This post is part of the August 2013 Synchroblog on the subject “Parables: Small Stories, Big Ideas.”
Parables are weird. I’m not talking about the specifics of particular parables — although those are often weird too. I’m talking about the entire genre. The very existence of parables is a really odd phenomenon. The premise of the parable is that small stories of mundane events, sometimes just a few sentences long, can somehow contain life-altering challenges.
Have you ever thought about how odd that is? It’s one thing to see big ideas at work in, say, the sack of Rome, the failed Mongol invasions of Japan, the death of colonialism, or even something as comparatively small as the Berlin airlift or the Tiananmen Square massacre. It’s quite another to see big ideas at work in the tale of a nameless sower at work in a generic field. Why does it work? What sort of world do we live in, that such a thing is possible?
In the beginning was the Triune God, and the Word spoke all things into existence. The world we live in is the ultimate spoken-word performance piece, and like all works of art, it reflects the nature of the Artist. Within that overall spoken mixed-media portrait, we as human beings are meant to reflect the likeness of God in a special way. “Let us make man in Our image, after Our likeness,” God said, and “in the image of God He created him; male and female He created them.” This is reflected to some extent in the parables. Have you ever noticed how virtually all the parables center around human activity — sowing and reaping, buying and selling, making bread, fishing, investing?
Within these simple stories, each parable presents its own challenges to us. The Good Samaritan: will I be a neighbor to anyone I meet? The Wheat and Tares: am I willing to leave final judgment to God for the sake of protecting vulnerable saints? The Leaven: will I be patient with the slow and hidden coming of the Kingdom, or will I try to gin up something flashy and quick, something I can take credit for?
If simple fictional tales set in mundane circumstances can contain such life-altering challenges, might the mundane moments of our own lives not contain those same challenges? Might it be possible to see those challenges, and live in such a way that our choices make parabolic lives?
Of course it is. There are famous examples, like when the Pope forgave his would-be assassin. But that’s pushing it up onto the grand scale again, and that’s not where parables happen. When a mother loves her teenage daughter, even though the girl has just screamed “I hate you!” and slammed her bedroom door — a parable is taking place. When a husband and wife stop in the middle of a stupid fight, forgive each other, and try to make date night work after all — a parable is happening. When an infertile couple conceives, then goes ahead with the planned adoption anyway, because that child needs a home — a parable appears before our eyes.
So what will it be in your life? The Kingdom of Heaven is like a person who…[your life here.]
This is the promise of the parables: that your life, rightly ordered by God annd lived in the power of His Spirit for the glory of Messiah’s Kingdom, your life, can be a succession of parables for the world to read.
Of course, as Jesus once explained to the disciples, parables have a dual purpose: to conceal from some, and reveal to others. Some people will look right at your God-glorifying, poetically lived, parabolic life and see nothing of consequence…or worse still, entirely misunderstand. Some people won’t have eyes to see. They just won’t get it. But some will — and for those that do, you can be a lamp set up on a lampstand, that gives light to the whole house. What will they see in your light?
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You can find the other August Synchroblog participants here:
Jesus’ Parables are Confusing? Good! – Jeremy Myers
Seed Parables: Sowing Seeds of the Kingdom – Carol Kunihol
Parables – Be Like the Ant or the Grasshopper – Paul Meier
The Parables of Jesus: Not Like Today’s Sermons – Jessica
Penelope and the Crutch – Glenn Hager
Parables and the Insult of Grace – Rachel
Changing Hearts Rather Than Minds – Liz Dyer
Young Son, Old Son, a Father on the Run – Jerry Wirtley
Full Contact Christianity 
Tim – this is all true, but we often misunderstand the point of Jesus’ parables because we forget that they weren’t spoken directly to us. Joel McDurmon sees them as part of Jesus’ “Covenant lawsuit” against the rulers of Jerusalem (in his book “Jesus versus Jerusalem”). This might sound like a strange idea, but when viewed through this lens, the parables suddenly make perfect sense. And once we interpret them correctly, we are able to apply them to our own situation with greater wisdom. – Mike Bull
Mike,
I generally take the parables as Jesus’ description of His own ministry and Israel’s situation at the time He was speaking, a way of preaching to and about Israel on matters of immediate concern. Cadged the concept off Leithart, if I remember correctly,and it makes an enormous amount of sense.
I haven’t read McDurmon, but just offhand I wouldn’t know how to situate the parables as apart of a lawsuit. Remonstrations with the offender precede the courtroom; they don’t take place in it. Once the matter has come into court, one speaks to the judge (a la Habakkuk)
That said, the applications are there, and all the more potent for being so tightly situated, rather than being Aesop-style generic commentary on the human condition.
This really spoke to me. What parables am I telling with my life? Can I have eyes to see and ears to hear what I’m doing in the middle of that stupid fight and change the story? This is a beautiful way to think about keeping the Good News at the center of our lives. Thank you.