Seed Cathedral

Have you seen the Seed Cathedral at the Shanghai 2010 Exhibit by the UK? It is incredible! If you haven't seen it yet, I am providing a link to a video of it.

There is some background music...if you listen, you will hear it softly say:

Safe Tomorrow , by Lali Puna
Never going anywhere
Never going anywhere
If we meet turn your head
Try to make it home by night

Never going anywhere
Never going anywhere
Don't stop by and get to know
Stuff your memory with facts

Save save save
Save the things you've got

When you walk into this building, there are thousands upon thousands of clear plastic sticks. And inside them you will find a seed. You can only see them from the inside of the building. From the outside, some have described the building as a giant dandelion puff that moves gently in the breeze. But on the inside, there are myriads of seed samples lit from the sunlight outside...they say about 60,000. Amazing shapes, sizes and colors...all packed up and ready to be a tree, a flower or a stalk of grain!

It is a most amazing collection I have ever seen. Each one by itself, mounted and balanced inside a solid piece of plastic, an architectural dream!

And then the song started to make it's way through the awe of the engineering feat before me.

"Never going anywhere" the chorus drones...and my mind sees another cathedral or church with rows upon rows of people in the pews. Each one a unique creation, ready to be planted, but they stay put. (1 Peter 1:23)

"Don't stop by and get to know" another line rolls across my speakers and I see families rushing out of their seats and into their cars to get home for Sunday dinner, soccer games or a movie. My conscience is elbowed--how many times have I lingered to speak to that new visitor that snuck in the back row? (Hebrews 13:2)

"Stuff your memory with facts" the song continues and I see many heads bent to read their Bible, memorize verses, looking at archeology time lines and genealogies. Don't get me wrong, it's good to study...but how good is what you learn until you actually apply it to your Life or share it with someone? (2 Timothy 3:7)

"Save the things you've got" and i am convicted of the stuff in my house that needs to be whittled down. That bookshelf, those clothes and nick-knacks that only catch the dust...time to make room. Do I really need the item if I have the memory? (Luke 12:33)

How long have we been sitting in our own seed cathedrals or churches? We are so well preserved, studious and obedient little seeds...but if you face the facts, we are nothing until we hit the ground! Because it is then that the shell cracks, a root slips out and we start the growth that is so needed in our church today.

Time to step out of your pew Christian...time to be in the World, but not be of the World. Yes, that seed cathedral is beautiful, but the potential for growth that is locked up inside blows my mind.

During this hot summer season may the Holy Spirit breathe on all dandelion puff churches and scatter us onto the ground, where we can grow AND bloom in Christ!

And when a great crowd came together and people from town after town came to him, he said in a parable: "A sower went out to sow his seed; and as he sowed, some fell along the path, and was trodden under foot, and the birds of the air devoured it. And some fell on the rock; and as it grew up, it withered away, because it had no moisture. And some fell among thorns; and the thorns grew with it and choked it. And some fell into good soil and grew, and yielded a hundredfold." As he said this, he called out, "He who has ears to hear, let him hear."
Luke 8:4-8