The Parable of the Sower

Matthew 12:1-9, 18-23

7-16-23

 

The Sower
Vincent Van Gogh

This week, we hear the parable of the sower.

Parables are tough. Especially Jesus’s parables.

They’re metaphors.

They show a point by telling a story.

And sometimes the point of the story isn’t all that clear.

And it’s even harder for us today because a lot

of the metaphors Jesus uses rely on information

or references that the people then shared and we do not.

 

But this week Jesus tells them this story about growing things.

Fortunately, how things grow or don’t grow hasn’t changed

too much since Jesus has been around,

so we can understand this one pretty well.

And we get a rare gift in the gospels:

Jesus explains the parable to his disciples.

So a farmer goes out and spreads seeds on different terrains.

A path, rocky areas, a place with thorns, and good soil.

Jesus tells us that the seeds are the Word of God.

And there are four types of people outlined in the parable:

Those who don’t understand the word of the kingdom.

Those who receive it with joy but it doesn’t take root.

Those who hear it, but worry too much about the cares of the world

and so it doesn’t amount to anything.

And those who hear it and it grows and it bears fruit.

 

So, there it is. Jesus has done it for us.

Nothing much for me to do except lay it all out there.

My job is done this morning.

Amen.

 

Except, I have some questions that I would

like to have asked if I was there with Jesus that day.

I’m really interested in that soil.

 

Isn’t there anything we can do about the soil?

-Can we make it better?

-Can we cultivate it? Improve it?

-can we, metaphorically speaking, put some dirt on top of those rocks

- Can we go and take out some of the thorns?

-Once you’re bad soil are you just bad soil?

-Are some people just hopeless?

-And who is bad soil and who is good?

-How can I tell who is good and who is bad?

so that I don’t waste seeds?

 

-And Jesus, which one am I?

-Because some days I feel like I’m that good soil.

-But some days I think I’m that rocky ground

-And some days the thorns come in.

-And some days it just depends on the hour of the day.

 

So I have a lot of questions about all that soil.

 

I think the temptation we have when we hear this parable

is to make this into “the parable of the soil.”

But it’s important to remember that this is

called “The Parable of the Sower”.

Jesus even gives it that name, which is rare

in the world of parables.

So we should pay attention to the sower.

Whenever we garden,

we spend a lot of time on our soil.

We mix nutrients into it, we till it.

We make sure it’s the correct place for sun exposure.

We make sure it’s ready for the seeds.

And then we put seeds or plants in carefully.

We do it very intentionally and purposefully.

 

We sow our seeds with prudence.

Cautiously, sparingly, we have limits.

We don’t just put them anywhere.

We don’t want to waste them.

 

But look what this crazy sower in the parable does.

He’s got some seeds, these precious seeds,

and he throws them all over the place.

He’s not worrying where they land.

Good soil or bad soil. Rocks or dirt.

 

And this was at a time that you couldn’t talk to the Burpee dealer

and purchase more seeds if you needed them.

Each seed was cultivated by the sower.

Seeds were precious and limited things then.

But still the sower in this parable throws the seeds everywhere.

The sower is not thwarted by the failure.

He just keeps throwing those seeds around.

 

I want to break in right now

and tell you about my saga of gardening.

Most of my adult life, I lived in apartments.

 

Texas was my first ever house with a yard,

but it was too hot and most people didn’t

grow vegetables in their gardens.

So when we bought a house in Columbus,

one of the first things I did was to plan a garden.

 

A friend of ours picked the spot with me

and I started the garden in 2013.

 

I did everything that you were supposed to do

tilling, adding, things to the soil.

Things were looking good at first.

 

But the first year, I planted too many things

in my plot and I got a bunch of beautiful leaves

and not a lot else. But I learned and I started

again the next year. And the next.

Every year I would start with big

hopes and things would look good

and by July, I would have a bunch of leaves and a lot of

sweat and tears and not much a lot to show for it.

I did this five years in a row. It got worse every year.

 

Some people blamed it on the walnut tree

on the corner of our property.

But realistically, the neighbors all have great gardens.

