We Plow the Fields and Scatter the Good Seed on the Land

One activity still possible while in a hospital bed is reading.  I’ve consumed quite a few newspapers and periodicals.  In the science section on one weekly, I came across the limitations of our technology – the Google machine, to be specific.

If you had ever wondered how to keep the cheese on your pizza while eating it — use glue.  That was Google’s handy household hint.  Use glue.  I, suppose it might have been a little more helpful if it had suggested a brand.  Now, left to my own devices, I might have used duct tape in error.  Big mistake.

That story just goes to show that there are some things, like “common sense,” for instance, that humans will always be better at than AI or any other whiz-bang invention.

The coming wave of modern technology will astound but none of it will ever be a stand-in for a real father’s wisdom and love.

In Ezekiel we find the promise and wisdom of nourishment.  “Thus says the Lord God: I myself will take a sprig from the lofty top of a cedar; I will set it out.  I will break off a tender one from the topmost of its young twig; I myself will plant it on a high and lofty mountain.  On the mountain height of Israel I will plant it, in order that it may produce boughs and bear fruit, and become a noble cedar.  Under it every kind of bird will live…”

This is what a good father, what a good husband does, he nourishes productivity and coaxes from the land a good life for his family.  In short, brings home the bacon.

Before our children were born, given my family of origin’s poor dynamics, I had serious doubts about my ability to be a good father.  It wasn’t until I came across the title of a book on parenting that I began to loosen up a bit.  The book’s title?  “Good Enough.”  I realized that I didn’t have to get everything right, that I would make mistakes.  I just had to be good enough.

Mark’s gospel puts the teaching in another light.  “Jesus said, ‘The kingdom of God is as if someone would scatter seed on the ground, and would sleep and rise night and day, and the seed would sprout and grow, he does not know how.  The earth produces of itself, first the stalk, then the head, then he full grain in the head…’”

These past weeks, with the 80^th anniversary of the Landing at Normandy, we honored those men who were asked to rise to the defense of our civilized society.  They were asked to do something they had never been trained or wished to do, to kill another human being.

Many were fathers with established lives.  Growing up, most envisioned a future as having a good job, marrying their sweetheart, raising a family and contributing to their communities.  In the end, awaiting the golden years of retirement.  Unfortunately, such a dreamt of future was denied to many of our citizens of color at the time.

My father’s generation has been labeled the “Greatest Generation” by newscaster Tom Brokaw in his book by the same name.  After war was declared by Congress, hundreds of thousands flooded the recruiting stations to fight against the Axis Powers – Germany, Italy and Japan.

My father served in the dental corps in Okinawa.  Jai’s father served in Germany, running the motor pool.  He went in as a private and was discharged as a lieutenant with a battlefield commission.

Contrary, to the Former Guy who dodged the draft, these men were not “suckers.”  They were patriots, many of whom paid the ultimate price.  This from an unfit felon who had the audacity to ask his then-chief of staff John Kelly: “Why should I go to that cemetery? It’s filled with losers.  What was in it for them?” 

Have you no respect?  As a veteran myself, I highly resent the disparagement that felonious draft dodger casts on those who did serve.  But enough of him!  (Had to get that off my chest).

The story of WWII is a story of thousands of individual stories of men like our fathers, like your fathers, who had left shop and farm, left the comforts of home and family, to report for duty when called.  As I read of the first paratroopers dropped behind enemy lines, as I read of the men struggling up the cliffs to get off the killing grounds of those beaches through confusion, withering machine-gun fire and heavy bombardment, my eyes welled up with tears.  These were stories of sacrifice, bravery and solidarity with the people of Normandy.  These were our fathers.

In the early hours of June 6^th, just after midnight, thousands of U.S. paratroopers came drifting out of the skies near the village of Ste.-Mere-Eglise, France.  That was the first town to be liberated. 

One of its residents vividly recalls that day.  “One parachute floated right down into a trench dug in Georgette Flais’ backyard, where she huddled with her parents and a neighbor.  Attached to it was Cliff Maugham.  Ms. Flais refers to him as ‘our American.’”[1]

The German soldier billeted at her house ran out, pointing his rifle at the trench, threatening to shoot.  Ms. Flais’ father jumped up and begged the German not to shoot.  Amazingly, he agreed.  Soon afterward the German soldier realized that the war was over and surrendered to the American, who calmly handed out chewing gum, cigarettes and chocolate.

