Words'nTone

Prolonging Our Prosperity (Mark 4:30-32 and Daniel 4)
So, we are imitating our Lord in wasting our evangelism, lavishly spreading the seed of the Gospel of the Kingdom of God.  But what does this imitation consist of?  Most, if not all, take evangelism to mean proclamation, witnessing, preaching, sharing Christ verbally with the unchurched and non-believer.  While I agree to the importance of providing verbal affirmation of Christ, it is significantly more than verbal testimony.  Evangelism is, by the nature of the Good News of the Kingdom of God itself, any action that indicates that God is ruler over heaven and earth.  Evangelism must be more than mere words.  Evangelism is the action that stems from the first and second commandments: It is both loving God and loving our neighbor through both proclaiming the Good News and by activities that love our neighbors.

Now I want to look at the next parable, Mark 4:30-32, which hints at how evangelism is more than just mere words, but action—social action:

And He said, “How shall we picture the kingdom of God, or by what parable shall we present it? It is like a mustard seed, which, when sown upon the soil, though it is smaller than all the seeds that are upon the soil, yet when it is sown, it grows up and becomes larger than all the garden plants and forms large branches; so that THE BIRDS OF THE AIR can NEST UNDER ITS SHADE.”

I am often accused of seeing “the poor” behind every text of Scripture.  Perhaps that’s a little exaggerated (maybe not).  But perhaps, more so, I emphasize the call to Biblical Christianity through Scripture by showing others their lack of seeing the poor behind much of the text of Scripture.  In fact, this time it is really there—the poor is behind the parables here.  Maybe you can’t see it, but its there…the poor are behind those last verses: THE BIRDS OF THE AIR can NEST UNDER ITS SHADE.” Yes of course we can see that the Kingdom of God is likened to a large branchy-garden plant, where the animals can find protection.  Perhaps this is the veiled reference.  It is, but there is more.  Jesus references specific Old Testament texts—which his first disciples and those listening to him would have been very familiar, and in the parable of the mustard seed, he reaches back to Daniel 4 and the story of Nebuchadnezzar, king of Babylon and a frightening dream that had plagued the king.

In the context of Daniel, we have “Nebuchadnezzar the king to all the peoples, nations, and men of every language” (4:1) who is terrified by a dream that had awakened him during the night.  The king summons the various court officials, querying them about the interpretation of the dream.  Eventually it was apparent that his court ministers were not able to render an adequate interpretation.  Finally, Daniel, of whom the king acknowledged that “a spirit of the holy gods” is in him and “no mystery baffles” him, offers an interpretation.  But it is not, in the end, a good one for the king of all the nations on the earth.  In the end, the vision was about the king’s undoing, his ruin.  Although great and powerful, the king’s rule would come to an abrupt end.  This seems never to fit into interpretations of Jesus’ parable of the mustard seed in Mark 4.

At first, all looks good.  The dream indicates the king’s power, prestige, and extent of his kingdom.  The affirmation is described in the vision:

   “The tree grew large and became strong
    And its height reached to the sky,
    And it was visible to the end of the whole earth.
    Its foliage was beautiful and its fruit abundant,
    And in it was food for all
    The beasts of the field found shade under it,
    And the birds of the sky dwelt in its branches,
    And all living creatures fed themselves from it.”

This is what is referred to in the parable…THE BIRDS OF THE AIR…NEST IN ITS SHADE.  In other words, the kingdom—the king’s rule—provided the safety and protection needed to its citizens.  This is all good—for king Nebuchadnezzar.  His kingdom is described in “beautiful” terms, as if creation under his rule works as it should.  But, it will come to an end, for we read in the following verses:

“I was looking in the visions in my mind as I lay on my bed, and behold, an angelic watcher, a holy one, descended from heaven.
    ’He shouted out and spoke as follows:
       “Chop down the tree and cut off its branches,
        Strip off its foliage and scatter its fruit;
        Let the beasts flee from under it
        And the birds from its branches.”’” (Daniel 4:13-14).

We are told that the king’s reign will come to an end because he does not acknowledge the right and rule of heaven (the real Kingdom and the real ultimate King).  As Daniel tells the story, the seer picks up one particularly surprising point of reference, and maybe even seemingly a little incongruent, almost out of place, namely that the king can forestall the outcome of his demise if he shows “mercy to the poor.” Daniel tells the king,

“Therefore, O king, may my advice be pleasing to you: break away now from your sins by doing righteousness and from your iniquities by showing mercy to the poor, in case there may be a prolonging of your prosperity” (4:27).

What I find very interesting, of all the things Daniel could have said to help the king identify what needs to be repented of, what needs to be done in order to heed the warning of the night vision, it is the king’s relationship to the poor.  The connection between the kingdom and the poor is made here and should inform us of the nature of God’s rule—and to evangelism.

The picture of the branches in which the beasts of the field and birds of the air take refuge has the connotation of how a socio-economic structure cares for, protects, and causes to prosper its citizens.  (This is often the case in the Old Testament when creation is viewed as working as it should, namely that God’s redemptive action is making things right—restoring creation back to its proper place and function.) In this case the reign of the king and its socio-economic dimension is to provide a safe and thriving structure for those within its sphere.  Daniel in particular makes the connection to the weakest among the citizenry, namely the poor.  In fact, in order for the king to keep his kingdom, showing mercy to the poor might prolong his prosperity.  In order to hear the impact of the parable of the mustard seed, one must take into consideration the connection to the poor.  Once this background is incorporated into our thinking, it will be most natural to view the church’s task of evangelism, that is, spreading the Gospel of the Kingdom of God, as it relates to our social responsibility to the least among us—the poor.

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