Grapes and Okra
Isaiah 5:1-7
Psalms 80: 1-2, 8-19
Hebrews 11:29-12:2
Luke 12: 49-56
I planted okra for the first time this year. I had no idea it could grow in Minnesota. When I was in Greece in 2005, my aunt Bethlehem taught me how to cut off the stems diagonally and stew the blossoms in vinegar, oil, onions, and tomatoes, all of which came right out of the garden. It was the best stew I had ever tasted. Last night, I harvested onioins and okra and tomatoes from the garden and lovingly, attentively, made this stew, praying for my mother, who would have been 73 yesterday, my Thea Bethlemem, who would have been about 80, and thinking how lucky I was to have this concrete way to connect to those I have lost, through gardening and cooking. The whole house filled with the familiar smell and took me right back to my aunt Bethlehem's kitchen.
But in the end, the okra were much too tough to be edible. I managed to eat the stew anyway--I cut open the tough blossoms and poured the seeds into the stew, and added rice. It was good, but not the same, of course. (Later, I talked to a friend who grew up in the South and therefore knows her okra--and she told me I had simply waited too long to pick them from the garden. Duh.).
Even though there's not much of a connection in terms of the message in the stories, I thought about that okra as I reread the verses from Isaiah this morning: "My love had a vineyard on a fertile hillside. He dug it up and cleared it of stones and planted it with the choicest vines....Then he looked for a crop of good grapes, but it yielded only bad fruit...What more could have been done for my vineyard that I have not done for it?" The story is a metaphor for the way the house of Israel turned away from God, yielding nothing but "bad fruit" despite God's care. God promises to destroy the vineyard.
Today's psalm is a response to God's promise of destruction. "Why have you broken down its walls so that all who pass by pick its wild grapes?...Watch over this vine, the root your right hand has planted, the branch you have raised up for yourself...Then we will not turn away from you." God's people pray for redemption, for a re-planting, a new harvest. We know, of course, how the story turns out: God chooses in the end to hear the people's prayer and to care for them despite his anger. Today's verses in Paul's letter to the Hebrews is a reminder of this, of the people's faithfulness and God's blessings on them.
At first, the verses in today's gospel did not seem related to this narrative. In fact, I considered ignoring them altogether. Like God's promise to let the vineyard with the "bad fruit" go to waste, they are hard to hear. They are, in fact, some of Jesus' harshest words, and they have always bothered me. The religious right, not to mention several religious cults, have used these words of division between father and son, mother and daughter, to convince people to cut themselves off from anyone who does not believe exactly as they do. In other places in the Gospels, Jesus preaches love; Jesus asks his followers to put away their swords. But here, he tells the people that he came to earth not to create peace, but disharmony. Why?
When reading about a division of "father against son and son against father, mother against daughter and daughter against mother...," I thought of a student of mine who just got back from Iraq. Again, the connection makes no logical sense except that he has been in the midst of extreme disconnection on a global scale for longer than he'd expected. He came to see me last week to tell me he would be going to seminary after finishing his degree at UMM. He wants to create change in people's lives, and he doesn't think his earlier life plan makes sense anymore. He talked about how hard it was to tell his fiance and family of this change in plans. They worried. Perhaps he was not in his right mind, having just returned from such horrifying circumstances. This wasn't the son, the partner, they knew.
During the first Iraq war, when I was in college, I talked to my friends for the first time about my political views. I had assumed we were pretty much the same; I had managed at this point in my life to hide my shame about my home life, to generally fit in, doing well in school, joining the marching band, partying with friends on the weekends. But when the war started, I had difficulty functioning; it seemed so wrong to go on with my life, safely alive in this country, when we were bombing Iraq for no reason at all. How could I just go on taking classes, studying, partying with my friends, when we lived in such a corrupt country that sought power without considering consequences? What was the point?
I lost several friends because of my views. One friend threw a chair at me in a drunken rage. Once, someone wrote "Go back to Greece" on the whiteboard on the door to my dorm room--I knew what the message meant. I had been too vocal. Eventually, my roommate and best friend asked me to move out, and I agreed this was a good idea. While I regret how depressed I became--I realize now that I could have found ways to channel my feelings more positively--I am proud that I spoke up, even if only to my small circle of friends, despite the consequences.
