Where is the Good Soil?

Matthew 13: 1-9, 18-23
That same day Jesus went out of the house and sat by the lake. Such large crowds gathered around him that he got into a boat and sat in it, while all the people stood on the shore. Then he told them many things in parables, saying: “A farmer went out to sow his seed. As he was scattering the seed, some fell along the path, and the birds came and ate it up. Some fell on rocky places, where it did not have much soil. It sprang up quickly, because the soil was shallow. But when the sun came up, the plants were scorched, and they withered because they had no root. Other seed fell among thorns, which grew up and choked the plants. Still other seed fell on good soil, where it produced a crop – a hundred, sixty or thirty times what was sown. Let anyone with ears Listen!
Listen then to what the parable of the sower means: When anyone hears the message about the kingdom and does not understand it, the evil one comes and snatches away what was sown in the heart. This is the seed sown along the path. The one who received the seed that fell on rocky places is the one who hears the word and at once receives it with joy. But since there is no root, this one lasts only a short time. When trouble or persecution comes because of the word, this one quickly falls away. The one who received the seed that fell among the thorns is the one who hears the world, but the worries of this life and the deceitfulness of wealth choke it, making it unfruitful. But the one who received the seed that fell on good soil is the one who hears the word and understands it. This one produces a crop, yielding a hundred, sixty or thirty times what was sown.
Sermon
In this passage Jesus is having a problem that I would love to have – that when I come here to preach on Sunday morning the crowds would be so great that I would have to sit out on a boat to avoid being consumed by the growing crowd on the shore.
But while I know that is not our problem this Sunday morning, in this church, like many churches, there was once a problem of space – the congregation outgrew the old worship space that is now the fellowship hall and so this new sanctuary was built to facilitate the growing congregation.
As a seminary student I learned that church growth is a slippery concept, that it’s elusive, and can’t be simply tracked back to one reason or cause. We want facts though, things that we can do or change, forces that we can control. We see that some churches prosper when led by certain pastors, while others don’t. Or that those churches with a certain theology or worship style attract people, packing worship services with excited people, and we begin to wonder what we’re doing wrong.
I grew up in a church that grew dramatically, especially under the care of one particular senior pastor. While this man was the senior pastor at First Presbyterian Church of Marietta, membership increased in ways you wouldn’t believe, to the point that the occupancy of the sanctuary had to hold much more than twice what the old sanctuary did, as membership had increased into the thousands.
In so many ways I was intimidated when my former pastor asked me to lunch after graduating seminary. For me, as a child who had witnessed the church grow and expand, this man was larger than life, surely the most intimidating model for ministry I could imagine. After lunch I asked him what words of advice he had for a young man seeking a call to a church. I asked something like, “as far as having a successful ministry goes, your time at First Presbyterian can’t really be beat. What’s your secret?” His answer surprised me, and really, the fact that he would have lunch with me at all surprised me, considering how most senior pastors rarely take the time to meet with anyone, much less a young aspiring minister. He said, as he looked me in dead in the eye with a gaze I had to look away from, “Joe, you have to know what is in your control and what isn’t, and when it comes to being a minister, there isn’t really that much that is in your control.”
In him I saw a man who had earned the right to pat himself on the back, but I then realized I was face to face with a man who knows the wisdom of the parable of the sower.
In this parable we hear about a farmer who has gone out to sow seed. The farmer seems careless, sowing seed along the path where birds would eat it up, on rocky places where the plants would sprout quickly, but with shallow roots that the sun would scorch, other seed scattered among thorns that would out grow the plants and choke them out – seed going all these places besides its intended destination, among the good soil.
This parable describes a farmer, but surely not a farmer who knows what he’s doing. There is no mention of plowing the field, irrigating or fertilizing it. The farmer seems to carelessly sow seed without thinking much about the maximum yield of his field, depending on a miracle for any kind of harvest at all.
Modern farmers don’t depend on miracles, but plan ahead, plowing, irrigating, and fertilizing – minimizing waste by sowing with some precision, recognizing that minimizing waste means maximizing profit.
But Jesus admires this less economical farmer, and he interprets his parable far away from the crowds so that only the disciples hear; the disciples, who, in a way, are like sowers, sowing the Good News of the Kingdom of God.
We know that they found good soil, as the church that began with 12 disciples has today grown to billions, spreading the Good News over the whole world. We assume that they must have been skillful in casting their seed out over the earth, finding that good soil.
But Jesus doesn’t offer us a parable about a farmer who tended a field with precision, who counted the seeds he had wasted among the path, the rocky soil, and the thorns. Jesus offers a parable about a farmer who sows his seed and leaves the rest up to God.
My pastor knew that First Presbyterian Church grew not because of him, but because the seed he sowed fell on good soil, in a city booming with young families looking to the suburbs for a place to raise their kids. That the church he served grew because the city the church served grew, and though he and the church did their job of casting out seed, the harvest was plentiful because of many factors that were completely out of their control.
Like modern farmers we are used to believing that we can control every aspect of production. We can maximize the soil’s fertility, adding in Miracle Grow ourselves, not leaving any part of the process up to chance or up to God.
When we seem to be successful, the temptation is to take the credit for a job well done; and when we seem to struggle, we assume we have done something wrong, we haven’t planned enough. We want to maximize our yields, minimize our waste, and with the opportunity to control more and more, to know more and more, we run the risk of forgetting that ours is a vital, but ultimately small part of the great miracle God has been doing in our world since the dawn of creation.
Our seed must be sown or there will never be a crop, but by no means is the harvest all up to us. We must sow the seeds, but we must also trust that what will grow will grow, and what doesn’t is out of our control.
Likewise, parents have no choice but to sow seeds of love and guidance to their children, but at some point parents are also called to trust, not attempting to control something that is no longer, and maybe never has been in their hands to control.
Jesus entrusted 12 people with the future of the church, 12 people who launched a campaign of evangelism that changed the whole world. The mainline church in the United States worries over losing members, but even if we get back down to just a dozen we may be in the exact position God wants us to be.
We are not in control of the harvest, so go throw out your seeds with joy, giving thanks to God.
Amen.