Seedling

When we fall into the soil of God’s grace—surrendering like a grain of wheat—something miraculous happens. We rise anew. Alive in Christ. Bearing his good fruit

There’s a story I loved as a kid called The Carrot Seed. It’s about a boy who plants, well, a carrot seed.

His mother says, “I’m afraid it won’t come up.”  His father agrees. Even his big brother doubts.

But each day the boy keeps watering. Keeps tending. Keeps believing and waiting.

Then one day—up comes the carrot. Bigger than anyone imagined.

That’s Lent. A season of persevering in the mystery of faith when everyone—even your inner critic—says, “It’s not going to work.”

But you don’t give up.

Little by little, you just continue to tend to it with quiet hope knowing that something holy is happening deep down within, even when nothing looks different on the surface.

This is the message that we are given today for the Fifth Sunday of Lent. A story from the gospel of John where Jesus has this to say about...seeds.

Jesus answered them, “The hour has come for the Son of Man to be glorified. Very truly, I tell you, unless a grain of wheat falls into the earth and dies, it remains just a single grain, but if it dies it bears much fruit. Those who love their life lose it, and those who hate their life in this world will keep it for eternal life. Whoever serves me must follow me, and where I am, there will my servant be also. Whoever serves me, the Father will honor.                                                John 12:23-26

So far, Lent has taken us deep into the wilderness. And Jesus, as he tends to do, doesn’t hand us a map—he just invites us to follow. Carrying our cross. Not as punishment, but to remake us, transform us in ways that only love is capable of doing.

Now, Jesus interrupts our journey with a familiar parable about seeds. He essentially says, “You’ve got to die to yourself if you want to grow into yourself.”
 
If you don’t know the things Jesus says, you might think this is a cryptic message about gritting your teeth and suffering through life. But like all his parables, it’s a metaphor. It’s about letting go. Dying to what doesn’t serve love, so something holy can live and grow in its place.
 
Jesus isn’t trying to kill us or trick us. He’s leading us down, what Richard Rohr calls “the path of descent”— where everything false falls away so the true self can rise. And when we fall, it might seem like we’re  being buried and cracked open in the dark. Yet, as every seed knows, this is where we fall into the heart of God. Into mercy, peace, and love.
 
But for that to happen, something in us has to give. The part that needs to hold on and control everything. To be right. To win. To be seen.

Jesus says, “Let that stuff go. And really live.”

Because when we fall into the soil of God’s grace—surrendering like a grain of wheat—something miraculous happens. We rise anew. Alive in Christ. Bearing his good fruit.
 
According to Jesus, the first step into this falling is to repent. Not a do this or else kind of thing…but true renewal. In the original Greek the word is metanoia—which literally means: change your mind.

When we start thinking like Jesus, we start seeing like Jesus. And that changes everything. You see others the way he does. You respond the way he does—with tenderness and healing. With a love that gives life.
 
That’s the hard, holy work of Lent. What Paul calls being “transformed by the renewal of your mind.”  For this to happen, something has to give. Something has to die. We don’t get Easter without Good Friday. Before the tomb can be emptied, the cross must be occupied.
 
Yet, no matter how wonderful the promise is, everything in us resists. Why is that? The ego is a master of self-preservation. It says: You’re only as good as what you produce. Your worth is based on how well you perform, how polished or powerful you appear. Jesus invites us let those thoughts die so something beautiful can bloom.
 
Every year, sunflowers grow along the sidewalk around the corner. By mid-summer, they’re towering—six, seven feet tall—faces lifted up proudly to heaven.

Come September, their petals fade. Leaves crisp and curl. And their golden heads droop. It looks like a little garden funeral.
 
We know death is in the air. But we know those heavy heads are full of seeds. Hundreds of them. Each bloom letting go of its own beauty so an entire field can rise next season.

That is how life works. And Jesus is inviting us into. “Unless a grain of wheat falls into the earth and dies, it remains just a single grain; but if it dies, it bears much fruit.”
 
While this is a foreshadow of what is to come - Jesus is also describing the shape of divine love. Love that doesn’t cling or hoard. Or stay shiny or safe.

But the kind of love that cracks itself open and gives itself away. Love that whispers, “I’ll be less so others can be more. I’ll fall so someone else can rise.” Isn’t that what it means to love God, love others, and serve both?
 
Jesus tells us that it’s in this giving we find our true selves. Our belonging with God. And each other. And it’s in this space we find who we really are. People who bear fruit. People who live rooted in grace, growing in love.

Sometimes this looks like letting go of control. Sometimes it means staying in the hard place when everything in you wants to run away. But like James Baldwin wrote, “Not everything that is faced can be changed, but nothing can be changed until it is faced.”

The ego will push back, resisting. It wants self-preservation. You have to constantly remind yourself what feels like dying is usually the beginning of something sacred.

Because when we give our lives away in love, we don’t end up with less. We end up with more. More connection. More meaning. More kinship. All this leads to more joy, more peace, and more salvation.
 
Jesus shows us how one life, given freely, can blossom into a whole field of blessing. That’s the invitation. It’s how God’s love works.

Like the sunflower--one “yes” to God and suddenly your love multiplies. The sooner the false self relents, the sooner the true self can rise and get up to speed.
 
Lent is a season of movement – dying, rising, and growing into our belovedness.
 
Here’s the hard truth we all must face - death is inevitable. It’s embedded in our DNA. I’m not trying to be grim here, but let’s be real none of us wake up the same person as who went to bed. Your body is constantly changing. Skin cells die off. Blood renews. Hair falls and regrows (hopefully). 

The old dies so the new can emerge.
 
Jesus is always inviting us to step into that newness. He reminds us that every day is a new chance to help someone. A new opportunity to forgive something; to carry one another; to plant seeds of kindness and mercy and peace.

Each day is a new opportunity to build a community of love in the space between our waking and sleeping. A vibrant community that doesn't float above reality. But one that is rooted in the messiness of life.
 
The early Church showed us what this looks like. The book of Acts tells us they "had everything in common." They shared meals with joy. And there wasn’t a needy person around them. (Acts 2:43-47).

That’s what happens when people let go and fall into love. When our seeds die to individualism  something holy begins to grow. Community. Kinship. Salvation.
 
I recently went to an AA meeting to support a friend’s newly found sobriety. Around the circle, people admitted how hard it was to keep showing up. And yet, there they were. Because in that room, they belonged. Their stories were heard. Their lives were held. No one was without support. One guy summed it up best saying, “I used to be part of the problem. Now I’m part of a community.”
 
That's the fruit of the gospel right there. Not perfection, but participation. Not polished saints, but wounded healers leaning in to carry each other. And that’s our call too. To be a community where love is lived out loud. Where our scars aren’t hidden, but lifted up as signs that grace is real and still working on all of us.
 
Julian of Norwich wrote, “The love of God creates in us such a oneing that when it is truly seen, no person can separate themselves from another person.”

That’s Anamesa. The Christ-soaked space where God meets us to love on us. And through us. We don’t do this alone. We have God’s Spirit. We have each other.
 
We are given today to begin again. Not just with grand gestures, but with small deaths. Quiet surrenders. A kind word. A soft place to land. A voice lifted on behalf of someone who feels invisible.
 
We are seedlings. God is the soil. Together, let us create a field of sunflowers—bringing the kingdom of heaven to life day by day.

​And believing in our hearts that “Unless a grain of wheat falls into the earth and dies, it remains just a single grain; but if it dies, it bears much fruit.”