“The American then curled up for a nap,” she remembers.  Afterward, “we kissed him warmly goodbye.”  He then headed off at early light to the battle.  A lasting friendship was born that morning.[2]

By 1984 Ms. Flais was teaching Greek and Latin some 140 miles away when June 6^th rolled around.  She was watching TV when she caught the glimpse of an American soldier who had come back for the festivities.  “He was broader and wore a baseball hat instead of a helmet.  But he had the same laid-back demeanor.   She jumped in the car and rushed back to her childhood town.

“It was my American,” she said.  “We fell into one another’s arms.”[3]

Year after year, fewer veterans are able to return to Ste. Mere-Eglise.  Townspeople volunteer driving them around as they seek significant places attached to that dark early morning.  It may have been where they lost a friend, were wounded, or first landed.

For the town’s first annual celebration, while the war still raged in Europe, Maj. Gen. James Gavin sent over 30 American soldiers stationed in Germany for the event.

The bond between the citizens of that small town and their American visitors these days is palpable.  One photographer, Jacques Villain, who has been documenting the annual celebrations remarked, “There is a sense of welcome here that’s nothing like anything else in the region.”

In the motion picture, “The Longest Day,” one memorable scene depicts the American paratrooper, John Steele, who had the misfortune of getting hung-up on the pinnacle of the church’s steeple.  Today, a mannequin of Mr. Steele hangs from that church steeple.

This is what our fathers did and endured for a cause greater than themselves, a cause every bit as prone to failure as a farmer’s labors.

Before the day of the battle, Gen. Eisenhower had written two letters – one in case of total disaster and the other in case of success.  Until the end of that day, he didn’t know which he would be releasing to the news media.

I remember vaguely the day my father returned from the war.  Around the house things were awkward and uncomfortable.  He tried to be a good father and I had no idea of the inner demons that pulled at his soul.

One event I still remember, years after his return, was a vacation trip we took to Ensenada, Mexico.  I was a reluctant camper because it was over my birthday.  I must have been ten or eleven.

My mother had asked me what I might like to do for my birthday.  After thinking a minute, my mind lit up with an idea.  I had remembered seeing all the fishing boats tied up at the docks as we drove through town.  “Fishing,” I exclaimed.  “I want to go fishing.”

I had no idea that my dad got terribly seasick.  As the boat pulled off into the open ocean, I remember him telling me at the rail, “Don’t look down at the water; look at the horizon – that way you won’t get seasick.”

I had all kinds of help from the crewmembers who took me under their wing, baiting my hook and helping me pull in fish after fish.  I think they were seabass.  Dad had gone down to the cabin to rest, not feeling well.

When we got back to shore, I ran up the gangplank with a crewmember behind me hauling my gunnysack full of fish.  Dad staggered up, looking three shades of green.  I exclaimed to my mother, this was the greatest birthday ever, but Dad looked down at the water and got sick.

On the way back to our rented cottage we passed several run-down shacks.  Dad stopped the car and gave away most of my fish.  When I objected, he said that those people needed them more than we did.  A lesson I never forgot.

As we celebrate Father’s Day today, these men in our lives who sacrificed and nurtured us – they are tokens of God’s grace.  They protect, guide and support us through infancy and the rest of our lives.  Like God’s promise in Ezekiel, they are sacramental representations of generativity proclaimed to a desolate Israel by a gracious God.

Indeed, God will take a twig and “plant it on a lofty mountain where it will produce boughs and bear fruit and become a noble cedar.”  That twig is a Father’s love. That is exactly a good father’s hope for his children.

We are the soil on which their guidance, hopes and dreams are scattered, fed by their care and wisdom, and today we celebrate the fathers who have been the sacramental presence of such unbounded love – most, not perfect, but “good enough.”   They have loved us from the first and to the end.  For that gift of grace, we say, “Thanks be to God.”  Amen.

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[1] Catherine Porter, “First Town Liberated by the Allies Still Remembers, With Gusto,” New York Times, June 8, 2024

[2] Ibid.

[3] Ibid.

June 16, 2024
4th Sunday after Pentecost
Proper 6

The Rev. Dr. John C. Forney
Ezekiel 17:22-24; Psalm 92:1-4,11-14;
2 Corinthians 5:6-10,14-17; Mark 4:26-34 “We Plow the Fields and Scatter the Good Seed on the Land”