Eighth Sunday After Pentecost

“Living Parables”

Matthew 13:1 - 9

Dr SARAH L HALLSTRAND

A long time ago Jesus preached a great sermon in just a few minutes. (Don’t get your hopes up, friends!) He told a parable to folk who had gathered by the seaside to hear him speak about God. People who are good communicators tell stories. Abraham Lincoln was such a speaker. People got past his country bumpkin ways and marveled at his intellect and insight when he told a story. The Gospels are replete with interesting parables. Remember the Prodigal Son, the Lost Coin and the Great Banquet, among others? A parable is a small story with a big point. Or another way to describe it is that like a joke, if you have to explain it, don’t bother!

Speaking of jokes, Bob Puckett is our favorite…..teller of them, that is! I have discovered that he is a source of great wisdom on many topics. I asked him the other day to tell me about farming methods during the time of Jesus and he told me he didn’t know much about that but he did know about this farmer around here who was getting up in years and found it difficult to turn the hard Tennessee clay in order to sow his garden. The old man wrote a letter to his son who is in prison and mentioned his predicament.

“Dear Bubba, I am feeling pretty bad because it looks like I won’t be able to plant my potato garden this year. I’m just getting too old to be digging up a garden plot. If you were here, all my troubles would be over. I know you would dig the plot for me.

Love, Dad”

A few days later he received a letter from his son.

“Dear Dad, ‘FOR HEAVEN’S SAKE, Dad, don’t dig up the garden! That’s where I buried the GUNS!’

Love, Bubba”

At 4:00 A.M. the next morning, a dozen FBI agents and local police officers showed up and dug up the entire area without finding any guns. They apologized to the old man and left. Later that same day the old man received another letter from his son.

“Dear Dad,

Go ahead and plant the potatoes now. It’s the best I could do for you under the circumstances.

Love, Bubba”

Now let’s turn our attention to this parable. It is about a farmer working in his field. It is most likely that Jesus saw this farmer at work in the distance as he was preaching to the crowd that had gathered down by the seashore to listen to him. He was using a boat as a pulpit realizing that sound carries well over water. Instantly he seized upon the action at hand. Imagine him pointing in the direction of the farmer sowing seeds and saying, “Look! The farmer planted seed. As he scattered the seed, some of it fell on the road, and birds ate it. Some fell in the gravel; it sprouted quickly but didn’t put down roots, so when the sun came up it withered just as quickly. Some fell in the weeds; as it came up, it was strangled by the weeds, some fell on good earth (Tennessee red clay!), and produced a harvest beyond his wildest dreams. Are you listening to this? Really listening?”

In the hearing of this story what part of it are you thinking about right now? It’s the seeds, I bet! Why? Because most of us have planted gardens or perhaps even fields and have waited for results that are dependent on the quality of the seed and environmental factors such as moisture, soil condition, and, of course, “critters.” How many of you focused on the farmer? If you did, “Hooray! Good for you!” It is this farmer who is the key to the harvest. There must be someone to sow the seed. No action; no result! This activity of the sower reveals an important truth about the way things work in the Kingdom of God. It is a story that encourages the believer to cast broadly and boldly in our world words and deeds of God’s love. Dixie Damm, a member of our church and a colleague in mission to Estonia, shared with me this poem written by her friend, A. W. Clark

THE SOWER

I trudged along life’s rugged road

Observing the seed that others had sowed.

The seed of hatred vice and sin,

Seemed to be broadcast on every wind.

The good seed too seemed to germinate and grow,

But the stalk was small

And the growth was slow.

Lord; help me as upward and onward I go

The right kind of seed

Always to sow.

Spread goodness wherever you find opportunity! It is not our responsibility to worry about the fate of the seeds. Rather our job is to just keep sowing! How can that be? I tell you a mystery; it is God who guarantees a harvest that exceeds all expectations. Friends, what a wonderful encouragement this is to all who want to make a positive difference in this broken, hurting world of ours today! How is that, you ask? Because too often we feel so overwhelmed by the needs of others in comparison to our abilities to meet those needs that we cave in to apathy born from our disillusionment. We cry, “I am so small and the field so great”!

So, where and how do we begin to tell the story about God’s love that is for the whole world? Let’s begin with Jesus. Think about Jesus as a parable of God. Want to know what God is like? Look to Jesus! How does God work? Study Jesus! Wonder about God’s purpose for your life? Follow Jesus! And more than discovering our own purpose in living, it is in the following of Jesus that we bring God to people who are lost. Casting those seeds of faith and love, again! So it is that you and I are parables of Jesus. Living parables!

