An Acorn, A Forest

The Rev. Whitworth Ferguson III
The First Presbyterian Church
Washingtonville, New York
July 24, 2005

An Acorn, A Forest
Genesis 29:15-30
Matthew 13:31-32

One acorn;
one small acorn;
an acorn that doesn’t find its way onto a chipmunk’s dinner table
or into a squirrel’s cupboard:
It will force its roots downward into even the most resistant soil;
roots to draw water and food,
roots to help the acorn push upward,
a hair’s width up at time,
struggling, pushing, determined,
the roots thrumming like a factory, pulling potassium,
nitrates and water from the ground,
and then sending them along up one flight, then two, then three;
another level each day as the acorn pushes against the dirt.
It’s not hard to imagine that the roots even send along
the occasional word of encouragement;
listen carefully and you might even hear a subterranean cheer
flowing up the pipeline: “Go! You can do it!”

And then one day one thin thread does it:
it pokes through the soil and take a deep breath of air.
After all that time in the darkness,
the baby tree is dazzled by the sunlight,
and more than a little disoriented.
It hones in on the light and the warmth of the sun.
Eventually leaves sprout on the pencil-thin trunk;
It looks like a tree from a dollhouse – hardly real.
But the cells filled with chlorophyll chug around and around
inside even the smallest leaf,
the process of transpiration already at work
pulling in carbon dioxide and water,
and giving off oxygen.

And as the days pass, the tiny tree becomes a youngster,
gangly and awkward, bending every which way the wind blows,
no pride, no resolution, unable to resist anything
but the lightest breeze.
A year goes by, and then another and then another.
Rings added to mark each year:
thick rings for healthy years,
and thin rings reflecting drought, heat, and sickness.
It will be more than 20 years before that special day comes,
that day when the tree produces its first acorn,
an acorn just like the one from which it sprouted.
The tree won’t hold onto that acorn;
it will send it out into the world eagerly, enthusiastically.
The tree will watch with pride as the acorn rolls away down the hill
hoping that it will find a home in a wonderful patch of dirt,
rich, moist dirt, just perfect for taking root.
Even as one acorn rolls off to the left of the tree,
another drops off to the right,
and then another and another.

In time, where there was once only one acorn,
one seed buried in the soil, invisible,
almost nonexistent, there will be a forest,
a mighty oak forest spreading in every direction,
strong trees, with deep roots,
standing firm against the vagaries of the wind,
the storms, the heat, the drought.
The acorns will rain down year after year,
and new trees will grow, the forest spreading in every direction.
And the acorn’s Creator will watch over the whole process with pride,
calling it good.

An acorn, a forest.
Time is what separates the two,
time, and nurturing,
time, nurturing, and work on the part of each tree.
The tree doesn’t grow just for itself; it grows for the future,
it grows to create a forest;
one tree spreading 500, 800, a thousand or more acorns each year,
year after year,
spreading them in every direction,
knowing that only a few will ever become trees,
but never worrying about which will take root,
and which will whither;
It just continues to spread acorns.

That is the essence of Jesus’ teaching about the mustard seed:
That from one small seed, something big can grow
something powerful, something wonderful.
Jesus words were seeds,
seeds that he scattered here, there everywhere,
knowing that some would be lost,
some would never take root,
some would blow away with the wind.
But some would take root and grow
and then, like trees, continue to spread seeds and multiply the growth.

But even before Jesus could spread the word among God’s children,
God needed to fill the world with his children.
And that’s where Jacob is the acorn in our first lesson.
the seed that would begin the spread of God’s children.
First Abraham, and then Isaac, and then Jacob.
Just one at a time.
But God had great plans for Jacob:
Jacob the liar, Jacob the cheat.

You will recall from last week that Jacob was running away:
running away from Isaac, the father he had deceived,
his elderly, blind, faithful father.
running away from Esau, the older brother he had cheated,
cheated out his birthright.
Jacob was running away to save his life.

He journeyed north from a town in the southern part
of what we now call Israel but in Jacob’s time
was still known as the land of the Canaanites.
He was headed to the village of Haran,
where his grandfather Abraham had originally come from.
His father Isaac sent him there to find a wife.
After a long and difficult journey on foot
he arrived at the most important place in Haran:
the well, the source of water, the source of life.
And there he met his cousin Rachel,
daughter of his Uncle Laban.

Rachel, with her glowing skin and soft, flowing hair;
Rachel: a picture of grace and beauty:
she captured Jacob’s heart instantly.
Over the course of the month that he stayed with his Uncle,
Jacob rarely took his eyes off Rachel,
She was the one he wanted to marry.
He was aware that Rachel had an older sister, Leah.
Leah’s eyes sparkled in the sunlight,
but she was no match for her younger sister.

