Kingdom Fruit: Soil

Welcome/Intro/Prayer/Scripture Reading

Greeting:

Good Morning Church! How is everyone doing this morning?

Series Refresher:

The Series that We have been going through the past several months has been called Growing Fruit, for most of this series we have been focusing on looking inwardly as a starting point for producing outward fruit. My hope is that we have been blessed and transformed by this journey together.

Intro:

Me- When I first began studying this passage, I was challenged by it. I have preached on this passage several times. I have usually talked about how this passage is about the sower, sowing with reckless abandon. This is so True, but then the Spirit asked, What about the soil?

What about the soil in your heart Joe? Is my word something you hear once and your good to go the rest of your life?

Joe, youve preached about looking within and reflecting on whats inside, the self, dealing with conflict, but have you invited me into that space recently?

What’s gotten in the way of you producing fruit for my Kingdom?

You- So church I bring these questions to you too church!

Is God’s word something we just hear once or should we expect to hear from God more? When did you last hear from God?

What has gotten in the way of us hearing from God? What other voices have we listened to?

One Pastor says,

Because life is hard and unfair, we can respond to life from a carnal mind-set and become, hard hearted. When other people attack you, malign you, abuse you, gossip about you, slander you, or hurt you, the natural response is to protect yourself. You will either rise up and lash back, recoil and put up a wall to shield yourself from continued attack or you will run in order to escape. Whether you rise up, recoil or run, you will have a tendency to hold on to the hurt and play back in your mind the scenes of attack and hear over and over again the hurtful words that were spoken. As you harbor those images and words, if you do not allow God to bring you healing and help, you can become hardened by bitterness. Through unforgiveness and resentment, you can become so hard that your heart is unresponsive to God’s Word and your life never changes.

How can we invite God in to produce more fruit in our life?

Prayer and Scripture Reading

Transition: As we hear the scripture reading this morning, Id invite you to see this text with Fresh Eyes. See yourself as not just the sower, but also the soil! Invite God’s spirit to speak to you here in this space, would you pray with me to prepare our hearts this morning?

Prayer:

transition: Let us dive deeper into the text this morning and allow God to speak to us and shape us, just as Jesus did when he first spoke these words.

Diving in and Living Out the Word: Luke 8:4-15.

Context:

Agriculture: Farming was the main source of both lively hood and sustance in Jesus’ time. Most people grew in order to eat. Whatever they didnt grow for their own families. They sold to buy other life sustaining products.

Soil- The rocky soil, at least in Palestine, is hard to spot, since in the hill country, much topsoil is set thinly over a limestone rock base. Weeds are also plentiful, with some able to grow up to six feet in height. The parable also speaks of a hundredfold yield, which is not bad in a culture that expected a seven to tenfold yield . All these natural factors of everyday farming add life to Jesus’ imagery. Anyone who worked in the field or walked by them would know the hazards of sowing seed.

Farmers, how important is soil in the growing process? Share about some struggles you have with Soil!

Jesus is comparing hearing God’s word to something that was done throughout the daily life of the average person of that time, depending on what they were growing and the time of year. Jesus is also talking about perhaps the most important part of the farming process the soil: the place of all the nutrients and where the seed begins. He wanted his audience to listen. It was as critical as the food they would produce for themselves. Let us listen with the same care and attention. Lets look at take a closer look at the Parable of the Sower

The Four Soils

The Seeds that fell on the Road and the birds stole away.

Lukes Gospel is unique in that it adds that this seed was trampled on beated up, stepped on I think this is interesting, because when we feel like we have been walked on and stepped on, abused and hurt its often difficult to listen.

Even if its not people directly, maybe its just been a hectic week at work and you feel like you are just spinning.

Jesus later says that this soil is the person who has the devil stealing the Word of God from their heart. The devil is real church and He uses things like hurt, distraction and delay to steal God’s word from us.

He does this in both the soil and the sower. He does this in the soil by saying, you can listen later and to the sower you can share the good news later. But now is the time to start listening.

The Shallow Soil on the Rock.

Rocky Soil is not rooted. It looks hopeful on the surface, but it doesnt take root.

Rocks in soil is quite a pain, because on the surface the soil may look fine, and the seed might sprout up with joy, but unrooted it will eventually wither and die.

Jesus said the soil with the rocks are ones that receive word and for a little while believe, but when tempted they fall away.

Unpack this in two parts:

Fall away when tempted, this can happen in a moment by moment basis. This doesnt just refer to apostacy or people who leave the faith.

There are times when I can do my devotions before going to work and then within an hour get frustraited with a customer or co-worker.

There are other times when I can have a wonderful time with God on the way to the gym, but then Im distracted by what others are wearing at the gym and loose focus on God. Those are also examples in of rocky soil.

So what are the rocks in our soil? or as some call them, “New England Potatoes”

I think they can be sin, bitterness, anger, lust, doubt , low self-esteem, pride, and even insecurity, because all of these things get in the way of God’s word taking root!

The Soil in the Thorns and Weeds

This is the soil that has so much other junk that there is no room for growth.

This is when are hearts get so filled with other things that our hearts get chocked out. These are the things that take up our thought life. Our distractions. Our

Jesus says, that these are the ones who, as they go about their lives, are choked by the concerns, riches, and pleasures of life, and their fruit never matures.