I am not sure how any of this ties together, exactly: how the okra I waited too long to harvest connects to my student, who sat calmly in my office, explaining that despite everything he'd seen, he believed he had the power to change people's lives through ministry. I'm not sure how the okra or my student connect to the 20-year-old college student I once was who had to start over with new friends her sophomore year because of her views about the war. And I'm definitely not sure how any of this connects to this week's bible verses.
But perhaps Jesus' harsh words simply meant that as God's people, we will have to stand up for what we know is right, which will sometimes mean we create conflict even among those closest to us. Speaking truthfully, even harshly, is an act of hope, even if it is also divisive. Choosing a path that will be difficult for those closest to us to accept is an act of hope, even if it is also divisive. Sometimes we have to cut open the harsh, inedible exterior and go straight for the seeds; sometimes we have to pull the plants up by the root and start over.
This week, I spoke some harsh words to a friend who was choosing to stay stuck in her pain and anger; I told her I didn't think it made sense for us to keep talking unless she really, truly wanted to work through her past and change her life so that her past no longer controlled her present or her future. It took a couple days, but she thanked me for those words; she has since made a plan to move forward, and I have agreed to be there for her as she continues to heal from her past. I have been on the receiving end of words like these in my past, and I have not always responded as positively, but I feel lucky that people I loved told me when I was living a life that was out of control or thoughtless or selfish, when I was not being honest about my motivations.
My soldier-student and I were lucky: his loved ones eventually accepted his new life plan and agreed to stand by him; my friend accepted what I had said, and we were able to remain friends. But we both took risks--we couldn't be sure of the outcome. We just knew we had to speak, just as many of my friends were called to speak harsh words to me at different times in my life. In a way, God's metaphor of the vineyard holds the same message. God responded in anger to the people's decision to live without considering God's love for them. God's people responded with a sincere desire to change, and then God acted in love, continuing to care for them. In this story, God was showing us how we are to treat others--we need to be honest and also loving, to risk disconnection in order to connect more deeply, because any relationship that is not based on honesty, any friendship in which we cannot say what we really mean, is not complete. God was also showing us how to respond to him, with a sincere and humble desire to follow, and, often, to change.
Psalms 80: 1-2, 8-19
Hebrews 11:29-12:2
Luke 12: 49-56
I planted okra for the first time this year. I had no idea it could grow in Minnesota. When I was in Greece in 2005, my aunt Bethlehem taught me how to cut off the stems diagonally and stew the blossoms in vinegar, oil, onions, and tomatoes, all of which came right out of the garden. It was the best stew I had ever tasted. Last night, I harvested onioins and okra and tomatoes from the garden and lovingly, attentively, made this stew, praying for my mother, who would have been 73 yesterday, my Thea Bethlemem, who would have been about 80, and thinking how lucky I was to have this concrete way to connect to those I have lost, through gardening and cooking. The whole house filled with the familiar smell and took me right back to my aunt Bethlehem's kitchen.
But in the end, the okra were much too tough to be edible. I managed to eat the stew anyway--I cut open the tough blossoms and poured the seeds into the stew, and added rice. It was good, but not the same, of course. (Later, I talked to a friend who grew up in the South and therefore knows her okra--and she told me I had simply waited too long to pick them from the garden. Duh.).
Even though there's not much of a connection in terms of the message in the stories, I thought about that okra as I reread the verses from Isaiah this morning: "My love had a vineyard on a fertile hillside. He dug it up and cleared it of stones and planted it with the choicest vines....Then he looked for a crop of good grapes, but it yielded only bad fruit...What more could have been done for my vineyard that I have not done for it?" The story is a metaphor for the way the house of Israel turned away from God, yielding nothing but "bad fruit" despite God's care. God promises to destroy the vineyard.
Today's psalm is a response to God's promise of destruction. "Why have you broken down its walls so that all who pass by pick its wild grapes?...Watch over this vine, the root your right hand has planted, the branch you have raised up for yourself...Then we will not turn away from you." God's people pray for redemption, for a re-planting, a new harvest. We know, of course, how the story turns out: God chooses in the end to hear the people's prayer and to care for them despite his anger. Today's verses in Paul's letter to the Hebrews is a reminder of this, of the people's faithfulness and God's blessings on them.
