* a sermon preached at New Hope Lutheran Church on July 16, 2017 *

Since sermons are primarily intended to be heard, you can listen along here.

Texts for the 6th Sunday after Pentecost:
Romans 8:1-11 + Matthew 13:1-9, 18-23

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Please pray with me:

Nurturing God,
We come to you this morning covered in dirt.
Dirty from our week, our expectations, our hurts, and our pains.
Things we’ve done, and things we’ve failed to do.
Plant in us this morning the truth of your immense love for us.
Water that truth with the nourishing waters of baptism,
And care for it, that it might take deep root in our lives.
Amen.

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There’s a common conversational method called the “Three Sieves” or “Three Filters”. Many people attribute it to Socrates or some other influential thinker, but the truth is, we don’t really know where it comes from. The premise is largely universal though.
Before one speaks, they should allow the thought or speech to pass through 3 filters: is it true, is it kind, and is it useful. The method has to do with how we create information or transmit information to one another.
The Quakers utilize a similar method at their meetings, whether in worship or in conversation with each other. The barometer they use centers around the question, “Will what I am about to say add something helpful to this discussion and move it forward?”

I think both of these methods try to get at the heart of what it means to be in relationship with one another in a community. And I think there are a few truths being expressed:
That in speaking kindly and truthfully, we do so out of love and a commitment to building up the community.
That it reflects a baseline of at least a desire to be in community together.
And there are certainly more truths to be uncovered, but the point is this: being in community with one another is difficult business. Simply because being in community with other people involves…other people…so communities are messy, multifaceted, nuanced, and complicated.

Quite a bit like parables in a lot of ways. Parables are stories with many different entry points and many different exits. There’s no one way to hear or receive a parable. They’re complex, layered stories with many truths existing within them.
But parables take a well-known action or lifestyle and approximate it to an abstract concept that’s difficult to understand. Like the kingdom of heaven…or the reign of God…or a life of discipleship…
Parables use the familiar to say something true or needful about the seemingly incomprehensible.
And it’s probably why Jesus uses them as a frequent method of teaching.

For years, sermons about this parable of the sower have been all about the ground, right? Like, “What kind of soil are you? Don’t be rocky or shallow soil, be good soil so that God’s word takes root in you and produces a bunch of stuff.”
Which is interesting because if the parable were all about the dirt, you’d think that it would be called the Parable of the Soil…

But if we consider the sower in the Parable of the Sower, we see someone who, honestly, I think is a little extravagant with her seeds. The parable doesn’t tell us that the sower goes out and carefully tills the soil so that when she does plant seed, it has the best possible chance of taking root and growing. No, the sower just goes out and starts throwing seed. Everywhere.
Doesn’t seem to take any special care with where the seeds are landing.

Which I think tells us something really significant about the heart of God. Because if God is the sower in the parable, then God is throwing out seeds—tossing out handfuls of God’s word of love and mercy and peace and compassion—like it’s going out of style.
Friends, the character of God is one of extravagance. Abundant and overflowing and generous measures of unconditional love, unmerited grace, and unrelenting compassion.
And if that’s the character of God, then it’s the character that we who call ourselves disciples and followers of this God are called to show as well.
That we communicate and demonstrate that same extravagant love and grace in the places where we find ourselves, charged with sowing those same seeds in our lives and in the lives of those we encounter.

And remember what I said about parables…that there are many entrances, many exits, and many truths. So our parable this morning isn’t just about the sower, right? I think the Parable of the Sower invites us to ask a lot of different questions.
In addition to the character of the sower, we might also wonder about the type of seed we’re sowing.
What kinds of handfuls of seeds are you throwing out? Is it good seed? Useful? Truthful? Kind?
If the seeds of the sower are the words of God, what words are you sowing?

What about where you’re sowing? Are you waiting for the perfect soil conditions to tell someone your story about how God’s love has impacted your life? Or is your testimony so compelling that, like the extravagant sower, you find yourself sharing handfuls of the ways and places you’ve experienced the life-changing and transformative love of God?

And finally, I do think it’s important to talk about the dirt, about the soil we find ourselves in, but maybe in a little bit different way. I wonder, what kind of soil do you think you are? What kind of soil do you think this place is?

To be completely honest, the question I’ve been wrestling with this week is, “How do you help people see that they really are very good soil?”
So much of our history with this parable is of trying to just be better dirt, to be a more worthy place for the word of God to take root and flourish. And that may be true of some communities.

I just don’t think it’s true of us right now at this moment.
Church, you are good soil. New Hope is very good soil.
I hope you can start to truly believe and internalize this.

This morning, we’re rejoicing with Lynnea and Alyssia as they celebrate their First Communion. These little ones are so, so hungry and eager for the love and goodness of Christ given for them in this magnificent meal, and they are so excited to share that with you.
This week we’ll welcome our siblings from El Buen Pastor in El Salvador and we’ll throw open our doors and our arms and shower them with the same warmth and hospitality that they show us every time we visit them.
Last week and in the weeks to come that Community Center over there is filled to the rafters with the shouts and squeals of young people who are learning and laughing and singing about a God who loves them beyond their wildest imaginations.

My goodness…
Keep planting, church. Keep cultivating this soil.
Keep speaking words that are true, kind, and useful.
Keep extravagantly planting the gracious, loving, compassionate words of God.
The fruits that are beginning to show are so, so good and abundant.