And I had the soil tested and they said it was fine.

 

So one year, I gave up and I planted sunflowers.

Which seemed to like whatever I’ve done to the soil there.

 

But I couldn’t stop. The next year I picked

another plot of land, on the opposite side of the walnut tree

 

And I thought I had a good start.

Then the bugs at the pepper plants.

And the birds ate my string bean plants.

Actually I’ve started the string beans six times in one year,

seed after seed,

And something happened to each plant.

 

But I had a cucumber starting!

 

And a few strawberries in the pot.

But then a deer came and ate lots of it and

the cucumbers and the strawberry plant.

 

And so I bought a tent and put it over the yard.

And replanted the cucumbers and the strawberry

and another pepper and some more green bean seeds AGAIN

But the tomatoes got some kind of wilt and I lost

three of the four of them.

 

And realistically nothing else good happened.

Just a lot of leaves and nothing else.

And then we moved here.

 

But before we knew we were moving, I was making big plans

for the next year. Eight years I tried to grow

a garden, I think in total for all those 8 years,

I’ve gotten one basket of vegetables.

Now, I don’t usually like to put myself

in the role of prime example in my sermons.

But just to be honest, I am like that sower!

 

I keep trying and trying and gardening with reckless abandon

Not looking at the cost.

(I’m NOT looking at how much all that cost).

As many times as I’ve failed, I keep trying.

I am the sower! BE like me!

 

But of course, in the end,

Jesus is not talking about gardening.

Jesus is talking about people

and Jesus is talking about God.

 

I wish I approached every person

the way I approached my task of gardening.

I wish I looked at people with renewed hope,

and without regard for past experience.

I wish I shared grace and love and the Gospel like that.

I wish I looked at every person anew instead

of judging them by what the last person like them did.

I wish I was as forgiving as that sower

when it came to other people.

But I’m not.

 

Like most people, I judge people by what they look like,

and where they come from, and by my past experiences

with people who look and act like them.

I make decisions about who I want to spend time on

and who I want to share the good news with and with

based on all sorts of perceptions that are often not valid.

I am stingy with my seeds

 

But God just throws those seeds of love out there

ham-fisted willy-nilly without thinking much about the results.

God gives that love to people who deserve it and

those who don’t just the same.

That is the grace of the sower.

That is the abundance God.

 

God's grace doesn’t calculate the best choice

it doesn’t hedge its bets on who’s worthy and who’s not.

It doesn’t determine who’s bore fruit in the past,

who will be the best and the brightest.

God just throws grace around with wild abandon.

 

Our creator is not worried where the seeds go,

just that the seeds keep falling on everyone.

 

Remember, Jesus was preparing the disciples to send them out.

He’s telling them, showing them, “don’t worry where the seeds fall.

Just worry that the seeds keep falling.”

Don’t count how many seeds you drop on thieves,

tax collectors, prostitutes, Pharisees,

gentiles and other people that seem unworthy.

Don’t worry about whether people seem like good soil or not.

Just keep the seeds coming.

There will always be more when you look in the bag.

 

That is the parable of the sower.

The ground that we work in may seem rocky or thorny,

it may seem hopeless and like no one is listening.

But God will not give up on us.

 

God will continue to spread those seeds, confident

that they will take root in us and in time

will yield a wonderful harvest.

 

Real Peace vs. False Peace

The Cost
Shawn Nelson Dhalstrom

Matthew 10:24-39

July 2, 2023

 

I think when we hear peace we think of,

good things: love, harmony, understanding,

tolerance, inner security, calm.

 

And we might go, why would Jesus say

he isn’t here to bring peace?

Those seem like ideals of the kingdom of God.

 

But that’s not the only way the word peace has been used.

Sometime people use the word peace

when they are talking about something else entirely.

 

Pax Romana or Roman Peace

Was an unprecedented  time of

prosperity in the Roman Empire.

It went from about

27BC to about 120 AD, give or take a few decades,

It was right around the time of Jesus.