I believe that some of you already have a good idea of what Jesus means to you. I see you making choices about how you will respond to social needs in Loudon County and Greater Knoxville living as it were, on this island of pleasantries, surrounded by major needs born by poverty. I’ve seen you respond to disaster with incredible generosity. I’ve seen you prepare good meals and deliver them to the hungry. Just as Jesus is the “skin face” of God so it is that the grateful recipients of your help look into your face and see Jesus. Something has already happened in your heart and soul and you have decided to follow Jesus. In the good times and in the bad times you feel God’s presence and you radiate a new confidence that “all things are possible with God!”

A friend likened the experience of Jesus in her life as a paradigm shift, of sorts. She described the change this way, “Once she felt despair; now she feels hope. Once she felt frustrated and helpless; now she feels connected and useful. Once she worried about getting through just today; now she joyfully anticipates the future. Once she was timid and unsure about reaching out and loving strangers; now she embraces a radical discipleship for herself. She is more concerned about the needs of others then her own safety. Looking through the lens of Jesus, she sees world events and crisis differently. Her passivity to the ministries of the church has been replaced with urgency to getting out the word about Jesus, his sacrifice for us and how that love restores us to God. Remember when we used to boast about “living color” coming to theatre screens across the nation? Well, now she boasts about “living love.” Centered in Christ, she lives for sowing seeds of the transforming Gospel which calls all of us to serve others by responding to their needs because justice, mercy and grace demands it! She is no longer afraid of people who are different from her. This is radical love that is a fruit of the Spirit for one who is grounded in Christ Jesus. It is expressed in one of our hymns this morning, “To serve the present age, my calling to fulfill; O may it all my powers engage to do my master’s will.”

What caused this change in my friend? She was “touched” by someone; a living parable. Perhaps this person does not know that he or she ever influenced her. What about you? Do you remember when the shift began in your life? Perhaps someone spoke to you, gave a direction, sat with you when you felt alone, invited you to a meal that tasted especially good because it was eaten in the presence of friends, or perhaps it began with the person who asked about you or your family and really listened to your response? Perhaps you saw someone reading and reflecting on Scripture or praying in such a way that tears ran down their cheeks and you just knew there was in that poignant moment great grace responding to deep need. On the surface, these acts seem small but they influence us greatly!

It is the same wherever living parables go in the world. Whether across the street to a neighbor, a few miles to the Good Neighbor Shop or across oceans, we represent Jesus to someone who needs God. A pastor shared this story with me, “A man told me: ‘You don’t know this, but before I became a Christian I used to avoid you on the street. You didn’t even know who I was, but I knew who you were; when you’d come down the street, I’d duck out of the way. But the one I was really avoiding was God. He was the one I was running from. When I finally decided to start coming to church and got to know you, I realized that I hadn’t been running from you, I was running from God.” This pastor was merely there doing his “pastoral thing” and being himself. He was not aware of the impact he was having on the man. But the man experienced the pastor as a living parable. How true it is that:

People know what they do; they frequently know why they do what they do; but what they don’t know is what they do does.”

Simply following Jesus is the greatest form of evangelism and mission outreach. Notice I said, “Simply.” I do not want to imply that it is “easy.” Rather, it is “focused.” Whether here or there, now or then, when we choose to follow Jesus we become a living parable of Him. What we do and who we are will require a radical discipleship. All who see us will know we are Christians by our love.

A sign posted on the wall of the children’s home in Calcutta where Mother Teresa directed the mission of mercy and healing to the starving and dying read:

People are unreasonable, illogical, and self-centered,

LOVE THEM ANYWAY

If you do good, people will accuse you of selfish, ulterior motives,

DO GOOD ANYWAY

If you are successful, you win false friends and true enemies,

SUCCEED ANYWAY

The good you do will be forgotten tomorrow,

DO GOOD ANYWAY

Honesty And frankness make you vulnerable,

BE HONEST AND FRANK ANYWAY

What you spent years building may be destroyed overnight,

BUILD ANYWAY

People really need help but may attack you if you help them,

HELP PEOPLE ANYWAY

Give the world the best you have and you’ll get kicked in the teeth,

GIVE THE WORLD THE BEST YOU’VE GOT ANYWAY.

This is radical discipleship embraced by those who are living parables!

My brother Doug kidded me about whether I would give an altar call at the end of my sermon. Baptists are known for that, don’t you know! Yes, I am….but don’t move! Instead listen. There are many opportunities to being a radical disciple in this congregation. Local mission opportunities are springing up around us every day and some right in our local church. Work opportunities abroad in every corner of the world await your response. You’ll know when the time is right for your involvement. There will be a stirring, restlessness, that there is something yet to do and someone yet to be to another person or people somewhere in this big world of ours. You may find that now you are settled in your new nest in this beautiful place that you are bored (as hard as that is to believe) with doing the same activities over and over again. Folks might laugh at you for saying that. Don’t worry, it may be Jesus prodding you a bit and asking you to look over there to the sower. Maybe it is your turn. Lose yourself by living your faith and find your soul. And now join me in silent prayer.