About

Many years back, it seemed every hot scenic tourist spot had those binoculars you put a quarter into to see a somewhat blurry, not-so-faraway detail about the place your station wagon pulled over to gaze at.

These clever quarter-catching gold mines actually have their own name. They are called ‘tower viewers’. They even have their own Wikipedia page.

I always found these contraptions a challenge to use. First, the pole each tower viewer is mounted on always seemed too tall or too short for my stature at the time. Second, once you dropped your money, the tension immediately builds because you know you are on the clock. Third, your brother or sister is bugging or pawing you to get a turn on your coin.

Lastly, and most challenging, I would find myself looking through the eye holes, then looking around the machine to find the precise spot I was looking for. Back and forth I go. Sometimes without any success at all, until I heard the shutter click closed. It must have been quite a sight to see me. I probably had more eyeballs on me than the Grand Canyon everyone was there to see.

Asking for another quarter would yield a, “Just enjoy the view!” from my father. But I wanted so badly to spy the lady riding the burrow down the canyon wall.

Back to present tense, ever hear someone use the phrase ‘big picture’? As in, “What’s the big picture?”, or “Do you understand the big picture here?”. The way my brain works I sometimes need to turn that around and focus on the small picture. Especially these busy days when slowing down and investing the time to focus, to see the details, to actually smell a rose instead of admiring just a picture of one seems a more admirable choice.

So here is an idea. Instead of zooming in, let’s try zooming out. Start with a single, solitary detail. Discern what it means to or for you. Gradually stir in the context. Like Mom said, you can always add salt to the soup, but you can’t take it out.

Sometimes I think that is what Jesus is asking me to do. Because He knows I can make things too complex, become overwhelmed with the iterations and machinations, and lose sight of why I am on my knees. Perhaps you have had the same prayer experience. Pretty soon the web of ‘what-ifs’ and ‘what-abouts’ take you so far from where you began. Sometimes the web we end up weaving is scary. Sometimes beautiful. But always complicated.

Do not worry about tomorrow; tomorrow will take care of itself.

Matthew 6:34

Back into the time machine. Fourth grade was the first school year I can remember geeking out on history. And in Ohio that is still the year students learn all about state history. Maybe it is unique to Ohioans, but it sure is true that we like to claim as our own not only people born and raised in Ohio, but also some who just spent a sliver of their lifetime here (e.g. Tom Hanks).

One such person we learned about, who stayed with me all these years, was Johnny Appleseed. Even though he did not start or end in Ohio, he does have a museum in the Buckeye State. Legend has it Johnny strolled around the state with a burlap sack full of apple seeds, and flung them willy-nilly wherever inspiration struck. I am confident his mission was much more focused, but the legend version better captivated the ten-year-old imagination.

My young mind at the time told me this must be Easter bunny stuff because I had limited, but adequate, garden experience to know that tossing a seed in the air was not the methodology of a serious gardener. Many years later, as a grown man with more anxiety than peace, my classroom appleseed memory was exhumed the moment I read the Parable of The Sower.

“A sower went out to sow. And as he sowed, some seed fell on the path, and birds came and ate it up.

Some fell on rocky ground, where it had little soil. It sprang up at once because the soil was not deep, and when the sun rose it was scorched, and it withered for lack of roots.

Some seed fell among thorns, and the thorns grew up and choked it. But some seed fell on rich soil, and produced fruit, a hundred or sixty or thirtyfold.

Whoever has ears ought to hear.”

Matthew 1:3-9

I certainly had ears, although I have been accused of a lifetime of using my tongue more frequently than my hearing. But the real impact of this moment of sudden revelation was on my sight.

Perhaps Johnny had it right. Was he more trusting of the Master Gardener than I am? Do I categorize my outcomes as strictly a result of my effort? Do I neglect the loving grace of the Father in the results?

I could see my single, solitary seed now. And what comes of it (the fruit) is a result of letting Jesus in (the rich soil). With God’s grace, even surrounded by weeds, my little seed could produce ‘a hundred fold’. But like many things in life, “Where do I start?”

Silence is God’s first language; everything else is a poor translation.

Thomas Keating

Let’s return to looking inside out. The lesson I learned is that when I quiet myself, I open myself to God’s grace. Whether it be in Eucharistic Adoration, under the clouds in the back yard, or laying in bed, I can consent to Jesus getting knee-deep in all of my triumphs and failures, and everything in between. How can He guide me if I cannot (through my own fault) hear Him? And not just to survive, but to thrive.

The silence of the Creator is thunderous, drowning out everything else, and hiding in endless creativity.

Thomas Keating

So I open the door to God’s grace, then what? For me, it was changing my paradigm from ‘reading’ Scripture to ‘seeing’ Scripture as the Living Word, most especially in The Gospels. I try to see each word, or better yet, a word, as a potential seed of grace that may flourish among my weeds of life.

JesuSeeds is a collection of those words. Discerned daily from the Liturgy of The Word, for you I pray that the JesuSeed word you find here may be that contemplative seed of grace for you. The Living Word. Bearing fruit in your life, building faith a bloom at a time.

Remain in Me, as I remain in you. Just as a branch cannot bear fruit on its own unless it remains on the vine, so neither can you unless you remain in Me.

I am the vine, and you are the branches. Whoever remains in Me and I in him will bear much fruit, because without Me you can do nothing.

John 15

May God’s grace bless you abundantly today.

Bob Reszler, Managing Editor, Lent 2023