PLANTED WELL - DESTINED FOR GREATNESS

Some seeds were eaten by birds, some withered under the sun, some were chocked by weeds, but some grew into a huge harvest 

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One of the things about being a priest of my age is that you are always running into people you have baptized or united in marriage several years back. Often you are amazed at how far they have come. Sometimes, however, you are shocked by how far some beautiful young couples have let themselves go! Sometimes it’s all you can do to hold back a gasp. The same can be said about priests. The years have not been kind to them. They are like sprouted seedlings scalded by the sun or growing plants crowded by weeds. They squandered their potential. It hurts too much to watch.

What got them into trouble in the first place, I believe, is their belief that things like graduations, weddings and ordinations mark the end of school, the end of dating and the end of seminary instead of a beginning – a beginning of a lifetime of fighting one’s lazy streak and one’s temptation to rest on one’s laurels.  

A graduation is called “a commencement” for a reason. Rather than being a celebration of the end of your studies, it was a celebration of the beginning of your careers and lives as independent people. What happens after you leave school is more important than what happened while you were there. At a graduation, we do not celebrate a harvest. We celebrate the fact that the seeds of your future have finally been planted. What happens next is what really matters. 

Jesus makes a very important point in today’s gospel: planted seeds, no matter how good they are, must be tended: watered, protected, encouraged with fertilizer and sometimes, even pruned. Otherwise, their potential for reaching their goals will be wasted, stunted or overpowered.

Of course, Jesus was originally talking about the reception his teaching was getting. Some, he said, heard what he said, but evil came and grabbed it like hungry birds gobbling up seeds on top of the ground. Some heard what he said and got all excited at first, but they soon fell away because it required too much. Some heard what he said and listened with enthusiasm, but other things grabbled their attention and soon they lost interest. A few heard what he said, took it in and watched it change their lives forever.

These words can also be applied to you. Some of you took what you were taught, religiously and academically, and wasted it like seeds sprinkled on concrete. They went nowhere. The investment in you was wasted. Some of you took what you were taught and left school all excited about what you could become, but you gave into your lazy side and did little with what was invested in you. Some of you took what you were taught and made a great start only to get distracted and side-lined, losing sight of your goals until it was too late to get back on track. Some of you shocked and surprised yourselves and others by taking what you were taught and parlayed it into a future rich in spiritual/personal development and worldly accomplishments.

“Good seeds” have been planted in each of you, but no matter how good these seeds are, much depends on you, the ground that received them. Yesterday’s “most likely to succeed” could be today's biggest failures in life, while yesterday’s “least likely to succeed” could actually be the biggest successes. Nothing was guaranteed. A lot depended on your attitude and willingness to water, protect, encourage and prune what had been planted in you.

Anybody can plant a garden, but what happens after you plant it determines whether you will have delicious vegetables to eat in the future. Just so, many manage to graduate from college, but what happens after graduation determined whether they turned what they had learned into a satisfying life in the years that followed.  

Many of our heroes have said as much. Jesse Owens said, “We all have dreams, but in order to make dreams into reality, it takes an awful lot of determination, dedication, self-discipline and effort.” Johann von Goethe said, “Knowing is not enough; we must apply. Willing is not enough; we must do.” Henry Ward Beecher said, “Hold yourself responsible for a higher standard than anybody else expects of you. Never excuse yourself. Never pity yourself. Be a hard master to yourself – and be lenient to everybody else.” John Atkinson said, “If you don’t run your own life, somebody else will.” Orison Swett Marden said, “The greatest thing a man can do in this world is to make the most possible out of the stuff that has been given him. This is success, and there is no other.” And my favorite of all are the words of George Bernard Shaw, “People are always blaming their circumstances for what they are. I don’t believe in circumstances. The people who get on in this world are the people who get up and look for circumstances they want, and, if they can’t find them, make them. ... This is the true joy in life … the being a force of nature instead of a feverish selfish clod of ailments and grievances complaining that the world will not devote itself to making you happy.”

Friends! God still uses many people to plant the seeds of your future in you. These seeds are God’s gift to you. They are God’s stake in your future. Seeds represent potential, but potential is nothing unless it is developed. “Knowing is not enough, you must apply. Willing is not enough, you must do.” Do not let these precious seeds fall on hard ground, thin ground or weedy ground. Give them a rich, loose soil. Give them plenty of sunshine and water. Bring them to harvest so that you too can take your turn in planting good seeds in those who follow you: your children, your spouse, your community, your church and your world. Then, one day, you can stand in front of your Maker and hear this: “Well done, good and faithful servant!”