Jacob asked his Uncle for permission to marry Rachel,
and Laban, unaware of Jacob’s shady doings
was only too happy to arrange the marriage of his daughter.
But there was a condition: Jacob had to work for Laban for 7 years
before he would be allowed to take Rachel as his wife.
Jacob happily agreed, and the time flew by.
Finally the day came when Laban had to give Rachel to Jacob.
Jacob went into the wedding tent after a long evening of celebration.
But in the darkness, and with his mind muddled by too much wine,
Jacob did not notice that Laban delivered his older daughter Leah
to the tent, rather than Rachel.
In the bright sunlight of the next morning Jacob realized
that Laban had tricked him.
But even as he shouted at Laban,
he never thought about the irony of his protesting
that he had been deceived in the darkness
by one person pretending to be another.
Nor did he think about the irony when Laban responded that
it was the custom in that area to honor the rights of the first born.

But Laban was not an unreasonable man,
and so he gave Jacob Rachel as well as Leah.
And Jacob and his wives remained with Laban
and Jacob became a father: the father of Reuben,
and then Simeon, and then Levi, and then Judah.
Acorns, each of them: in these four
and the 8 other sons who followed
we have the beginning of the nation of Israel,
Each son was the foundation of the twelve tribes of Israel.

Jacob may have preferred Rachel to Leah
but it was Leah who was the mother of Judah,
through whom Moses was descended.
Leah was the mother of Levi, through whom King David,
and eventually our Lord Jesus was descended.
Rachel was the mother of Jacob’s most famous son: Joseph,
the second youngest, the one sold into slavery by his brothers.
(And the only one ever to have his own Broadway show!)

A single acorn in Abraham,
and then Isaac,
and then Jacob,
but then from Jacob, twelve acorns,
and from them others
and before long a nation of people
all proclaiming faith in the Lord God.

Seed after seed dropping from tree after tree.
Some seeds taking root, others withering,
some growing strong, others stunted in their growth,
some thriving even under difficult circumstances:
It would be only a few hundred years later that the children of Israel
would be living in bondage under Pharaoh in Egypt,
praying and waiting for a deliverer.
Even as they waited, they maintained hope,
sending acorns, raising faithful children.

And then our Lord Jesus came to the people of God
to spread the word of God.
And Jesus calls on us to continue his work spreading the word,
spreading the gospel, a word that means simply “good news”,
as we work to build God’s Kingdom here on earth.

Did you hear Jesus’ imagery of the seed:
“when it has grown it is the greatest of shrubs and becomes a tree,
so that the birds of the air come and make nests in its branches.”
(Matthew 13:32)
Jesus picks up his imagery from Scripture, what we now call
the Hebrew Bible: Speaking through the prophet Ezekiel God said,
“I myself will take a sprig from the lofty top of a cedar;
I will set it out, I will break off a tender one
from the topmost of the young twigs;
I myself will plant it on a high and lofty mountain.
On the mountain height of Israel I will plant it,
in order that it may produce boughs and bear fruit,
and become a noble cedar.
Under it every kind of bird will live;
in the shade of its branches will nest winged creatures of every kind.
All the trees of the field shall know that I am the Lord….
I will accomplish it.”
(Ezekiel 17:22-24)

This is God’s hope, God’s desire:
to build his kingdom here on earth, and he does that through:
Jacob and Leah and Rachel,
Moses, Amos, Judith, and Esther,
Paul and Silas and Timothy,
through Mary Magdalene and Lydia and Phoebe,
and through you and me;
through all the different ways we spread the word,
spread the word: God’s word through Jesus Christ.

Our Vacation Bible School is just one way we spread the word
as we work to build the Kingdom.
We don’t do it by trying to convert,
or by trying to save,
or by asking each child to profess his or faith;
No, that’s not what God wants.
He wants us simply to spread the word our Lord spread,
words of love, mercy, forgiveness, and righteousness.
and we do that all week long
as the children laugh and sing and play:
they learn of the love God gives them through Jesus Christ.

This year’s program was wonderful in the simplicity of each daily lesson:
Monday the lesson was: Know God
Tuesday: Talk to God
Wednesday: Tell about God
Thursday: Love God
Friday: Work for God.

We work for God when we know him, talk to him,
tell about him, and of course, love him.
And we love him, because “he first loved us.”

I love the ecumenical aspect of our Vacation Bible School:
that we draw so many children from other churches
and other denominations.
We don’t know much about the “soil” within each child
but we don’t worry about that:
we leave that confidently in God’s hands.
We simply spread the seeds, spread the word,
share the love, and keep telling the news,
building the Kingdom here on earth.
That’s our job
Building the Kingdom:
And we do that one seed at a time;
one word at time;
one person at a time;
one acorn at a time.
One acorn:
For from one acorn, a mighty forest grows.
AMEN