You Are a Grain of Wheat

Fifth Sunday of Lent
By Rev. Dr. Beverly Bingle
March 21, 2021

The gospel of John as we hear it today was put together 60 to 80 years after Jesus lived, using some stories from various older writings to show Jesus predicting his own death and resurrection. 

That seed image was common in the tradition - “unless a grain of wheat falls to the ground and dies, it remains just a grain of wheat; but if it dies, it produces much fruit.” 

So Jesus MAY actually have used that saying at some point, but scholars say that nothing in THIS story is historical. 

John created it to show his community what Jesus’ commitment was and that he was determined to keep it, no matter the consequences. 

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Today’s first reading from the prophet Jeremiah reflects some of the mindset that paved the way for Jesus’ actions. 

The prophet says that there is no longer any need for God’s people to learn from their leaders how to know God because they will know inside themselves. 

The priests and the people had failed miserably in keeping the covenant that was given to Moses, written on stone, so there’s a new covenant, straight from God to the people - in their hearts. 

No more need for those faithless rulers.

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Jesus was a perfect example of knowing God in his own heart. 

Sure, he struggled with it, like we all do, as we know from those scriptures about his 40 days of temptation in the desert and the constant dialogue with religious leaders who didn’t like what he was doing. 

He went to the bedrock of Jewish teaching and he found this: Love God and love your neighbor. 

He kept pondering what that meant and kept following through on it, even when it got him into trouble. 

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What does that say to us? 

We’ve all suffered from taking action that doesn’t match the way the “world” wants us to act, but that’s nothing new. 

Remember Galileo, using his brain to figure out that the sun wasn’t moving around the earth? 

After all kinds of questions and threats, the Vatican didn’t kill him for what he thought, but it did take 359 years for them to admit that he was right. 

We still see people who listen to God in their hearts struggling… and dying… in dangerous times.

Many of us are old enough to remember April 4, 1968,  the day that Martin Luther King was killed. 

The day before, he spoke words that turned out to be a prediction of his death; he said: “We’ve got some difficult days ahead. But it really doesn’t matter with me now, because I’ve been to the mountaintop…I’ve seen the Promised Land. I may not get there with you. But I want you to know tonight, that we, as a people, will get to the Promised Land.” 

We remember Pope John Paul I, who died suddenly in 1978, just 33 days after his election. 

Contradictory reports about his death and conflicts around what’s on the death certificate, among other things, have led to conjecture that he was murdered because he was going to take action against serious corruption in the Vatican Bank.

Archbishop Oscar Romero expected to suffer because he kept on working for the poor and marginalized,  saying “I do not believe in death without resurrection. 

If they kill me, I will rise again in the people of El Salvador.” 

Romero was murdered in March 1980. 

Maryknoll Sisters Maura Clarke and Ita Ford, Ursuline Dorothy Kazel, and lay missionary Jean Donovan knew the danger in El Salvador. 

The military was targeting anyone they suspected of working for social and economic reform, yet those four women kept on ministering to the people of San Salvador, and they were murdered. 

Like Jesus, these folks - and many others - knew they were risking their lives by speaking up for justice and working to help the victims of oppression. 

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WE don’t face a lot of danger when we go about doing good...maybe some discomfort, or inconvenience, even the loss of friends who think we’re crazy. 

But we do it anyway. 

Fr. Bob Wilhelm—who died March 11, God rest his soul - described our role as Christians when he gave his first homily at the Community of the Risen Christ back in 1972; he said: “We give of ourselves day by day. Christ didn't go around doing RELIGIOUS things. He DID go around doing GOOD. He met people where they were in need. He made himself available." 

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You know what that’s like, giving life away one bit at a time - raising children, doing your best at whatever job you hold, helping others, sharing the fruits of your labor with people who need help, staying informed about current issues, speaking out for justice.

You are grains of wheat that produce much fruit. 

Thanks be to God!