, our trust and faith in Creator God, is deepened through everything we experience; because storms will come, and the way of this world without God will choke what little truth we think we have and leave us withered and empty of life that is good. When everything in life presses down upon us, turn to Creator God. Turn to Him in trust. He is here, always! His love will never fail and it is His love that will give us hope and strength to hold on to life with Him. Let go of every worry and hold onto Him. He is our anchor and solid ground and His love will surround us as we trust in Him.