Seeds in the Dirt

I don’t know a lot about farming, but many in this community do. Since you have some of the most fertile soil in the world, I was reading about the makeup of your soil. I found different nicknames for soil here like “buckshot”, “sand-blow”, “rice land”, “cotton dirt”, “precision leveled” or “gumbo.” All that to say, the condition and makeup of the soil is very important when preparing to sow a field.

But then there’s Jesus who starts talking about farming. Now Jesus is a carpenter. And the disciples were fishermen, tax collectors, doctors, and tent makers. So why is Jesus telling a story about farming on the side of the sea?

Jesus uses parables in lots of ways but would often use these stories to teach deeper things in ways that related to the listeners. And in an agrarian society, farming would have been a familiar illustration.

Jesus says a sower went out to sow. Not with a machine but with a bag full of seed and your arm to throw it. And so we have this sower who is sowing, but look at where all the seed lands. It lands on the path. It lands on the rocky ground. It is choked to death by weeds. It is scorched by the sun.

First of all, this sower is a terrible farmer. They are failing spectacularly so far. Everything the sower has sowed has failed. Failed attempt after failed attempt after failed attempt.

Ever been there? You hope this time it will be different. You try once more praying for a different result. Maybe this time something will change. Maybe this time all your efforts will prove worthwhile....only to find out it is the same again. A lot of effort for zero fruit. It is the definition of insanity, doing the same thing over and over and expecting different results. Perhaps you are all too familiar with the feeling of not landing on the good soil. Perhaps you are familiar with what it feels like to feel like you yield nothing.

But then there’s Jesus talking about a sower throwing some seeds in the dirt. Jesus knows failure. This passage is in the middle of opposition to Jesus in various towns like we mentioned last week. While Jesus had crowds of followers, there were many who wanted to kill him, who didn’t understand him, and who accused him of everything imaginable.

And yet Jesus says the sower continues to sow. Do we do this? We want to stop and reevaluate, to change our method, to maybe collect a soil sample or buy special plant food. But the sower doesn’t know which seeds will bear fruit and which will be choked. The sower simply sows.

And then some of the seed, about a 1/4 of the whole, happens to land on good soil. Whew! It’s about time. Now this good soil isn’t like all the the others. This is the Delta soil of the Bible, the stuff that yields abundant fruit.

But the disciples are confused. Jesus has shared all of this, and they are lost. Maybe they smiled and nodded along like they totally knew what he was talking about and now are pulling him aside and saying “hey rabbi, can you break this down for us? What on earth are you talking about?”

Jesus begins to explain it to them. What is sown is the word of God. Anyone who hears but does not understand is like one who has it snatched away by the enemy. This is when you hear the word but it just kinda sits there, failing to sink in or take root. This is the seed on the path with no soil at all to grow in.

Then there is the seed on the rocky ground. This is like the person who hears the word and receives it for a moment when things are good. But when things fall apart, there are no roots to hold onto and so faith falls away. This is shallow soil.

Then there is the seed that lands among the thorns. Temptations and the lure of wealth begin to choke the plant so that it cannot produce fruit. This is the seed that gets distracted and taken over by the weeds, a little at first, and then all at once.

But then there is the good soil, the Delta soil of the Bible like we mentioned. This stuff produces over and above. This is the soil that allows for deep roots. This is the soil that Jesus describes as one who hears and understands the word. I have heard some say that the dirt got in their blood here. It is part of who they are. It goes deep. The good soil is when we hear and understand and receive God’s word and it is becomes part of us. It grows deep roots in our soul. I’m willing to be you know some people with that good Delta soil in their veins- with roots that run deep.

When the disciples hear this, maybe they are wondering about what kind of soil they are.

Am I the good dirt, or the bad dirt? Am the the Delta soil, or do I have soil problems? It can be tempting to assume sometimes that we are the good soil, or at least fairly decent soil. We are somewhat fruitful and mostly faithful. We are like the song says somewhere between raising hell and amazing grace.

If we are honest, maybe we have been all types of soil before. Shallow. Scorched. Choked. Tempted. Never yielding much. And while it may be helpful to think about which kind of dirt you are, the story doesn’t end there.

The story doesn’t end with the seed. The story ends with the harvest. It ends with a handful of seed that landed on good soil and produced over and above- some thirty, some sixty, and some a hundred fold. The story ends with a miracle. Talitha Arnold says “sevenfold meant a good year for a farmer, and tenfold meant true abundance. Thirtyfold would feed a village for a year and a hundredfold would let the farmer retire to a villa by the Sea of Galilee.”

This isn’t a story that explains the mystery of why some hear and receive the word and why some don’t. It isn’t a story that teaches us better evangelism techniques or how we can learn to be the good kinda soil.

But it is a story about the goodness of God and how the desire of God to sow God’s word in our hearts is not dependent upon the condition of our soil.

It is a story that tells us of God who continues to scatter grace in a ridiculous and extravagant manner, almost wastefully. On the path. On the rocks. In the weeds. On the good soil. Across every surface of our lives.

It is a story that reveals God’s promise of a harvest. It is the story of God who can take little and yield much.

When I served at St. Luke in Tupelo, we were hit by a large tornado. The Joyner neighborhood around us was impossible to drive through with trees down everywhere. The earth had been ripped open. We decided we needed some signs of hope. We ordered hundreds upon hundreds of yellow daffodil bulbs. We bagged them up and wrote cards and placed them on the doorsteps of every house in the neighborhood. There were bulbs everywhere. So, so many of them. And we waited. We didn’t know if they would get thrown away or if they would be planted or if we would see anything at all.

But time went by. I had almost forgotten about them. Until one day the yellow flowers in the neighborhood caught my eye. A few here. A few there. Tucked around house after house. A reminder of a God who scatters grace over every surface. A God who delights when we hear and receive him. A God who takes little and makes much.