Lilies of the Fields
By the Rev. Othmar Tobisch -- Sunday, May 21, 2000

Letter From Your Editor, May 2000

Bible Reading

"Therefore I tell you, do not worry about your life, what you will eat or drink; or about your body, what you will wear. Is not life more important than food, and the body more important than clothes? Look at the birds of the air; they do not sow or reap or store away in barns, and yet your heavenly Father feeds them. Are you not much more valuable than they? Who of you by worrying can add a single hour to his life?

"And why do you worry about clothes? See how the lilies of the field grow. They do not labor or spin. Yet I tell you that not even Solomon in all his glory was dressed like one of these. If that is how God clothes the grass of the field, which is here today and tomorrow is thrown into the fire, will he not much more clothe you, O you of little faith? So do not worry, saying, `What will we eat?' or `What will we drink?' or `What will we wear?' For the pagans run after all these things, and your heavenly Father knows that you need them. But seek first his kingdom and his righteousness, and all these things will be given to you as well. Therefore do not worry about tomorrow, for tomorrow will worry about itself. Each day has enough trouble of its own." (Matthew 6:25-34)

Reading from Swedenborg

When we are being born anew, . . . divine goodness and truth from the Lord are planted in us. Like a tree, we begin from a seed, which is why "seed" in the Bible means truth that comes from goodness. And like a tree, we produce leaves, then flowers, and finally fruit. For at first we grow in understanding, which is meant by "leaves" in the Bible, then in wisdom, which is meant by "flowers," and finally we grow in our way of life, meaning we express the good of love and kindness in action--which is meant by "fruit" in the Bible. (Arcana Coelestia #5115.2)

Sermon

During May, the wildflowers of California bloom in great profusion. Golden poppies appear in great sheets, mixed with blue lupine. There are the purplish brodiae, yellow buttercup, violets, shooting stars. You name them. The lilies of the field.

The lilies that the Lord mentioned in the Sermon on the Mount as incomparably more beautiful than Solomon in all his royal finery were not our Easter lily or the tiger lily in the woods. The word is krinon, not lirion. The botanist in Palestine finds that the Arabs use the term "susan," and the peasantry uses this to describe in general any lily-like flower, such as the iris, gladiolus, tulip, anemone, crocus, or narcissus. The Rev. J. G. Dufty, in his Lessons: Nature Topics from the Word II, says:

It must be a lily of the field and have a stem of some substance which, when dried, can be used as fuel, and it must be richly colored. The plants which best fulfill this condition are the gladioli, many species of which are native to Palestine, growing among the grain, often overtopping it, and illuminating the fields with their truly royal colors.

Can we see the Lord sitting there on the mountainside, surrounded by these fields, point to these glorious creations of the Divine Being surrounding his hearers? I hope you have noted:

• We are seeing the master craftsman at work as a teacher, using material on hand to bring home a point: the everlasting tender care of the Father of us all who is in heaven.
• His cognizance and appreciation of the truly beautiful in nature. Jesus had a sensitive esthetic nature, as well as an ethical, social, and even divine one.

Now, some of you may think in yourselves: "Why bother with all this? This is not practical. What matter the beauties of lilies of the field when half the world is full of hunger, others are killed by bombs and napalm, others again suffer disfranchisement and have no civil rights? Or what about the necessities of the individual to become a whole person, or know what is going on in himself. Why don't you preach on that, Mr. Tobisch!"

To this I would say that there is a time for all these things. There is a time for introspection, self-analysis--and not too much of it, or it becomes morbid self-interest. There is a time for action, to help as best one can with the great problems of famine and undernourishment, or to protest against unnecessary wars. There is a time for helping the night minister in San Francisco, or the migrant ministry in the Central Valley.

There is also a time to behold the lilies of the field and learn a spiritual lesson. Yes, the human mind must look at God's superior works: the beauties of the world in which we live. For in looking there, we learn something of his nature, and our nature, too.

The Lord used this lovely scene of wildflowers on a Galilean hill to teach us that we should rely implicitly and with great faith on our heavenly Father's interest in us. Most lovingly he cares for all. There is no frantic activity, spinning, weaving, thinking of the latest styles in clothing, material, and color. Actually, in this country we don't have to worry anymore where our clothing will come from, while billions of other human beings still have to. We are so saturated with clothing that we can discard barrels full every year.

And there is another item. The Lord points to the fineries with which the great King Solomon was arrayed--and we, also, from time to time. Let us now look at a simple wildflower. We shall never create anything as beautiful as the form of a wildflower. Let us bow before this divine creation, and worship its Creator.

The Lord was a master teacher using materials visible to all. He drew on the mineral world for an analog to teach us the sturdiness of faith in the Lord, so necessary in a turbulent world:

He who believes these words of mine and does them is like a man who builds his house on a rock. The winds came, gales and hurricanes, and the rain and floods, and beat upon that house; but they could not destroy it. (Matthew 7:24-25)

With these words the Lord ended his great Sermon on the Mount, which is the very rock upon which the ethics of Christianity is built--the house that we too must erect and defend against the floods and gales of the immoral world around us.

