A Sower Went Out to Sow – Silly Sower

Proper 10 A

Matthew 13:1-9, 18-23

13 July 2014 – Redeemer

The sower went out to sow. Now this sower flunked ag school at the U of M. They kicked him out of Future Farmers of America and his 4H projects never even made it to the Benton County Fair. Any novice gardener knows you plant seed in good soil. You don’t sprinkle your cucumber seeds on the driveway or plant your tomatoes in the rock garden.

The sower went out to sow and it’s obvious from his sowing tactics that He isn’t a sower like you and me. We try to calculate and prepare, talk to the folks at the nursery. We fertilize and weed and prune and water and protect from pesky rabbits and nuisance fungi. With all the best practices of gardening we hope that in the end there will be some beefsteak tomatoes, new potatos, and English cucumbers. (And of course no matter what we do there will be zucchini – lots of zuchini).

That’s what is so odd about this Sower – he is downright reckless. He throws seed on the field road, in the thistle patch, on that old rock pile. Surely He is aware of all the enemies out there – the birds find the seed on the path easy picking, the thistles choke out the wheat, and the rocks, well they’re sort of like Germans, hard and stubborn – seeds don’t usually win over rocks.

Notice anything else odd about the Sower? All of us know that seed is valuable, but for this Sower something is more valuable than the seed – the harvest. He is scattering the seed all over. It is as if He has an endless supply of seed – it cannot be exhausted and so He throws it to the wind. Path sown. Thistles sown. Rocks sown. Soil sown.

He wants a harvest and he’ll take it wherever he gets it. He wants His seed to bear fruit – a hundredfold, sixty fold, thirty fold. If His seed takes root among the thorns He’ll rejoice in the fruit. If His seed bears fruit in the cleft of a rock He’ll harvest it. If His seed gets eaten by a bird and deposited fifty miles away on your windshield and get’s washed off and grows beside your driveway – He’ll harvest that also.

Reckless Sower. Endless Seed. Valuable Harvest. Wherever it takes root and grows He’ll gather it in. No one works like this (and stays in business), but this is not anyone – this is God and the work of the Kingdom to which you belong. Jesus explains that the seed is “the Word of the Kingdom.”

Now I’m not sure who the sower is – could be the Father sowing the seed of Jesus the Word made flesh. Could be Jesus sowing the Word of forgiveness. Could be the Holy Spirit sowing the Word and Sacrament in the world. It matters not – but the seed is the Word of Jesus, His life, death, and resurrection, His gifts of forgiveness and salvation, His life to bring you to life.

You are more important to the Sower than his seed. You are more important to the Father than His Son. You are more important to Jesus than His life. You are more important to the Spirit than the hours and work He must work on you. God loved the world so that He gave His Son. Jesus did not consider equality with God something to be grasped, but made Himself nothing, taking the form of a servant. The Holy Spirit blows when and where He pleases. He scatters His seed in the hardest places, the lowest places, the least likely to grow places – why look He scattered His seed on you.

The Scriptures call this love and faithfulness and grace. It is God’s heart toward you. This comes from heaven. It was on earth in the beginning, but we lost it through sin. Now it only comes from heaven and it has come from heaven. The Sower sowed His seed. Jesus was born of the Virgin Mary. He spoke His Word of repentance and forgiveness and scattered it into the ears of the high and low, the hard and soft, the thorny and the field. Prostitutes and Publicans and Pharisees and Peters and Pauls and Pontius Pilates.

There are two reasons He does this – first the seed knows no limits. Jesus Christ’s death is sufficient for the world’s sins. There is no sin beyond Christ’s forgiveness – not the prostitute who sells her body, not the publican who commits high crimes and treason, not you who stab your neighbor in the back with your words or commit adultery against you wife with some fantasy at work or on the internet. Christ’s forgiveness is greater. It is inexhaustible. The Devil would have you believe otherwise – that you’ve used up your supply or your sin is too dirty for the blood of Jesus to cleanse or too deep for Him to reach. Silly Satan don’t you know about the Sower? Christ Jesus died for sinners. Which ones? Sinners. Me too? Well are you a sinner? Yes. Well then, yes for you too. For Judas, for Thomas, for Pilate, for Herod, for Rabab, Bathsheba, Adam and Eve and you.

The Word of Jesus, His work of forgiveness, His death and resurrection, knows no limit. It will bring life wherever it is planted, wherever ears hear and tongues confess, “Jesus Christ died for sinners and I qualify.” He who has ears to hear let him hear. There is only one limit to God’s Word – ears that won’t hear and tongues that won’t confess. God will not force His seed into you – that is not love. You can say, “Thanks, but no thanks.” There’s nothing the Devil would rather have you do – treat this Word of God like something you can pick up later (but be warned by then the birds might have it). Or regard your baptism like some magic seed – once I got it I’ll keep it and never tend it and I’ll be fine. What’s the likelihood of that Word bearing fruit if you are never in the light of God’s Word or fertilized with Christ’s body and blood? Or maybe you just look upon this seed as one seed among many – life is found is so many places – there’s a veritable nursery out there of life-promising seeds – work, family, pleasure, wealth. They grow fast, they grow strong, but like weeds they’ll choke the Word right out of you. He who has ears to hear let him hear.

The second reason the Sower sows so recklessly is because He wants you – He values the harvest and you are the harvest. Christ is planted in the grave dead like a seed so that He might be raised and bear life – a hundred fold. The Lord desires that everyone come to the knowledge of Christ and be saved. So He scatters the Word – Jesus. He sprinkles the seed in baptism, plants it into your ears with His Word, feeds and nourishes you in the supper of Christ’s body and blood.

It’s a mystery how it works – We know where it works, but not how. Thomas is saved and Judas is damned. Nicodemus comes to faith and a host of pharisees do not. A tax collector named Zacchaeus comes to life and King Herod chooses death. Jesus told the chief priests and elders, “Prostitutes and tax collectors go into the Kingdom of God before you.” You never know where the seed will grow. I have problems growing grass on my hill, but it always grows well in the cracks in my driveway. None of us is good soil – we’re more like paving stones and granite slabs, parking lots. God’s Law must crack us open, churn up our lives, grind us to death so that we confess our sins and then our ears are open to receive the Word.

This is His work from beginning to end. That our ears now hear and the seed is planted, that we believe in Jesus and have life in Him – that’s all this silly sower scattering His seed. And that’s really important for us to remember as a congregation – so many experts come along with the latest plan to grow the church. It usually involves modifying the seed to make it easier to plant. Some of these experts guarantee results. There is no guarantee for this seed. In fact if you modify God’s Word His promises are null and void. The only guarantee is this, “Jesus is life.” He is your forgiveness and your salvation. You cannot make this happen in your own life or anyone elses – but once He has planted His Word in your ears He does let you scatter the seed with your lips. When you go out into the world this week scatter Jesus, throw the seed of His love and compassion and forgiveness out there. You cannot run out. He’s more than enough. You never know where it might land, but you have His promise – where it is heard and believed, where it lands and is planted, there will be life a hundredfold, for you and for the world. In the name of Jesus. Amen.

Pr. Bruce Timm

12 July 2013