Daily Gospel Reflection for June 16, 2024

Join us as we reflect, ponder, and pray together inspired by today's Gospel.

Reflection by Leslie Lynch

Today's Gospel: Mark 4:26-34

Today’s Gospel contains two parables about seeds. One is sown, then by God’s grace sprouts, grows, and bears fruit. The other is a mustard seed, the smallest of seeds that grows into the largest of plants, and provides food and shelter for many.

I remember a time when I was in college, in Organic Chemistry to be exact, and got a powerful urge to travel to another university town to give my long-distance boyfriend a Bible. In what seemed to be miraculous workings, within the next two hours I had a ride to and from, and a place to stay.

So I went.

My boyfriend was surprised, to say the least. Happy, but befuddled. He accepted the Bible, we had an outdoor barbeque supper with his friends, and I went home.

A few months later, he broke up with me.

Years passed. I married, had children.

One day the phone rang, and it was him, calling to thank me for the Bible.

He, too, had married and had children, but had divorced. In his move to his new home, he found the box containing the Bible I’d given him. This time he opened it and began reading.

He wanted me to know that he’d found Jesus, that he’d been baptized, that he was growing in Christ.

That the seed had borne fruit.

It’s rare that we get to see what happened after we do the thing the Holy Spirit put on our heart to do. I’ve always been grateful that God graced me with my friend’s phone call, and his personal gratitude for my small part in his Christian journey.

So never doubt that God is working through you. Whether you are the seed, the fruit, the harvester, or the bird seeking shelter, you are part of His plan.

Ponder:

Do I trust God to sprout and grow the seeds He asks me to sow?

Pray:

My dearest Jesus and master gardener, please use me as You will. As seed, fruit, harvester, or seeker of Your sheltering arms.

Copyright 2024 Leslie Lynch

Leslie Lynch lives near Louisville, Kentucky, with her husband and a rescued, feral-turned-sweetheart cat. She’s written three full-length novels: Hijacked, Unholy Bonds, and Opal’s Jubilee; and two novellas: Christmas Hope and Christmas Grace. She is an occasional contributor to the Archdiocese of Indianapolis’s newspaper, The Criterion, and holds an MFA in Writing from Spalding University. Learn more at www.leslielynch.com.