 

It was an unprecedented time because

the centuries prior to that,

the empire had been almost constant war within itself

with emperors and rulers deposing other

emperors and rulers and occupying territories

until another ruler came in and deposed them.

War was a habit for the Romans.

The time of Pax was ushered in by Augustus defeat

of Mark Antony and Cleopatra in 31BC

 

After he took power, Emperor Augustus had the clever idea

to tell the people of the Roman Empire that they should just let

him rule, and that being without war would be more prosperous

to them than being with war.

 

And it was. The 200 years of the Pax Romana

was a time of economic expansion,

and creative and cultural achievements.

The building of many of Rome’s roads and monuments, statues,

places of worship, stadiums happened during this time.

 

And eventually, by Jesus time,

The Roman Empire was bragging about the 

Pax Romana to the world. It was something they were dedicated to maintain.

The word “Pax” or “Pax Augusta”,

showed up on coins and other methods of

written communication as kind of advertisement:

We’ve got peace here in the Roman Empire, come to Rome, 

live, do business, vacation, come join the Roman Empire.

 

And part of the economic expansion was an expansion of

territory, this was the rise of the Roman Empire.

During the height of the Pax Romana, about 70 million

people lived in the Roman Empire,

almost a quarter of the entire world’s population.

Pax Romana was good for the emperor, for the ones in power,

for the business people, and for the wealthy

citizens around the center of Rome.

 

But of course, this Pax Romana wasn’t

peaceful and prosperous for everyone.

Especially for the people of the regions that Rome invaded

and occupied and expanded into by force

like Israel and the middle East.

 

And to maintain the peace, or the image of peace at least,

The Roman Empire forcibly took down any rebellion,

any inkling of an organization that might have

the thought of challenging or changing the Empire.

 

And from these conquered territories and people

on the outskirts of the empire, the Roman

government collected lots of taxes to fund their prosperity.

Ad with the inability to pay taxes,

millions of people were enslaved, sold into forced labor,

in order to build the structures of the empire

and to work for the wealthy and those in power.

 

The Pax Romana, the peace and prosperity of Rome,

was maintained, not by merciful coexistence,

and harmony, but by dominance,

and military and economic might.

What was called peace and prosperity by Rome

was an illusion of peace maintained by fear and intimidation.

it was a peace that was almost a prison for so many.

 

Tacitus, who was a Roman politician and a historian,

and a critic of his own country wrote:

“To ravage, to slaughter, to steal, this they give the

false name of empire;

and where they create a desert, they call it peace.”

 

It is the Pax Romana, the illusion of peace,

that Jesus would have heard about repeatedly

in the Roman territory that he lived in.

He would have been taught to  not say anything,

in order to not disrupt the “peace”.

His disciples would have heard the same.

Just get along. Don’t disturb the “peace”.

 

It’s this peace – the uncomfortable peace that was

brought by intimidation and threats of violence—

that he tells his disciples is not here to maintain.

In the face of this false peace, Jesus has come to

bring conflict, the conflict between

the way things are and the way of God’s Kingdom.

 

This speech is near the end of the pep talk that Jesus

is giving his disciples before he sends them out.

He is sending them out to do that work that

he has started: healing, and casting out demons,

announcing the kingdom of God

He is warning them that everyone might not

receive their message with joy.

 

Sometimes we assume that healing, and casting out demons,

announcing the kingdom of God would be

universally well received.

That everyone would be happy with the news

that God’s presence on earth would bring

joy and happiness to all.

That and everyone would welcome the disciples in.

 

But Jesus is telling them no.

Bringing power and hope to people

that are oppressed and freeing them

from the bonds that hold them captive,

that is a disruption to that illusion of peace.

Before real peace and justice comes,

there can actually be conflict and discomfort.

 

When Jesus said that love your neighbor as yourself

it wasn’t a problem, but when Jesus showed that it meant

eating with tax collectors and prostitutes

and talking to their religious rivals,

that was uncomfortable.

 

People love to quote the phrase

“an eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth.”

But they forget the rest of the quote where

Jesus says that isn’t the way anymore.

He says do not resist an evil doer,

if they strike you on one cheek offer the other also.

