Luke 8: 4 - 15... Seeds not fruits

text:
4 And when a great crowd came together and people from town after town came to him, he said in a parable:
5 "A sower went out to sow his seed; and as he sowed, some fell along the path, and was trodden under foot, and the birds of the air devoured it.
6 And some fell on the rock; and as it grew up, it withered away, because it had no moisture.
7 And some fell among thorns; and the thorns grew with it and choked it.
8 And some fell into good soil and grew, and yielded a hundredfold." As he said this, he called out, "He who has ears to hear, let him hear."
9 And when his disciples asked him what this parable meant,
10 he said, "To you it has been given to know the secrets of the kingdom of God; but for others they are in parables, so that seeing they may not see, and hearing they may not understand.
11 Now the parable is this: The seed is the word of God.
12 The ones along the path are those who have heard; then the devil comes and takes away the word from their hearts, that they may not believe and be saved.
13 And the ones on the rock are those who, when they hear the word, receive it with joy; but these have no root, they believe for a while and in time of temptation fall away.
14 And as for what fell among the thorns, they are those who hear, but as they go on their way they are choked by the cares and riches and pleasures of life, and their fruit does not mature.
15 And as for that in the good soil, they are those who, hearing the word, hold it fast in an honest and good heart, and bring forth fruit with patience.

my reflections:
One time, i went to 'Whole Foods' in Sta Fe to buy fruits for my community's week-long consumption.

Monks love to eat varieties of fruits so i made it right to drop by the grocery store to pick some for them as i would not want them to get disheartened and disappointed in case they find nothing in the pantry the next day.

To my great surprise, i saw nothing in the fruit stand and so i asked for assistance from one of the guys connected with the grocecy store and said to him: "hey, i did not know you don't sell fruits anymore!." i exclaimed. The guy replied: "i'm sorry brother, but we don't sell fruits anymore", he apologized. "why is that so? hhhmmm, it's a bit strange that you don't carry fruits anymore huh?," i quickly told the man with a bit of sarcasm. "But wait a minute brother, we sell seeds, you may want to buy a few of them", the man explained in a little bit of excitement. I was taken aback. I thought to myself, what can seeds do to the monk's appetite and enthusiasm for fruits?...

Well, just like in today's Gospel, Jesus Christ sells seeds. he sells seeds of peace, joy, and unity to us.

The seed for joy is called forgiveness. If we learn to forgive, to love our enemies, to forget our grudges, then the seeds of peace and joy will grow and we will reap the fruits we are asking from the Lord.

Let us look therefore, into our hearts and see if we are ready to sow those seeds.

Sometimes we are just too preoccupied, too excited with such compulsive concern on harvesting and enjoying the fruits, that we are not ready to work and labor.

We can ask the Lord for peace, joy and unity, but first let us be ready to take from Him the seeds that grow in order to enjoy the fruits we aim and long for.

God bless us all....