Pastor Slaughter
Pentecost 4
6-20-2021
Followers of Jesus Spread God’s Word
Mark 4:26-34
How did you get here today? (I am not talking about if you walked or drove). Have you ever thought about all the things that happened in your life to bring you here, worshiping at Trinity, today? I find it fun looking back and seeing the hand of God at work in our lives. What’s your story? How did God orchestrate things to bring you to faith? Did you come to faith later in life where God brought the right person into your life and started the conversation about Jesus? Is it a simpler story, but no less amazing, where God created faith through the waters of baptism when you were a baby?
Some people’s story is really involved, and intricate and other people’s story is simple. Both are amazing. Both are miraculous. Someone shared the Word with you and God both created and caused that faith to grow inside you. God uses people to share his life saving word with others. He uses people just like you. I want you to think about this for a bit, what is your biggest fear or what keeps you from sharing God’s Word? We will come back to this later in the sermon. As Christians we grow in God’s Word. We see the love and grace he has for us. As followers of Jesus, we want to share that message with others. Today, as we look at the Gospel of Mark, we will be reminded that followers of Jesus spread God’s Word.
Jesus was using parables to help people understand key biblical truths. Today he uses a picture of a seed to show us that the growth of God’s kingdom is God’s work not ours. When Jesus says that phrase “The kingdom of God is like…” he isn’t just talking about a kingdom that is far off in heaven, but rather he is talking about his reign and his rule in the hearts of believers. When Christ speaks about this this Kingdom of God, his ruling activity, his words have something to do with the seed, the gospel that brings people to faith in Christ Jesus.
To show the power and reliability of the gospel, Jesus uses a picture of a man scattering seed on the ground. What does he do after? He goes to sleep, and he gets up. But something happens during that time. Something that he doesn’t know how. Something that he can’t explain. The ground begins to produce fruit on its own. The seed sprouts and grows. First the blade, then the head, then the full grain in the head. And when it is ready, the harvest comes.
That seed is the gospel. All that can be done is to sow the seed. We can cultivate. Make sure the ground is ready, water it but the rest is out of our control. After the gospel is sown; it sprouts; it matures; it is harvested. It’s really beyond our control. God spoke to the prophet Isaiah and said, “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.” God’s word works. It accomplishes what he desires. It achieves the purpose for which he sends it.
Going back to that question in the introduction, what is your biggest fear or what keeps you from sharing the gospel, from scattering the seed? What is the lie the devil keeps telling you to try to keep you from sharing that word? When you look at a person, that friend or family member or even stranger, do they look like a barren wasteland where you are sure that seed won’t take root? Where you focus on their spiritual condition and forget the power of the Word? Is it because you don’t know what to say or how to say it? Where you think that because you don’t have precisely the right words, or the right phrase that there is no way the seed would take root? Those times where you are focusing too much on the person who scatters the seed instead of the power of the Word? Then there are those times where we have spread the word but we feel like our time is wasted because we don’t see the results. Where we think to ourselves, “Is this pointless?”
What’s the lie that Satan tells us? That the power of the Word to change hearts somehow rests on us, on our gifts, and abilities. That we somehow have the power that makes the seed take root and grow. He tries to get us to think that something that is really out of our control is our responsibility so that when we don’t see the results we want or when we shift the focus from God to us, we can start to think that it is pointless, we get discouraged, and it can lead us to not scatter the seed, share the Gospel, with people. The question becomes, “Do we trust that the Word works?”
We can’t do anything to turn dead enemies of God into living, breathing, children of God, through faith in God’s Son. No, only the Word of God can do that. And what’s the proof of that? Just look at you and me. When you were first brought to font for washing with water and the Word, did you say, “I think I will become a believer now? That I am going to cultivate soil of my heart and make it ready to accept God’s love? No. At the moment of our baptism we did absolutely nothing. God did it all. God planted the seed of his Word. That Word sprouted and grew. That Word bore fruits of faith in your life.
So what’s our responsibility then? We believe that the Word works and we act like the word works. Going back to the picture of the man scattering the seed. If he didn’t believe that seeds would grow, do you think he would put the work, time and effort in scattering the seed? No. Likewise if he believes that the seeds will grow do you think he would keep it in a jar on top of his shelf? No. When we recognize and believe that the Word works, what do we do? Do we put it on the shelf and ignore it? No! We spread it. We share it. We trust that it will accomplish the purpose for which God has sent it.
The apostles took comfort in this fact. Paul said in 1 Corinthians 3:6-7, “I planted, Apollos watered, but God was causing the growth. So then, neither the one who plants nor the one who waters is anything, but it is God who causes the growth.” Paul didn’t find comfort in how good his sermons were, or how articulate his arguments were. He found comfort in the fact that it is God who causes that seed to grow. And how does he do that that? Through his Word.
And if we go back to the parable there is a distinction between the sower and the seed. Each has a different role to play and a different job to do. The farmer can’t cause the seeds to grow. But neither can the seed sow itself. Isn’t that true in our spiritual lives? The gospel can’t sprout legs and take itself over to the ends of the earth. Sermons don’t write themselves (no matter how badly I want them to). And you can’t just place a bible next to your child’s bed and expect it to work faith in that child’s heart. God saw fit to use people to share that life-saving message with others. As followers of Jesus, we hear that Word and God causes our faith to grow, and we produce fruits and share that Word with others.
I think sometimes what can keep us from sharing the gospel is that we may be intimidated. From a worldly point of view, the kingdom of God seems to be no big deal. It appears as the smallest of seeds. A kingdom without a realm, without armies, without an imposing king. When Christ proclaimed the Word, the leaders of the time didn’t follow him. The pharisees, the teachers of the law, the priests, the rich Sadducees, they ridiculed him and even went so far as to crucify him. The beginnings of the New Testament church were so small almost invisible. Even now I think at times we feel small and insignificant with attacks against Christianity and moral truths that scripture proclaims.
Even though it starts out as a small muster seed, it grows up and becomes larger than all the garden plants. The kingdom of God started so humbly. It makes unnoticeable progress as it conquers hearts for Christ. The kingdom starts with a seemingly insignificant event. Maybe just someone thing someone said of God’s Word and yet it keeps growing. It creates this ripple effect.
In 2016 a group of 4 of us and one professor went to Morristown TN. We helped a lady do some house repairs and we went canvasing. We did mostly door hanging and had a few conversations. But I didn’t think anything significant took place. The pastor out there sent us an email a few months ago and said,
“First the bad. If you remember Irene Nelson, whose home we went to and finished some repairs and we did some of a BIC with her – she was the one whose husband of 35 years suddenly ran away with a 20-year-old college man. After a year her husband came back, which seemed like it was a good thing until he convinced her that it was best for all that they have an “open relationship.” When I pointed out that this was a terrible idea they decided to leave us for the ELCA church.
The good: The Bill and Barb Lerch family who you also met doing cold calls took the BIC and joined the church from your invitations. Their children and grandchildren then joined the church and we baptized their grandchildren. Their children have invited many of their friends who are now on our prospect lists. I bet at least twenty people have come into our church and half a dozen have joined because of that initial cold call. That initial invitation you gave has and will continue to have a huge ripple effect.”
My dear family, what are you going to do with those powerful seeds of God’s Word? You will do what any good farmer would do. Plant them. Maybe it is taking time out of your schedule to read your Bible. Read a mediation with your family. Share it with others. Christians, plant the seed. Do what God has given you to do. And let the Word do what only it can do. That’s how God grows his kingdom in your hearts and in our world, for your good and his glory. Amen.