LESSONS FROM A ROCK
"I ALSO SAY TO THEE, THAT THOU ART PETER,
AND UPON THIS ROCK I WILL BUILD MY CHURCH,
"AND THE GATES OF HELL SHALL NOT PREVAIL AGAINST IT."
(Matthew 16:18, KJV)
Peter is the Rock. It reminds me of the picture of a rock that has split open with a flower or tree growing out of it. So the author of I Peter (the rock man) says,
"FOR YOU HAVE BEEN BORN AGAIN NOT OF SEED
WHICH IS PERISHABLE BUT IMPERISHABLE,
THAT IS THROUGH THE LIVING AND ENDURING
WORD OF GOD.
FOR, 'ALL FLESH IS LIKE GRASS,
AND ALL IT GLORY LIKE THE FLOWER OF GRASS.
THE GRASS WITHERS, AND THE FLOWER FALLS OFF,
BUT THE WORD OF THE LORD
ENDURES FOREVER.'
AND THIS IS THE WORD WHICH WAS PREACHED TO YOU."
I Peter 1:23-25
It's spring and all thoughts are turned to seeds. I don't know about you, but I can get my hands dirty, dig, and plant little bitty seeds, water them, but half the time those seeds are duds and never appear due to my not so green thumb. They don't even grow so they can wither and their flower can fall off. So "seed" can mean that which can be planted to make things grow in the dirt of earth--or not, like me--, or it can mean the seed implanted by a man in a woman that can also make something grow, a baby, providing descendants. I've had three of those myself.
This last is not a common contemporary use of the word, but is more Bible-talk. I think of when the Holy Spirit came upon the virgin Mary, and overshadowed her, she conceived "the holy thing begotten." This is the seed which is imperishable. They planted Jesus in the ground three days before He rose out of there, breaking the power of sin and death, showing that the Word is imperishable. As humans we will be like that grass that withers or that flower that falls off. Don't even get me started on how I'm withering. Yet when we were born again, everything changed. We too are now born of imperishable seed! How? Through the living and enduring Word of God, that which endures forever. Who is the Word? I John says He is the Word.
"What which was from the beginning,
which we have heard, which we have seen with our eyes,
which we have looked upon, and our hands have handled,
of the Word of life."
(I John 1:1)
There is the mystery of Jesus' conception with the virgin Mary. Also, there is a mystery when we are born again through the same Spirit, not in the womb, but through the Word that endures forever. By baptism we water that seed. We nurture its growth in the Word. And it is this Word that promises that we will endure forever, a promise given and a promise kept. In other words, the bio-gradable peanut shell perishes, but the nut goes to heaven, some glad morning.
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