“Don’t be foolish. A seed must die before it can sprout from the ground. Wheat seeds and all other seeds look different from the sprouts that come up” 1 Cor 15:36 CEV
A dear friend recently gave me a book called Listening to the Language of the Bible. When I expressed my thanks, she said she thought it would be “right up my alley.” She reminded me of my love of words and their meaning. Not that I had forgotten how much delving into the original meaning of words excites me, but sometimes different seasons of life can undoubtedly sidetrack us, and I’m in one of those seasons with a lot of side roads! The Bible was written in languages and cultures very different from our own. Much study and time by numerous scholars has been devoted to translating the nuances of Hebrew and Greek. However, digging a little deeper into the translated words and phrases can bring wisdom and rich new insights.
My devotional time has led me to the book of John. In chapter twelve, Jesus predicts his death. Jesus replied (to Andrew and Philip), “The hour has come for the Son of Man to be glorified. I tell you the truth, unless a kernel of wheat falls to the ground and dies, it remains only a single seed. But if it dies, it produces many seeds (John 12:23-24). I’ve heard many teachings on this verse, but with my mind tuned to the actual words of the passage, I decided to dig a bit deeper. As a farm girl, the concept that a seed must die to produce anything makes sense to me, but does it defy the law of biogenesis (I’m also a science girl!), which tells us that in nature, life comes from life. So what exactly did Jesus mean? Did He contradict the scientific law?
In the Bible, the word death or die can mean different things, depending on the context in which it is used. Death in the Bible means separation. Spiritual death occurs when we sin (Rom 6:23), and James tells us, “Anyone who doesn’t breathe is dead, and faith that doesn’t do anything is just as dead” (James 2:26). Sin separates us from God, faith apart from obedience is dead and our physical bodies die without breath. But plant life was not created in the image of God and did not have a spirit, so Jesus is not talking about death in the same way humans die.
Keeping within the context of the scripture, for the seed to fall to the ground, it must separate from the stalk. It no longer receives nourishment from the stalk, so it is not growing or being nurtured; it is slowly decaying, lying dormant until it gets nutrients from the soil to sprout and grow into a new plant. When the seed sprouts, the outside seed hull is separated from the budding plant, and the seed (hull) dies. And that is precisely what the word “dies” means contextually in John 12:24. It means decaying. Seeds lie dormant and decay over centuries, so Jesus did not defy the law of biogenesis in His teaching. In context for us today, Jesus was the seed that had to die and be separated from His physical body and His disciples for His kingdom to grow. He could not remain the single seed. He had to die to produce many seeds. While hiding in the upper room (John 20:19), the disciples were decaying to fear until the nourishment of the Holy Spirit breathed new life into them, and they were emboldened to go out into the world to plant seeds. We lie dormant until someone comes into our lives with the Good News that gives us life. Just like the seed, the process of dormant, decaying, and death must happen for us to receive a life that never dies. And that’s your Tuesday Tidbit.
The picture is of the Jezreel Valley or Valley of Megiddo, Israel, where many crops are grown.