Jesus presents some marvelous imagery in the parables in today's Gospel reading.
The farmer plants seeds and does his part tending to them, but then the process of the seeds becoming plants in full bloom unfolds in ways beyond his control or understanding. Then there's the incredible reality of how the tiny mustard seed becomes such a large bush.
It is truly marvelous to think at how God is similarly at work in our lives. While we can't see God, He reveals Himself to us, so that we walk by faith, not by sight, as St. Paul writes, striving to please God in this life as we journey toward the judgment.
As we devote our lives to putting faith into action through righteous deeds, God is at work in ways that we can't fully understand or control, though we know His work is really happening because of the fruits that come to bear. Ultimately, God mightily declares Who He is through these deeds, doing what He alone can do.
Yet we marvel at how God invites us to be transformed so that even our small deeds of righteousness, kindness, and compassion can be part of His plan to advance the Kingdom of God on Earth, which is not a place, but a way of life. By faith, we open ourselves up to how our deeds can be part of God's plan to advance the Kingdom by making God known. So we constantly strive to do good works, ready for God's action through them.
As a Religious Education teacher, part of my role is to plant seeds, and then open up to how God does His part to bring them forth to fruition. By faith, I recognize that the seeds planted during their time in RE class will come to fruition, though I know not how it happens, and even if I'm not there to see the fruition.
Furthermore, I recognize in my experience that so many seeds were planted during my middle school years, especially in becoming a person of deep faith, which have born great fruit over the past 16 years, and I marvel to think of how God has been at work in wondrous ways that He alone can do.
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