That was uncomfortable.

 

When Jesus talked about God’s blessings, it was okay,

but when he said “blessed are the poor”

and “woe to the rich”

that was uncomfortable.

 

When Jesus said the Kingdom Of God is at hand,

it sounded great.

But he reminds us that that means that another

kingdom will fade away.

That was uncomfortable.

 

The coming of the Kingdom of God

can be uncomfortable, it can cause conflict.

 

But this conflict is expected.

It’s the old world holding on tightly to its old ways.

It’s the new world being born.

And birth doesn’t happen without

some pain and suffering.

 

And this is how Jesus message

often comes into this world too.

We assume that talk of God’s love will be

received with joy and happiness, but it’s not.

 

Now Jesus isn’t telling us to take up arms

and he’s not telling us to get into physical altercations

with people who disagree with us.

Jesus doesn’t want us to be jerks to everyone.

 

But sometimes Christianity has made us conflict avoidant

Christians have sometimes acted

 like the first calling of Christianity is to be nice.

To make sure that everyone is always happy and no one is uncomfortable.

 

Jesus is telling us that “nice” isn’t the first call of peace,

and that bringing God’s real-life message of love

into this world is often controversial.

And sometimes people, even other Christians,

can have a problem with Jesus message.

Just saying that Black Lives do matter,

that can be uncomfortable.

Just saying that God loves LGBT people the way they are,

that can be uncomfortable.

Just working for housing for our neighbors means that

development doesn’t happen and a company

might not make all the money they projected for this year.

That can be uncomfortable.

 

Just making a plea for love, for justice, for equality,

for tolerance, for actual peace, for understanding

can cause conflict, some of this discomfort can happen

in our own neighborhoods, with our friends,

and sometimes it in our own families

around a dinner table.

 

Jesus is warning his disciples that the real life, bold

proclamation of God’s Kingdom

can come with discomfort.

 

As Martin Luther King, Jr. said:

"True peace is not merely the absence of conflict;

it is the presence of justice”

 

Jesus didn’t come to bring false peace.

Not just the nice absence of conflict that passes as peace.

Jesus came to bring real peace, real justice for everyone.

The Kingdom of God.

  

And to get there, Jesus needs us to get to the

bottom of some real problems here and now.

And that often starts with disruption of the way things are.

That’s the sword that Jesus talks about.

A metaphorical sword, not a real one.

 

But the question that he asks the disciples then

and that he asks us today is:

Will be able to bear that cross for Jesus

and for the Kingdom of God?

When the kingdom of this world

contradicts the kingdom of God

and the rights and justice of all people,

will we be willing to stand up for what’s right?

Will we be able to do difficult things

and have uncomfortable conversations?

Are we willing to pursue real peace, real understanding

and justice and not just the absence of conflict?

 

As we celebrate July 4^th this week,

we know that there are many things

in our country that we should be proud of.

And there are also many ways that this country has not

lived up to its own ideals that it was founded on.

 

It seems like every day there are new ways

that hard-won freedoms are being stripped away

and are slipping out of our hands.

it is not self-evident that all people are created equal,

it does not seem as if we behave as if all people

have been endowed by their creator with the

inalienable rights of life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.

It seems like there are people who are intent

on preserving that right for only a select,

privileged few instead of for all.

  

Whenever we try to live up to those ideals,

there are conflicts and sacrifices.

There are uncomfortable conversations

and there is resistance.

But this discomfort is just a part of the birth pangs.

Nothing gets born without some pain.

 

This is our world working out its problems.

This is the human race exorcising its demons.

It’s part of bringing about the new life that Jesus promises.

Shedding off the old and letting in the new,

it will continue to be painful and difficult.

 

But God will not abandon us in this struggle for real peace.

Like Jesus told the disciples:

Even the hairs on our head are counted.

God values us, God loves us, God sees us

God will be with us.

 

Jesus didn’t promise that real peace would be easy.

He told us that some of it may be very hard

 

But staying grounded in God’s love gives us hope.

It gives us courage, it gives us peace,

true peace that passes all understanding.