If we are honest, it would be easy for us to be this kind of soil most of the time. We are so busy that we can just go about our lives focused on to do lists, what we need to do at home, planning the next thing, that for some of us its not even about focusing to much on idols over God’s word its just too much in our lives. Yet, i could refer to our idols too.

For me that might be woodworking, technology, or even school, but these thorns and weeds are different for everyone.

This things arent bad, but when they come before the things you actually need to flourish and bear fruit they can kill you.

A woman bought a parrot to keep her company but returned it the next day. "This bird doesn’t talk," she told the owner. "Does he have a mirror in his cage?" he asked. "Parrots love mirrors. They see their reflection and start a conversation." The woman bought a mirror and left.

The next day she returned; the bird still wasn’t talking. "How about a ladder? Parrots love ladders. A happy parrot is a talkative parrot." The woman bought a ladder and left.

But the next day, she was back. "Does your parrot have a swing? No? Well, that’s the problem. Once he starts swinging, he’ll talk up a storm." The woman reluctantly bought a swing and left.

When she walked into the store the next day, her countenance had changed. "The parrot died," she said. The pet store owner was shocked. "I’m so sorry. Tell me, did he ever say a word?" he asked. "Yes, right before he died," the woman replied. "In a weak voice, he asked me, ’Don’t they sell any food at that pet store?’" (Leadership, Fall 1996)

The fourth Soil: The one that grew and produced fruit a hundred fold

This is the soil that Jesus says, hear the word, commit to it, live justly, and are resolved to bear fruit. This is what Jesus calls us to be good soil that produces fruit.

Yet, we can easily get discouraged when we don’t produce fruit. We cant force our own fruit. its a process. Eugene Peterson says

The person who looks for quick results in the seed planting of well-doing will be disappointed. If I want potatoes for dinner tomorrow, it will do me little good to plant them in my garden tonight. There are long stretches of darkness and invisibility and silence that separate planting and reaping. During the stretches of waiting, there is cultivating and weeding and nurturing and planting still other seeds

Transition: There is one other portion of text that I want to unpack this morning and that is what happens between the parable and Jesus’ explination. Lets look at 9-10 (Slides)

What is Jesus saying in these verses

He’s not saying he doesnt want people to not see and not here

He is discribing how people will respond. People that only half see and half listen.

As a man and a husband, I struggle with this reality. My wife will sometimes say something and Ill be listening, but not really listening. Can I get an amen wives?

Last year, Jess hid my birthday cake in the fridge all day. Just my moving the things I look for most and use most all to one place. This is what Jesus is describing.

But, its to the disciples that the mysteries of the Kingdom are revealed.

Why, because they listen and ask questions, they hear and they want to go deeper they want to know more. Jesus wants us to be intentionally listening for and to God’s word

Transition: So What does this parable change for us? What is Jesus calling us to today. Well, I think its the same thing that Jesus was saying to his audiance. He was calling them to be aware of the soil. That is what he is calling us to today, to intentionally listening for God’s word and be aware of the Soil.

Application/ Closing

Let me tie this together with an image of a Garden.

The Garden of the Soul

There is a garden. A place of beauty and majesty. A garden as complex and diverse as each one of us. In that garden exists every wild flower, bush and plant one could imagine. There are delicate and stunning roses. Proud and strong sunflowers. There are big burly bushes and brambles like the ones you may have played in as small children and that small creatures of every kind call home. Grasses short and tall that dance to cadence of the breeze’s melody. Mosses that spread like green clouds over the face of the earth. Underneath, the roots of Trees tunnel deep stretching ever deeper into the unknown. Small cherry and apple trees providing sweet treats for all who pass by. The mighty oak giants and aromatic walnut trees tower above watching over all of life below. Underneath all of this exists layers of nutrient rich soil providing life to all of the plants above. And within the garden, crystal clear steam flows bringing life to each plant and creature in the garden.

Yet, there is a sickness that plagues the garden it, creeps in from the edge and festers in the secret places. The sickness starts like a small pebble in the soil and grows like a ravenous cancer. This sickness is the weeds and thorns that rob from the flowers and chock out the bushes. This sickness is a poison that kills the Garden’s watchtowers from the inside out. A sickness that threatens to destroy all of life in the garden. An evil that taints the waters and pollutes every root and clogs up the stream leaving only stagnant waste.

In everyone of us, deep within us, exists a garden. Left unattended the sickness will reign, weeds take root, thorns and thistles chock out. If left untended our garden will become stagnant and decayed. Soil suffocated by callous and stone, streams riddled with sludge and filth. But, who will save the garden? Who will keep away the curse? Who will uproot the vile and decay? Only the Master Gardener can, open the gate my friends and let him in to tend to the garden deep within.

Jesus wants to tend the gardens of our souls, Church

For us to be listeners that Go deeper so that we will seek and find, God rather than satan snatching the word away.

To dig up the rocks in our soil.

To uproot the weeds and thorns that plauge and destroy.

To make a fruitful and flourishing Garden. James writes about this, He says,

So throw all spoiled virtue and cancerous evil in the garbage. In simple humility, let our gardener, God, landscape you with the Word, making a salvation-garden of your life. - James 1:21 (MSG Sldie)

Church, What Kind of Soil are we? Where does God need to tend to the garden of our hearts and souls so that we can produce a harvest 100 fold?

Would you pray with me and invite the Holy Spirit to do this work in in each of us right now?

Prayer: