7.16.23 "Let's Seed What Happens!" Westminster Presbyterian Church, Pasadena, CA

 Psalm 65.1-4; Matthew 13.1-9, 18-23

I am the hard-beaten soil, and couldn’t care less … God’s Word comes to me, like seed sown by a farmer … sown without regard, without precision … sown generously, graciously … seed, flung far and wide … 

Some falls on the hard-beaten soil of my heart - self-centered as I am, and broken, in a lot of places … the good seed falls on the hard-beaten soil, bounces and rolls, and comes to a stop, going nowhere, and I could’t care less.

The birds feast on the seed … and that’s good for the birds … and maybe they say thanks, in their own way, and maybe they don’t … 

when the seed is gone, the birds take flight to another field … and that’s that, no fuss, no muss … I am the hard-beaten soil, and I couldn’t care less.

I am the rocky soil … stones and dried up weeds … the seed flung high and wide by the generous farmer falls my way, amidst the rocks and dried up weeds … 

the seeds find a home for awhile, sink a root, but in no time at all, it’s a shallow business, and when the sun comes out, bright and hot, those seeds and their roots are baked into dust … and that’s that, no fuss, no muss … and I couldn’t care less.

I am the soil with the thorns … hard, prickly thorns … some of the good seed falls there and takes root, but the thorns grow up hard and fast  - the good seeds are choked to death by the thorns …  

cares and worries overwhelm, fears and frustrations gnaw away at my soul, doubts and cloudy memories … so many things distress and disturb, distract and detract … and maybe I do care, a little.

I am the good soil … and there’s plenty of good soil … good soil for the seed sown generously by God … good soil, where the seed takes root … 

the good soil’s been there from the beginning, like an Iowa corn field, where the loam is eight feed deep and rich with nutrients … 

good soil, from the moment of my birth … the church of Jesus Christ … grandparents and great grandparents fluent in the language of faith, the hymns of the church, the prayers of the saints, Reformed and Lutheran … not a perfect family, but a family, nonetheless, where faith lived, and God was honored … 

And I do care, and I’m grateful … because the Word of God has produced, I’d like to think, a good and generous harvest … though parts of my life are hard and shallow and full of thorns, there’s another part of my life, the larger part of my life, and your life, too, where the harvest is plentiful, where the seed of God’s Word has taken root, and grows well … 

and I do care, I care a lot, I care about the things of God … I care about this world, and how it’s going … I care about my place in the world - as a servant of Christ, a minister ordained in the life and purpose of the Presbyterian church … I care … 

I care how I live, and how I think … I care about my values, and how I vote … I care about the prayers I offer, for myself my family, for the nation, for the world, and this church and our presbytery … I care a lot, about what I read and how I study, and how I write my sermons … the good soil of my life …

lots of it, plenty of it, acres of it.

Each one of us is like that farmer’s field … the hard-beaten pathways, where the birds are fed … the shallow rocky soil where the seed springs up, and then dies quickly under the burdens of the day … and the thorns, plenty of those: my sins, your sins … the sins of the mothers and the fathers, the sins of the nation, and the sins of the world … 

But always the good soil, plenty of it … with an abundant harvest … a glorious harvest … Jesus exaggerates beyond reality on this one … a hundredfold harvest is simply impossible … so is sixty, and even a fortyfold harvest would be a wonder … 

Jesus exaggerates because he’s talking about the work of God.

God’s love is always greater than we can imagine, more than we can calculate … a love surpassing all the means of measurement … and in this love, we find our way … and learn the power of saying Thanks!

If the church has a purpose, it’s this: to say thanks … thanks be to God … for creation, for Christ, for the cross and our redemption … for the hope that is ours in Christ … for the good soil of our soul.

The Psalmist says it well:

Praise is due to you, O God, in Zion; and to you shall vows be performed …

Mary Oliver, the poet, says it well:

 

I can’t remember

every spring,

I can’t remember

everything —

 

so many years!

Are the morning kisses

the sweetest

or the evenings

or the inbetweens?

