The Third Sunday after Pentecost-Proper 6B

3rd Sunday after Pentecost-Proper 6B June 13, 2021 We spent this past week at our family farm in Northeast Mississippi with my parents, brother and sister-in-law, and their two daughters. The four adults have joined together over these last few years to make their living by growing organic vegetables which they eat and sell through subscriptions to their CSAs or Community Supported Agriculture. In years past, when we have visited in the summer, we have helped with special projects that needed more hands, but this past week, it rained almost the whole time we were there, so no big projects were planned. During the few times I was able to get out and help, I spent the time cleaning out the old plants from the raised beds and the fields to make room for the new plants and seeds that they will plant in the coming weeks. At some point, I remarked to my sister-in-law that Jesus clearly didn’t know what he was talking about when he used these farm related parables that are our gospel reading for this Sunday. The sort of farming Jesus talks about makes it seem effortless. The farmer plants and then goes to sleep, and he wakes up just in time for the harvest. There’s no mention of all that can go wrong with farming—the 14 inches of rain that can fall in two days’ time; the bugs that eat the crops; the year that the watermelons just would not grow. Even though the ground was wet, the plants I was pulling up were deeply rooted and did not want to come out of the ground. I found my hands inexplicably sore the next couple of days and realized it was from all the grasping and pulling. And don’t even get me started on the ants. As I remarked on Jesus’s naivete to my sister-in-law, she began to tell me about her favorite new plant on the farm this year. It is elderflower bushes. The elderflowers are small, white, and delicate; they will eventually give way to elderberries, but she told me the elderflowers have all sorts of properties on their own. Elderflowers have been used in treating cold and flu symptoms along with sinus problems and swelling. The elderflower has a delicate, sweet fragrance that has been distilled for perfumes, and my sister-in-law used it to make a delicately sweet simple syrup which we used to make cocktails. She had spent significant time researching elderflowers and learning how to use it and what to do with it. And here’s the really cool thing about the elderflowers. They just showed up one day on the farm. Probably a bird was responsible for transplanting the berries from somewhere else but they just started growing all on their own. And she was curious enough to learn what they are and what to do with them. The kingdom of God is like an elderflower plant. You don’t know where it comes from; it just shows up one day and there is no work that you have to do to grow it or cultivate it. It offers bountiful gifts to you-first flowers and then berries- but it is up to you to notice it, to see it, to name it, to delight in it, and to figure out what uses you can make of it, how it can enrich your life and the world around you. This week, may you look for the Kingdom of God that is already within and all around you, through no work of your own. May you find ways to delight in it that it may be the free gift of God’s love and presence in your life.