Romans 7:15–25a
Saint Matthew 13:1-9 & 18-23
It was hard for me to imagine why John Dickerson in his very fine book about the American Presidency, The Hardest Job in the World, would devote an entire chapter to Dopamine which has been described as is known as “the feel-good neurotransmitter.”
Dopamine is the binding agent that locks us to . . . consumption – it’s the little jolt of pleasure that humans associate with beneficial actions. The reward comes after each affirmation either in the form of a “like” on Facebook, a little heart on Instagram, or delivery of information that confirms our world view when we turn to Twitter. Studies show that we will chase the reward of that neurotransmitter dopamine with the passion of a gambling addict or a smoker.
When there is no immediate reward, we keep hunting. Disappointment makes us more fervent. Like poison ivy, dopamine creates a fever. Each time we scratch, the desire to scratch grows.
The cycle saps our ability to concentrate, which invites us to speed up the search-for-reward cycle. Deliver us please from that itchy feeling of being insufficiently entertained.1
Dickerson wryly observes: “Who can remember, much of the time, what they were looking for when they first started that Google search. Studies show that we check our phones about every twelve minutes.”2
This frenzy, not just in the world of politics but the whole of life, got me to thinking about the difference between our addiction to immediate gratification and the patience of the “sower who went out to sow” who, by modern standards, wouldn’t even make a very good farmer.
Two falls ago Lowell arranged for me to take a ride in his brother-in-law’s combine at his farm in northwest Iowa and I’ll never forget the first words out of Gerald’s mouth when I climbed aboard. “Don’t touch anything!” he said.
I kept my hands in my lap and my mouth shut for fear of demonstrating my agricultural ignorance as we harvested corn in this marvel of modern machinery.
It had a steering wheel but was guided by the aid of GPS that told it to turn when the end of a row was reached. Next to the steering wheel was a joystick that controlled much of what else went on in the giant machine. And next to the joystick was a computer monitor that continually kept track of not only how much seed had been planted or crops harvested but the soil conditions for both seedtime and harvest. At planting, seeds would be placed in perfect rows at just the right distance apart for an optimum yield.
It was amazing!
I have been pondering that experience this week in light of the carefree sower in Jesus parable who just took some seed and let it fly. This guy didn’t need dopamine, because he was extremely enthusiastic about his job. He turned his task into a party by just flinging seeds this way and that apparently caring little about where the seed landed or the condition of the soil. Instead of riding in a machine that carefully calibrates the placement of a seed to a fraction of an inch this dude is walking around throwing handfuls of seed into the air.
Some of it falls on the road where the birds come along and eat it up, but really, what would you expect when you throw seed on the road? And some of it falls on gravel where it sprouts after the first good rain but then withers and dies because it doesn’t have any dirt to put its roots down into. What would you expect? Some of it falls among the weeds and thorns where it gets choked out by the competition, but again, what would you expect? The only surprise in this story, really, is that this reckless sower manages to get some of the seed onto good soil where it produces a miraculous yield of thirty, sixty, or even a hundred times as much grain.3
Because we tend to make things all about us want to make Jesus’ pithy little teaching all about us. We see ourselves as the seed.
There are people, we know them and tend to avoid them at all cost, who have no doubt that they are good seed. They’ve got this faith thing all figured out and, not only that, their life is a perfect balance of faith and works. There is no doubt in their mind that they are good seed and, if asked or even if not, they will be happy to tell you just how good they are.
Most of us see ourselves as the other kind of seeds.
Sometimes we fall and fail on the road of life and it’s like we are just being eaten alive. Sometime, when the road gets rocky, we begin to feel ourselves withering. Sometimes it just feels like the weeds of life are just going to choke the life out of us.
We can almost hear ourselves saying with Saint Paul. “No matter which way I turn I can’t make myself do right. I want to but I can’t. When I want to do good, I don’t; and when I try not to do wrong, I do it anyway."4
In thinking only about himself, Saint Paul is focused on his own troubles, his own failings. In thinking of ourselves as just the seed we will be trampled down by the anxiety of this age.
Even though he had no idea he was doing it Saint Paul gives us the key to understanding Jesus’ little story. “Who will rescue me?” he asks. And then it dawns on him, “I thank God,” he says, “there is a way out through Jesus Christ our Lord.”5
Jesus is the sower! He is the one who is foolishly casting seeds.
Some of it will fall in places where it gets a good start but doesn’t last. Some of it will fall in places where it gets choked out by competing interests. But some of it will fine finds good soil, and grow, and produces a bumper crop.
That is where we come in.
Our temptation, that dopamine that has taken such hold of us, is we want to control the reward cycle. We want to know exactly what kinds of seed to plant in exactly the right places and us want to know where and when to plant it. We want to take over Jesus’ seed sowing business and get it down the science of a modern day farmer.
But Jesus keeps telling us that since you can’t predict just how or where the seed is going to fall, or when or if it is going to produce, you scatter it wherever you can and hope for the best.
That’s the good news moment amid the cares and anxieties of our world.
Now there is one less thing for us to have to worry about to decreasing our dopamine levels.
Unless you are a farmer whose livelihood depends on bumper crops of seeds well planted and carefully harvested, don’t waste time counting the seeds or trying to figure out what kind of seed you are.
Understand that this parable is about God who, revealed in Jesus, is wastefully gracious. God just wants us to scatter that grace all over the place and he wants us to help. He wants us to toss God’s grace around.
He wants us to fling it, throw it with a mighty arm. Cast God’s grace freely, far and wide. Help others and ourselves discover the real dopamine rush that comes when we realize that God’s love is abundant, it never runs out, and there is always more than enough.
Thanks be to God who tells us for certain that this is so. Amen.
__________
1. John Dickerson, The Hardest Job in the World: the American Presidency (New York, NY: Random House, 2020), p. 336-337.
2. ibid.
3. James Sommerville, “The Reckless Sower,” A Sermon For Every Sunday, July 7, 2020, https://asermonforeverysunday.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/07/Jim-Somerville-The-Reckless-Sower.
4. Romans 7:18b-19. (TLB) [TLB= The Living Bible. (Carol Stream, IL: Tyndall House, 1971)]
5. Romans 7:25. (PHILLIPS) [PHILLIPS=J. B. Phillips, The New Testament in Modern English: a Translation (London: William Collins Sons & Co., 1960)]
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