All I know

Is that “thank you” should appear

somewhere.

 

So, just in case

I can’t find

the perfect place —

“Thank you, thank you.”

Whatever the future holds for Westminster, let Westminster make a vow, here and now, forever and a day - Westminster Presbyterian Church will be a place of thanksgiving … 

Where the complaints of the world are balanced by the hope of the Gospel …

Where the disappointments of life are healed by the promises of God …

Where greed is challenged by the power of generosity … the desire to accumulate is offset by simpler living … where less is more, and more just isn’t needed.

At one point on our recent trip, we walked by a store, and for a moment we thought we’d stop in, and then I said, “Nothing of interest,” and we walked on … 

In Portugal, I wrote this note: Eating a peach this morning, juice on my chin, dripping into the sink, I thought: "I'm eating a miracle." A seed, a tree, sunshine, and from the earth, the tree draws forth moisture and elements, and puts it all together to create a peach, full of juice, sweetness, and pleasure.

Our world suffers under the weight of accumulation, misplaced priorities, the failure to eat a peach.

We need to better manage our wants, so we can do a better job with our needs - the material needs of millions - clean water, adequate nutrition, shelter and safety … the social needs of acceptance and affirmation … access to education and opportunity.

In those parts of the world world where the material needs are met, the spiritual needs are too easily disregarded: our need for love, for hope, forgiveness, peace of mind, and a genuine sense of purpose … our need for something more than the one life we have.

Dear friends in Christ, we are what we are … a field of dreams … yet even a field of dreams has its share of thorns and thistles, rocks and weeds, shallow soil and hard-beaten pathways … 

But enough good soil, more than enough, where the word of God finds a home, where the love of God grows an abundant harvest, an impossible harvest - a harvest of faith, hope, and love.

The Psalmist put it like this: We shall be satisfied with the goodness of your house, your holy temple.

Hallelujah and Amen!

September 6, 2015, "It Will Work"

Mark 4.3-9

Disappointment!

Who hasn't been disappointed?

Family, friends … school, career, health, love … you name it …

Things go south.

Life grows dark.

Hopes drift away.

Disappointment?

The crowds on the Galilee Beach know all about disappointment … 

They live under an oppressive Roman Empire … family farms lost to large agri-corporations under contract to Rome … 

Fishermen in the crowd wonder if the next catch of fish will pay the bills … farmers wonder if the rains might come in time. 

Merchants and artisans … tax collectors and soldiers … widows and orphans … life ain’t easy for any of them.

And religion? 

It’s a big business in Jerusalem …

Temple taxes, expensive lambs, bulls, goats and birds …currency traders, money changers, souvenir merchants …

Temple officials in long robes with fancy phylacteries …

The well-to-do make a show of their offerings …

And the widow is ignored.

Disappointment? You bet!

The crowds on the Galilee Beach know all about it.

And to that crowd, Jesus says: “A sower went out to sow.”

A sack of seed slung around the neck … the sower grabs a fistful, flings that seed far and wide …

Hungry birds … rocky ground, shallow soil … thorns and thistles … hot sun and dry winds, they all have their way … the best laid plans of mice and men often go astray.

Says Jesus to his disciples: I’m asking a lot of you … take the message of peace into a troubled and troubling world … what you do will be challenged at every turn of the road … some will welcome you with open arms; others will seek your death … there will be hardship and rejection and frustration and tears … a lot of what you do will seemingly go to waste.

In the Kindergarten Classroom across the hall from my office, a sign on the wall: “Take chances, make mistakes, get messy.”

Pope Francis said: “I prefer a Church which is bruised, hurting and dirty because it has been out on the streets, rather than a Church which is unhealthy from being confined and from clinging to its own security.”

Bonhoeffer is hanged in a Nazi Prison just months before the end of the war … who knows what he might have accomplished had he lived, but in his death, the seeds of an amazing witness were sown … every seminary student since those terrible, fateful, days has cut her teeth on Bonhoeffer.

