In March of this year I decided to begin an intensive study of the Gospel of Thomas. With the help of Lynn Bauman's study guide, "In Trouble and In Wonder", I explore a logion a day; sitting down with it over breakfast and then meditating after reading. Today's Logion was the familiar Mustard Seed Parable (Jesus says, the Kingdom of Heaven is like a tiny mustard seed, which, despite its size, grows into a huge bush that provides shade and shelter for so many.)
I wonder if each moment in the present is like a mustard seed, ready to burst into a whole tree, rooted deep, touching the sky, providing shelter for the winged ones and fruit for the footed ones. Or what if each choice we make is another mustard seed, ready to explode into a whole decision tree, full of ramifications for all of creation? It all becomes so multi-dimensional that it is unfathomable, but if I sit with the analogy it helps me to see that everything is linked together.
Which could mean that we don't have to become a politician or travel to third-world countries to make a difference: it's possible that every little positive act could have an enormous effect on the world. Or, as my friend Anne says, just by telling one of her piano students that they may not speak to her in a contemptuous tone of voice, she could be averting a major war sometime in the future.
But what strikes me most today is that each of us can be a tree (how hokey does that sound!) -- rooted and grounded in the earth, always reaching and growing upward, changing with the seasons, offering shelter, bearing fruit: a noble aspiration.
I think there are far too many days when I am just the squirrel in the tree, hoarding nuts and chittering away in my own little space...
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