At first, the verses in today's gospel did not seem related to this narrative. In fact, I considered ignoring them altogether. Like God's promise to let the vineyard with the "bad fruit" go to waste, they are hard to hear. They are, in fact, some of Jesus' harshest words, and they have always bothered me. The religious right, not to mention several religious cults, have used these words of division between father and son, mother and daughter, to convince people to cut themselves off from anyone who does not believe exactly as they do. In other places in the Gospels, Jesus preaches love; Jesus asks his followers to put away their swords. But here, he tells the people that he came to earth not to create peace, but disharmony. Why?
When reading about a division of "father against son and son against father, mother against daughter and daughter against mother...," I thought of a student of mine who just got back from Iraq. Again, the connection makes no logical sense except that he has been in the midst of extreme disconnection on a global scale for longer than he'd expected. He came to see me last week to tell me he would be going to seminary after finishing his degree at UMM. He wants to create change in people's lives, and he doesn't think his earlier life plan makes sense anymore. He talked about how hard it was to tell his fiance and family of this change in plans. They worried. Perhaps he was not in his right mind, having just returned from such horrifying circumstances. This wasn't the son, the partner, they knew.
During the first Iraq war, when I was in college, I talked to my friends for the first time about my political views. I had assumed we were pretty much the same; I had managed at this point in my life to hide my shame about my home life, to generally fit in, doing well in school, joining the marching band, partying with friends on the weekends. But when the war started, I had difficulty functioning; it seemed so wrong to go on with my life, safely alive in this country, when we were bombing Iraq for no reason at all. How could I just go on taking classes, studying, partying with my friends, when we lived in such a corrupt country that sought power without considering consequences? What was the point?
I lost several friends because of my views. One friend threw a chair at me in a drunken rage. Once, someone wrote "Go back to Greece" on the whiteboard on the door to my dorm room--I knew what the message meant. I had been too vocal. Eventually, my roommate and best friend asked me to move out, and I agreed this was a good idea. While I regret how depressed I became--I realize now that I could have found ways to channel my feelings more positively--I am proud that I spoke up, even if only to my small circle of friends, despite the consequences.
I am not sure how any of this ties together, exactly: how the okra I waited too long to harvest connects to my student, who sat calmly in my office, explaining that despite everything he'd seen, he believed he had the power to change people's lives through ministry. I'm not sure how the okra or my student connect to the 20-year-old college student I once was who had to start over with new friends her sophomore year because of her views about the war. And I'm definitely not sure how any of this connects to this week's bible verses.
But perhaps Jesus' harsh words simply meant that as God's people, we will have to stand up for what we know is right, which will sometimes mean we create conflict even among those closest to us. Speaking truthfully, even harshly, is an act of hope, even if it is also divisive. Choosing a path that will be difficult for those closest to us to accept is an act of hope, even if it is also divisive. Sometimes we have to cut open the harsh, inedible exterior and go straight for the seeds; sometimes we have to pull the plants up by the root and start over.
This week, I spoke some harsh words to a friend who was choosing to stay stuck in her pain and anger; I told her I didn't think it made sense for us to keep talking unless she really, truly wanted to work through her past and change her life so that her past no longer controlled her present or her future. It took a couple days, but she thanked me for those words; she has since made a plan to move forward, and I have agreed to be there for her as she continues to heal from her past. I have been on the receiving end of words like these in my past, and I have not always responded as positively, but I feel lucky that people I loved told me when I was living a life that was out of control or thoughtless or selfish, when I was not being honest about my motivations.
My soldier-student and I were lucky: his loved ones eventually accepted his new life plan and agreed to stand by him; my friend accepted what I had said, and we were able to remain friends. But we both took risks--we couldn't be sure of the outcome. We just knew we had to speak, just as many of my friends were called to speak harsh words to me at different times in my life. In a way, God's metaphor of the vineyard holds the same message. God responded in anger to the people's decision to live without considering God's love for them. God's people responded with a sincere desire to change, and then God acted in love, continuing to care for them. In this story, God was showing us how we are to treat others--we need to be honest and also loving, to risk disconnection in order to connect more deeply, because any relationship that is not based on honesty, any friendship in which we cannot say what we really mean, is not complete. God was also showing us how to respond to him, with a sincere and humble desire to follow, and, often, to change.
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