Even deeper goes the story … the whole of the Bible is a response to trauma … from Genesis to Malachi … from Matthew to Revelation … from Assyrian defeat of the Northern Kingdom to the Babylonian conquest of the Southern Kingdom … from the crucifixion of Jesus to the the stoning of Stephen … from Paul’s conversion on the Damascus Road to the Fall of Jerusalem … how to make sense of it all … how to find hope in the midst of so much blood and war … and what’s one to do, Give up? grow dour and dark? embrace hedonism: eat, drink and be merry, for tomorrow we die?

The tone is set in the opening verses of Genesis - written during the dark days of the Babylonian Exile, when hope was as rare as rain in Los Angeles … and a Hebrew Poet took up a pen and wrote: the earth a formless void and darkness covered the face of the deep … and the wind of God swept over the face of the waters … and God said, “Let there be light,” and there was light. And God saw that the light was good.

Keep on sowing, says Jesus!

Sun and soil, wind and rain, conspire together, to work their magic … the seed softens, a sprout pushes upward toward the sky, a root reaches downward into the earth.

And then, the harvest … yielding thirty-fold, says Jesus … and that would be a very good harvest … 

And even sixty-fold … farmers in the audience smile and nod at one another … “don’t we wish” … 

And, then, like a good story teller, Jesus offers an exaggeration, “a hundred-fold,” says he … and by then, the audience is clear:

Don’t give up the work of sowing … it will work! 

Don’t count the cost, count the blessing!

Don’t fret about the loss, celebrate the gain.

Don’t grumble about rocky soil, sing a song of joy.

Don’t worry about the birds; they’re hungry, too.

And so the work of God goes on - always a harvest, a harvest of some kind … and sometimes, an incredible harvest, far and beyond what anyone expected …

For all the darkness, there’s light.

For all the loss, there’s gain.

For all the hardship, there’s hope.

For all the sweat, blood and tears, there’s progress.

Joshua fits the battle of Jericho … and down falls the wall.

David slings a well-aimed stone … and down goes Goliath.

Elijah prays to the LORD … and down rains heavenly fire.

Ezekiel prophesies to dry bones … and down comes the breath of God.

Keep on sowing …

Remember 1989? … the Berlin Wall comes down …

More recently, the Supreme Court opens wide the doors of Marriage Equality …

On another note, I’m pulling for the deal with Iran …

Because all of this leads to a perfect world?

A world of peace and joy?

Harmony and flowers?

Shine on harvest moon?

Are you kidding?

No …

More like singing in the rain!

We don’t expect perfection … there is always resistance to the good … always those who choose exclusion rather than welcome, who twist religion into a reason for hatred … and for all of us here, no matter the purity of our commitment, our own foolishness and ineptitude trip us up all the time … but neither do we give up!

The hallmark of all great stories … Harry Potter and Voldemort … Luke Skywalker and Darth Vader … Frodo and Sauron … 

Oh, the price to be paid … the hurt, the tears … the loss of hope when the darkness grows thick …

Yet Harry Potter remains loyal to his friends … Luke Skywalker stays the course … Frodo carries the One Ring to Mount Doom … 

And Jesus says, A sower went out to sow …

Though the land is full of war and rumors of war … sow the seed of peace … 

Though rough weeds choke the harvest … sow the seed of justice …

Though hot blow the winds of hatred … sow the seed of love …

Don’t look for perfection … 

Take some chances …

Be ready for disappointment …

Trust the harvest; it will come …

And so ends our summer sermon series: the parables and stories of Jesus … it’s been a good series, and we’ve learned a lot … and now we move on.

A new season of ministry … First Kids First begins anew next week Sunday … the Cathedral Choir returns well rested and in good voice, our staff is ready go, Steven Colbert is on the Late Show, and Scott is preaching about the hole in the ground and how to put it to good spiritual use … a new season of ministry is upon us.

Keep up your good work First Church, and work all the harder - to make everything all the better … 

Keep on sowing … the harvest is good!

Amen and Amen!