Sowing Seeds

Then he told them many things in parables, saying: “A farmer went out to sow his seed. As he was scattering the seed, …. Still other seed fell on good soil, where it produced a crop—a hundred, sixty or thirty times what was sown. Whoever has ears, let them hear” [Matthew 13:3a, 8-9, New International Version].

Some five or six years ago, Jane and I had a crazy idea. We’d grow a few tomato plants and perhaps a few squash in an allocated portion of a community garden. A couple of green thumb friends agreed to help. Our plot was the size of a two-person grave site. By the end of the summer, the plot’s size was entirely appropriate. Virtually everything I planted there died. A post facto financial analysis showed that the per pound cost of our tomato crop was about $47. We learned that we aren’t good farmers.

Nor perhaps is the parabolic “farmer” offered up by Jesus in this week’s Gospel lesson, Matthew 13:1-9, 18-23 (Seventh Sunday after Pentecost, RCL, Year A). Often called “The Parable of the Sower,” this is a story about a farmer who doesn’t rent or borrow a tiller. He doesn’t carefully prepare His soil or carefully line out his plants in careful, labeled rows. He doesn’t spread around topsoil or rich fertilizer. He just stands there and sows His seeds, barely mindful of where they might land.

Of our Lord’s parables, I’ve probably heard more sermons on this one than any of the others. Particularly in my pre-divinity school years, the sermons usually had a common refrain: “You better be careful. You better watch your step and your ways! You don’t want to be the sort of soil like the pathway Jesus describes in Matthew 13. Seed sowed on the path gets gobbled up by the evil one. Nor should you be like the rocky ground or the thorny thicket. Ah, instead you should aspire to be like the good ground. Look into your hearts, friends, what kind of soil are you?”

My thoughts have changed considerably over the past three and a half decades. Am I like the pathway? Am I rocky ground? Am I the ground beneath the thorn thickets? Or am I good, rich, loamy soil from which many blessings can flow?

The answer, of course, is yes.

Indeed, I’m all four kinds of soil or ground. There are times in which the Lord sows his Word—his abundant seed—upon me and it is as if He has spread it out upon a concrete driveway. Nothing happens, except of course, that the evil one swoops in and has his feast from that which was intended for me.

Rocks—there are other times when I hear the voice of the Lord and I am overjoyed. I float like a veritable balloon. I sense deep excitement. I anticipate the wonder that lies ahead while I stay immersed in His Word. I might even fire off a meditation or share a deep conversation with someone about what God, through Christ, appears to be saying to us. Yet, depth is lacking. I get a phone call or an email from a colleague, or I read an interesting case in my field of legal study. It might be that I respond to a flattering comment. My attention turns. In any of these settings, Christ’s words can be all but forgotten.

Thorns—sometimes His word comes to me, as it always seems to do so from mid-July through late August, when a cacophony of writing deadlines and other professional obligations shout altogether loudly, seeking to drown out all thoughts of a Master who is “gentle and humble in heart,” and whose “yoke is easy,” and whose “burden is light” [John 11:28-30]. I say to myself, “I’ll think about the apparent revelation later; right now, I have to finish 30 more pages of text.” There is so much around us that seeks to choke out the Word of our Lord.

Sometimes, not nearly often enough, I hear the Kingdom’s Word and I respond with care and concern for those around me. I take time to nurture a family member, a friend, and sometimes a stranger. The result can be staggering. The smile that’s returned to me is inestimable. The warmth of the embrace is soothing and wonderful. The depth of the shared bond is exhilarating. I think to myself, “Why can’t you spend more time like this?”

Are you at all like me? Do you see yourself in several, perhaps even all four types of soil described by our Lord in His parable? The remarkable point to be drawn from the parable isn’t so much that there are four types of soil, only one of which is really good. It isn’t even that all four types of soil live, sometimes comfortably, sometimes uncomfortably, within us. The remarkable point is that, no matter what, the Sower keeps sowing. As I mentioned in a Wednesday meditation three years ago, God, through Christ and the Holy Spirit, is an absolute spendthrift when it comes to the Grace and Love that He sows among and upon us. God is not the careful planter. He casts his Word everywhere.

Indeed, God gives and gives, all the while knowing that some of it—much of it—will not take root. When it comes to the daughter or son who seems to have turned his or her back on the faith, on his or her upbringing, God will never give up. God will continue to sow God’s seed toward the ear that so many would say is already hardened. To the friend, who seems always to have time for you, but who never has time for those who can’t return a favor, or reciprocate a nice dinner, or collaborate on a favorite cause, God is still sowing His Kingdom message. We may think to ourselves, “The friend isn’t listening.”

God’s response, “Not today, to be sure, but there is always tomorrow.” God doesn’t need or depend upon instant gratification. God is in it for the long haul.

The alternate OT reading for this Sunday, Isaiah 55:10-13, dovetails quite nicely with the Parable of the Sower. Consider a portion of the OT text which reads as follows:

As the rain and the snow come down from heaven, and do not return to it without watering the earth and making it bud and flourish, so that it yields seed for the sower and bread for the eater, so is my word that goes out from my mouth: it will not return to me empty, but will accomplish what I desire and achieve the purpose for which I sent it [Isaiah 55:10-11].

God’s word will not return to His mouth empty.

What about our own word? What might it look like if we truly emulated a Master who broadcasts His seed like the farmer in the parable? What if we shared God’s love in spendthrift fashion to all around us, whether or not we expected any thanks, any acknowledgement, any return? What if we gave of ourselves freely, knowing that we’d likely have to “rinse and repeat” again tomorrow? What if we spent less time trying to analyze ourselves and those around us, and more time casting God’s love along well-worn pathways, in rocky stretches, among deep and thick thorns, and yes, even upon good soil? What might happen?

For now, I’ll leave it there. I’d like to talk with many of you about the parable’s sundry implications. Alas, I need to close. I’m under the gun of a writing deadline. I desperately depend upon our God who keeps on sowing.