For a while now, I’ve had a ruminating thought about the work of God in my life and the lives of others. I suppose that this thought might be best expressed through an obscure but a strikingly profound reference to Jesus when he encounters Mary Magdalene in the garden, outside of the empty tomb from which he had emerged upon his resurrection:
Christ and St. Mary Magdalen at the Tomb, by Rembrandt
15 Jesus said to her, “Woman, why are you weeping? Whom are you seeking?” Supposing him to be the gardener, she said to him, “Sir, if you have carried him away, tell me where you have laid him, and I will take him away.” 16 Jesus said to her, “Mary.” She turned and said to him in Aramaic, “Rabboni!” (which means Teacher), John 20:15-16 (ESV).
“Supposing him to be the gardener.” Is this just a case of mistaken identity or is there something that the text is whispering to those who have ears to hear? I believe it’s the latter. One of the primary ways that Jesus communicated was in the form of parables which contained profound truths about the kingdom of God and what it looks like to follow Jesus and be in the world but not of the world. Many of those parables employed agricultural metaphors and similes. Their function, in my view, was to be a stumbling block to the hard hearted and an open door to those who were seeking. And by the way, have you ever noticed that parables are absent from John’s gospel? If you have noticed, have you thought why that might be?
Rachael recently preached on the parable of the sower from Luke 8:1-15. If you’re not familiar with it, the parable is an agricultural one about sowing seed and soil conditions necessary for the seed to take root and eventually flourish. Jesus explains that seed is God’s word and the soil is the condition of the heart. It’s interesting that between the telling and explanation of the parable is call that is central to understanding and following Jesus, “Whoever has ears to hear let him hear.” There is this aspect of the parables and the truth that they contain that at times is puzzling and transcends human knowledge and wisdom while simultaneously incorporating the stuff of everyday life.
Looking at Jesus’s ministry, it is primarily the religious leaders that rejected Jesus and the message he proclaimed, largely in part due to their expectations of who the people of God are and what the kingdom of God looks like and who they thought the Christ would be. Over and over again it is their hardness of heart, and spiritual deafness and hardness of heart.
So back to John’s gospel and the absence of parables. I had never thought much about it until I was taking a class on the Biblical Theology of the New Testament. My professor raised this question and all of us were silent and probably searching for the right answer or hesitating to respond in case it might be a trick question. One student responded “Jesus is the parable.” A stumbling block to the hard hearted and an open door for the seeker.
Mary Magdalene and Jesus. Luke makes it clear in his gospel that this woman who was most likely a Gentile, formerly demon-possessed but liberated by Jesus, and possibly a former prostitute, this Mary was one of the few who had ears to hear what Jesus was saying. She was present at his death (when Jesus’s disciples and friends had fled), present at his burial, and the first to encounter the resurrected Christ. She was a firsthand witness to the mysterious reality of the Kingdom of God. The Kingdom of the heart. The Kingdom for the broken, weary, and suffering where they are welcomed and made whole. The Kingdom that is now but not yet. The Kingdom whose king is a carpenter, a shepherd, even a gardener, fully God and fully man. The Kingdom where all will be made whole.
Mary whose heart had been cultivated by the gardener who encountered her at the tomb in the garden, had ears to hear and a ready heart so that when he called her by name, she knew exactly who it was that was speaking.
It’s my prayer that my heart and your heart and the heart of those who have not heard the call of Christ, may be cultivated by him so that his word might take root in our lives. May we be known as cultivators of the kingdom in our families, our homes and communities. Let us like Mary, have ears to hear, eyes to see and a heart to see God at work in this world.
“The Sower’s Song” song by Andrew Peterson has meant much to me over the last couple of years. May it encourage, comfort and strengthen you.