Grace and peace to you from God our Creator, and from Jesus, the Son of God, and our Savior who brings us life! Amen.
My Grandfather held my hand. I was probably 8 or 9 years old, and my Grandfather, a stoic, Swedish farmer who had spent his entire life on the family farm in southern Minnesota was walking me around the Butterfield Threshing Bee. Now just a show of hands; how many people here have ever been to a threshing bee? I thought so.
A threshing bee is an exhibition of the big, old, large steam driven pieces of threshing equipment that used to travel from farm to farm at harvest time. It is a showcase of old farm tools and implements. It is a way of remembering how things used to be done. And so I remember that on this sunny day in Butterfield, my Grandfather, who was probably in his late 70’s at the time, and was dressed in his overalls, held my hand and walked me all over the threshing bee. And he would stop…and he would tell stories about the equipment and about how he grew up using it. He told me stories about the past; about our family, about our friends. There, and at other times in other conversations, he taught me about the importance of family; about the importance of church; about life. My Grandfather was a farmer. He planted and raised crops. He raised livestock. That day, however, he was doing a different kind of farming. He was planting seeds in me.
You see, we are who we are because of the people around us. It is true. Who I am…what I like to do…how I like to spend my time…my life…my parenting…my vocation…are all heavily influenced by people around me. My parents…my grandparents… my wife…my children…my friends… all have a hand in me being who I am. And as I think about my life, and my vocation as father, husband, son, pastor…much of my identity, and much of what I try to teach Nathan and Samuel, can be tied directly back to all these people, and to conversations like the one at the threshing bee, where seeds were planted.
Our gospel parable for today is all about the planting of seeds. Jesus picked this image on purpose. He knew his audience. He lived in an agricultural society. So the ideas he was talking about made total sense, and would be obvious to the folks who heard him. They would say: “Seeds on rocky soil? Well, of course…that’s not going to work…we all know that. Thorny soil? No, that would never work either…what is that farmer thinking?”
So then I can’t help but wonder. If the people Jesus was speaking to knew all of this, what then was point of what he was trying to teach them? Jesus does give an explanation. And in the explanation, Jesus basically divides the world into three kinds of people:
- There are those who hear the Word of Christ, and do not understand it at all.
- There are those who hear the Word of Christ, and who receive it, but either lack the depth to sustain it, or who allow it to be choked out of them.
- And finally, there are those who hear the word, and who understand it, integrate it and live it.
As Jesus has done other times in scripture, he is drawing a distinction between people. He is asking his listeners, us, to stop and reflect on our own lives. What kind of soil are we? How open are we to hearing, to integrating the Word of God into our daily life? Good questions, and ones that we all need to take seriously. And in all honesty, when we read this Gospel, this is where we are tempted to stop. The point is simple. We should all be good soil, open to God’s Word. Amen. So be it. In the past, that’s how I’ve always read the story. It’s about us.
But if we just end this way, I believe that we miss the point, the key point of the parable.
You see, if you were a first century Jew, and you were listening to Jesus tell this parable. You would have been shocked. But not at the way Jesus differentiates between people, comparing them to soil. You would have been shocked at the behavior of the farmer.
Again, it was an agricultural society. You would know your farming. You would understand the level of work it takes to grow crops in a hot, arid, desert environment. It was a hard life! You would not take rain water for granted. The weather could be brutal and long droughts were common. The middle east does not resemble the rich, fertile farmland where my grandfather planted.
And you would recognize that this parable is not three separate stories. It is not a “compare and contrast.” This is one story of a farmer planting all of his crops in a single season, in all different kinds of soil. If you were listening to Jesus tell this story, you would be shocked that a farmer would ever plant seeds on a path where people and animals walked…and then in rocky places…and then in thorns…and then finally on good soil. You would say to yourself “is this farmer nuts? Is he crazy? Seed is precious! Seed is valuable! Why is he just wasting it?”
Farmers at that time, in that place, would only plant seed in places where they knew that it would grow, and would produce crops. They were strategic, and careful where they planted. To do what the parable suggests would be like me telling my grandfather I was going to go plant seeds in the middle of the interstate. He’d look at me like I was crazy.
So what point is Jesus trying to make in this parable?
This story is primarily about the farmer. The story is about someone for whom seed is in such abundance, that he can afford to scatter seeds wildly, with abandon. It is about a farmer who is of such means, that he can take a chance and invest seed in all kinds of soil, even in places where he is not sure what will come of it. This is the story of the extravagant farmer.
This parable is about the abundant, rich, extravagant love of a God who has so much grace to share, that it can be shared not only in the hearts of people where God knows it will take root, but in people whose hearts and spirits are rocky, are full of thorns, or where the seeds might be choked or taken by others. This grace is a grace not just for those who live the lives of the righteous, but for the sinner; for those whose lives are broken, who are in pain, or who doubt their faith. This grace is a grace for you…for me…for all of us.
I just returned last week from 12 days on the road with a fantastic group of 22 senior high youth on one of our AWOL (that’s A Work of Love) mission trips. We worked with the Macon, Georgia chapter of Habitat for Humanity, building homes and working on a church in a poor and broken neighborhood call the “Peach Orchards” in south Macon. I could tell you stories of many, many seeds that were planted during the 12 day trip.
I’d like to share one of these stories with you. Leah had never gone on a mission trip before. One night, while we were at the Laundromat, I did video interviews with some of the kids about their trip experience. Leah surprised me. She said: “…my faith has changed here. When I first came here, I didn’t have any faith. And we started doing devotions in the morning and at night. And the day Kevin did his, we started singing “Shout to the Lord” and I couldn’t sing it, because I finally found God…I finally found my faith. And it was a really revealing and satisfying and uplifting experience for me. I’m going to go home and tell everyone about my experience. It’s changed me a lot. And I’m going to go home and change how I see life, and I’m going to change how I am towards people and towards my parents. It’s changed me a lot.”
Seeds were planted in Leah’s life. And she opened herself up to the work of God, and the seeds took hold. Seeds took hold in the lives of all of us on that trip. Seeds took hold in the whole Peach Orchard neighborhood.
Yes, we have a responsibility to wonder about what kind of soil our lives are for the planter. We need to ask ourselves questions: am I open to God working within my life? Is my heart rocky? Is my spirit full of thorns? Am I open to the distractions, to the things that will choke the seeds from growing within me? How are my relationships? Am I too tired? Am I too sad? How is my faith life? How is my prayer life? Do I read scripture? Can I create space in my life for God’s love and grace to work?
But even more, Jesus is telling us to remember the one who plants the seeds. God is the extravagant farmer.
God’s love and grace comes to each of you in abundance; even if your life feels rocky; even if you feel overwhelmed; even if you don’t feel worthy of that love. Jesus’ love comes to the distracted, to the overscheduled, to the busy, to the addicted, to the beat up, to the abused, to the abuser, to the sick, to the sinner and to the saint.
There is no kind of soil in your life, which will prevent the farmer from sowing seeds of love and grace. God knows no limitations. He plants wildly, extravagantly and with abandon. We don’t get to decide where God chooses to plant. God plants in all of you. God works in all of you. God gives grace to all of you.
Ultimately, how we live our lives does matter to God, who wants our hearts to be rich and fertile soil for God’s Word to dwell and grow. We have the freedom to choose how to respond to that gift; to these seeds: we can accept it, we can ignore it, we can reject it. But we cannot prevent it. The farmer who plants the gift of grace within us is relentless. Our God is persistent.
My friends, receive that gift. Open yourself to the work of God. The farmer is planting. Be good soil. And experience, and dwell in the extravagant grace of God.
Amen.
