Put Yourself Into It (July 10, 2005)

There are some who receive the Word with great joy

"As for what was sown on good soil, this is he who hears the word and understands it; he indeed bears fruit"
Matthew 13:23

A seminary student was showing little promise of developing into a good preacher. One day, as he stumbled through a practice sermon in class, his homiletics professor called out to him from the back of the room: "Why can't you be more enthusiastic? Speak louder. Open your mouth. Put yourself into it!"

No better phrase could describe the energy and enthusiasm of the New Testament writers: "They put themselves into it!" They wanted us to know and love Christ as they did. And they made a particular effort to try to get us to think of Christ as the Word of God. The Apostle Peter has written,

Your rebirth has come, not from a destructible but from an indestructible seed through the living and enduring Word of God.

Then, quoting from the Old Testament Prophet, Isaiah, Peter says:

All mankind is grass and the glory of men is like the flower of the field. The grass withers, the flower wilts, but the Word is the Gospel which was preached to you" (1 Pt. 1:23-25).

Among all the other ancient religions, sight is primary in the relationship with God. There is an emphasis on visions or on idols that one can see. In our Judeo-Christian Tradition, the element of sight has not been absent. Prophets were referred to as "seers" or "visionaries," for example. Nevertheless, in the Judeo-Christian Tradition, the encounter with God is not primarily through seeing but hearing. The "Word of the Lord" is a phrase that occurs hundreds of times in the Old Testament.

According to a story told by the late humorist, Bennett Cerf, there were press agents at work all the way back to the time of Moses in the Old Testament. It seems that Moses' chief publicity person was urging him to build a bridge across the Red Sea as an escape route from the Egyptians. "There is no time for that," said Moses. "I have just received the Word of the Lord. I am to order the Red Sea to part in the middle and we'll just walk right through." To which the press agent replied, "You do that Moses and I'll guarantee you at least two full pages in the Old Testament."

Open your Bible to the very beginning -- the creation story in the Book of Genesis -- and you will read, "Then God said, 'Let there be light.'" (Gen. 1:3). And from that point on, emphasis on the spoken word of God continues to build:

Then the Word of the Lord came to Abraham (Gn. 15:4). And Moses commanded the People according to the Word of the Lord (Num. 396:5). The Word of the Lord came to Samuel (1 Sa. 15:10). Hear the Word of the Lord! .. Hear the Word of the Lord! ... Hear the Word of the Lord!

On and on it goes and, as it does, it picks up more and more content, so that the "Word" is not merely a sound but a Presence. The Word is filled with God's Presence. The Word is filled with the pre-existent Christ-Presence. Finally, when we come into the New Testament, John tells us in his Gospel that "In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God ... And the Word became flesh and dwelt among us" (Jn. 1:1, 14).

This Word is with you always, calling you by name. In order to hear it clearly, you need to go deep down -- below the noise and the distraction and the confusion and the busyness of your life. You need to go down deep to the level of spaciousness and silence, where this Word is given to you: this Word that is more than sound; this Word that makes you uniquely you; this Word that is your life. And when you allow it to come into your life, it will reverberate through your whole being.

The professor in a college English class was trying to impress upon his students the value of a rich vocabulary. He said to them, "If you will just take a new word and use it ten times it will be yours forever." Whereupon, a young woman in the class looked dreamily out the window and started saying, "George, George, George, George ... "

What the New Testament writers are trying to impress on you is that if you take this Word, which is Christ, and make it truly yours forever, you will be born again to a living hope, born again to a new life.

When you turn to Scripture, something special happens because Scripture is the Word of God coming to us in a very special way. Yet, how many of us read our Bible for an average of, say, ten minutes a day? That's one problem. Another problem is that when we do get into our Bible, we merely study it. Bible study is valuable, but we must remember that "understanding the Scripture" is not a mere intellectual exercise. The Bible is not simply one more puzzle, along with others, to be solved. We need to understand that there is a profound difference between studying the Bible and praying the Bible. Studying the Bible gives us a certain richness we can bring into the experience of Scripture reading. But in praying the Bible, we settle down in our quiet time, select a passage, let's say in the Gospel, and we begin to read slowly. We bring our mind into it, of course. But we bring more than our mind -- we bring our whole self. If we open our minds and hearts to the Word of God in this way, God uses the occasion to make His Presence very real to us. And the experience becomes an encounter with the living Word of God.

In today's Gospel, Jesus is speaking in parables to the crowds gathered about Him. He tells them the story of "a sower who went out to sow. And as he sowed, some seeds fell along the path." Since this ground, which had been walked on, was hard, the birds came and devoured the seeds. Some seeds fell on rocky ground "where they had not much soil." Consequently, the plants that sprang up were not deeply rooted and they quickly withered and died. Some seeds fell among the thorns that had been turned under when the land was plowed, and the thorns grew up and choked them. "Other seeds fell on good soil and brought forth grain, some a hundredfold." Later, Jesus interprets the parable for the disciples. The seed in hard, rocky ground represents His followers who have heard His Word and accepted it in faith. But not all persevere in the faith. There are some who receive the Word with great joy but do not allow it to take root deep within their being. Consequently, when trouble or persecution occurs because of the faith, they soon falter. "As for what was sown among thorns, "these are the ones who hear the Word, but the cares of the world and the delight in riches choke the word, and it proves unfruitful." As for what was sown on good soil, "these are the faithful who hear the Word and persevere in it. They indeed bear fruit -- as much as a hundredfold."
"He who hears the Word and understands it, he indeed bears fruit" (Mt 13:23). We can inspire the world to a new and living hope by hearing and receiving Jesus Christ, the living Word -- of God! We can be Christ's reconcilers in our divided world, if we put ourselves into it!
May God Bless you and your families!!

Fr Nony