Saint Matthew 13:1-9 & 18-23
A couple of 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, the fertility of the soil would be monitored so that the seeds would be placed in perfect rows at just the right distance apart for an optimum yield.
It was amazing!
It is also a stunning contrast to the fellow, you could hardly call him a farmer, who is just flinging seeds here and there in today’s parable from Jesus, who was, by the way, not a farmer, but a carpenter by trade.
This guy may be the worse seed sower in the history of time but at least he is enthusiastic about it. He has turned seed sowing into a party.
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 fellow is walking around throwing handfuls of seed into the air. And he doesn’t seem to care where the seeds land. Good soil or bad soil. Rocky ground or rich ground. He doesn’t even care that the seeds that are thrown on the path probably will never grow. He’s just having a great time sowing seeds, or really, just throwing them everywhere.
Jesus must have been crazy telling a story like this in a subsistence level economy like his. His people were even less likely to waste seeds than we are. If there was any farmer listening to Jesus’ parable back then they would have said, “Dude! This guy is crazy. He’s wasting seeds!”
If you look closely some of the seeds aren’t even landing within the boarder of the picture. How wonderful of the artist to portray Jesus as a day labourer, in t-shirt and jeans, working in a field. In so doing he reminds us who this parable is really about.
We want to make it about us.
The truth is that many of us have that immediate reaction upon hearing this parable: we attempt to self-measure and categorize what type of soil we are, because all of us want to be among the good soil. We hear of God’s word being scattered on the rocky ground—springing up quickly with joy, but not having the roots to last—and we think, “surely not I, Lord.” We hear of God’s word being scattered among the thorns—growing among the lure of wealth and the cares of the world and eventually being taken in by them—and we think, “Surely not I, Lord.”2
“And then there are those who proudly proclaim, “I am good soil!” And they're the people who kind of get on your nerves.”3
When hearing this parable our temptation has always been to ask, “What kind of soil am I” when we might be better off asking ourselves, “What kind of sower am I?”
Our temptation 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 we 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 you’re sowing is going to fall, or when or if it is going to produce, scatter it wherever you can and hope for the best.
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 to scatter that grace all over the place and he wants us to help. He wants us to toss God’s grace around, too.
Jesus wants us to understand that God’s grace and mercy is for everyone, everywhere.
God's grace and mercy lands on everything, everywhere.
God's grace and mercy is for people who are spiritually tone deaf.
God's grace and mercy is for people who know their bible backwards and forward and for those who have never cracked the thing open.
God's grace and mercy is for the spiritually eager and for those who are confused.
God's grace and mercy is for those who are wayward.
God's grace and mercy is for people who are parts of other religions and for people who have no religion at all.
God's grace and mercy is for people who are broken.
God's grace and mercy is for everybody.4
Sometimes in our sophistication we make things maddeningly confusing.
We want to place our transactional way of seeing things — You do this, and you get that – on top of what Jesus is plainly and simply telling us and make things more complicated than they really are.
We want to bring our scriptural scholarship into understanding of the simplest things.
The fact is whether you are a 21st century farmer onboard a million-dollar combine using the best instruments that modern day science can offer or just someone flinging seeds into the air trusting that some will land on fertile soil both are still hoping that in the end some of those seeds will spout and grow and return a harvest.
All Jesus is asking us to do is make sure that there is nobody who has missed out in the power that is in this gospel to transform all human life.
God just wants to scatter God’s power and grace all over the place and God wants us to help. He wants us to toss God’s grace around, too.
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 joy and fulfilment that comes when we realize that God’s love is abundant, it never runs out, and there is always more than enough.
A sower went out to sow and what was sown was God’s abundant mercy and grace. That’s it. “Let anyone who has ears, listen.”
________________
1. Mihee Kim-Kort, “Matthew 13:1-9, 18-23. Commentary 1: Connecting the Reading with Scripture,” Intersections: A Lectionary Commentary for Preaching and Worship, Year A, 3 (January 2020): 152–54.
2. Matthew Helms, “Sown Freely.” Sermon preached at the Fourth Presbyterian Church of Chicago, July 16, 2017.
3. James D. Howell, “What Kind of Sower is This?” Sermon preached at Myers Park United Methodist Church, Charlotte, N.C., July 16, 2017.
4. ibid.
Sermon preached at The Evangelical Lutheran Church of St. Luke
16 July 2023
No comments:
Post a Comment