Ancient War Lords always had a master plan. To sanctify their master plan, they invented mirror image Master War Lords, like Yahweh. So it is that Yahweh is described in today’s Old Testament reading as a “master of might” whose plan is for “mastery over all things.” Jesus has no “master” plan for “mastery.” His plan, if we can call it that, is for something even stronger. It is for bold love. Bold love can be planned but it cannot be mastered, it is free, creative. Bold love, as described in today’s Gospel, is thus wild in its boldness, “like a mustard seed” and “like yeast.”
When we think of being bold, we tend not to think of being mustard seeds or being yeast. Yet, both are bold indeed. A mustard seed “is the smallest of all the seeds, yet when full-grown it… becomes a large bush, and the ‘birds of the sky come and dwell in its branches.” So too peacemakers are seemingly small amidst the “masters of might” in this world and yet, like mustard, we are a spice of life for all who come and dwell with us. Yeast too is small yet is sprinkled into “measures of wheat flour until the whole batch is leavened.” So too peacemakers, like yeast, form vines of connection and act as leavening agents converting old dry “masters of might” into friends moist with love. The bold love of mustard seeds and of yeast is the bold love of Mary Magdalene whose feast day is celebrated this week, July 22. She is a mustard seed, small of space in the Gospel, but grown into a bold witness. She is yeast, sprinkled into measures of conventionality until we are all leavened as radical peacemakers. She lives as a growing, leavening peacemaker in our public consciousness though she lived 2,000 years ago. It was a time when women were marginalized out of public consciousness by masters of might. Mary would not be mastered and was bold with love to peacefully depose masters of might and their master plans. It meant she went alone to the tomb of a man executed for deposing masters of might and ending their system. How are we like Mary? Can we, like Mary, go it alone, if need be, to stand with those executed by the masters of might in our time? Can we, like Mary, proclaim in a world of killer rulers, a peacemaker Christ. Can we, like Mary, grows as a seed and leaven as yeast because in a culture that tried to master people, we too have a plan to love boldly. Mary had that plan and she kept at that plan though she watched a loved one die. She watched him die for the same senseless reasons many of us are watching loved ones die during our time of Caesar, Ceasar Nero. He is deploying nameless federal troops to U.S. cities, lauding police brutality, and worsening Covid 19. We are watching people die because ‘masters of might’ only have plans for “mastery over all things” and have no plans to love boldly, nor to be creators of health and life. Jesus dared to love boldly, so too Mary Magdalene, and so too us. What is my boldness, the skills and abilities with which I have been blessed, and that I can create as a plan of love during this time? Who are the people I can bring together to spread our bold love? Now, together, let us be mustard seeds, let us be yeast, let us be Mary – free, creative with bold plans of love.
“I should be bolder, seeing I commend Love,… beholding all things very fair And strong with strength that puts my strength to scorn… I have emptied out my heart, and spent Whate’er I had; till like a beggar, bold With nought to lose, I laugh and am content. A beggar kisses thee; nay, love.” (The Growth of Love – Robert Seymour Bridges)
Prayer: Spirit, move us to be bold with love.
Question: What is my bold plan of love to nurture health and life now and after Covid 19 and with whom can I join to realize that plan?
July 19, 2020 Gospel Matthew 13:24-43 Sixteenth Sunday in Ordinary Time