Feast of Saint Lawrence, Deacon and Martyr
I feel excited and empowered by today’s scripture readings! They are full of promise and hope. I can respond confidently to God’s summons to follow Christ, trusting that I will receive every grace that I need to become a faithful and fruitful disciple. We are invited to sow the seed of the Gospel, to be generous with the poor, and to die to ourselves in service to Christ. Let us press into each of these opportunities today, confident that God will equip us for every good work.
God invites us through our first reading to cheerfully sow the seeds of the Gospel. We love because God first loved us (1 John 4:19). Applying that basic truth, we sow seeds of the Gospel because Christ first sowed seeds that fell into the fertile soil of our hearts. We love, we serve, we give, we sow because Christ has already lavished so much upon us. In my reflection for the Sixteenth Week, I shared my vision of Christ as “Cosmic Sower.” I saw him abundantly broadcasting seed across the entire world. We become Christ’s hands as he sows his love and Word through us. As St. Paul assures us, “The one who supplies seed to the sower and bread for food will supply and multiply your seed and increase the harvest of your righteousness.” We need not fear our own feeble efforts – the Cosmic Sower will provide what we need as we trust in him!
Our psalm response promises, “Blessed the man who is gracious and lends to those in need.” Our selection concludes with, “Lavishly he gives to the poor, his generosity shall endure forever; his horn shall be exalted in glory.” Today is the Feast of St. Lawrence, third century Deacon and Martyr. Emperor Valerian issued an edict in the year 258 that all bishops, priests, and deacons should be executed. Immediately following the death of Pope Sixtus II, the prefect of Rome ordered that St. Lawrence turn over to the Roman government all the riches of the Church. Lawrence asked for three days to gather the wealth. He busily distributed as much of it as possible to the poor. On the third day, when ordered to deliver the treasury of the Church, he went to the prefect and presented him with the indigent, the blind, the crippled, the suffering and declared that these were the true treasures of the Church. Lawrence reportedly proclaimed to the prefect, "The Church is truly rich, far richer than your emperor." This act of defiance led to his martyrdom.
As we sow seed, let us do so with the same heart and mind as St. Lawrence, recognizing that Christ is intimately and uniquely present in the poor. Sometimes we sow seeds from our finances, sometimes we sow God’s Word, sometimes we sow a kind, gracious, gentle, or encouraging word. At times we sow comfort. We are called to sow peace, truth, justice, and righteousness. We must be ready to sow whatever it is that the poor need, in whatever form of poverty we find them. Each of us are poor in some way – materially, spiritually, relationally, socio-economically. Today, let us be abundant sowers in whatever way God calls us in order that we might “increase the harvest of [our] righteousness.”
Jesus says, “Whoever serves me must follow me, and where I am, there also will my servant be. The Father will honor whoever serves me.” We find ourselves in Christ as we find him in the poor. Today, let us walk in the footsteps of the Cosmic Sower, following him and helping to scatter his seed, serving those whom he serves, and recognizing in the poverty of humanity the treasury of the Church.
In our Gospel, Jesus uses the metaphor of wheat seeds. The seed that dies is the one that becomes fruitful. In this illustration I see the seed dying to what it was formerly and coming to life as something new. It dies to its seed-state and transforms into a fruitful plant. We are called to die to our former life of sin and come alive as new creatures in Christ. We die to our egoistic False Self and rise to newness of life as our True Selves, created in God’s image.
Let us sow seeds of love in complete confidence, knowing that Christ will indeed supply all our needs. Today, may we each receive the grace we need to die to self and live in Christ, in order that we might produce much fruit in him. Amen and amen!
Elizabeth Wells