8 — THE DIVINE SEED

Sunday of Sexagesima

Presence of God. — O Lord, here I am before You: may my heart be the good soil ready to receive and make Your word bear fruit.

Meditation

1 — Jesus, the divine Sower, comes today to scatter the good seed in His vineyard, the Church; He wants to call our souls to a new flowering of grace and virtue.

“The seed is the word of God.” The Word, eternal Word of the Father, became man, became Christ, and comes to sow in the hearts of men the divine word, which is nothing other than a reflection of Himself. The divine word is not a sound that strikes the air and soon disperses like men’s words, but supernatural light that enlightens us on the true value of things; it is grace that gives the capacity and strength to live according to the light of God. It is therefore a seed of supernatural life, of holiness, of eternal life. This seed is never sterile in itself, but always has a powerful vital force, capable of producing not only some fruit of Christian life, but abundant fruits of holiness. This seed is not entrusted to an inexperienced farmer who, through incapacity, can ruin even the best sowing; Jesus Himself, the Son of God, is its sower.

Why then does the seed not always give the desired fruits? Because very often the soil that receives it does not have the necessary dispositions. God does not cease to scatter His seed in the hearts of men, does not cease to invite them, to urge them to good by His light and His calls, does not cease to dispense His grace through the sacraments; but all this remains vain and sterile if man does not present to God a suitable soil - that is, a heart - well disposed. God wants us saved, wants us holy, but forces no one: He respects our freedom.

2 — Today’s Gospel (Lk. 8, 4-15) presents four categories of persons who receive in different ways the seed of the divine word and compares them to: the beaten path, rocky soil, thorny ground, and finally good soil.

Beaten path: light, dissipated souls, open like the road to any distraction, noise, curiosity; open to the passing of every creature and earthly affection. As soon as the word of God reaches their heart, at once the enemy, finding free access, snatches it away, preventing it from taking root.

Rocky soil: superficial souls, in whom the good earth is reduced to a thin layer that the wind of passions will soon carry away together with the good seed. These souls become enthusiastic easily, but do not know how to persevere; “at the moment of temptation they draw back.” They do not know how to persevere because they do not have the courage to embrace the renunciations and sacrifices necessary to remain faithful to the word of God, to put it into practice in every circumstance. Their fervor is straw-fire that stops and goes out before the least difficulty.

Thorny ground: souls preoccupied with earthly things, with pleasures, business, and material interests. The seed sprouts, but the thorns quickly choke it, taking from it air and light. Excessive concern for temporal things ends by suffocating the rights of the Spirit.

Finally, good soil is compared by Jesus to “those who, having heard the word with a good and upright heart, keep it and bear fruit with perseverance.” A good and upright heart is one that always gives first place to God, that seeks first the kingdom of God and His righteousness. The seed of the divine word, of inspirations, of grace, will bear abundant fruit in proportion to the good dispositions it finds in us: recollection, seriousness and depth of interior life, detachment, sincere search for the things of God, beyond and above all earthly things. And then “perseverance,” because without it it is impossible that the word of God bear in us its fruit.

Colloquy

O Jesus, divine Sower, You have every right to complain of the arid and unfruitful soil of my poor heart!

How many divine seeds of holy inspirations, interior lights, and grace You have scattered in my soul! How many times You have drawn me to Yourself with particular invitations, and how many times, after following You for a little while, I have stopped. O Lord, if only I could at least understand the deep reason for my spiritual sterility, for my levity and inconstancy in good. Is it perhaps Your light that I lack? No, because in a thousand ways You continually instruct and admonish my soul. Oh, if so many souls who live in error, who do not know You, had received only a hundredth part of the light You have granted and continue to grant me, what fruits of good they would already have drawn from it!

Do I then lack Your strength? But is not Your grace strength for me?

Now I understand: neither Your light nor Your strength is lacking to me; what is lacking is perseverance. Perseverance that knows how to sustain with fidelity temptations, difficulties, darkness; that knows how to face with courage sacrifice and the austerity of the spiritual life. To sacrifice oneself, to deny oneself one day is easy. To sacrifice oneself and deny oneself always, every day, all one’s life, is difficult; and perhaps it is precisely for this reason, O Lord, that - as You have said - the good heart bears fruit with perseverance.

O Jesus, who sustained with invincible patience Your most bitter Passion and Death, give me patience to sustain the struggle against my passions, against my selfishness. Patience to embrace with perseverance all the renunciations required by total detachment; patience to know how to live without personal tastes and satisfactions; patience to endure all that displeases me, jars me, and runs counter to my self-love.

You know, O Lord, that I desire total purification because I desire union with You, but You will not be able to purify me entirely if I do not know how to accept with humility Your work: the trials, humiliations, and detachments that You prepare for me. O Jesus, divine Patient One, give me Your patience, grant that with You I too may be humble and patient.