Nature can tell us many things, if we walk with open ears and eyes in its halls and fields--whether it be the slowly roiling river, or the single poppy on a stem, or the thunderheads building up over the Sierra. The birds that soar and those that sing--are they not also messengers of things more deeply interfused, which the ornithologist does not observe, and the museum does not exhibit?

If we step out into our church garden after this worship service, there are many things that may teach us wondrous truths. In spring we see the first leaves come forth on our plum trees, and soon afterwards its delicate rosy little blossoms are making a screen of spring against the still wintry sky.

Bees are busy fertilizing the flowers, and soon the first fruits will be dropping to the ground. Seedtime and harvest: like a fertile mind that has put forth its intellectual efforts and, after the joys of study and meditation, has brought forth some of the fruits of righteousness which our Master said are the things to strive for.

It is like a tree which, in its first stage at beginning of spring, decorates its branches with leaves. Then, as it advances to its next stage in the spring, it adorns them with flowers. In the summer it produces the beginnings of fruit, which go on to become the fruit itself. Finally, it produces seeds in them, which contain new trees like itself, and potentially whole orchards--which become reality if the seeds are planted. These are the comparisons that exist in nature; and they are representative. For all nature is a theater representing the Lord's kingdom in heaven, and so the Lord's kingdom on earth, or in the church, and so the Lord's kingdom in every regenerate person. (Arcana Coelestia #3518.3)

Ancient peoples such as the Greeks and Romans taught many valuable moral truths through such representatives of nature--as in Aesop's Fables. The Hebrew mind, not less poetic, wrought spiritual enlightenment into the ever-present objects of nature:

But for you who revere my name, the sun of righteousness shall rise with healing in its wings. (Malachi 4:2)

If you see the sun rise this summer, think of this message in the sunrise. It is none other than the Lord himself who is called the sun of righteousness. And have you ever thought of the sun as having wings? Of course, if you take this literally, it will spoil the image. But like a bird, the sun rises over the horizon and flies high to its zenith at noon. It has healing in its wings? "How strange," says the down-to-earth person, who only pokes holes in the ground. "Never heard of anything more stupid!" However, by nothing else but righteous living can the soul of man be healed of its malignant cancer of selfishness. Almost anywhere you may open your Bible, you will come upon some analog, some parable, some representative of the Lord's realm of life in the Spirit.

The people of Israel were enslaved by mighty nations, and oppressed by great empires. How did Isaiah picture their delivery?

The Lord of hosts will lop the boughs with terrifying power. The tallest trees will be cut down, and the lofty ones will be brought low. He will hack down the thickets of the forest with an ax, and Lebanon with its majestic trees will fall. (Isaiah 10:33, 34)

If you have an opportunity this summer to see the loggers cut down the mighty redwood or a giant Douglas fir, remember this saying. Remember that the mighty of the earth today--the rulers of millions who oppress their own or other nations and peoples--will see the ax of the Lord fall upon them, just as Isaiah saw mighty Assyria and Tyre felled to the ground. Observe world history with spiritual eyes, not temporary considerations. You will notice the short span of power, the instability of dominion of all who rule by deceit, murder, and covetousness. This was true in the past, is true in the present, and will be true in the future.

This is concealed from the worldly-wise, who shout for more and more weapons, and fear the might of the enemy in atom bombs, when it is revealed to the babes in the Lord that they need not fear at all!

Already the ax is laid to the root of the trees; every tree, therefore, that does not bear good fruit is cut down and thrown into the fire. (Matthew 3:10)

Seedtime and harvest: luscious fruits versus fire of forest. Into the fire of judgment and destruction will all fall ultimately who deny the Lord and live an evil life.

Don't you think it is good and useful for your mind to cease to look inward? Instead, turn to the wondrous world that the Lord has put around us to recreate our mind. For beauty heals the fears, traumas, and anxieties of man.

Look deeply into the eyes of a wildflower. There is healing there--of worry, of self-pity, of anxiety, of care for the morrow, of lack of faith. There are times when even the most active mind must rest in the Lord and gain new strength for the next day. He gave us the beauties of nature. These are the divine tranquilizers, the relaxing draft of soul nourishment, without money and price.

In these glorious days of spring, let us use them to their fullest. For truly it is just as Isaiah perceived and recognized it:

The wilderness and the dry land will be glad; the desert will rejoice and blossom like the lily. It will blossom abundantly, and rejoice with joy and singing. The glory of Lebanon will be given to it, the majesty of Carmel and Sharon. They will see the glories of the Lord, the majesty of our God. (Isaiah 35:1, 2)

Othmar Tobisch (1898-1970) served as pastor of the Swedenborgian Church of San Francisco, California for forty-one years.

Prayer

Creator God, in these beautiful days of spring we rejoice in the abundance and beauty of your creation. The joy of spring fills our mind and body like the blossoming of the lily and the profusion of the wildflower. Open our lungs to breathe deeply of the healing balm of spring; and open our spirits to the deeper draft of healing nourishment found in the Bible of nature. Amen.