Pentecost 6A/Lectionary 15
July 16, 2017
Matthew 13:1-9, 13-18
Grace to you and peace from God our
Father and our Lord Jesus Christ. Amen.
I’ll admit
it: I have garden envy. One thing I love about summer, especially in my
neighborhood, is walking around and looking at all the beautiful blooming
things. And I envy so many of them. I long to have such a beautiful garden! To
have the eye to know what to plant and where, and then to have the knowledge
and skill to plant it and make it grow so lusciously. But alas: my thumb is not
green. Even the lowest-maintenance of plants, I’m just not great at keeping
them alive and looking nice.
It seems like
it should be easy: just dig a hole, put the seed in, water, and be delighted!
But apparently there is a lot more to it than that. You have to prepare the
soil. You have to pull out the weeds and debris, and add nutrients, and plant
the seeds at the right depth. You have to water the right amount, and put them
where they get the right amount of light. If you want seeds to thrive, they
need all the elements in place, including well-prepared soil.
Any good
gardener knows this. So it’s surprising, then, that the sower in the parable
Jesus tells today seems to have no regard for the quality of soil where he
plants the seeds! Totally reckless, no forethought, no preparation, just
tossing seeds here, there and everywhere. And the result? Three quarters of the
seeds don’t fall on fertile soil, and are scorched by the sun, or eaten by
birds, or choked by thorns. Not much foresight there, Sower.
I mean we,
today – we know how to prepare for things. Businesses do a demographic study of
an area before they plant a store there. Church mission starts also study an
area, knock on doors, explore needs, before deciding to start a church. You
want to have a sense that you are filling a need, serving a purpose… not to
mention be successful! This lack of preparation that the sower is guilty of…
that wouldn’t fly in today’s world.
Not to
mention the recklessness! Throwing seeds willy-nilly. It’s just not
responsible. Since I was a kid, I have been so careful about not wasting
things, and keeping things in case I might need them later. I remember for one
birthday a friend gave me a package of clay that came with instructions for how
to make
pottery based on Native American designs. It even came with some black
paint so I could do designs on the side. Such a cool gift! I was delighted. But
every time I looked at the package of clay in my closet, I thought, “No, not
today. I might mess up, and then I will have wasted it. I should save it for a
time when I am sure I will be able to make something beautiful with it. If I
use it now, then I won’t have it anymore, and then I’ll be sad later that I was
so reckless to use this before I was really ready to get everything out of it
that I could.” See – I was careful, thoughtful, and I thought ahead. Not like
this sower in the parable.
 |
| Van Gogh |
Well, I’d
love to say my thoughtfulness, care and foresight served me in the end. But
guess what happened to that clay, that lovely, interesting gift from my friend?
I kept it – for years, until I was too old to really enjoy it anymore, and then
a little longer in case my interest might return… until the clay dried up and
became worthless to me. I ended up throwing it in the garbage one day many
years later. I never got to enjoy it.
How much of
life passes us by like that? How many opportunities do we miss because we are
afraid of not doing it right, because we are waiting for the perfect time, and
want to make sure we are absolutely prepared? How many of us need to make sure
the proverbial soil is perfectly tilled before we take any risks and try to
make anything grow?
There are many ways to enter this
parable. We can think of ourselves as the sower, being sent out to spread the
good news to others. We can think of ourselves as the seed, that is being
spread upon the world. But my favorite way to understand this well-known
parable is to think of ourselves as the soil, and God as the sower. But – we’re
not always the good soil. At least
I’m not. Just as I sometimes miss opportunities to share the good news with
others, I have also missed opportunities to let myself hear the good news. My
guess is I’m not alone in this. Sometimes it is hard to hear and receive God’s
Word, because our hearts have been hardened and burned too many times before,
and we’re not in a place to receive the good news of God’s grace. Or sometimes
we hear God’s Word, but quickly let it be choked out by other things that seem
more important in the moment, or by our own preferences or fears. Or we hear
it, but ignore it and let it be overcome by the elements and the ways of the
world.
It’s a good thing, then, that the
sower so recklessly spreads seed, even on the bad, unprepared soil – so that if
we miss it the first time, we will still have another chance. This parable, you
see – it is a parable of abundance. It is a story about a God who throws seed
out to all different kinds of soil – not because God is a bad gardener who
doesn’t understand about tilling and fertilizer, but because God knows that all
of that seed will do some good. The seed that gets eaten up by birds – at least
it is feeding the birds! The seed that gets thrown among thorns – it is
fertilizing the soil for future harvest.
And the seed that lands on good soil
– that not only grows and thrives,
but is an abundance beyond our understanding! A good harvest is one that yields
between seven and ten-fold. Jesus tells his disciples that the seed that fell
on good soil yielded 30 times, 60 times, even 100 times! Surely the farmers in
the audience were laughing at his absurdity – it is impossible! But God’s grace
IS absurd. It often makes little sense, is not at all the way we would do
things, and certainly is not, in any reasonable mind, the “best” or most
efficient way to do something.
But you see, what is impossible and
unreasonable with humans is possible and effective with God. Because our God is
one of abundance – who throws seeds everywhere without counting the cost, who
doesn’t worry that some of those seeds may not do a bit of good, and some will
do good that we didn’t expect; a God who knows that some of those seeds will
yield a crop that is lavishly beyond human comprehension. With God, there is
always enough. There is always more than enough.
That story I told about my clay… I
think I got that for my 7th birthday, and it has stuck with me for
27 years since, probably because in some ways I am still that cautious little
girl who wants to be sure she has what she needs when she needs it. But I
wonder: what if I received God’s abundant grace the same way I received that
gift of clay? Admiring God’s grace in its package – bread and wine, water in a
font, a baby in a manger, a man on a cross – and understanding what a great
gift it is… but never willing to actually delve into it and experience the joy
it brings. Unwilling to take it and touch it and use it, lest I use it up and
then not have it when I need it. Concerned that I might mess it up if I get too
invested in it, and so content simply to admire it from afar. What if that was
how we viewed God’s grace?
Thanks be to God, that is not how
grace works. Our God, the Sower, is a reckless God of abundance, lavishly
spreading grace and love upon the world. Some will receive it with joy, and
yield an absurd amount more. Some will not be ready to receive it – yet. But
the seed keeps coming. The grace keeps coming. It never runs out, and it is
never wasted. It may not make sense to us, but that is the way of our abundant
God of grace.
Let us pray… Reckless Sower, you never run out of grace for us. Make our hearts good
soil, ready to receive your Word, and to share your lavish abundance with the
world. In the name of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit. Amen.
No comments:
Post a Comment