I remember one of the most difficult days of my life. It was the funeral for Patti Arnold. Patti Arnold, thirty-nine years old, had cancer.  Her maiden name was Colello and she was Italian, pure Italian. Her family owned an Italian grocery story and she was the most fireball woman I had ever met in my life. Never in the history of this congregation have we ever had a funeral like this.

The people who came to that funeral were sitting in the parking lot, way out to the road. Why were there so many people? There was no one who had loved the way Patti loved. Patti had loved the world so vigorously. In that sermon for her funeral, I told about how Patti had loved people, not only when she lived but when she was dying. I told stories about when Patti was up at Fred Hutchinson Cancer Treatment center and the way that she cared for people around her. It was absolutely incredible. Her faith was fourteen feet tall. To this day, her life still inspires me.

The years passed. And I look at the most recent funeral here at Grace Lutheran Church. It was for Ellen Heffner. This giant of a woman who at the age of seventy-seven led our homeless ministry. She said of herself in her poetic musings, “God, why is it that you have created me in such a way that my heart always goes for the underdog? Why is it when the little boy in my first grade class at school wet his pants and everybody else made fun of him, why is it that I could not? Why did I have to go and protect him? God, why have you made my heart this way that I always go for the underdog? God, is that a curse or a blessing on my life?” The answer? It was both. It was a curse because it took so much out of Ellen, but it was a blessing because she helped so many people.

A week ago, when the homeless men and women had a memorial service for her in downtown Seattle and all the homeless men were gathered in a park, their lives had been deeply and physically blessed by the generosity of Ellen Heffner. Why? Because Ellen’s faith was fourteen feet tall. She still inspires many of us.

That is what this sermon is about. It is about the power of the seed. When Jesus Christ is planted in your life, when his word is planted in your heart, a miracle may occur. Because the power is within the seed. And over time, the seed grows and grows and grows and you finally exclaim, “It is over fourteen feet tall.”

For more of Rev. Ed Markquart’s sermon