17th Sunday in Ordinary Time, Year A

In our end is our beginning;
in our time, infinity;
in our doubt there is believing;
in our life, eternity.
In our death, a resurrection;
at the last, a victory,
unrevealed until its season,
something God alone can see.
~In the Bulb There is a Flower,
Natalie Sleeth, 1986
 
Telling the difference between what we consider good and evil is sometimes no simple thing. Consider the characters that inhabit today’s readings. Laban tricking the trickster Jacob in Genesis. In Matthew, a thief and a merchant. Fish both desired and rejected. Yeast in a batch that is properly without leaven. A weed masquerading as a plant that is intentionally sown in a field. Shady, subversive, corrupting, confounding stories all, yet Jesus offers them up, and, along with the disciples we are so confident: “Yes, we understand.”
 
Do we?
 
Here is a counter-cultural good word. Wisdom is fleeting, although it is there in abundance for the harvest, found in unexpected and surprising places. Like baptism, it takes a lifetime to achieve. It takes ears to hear, eyes to see. Perhaps that is why it is so valuable! Humility is a beginning, to be sure. Navigating amidst masquerading either/or realities so familiar in our current kingdoms is harder than we might think, and yet, it may be the way to this kindom we both long for and proclaim. Poking around the edges of Jacob and Rachel and Leah’s stories we discover just how important this is. And perhaps around our own stories as well. The poking, the prodding, the searching, the sorting. Is there a pearl of great price waiting to be found?
 
The Spirit helps us in our weakness. There’s food for thought! Open yourself up to the Love from which nothing can separate us. Listen for that Spirit of truth. Be transformed. Enter into worship.
 
Readings: Genesis 29:15-28 † Psalm 105:1-11, 45b † Romans 8:26-39 † Matthew 13:31-33, 44-52
 
About the Art: Egger-Lienz, Albin, 1868-1926. Sower and the Devil, from Art in the Christian Tradition, a project of the Vanderbilt Divinity Library, Nashville, TN. https://diglib.library.vanderbilt.edu/act-imagelink.pl?RC=55000 [retrieved July 1, 2026]. Original source: http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Egger-Lienz_-_S%C3%A4hmann_und_Teufel.jpg.

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