”CALLED

“Teaching in Parables 3 – The Growing Seed”

9.30am Sunday 28 September, 2008

Readings: Mark 4:26-29; 1 Corinthians 3:1-9 TNIV

Life is a mystery! There are many things in life that go on about us all the time that we do not fully understand. We know they happen, but do not how or why. The Book of Proverbs tells us of four such things among the sayings of Agur. It says: “There are three things that are too amazing for me, four that I do not understand: the way of the eagle in the sky, the way of a snake on a rock, the way of a ship on the high seas, and the way of a man with a young woman.”[1] I do not know too much about the first three, but the fourth never ceases to amaze me. Our reading this morning lists another, that of the growing seed. It is simply amazing how a grain of wheat that looks hard and lifeless has within it the potential for life. And even when a stalk of wheat is growing, it is amazing how at the top of the thin stalk a head begins to develop that grows into the full head of grain. Then when it is mature, it is harvested. That is the critical time for farmers as all the time, effort and money that has gone into preparing the ground, planting the seed can come to nothing if the harvest is not gathered in. When we lived in North Otago the wheat and barley harvest was always an anxious time for farmers. The weather conditions and the moisture content of the ripened grain had to be just right. The contractor harvesting the crop also needed to be free, as they would be contracted to do this for several farmers. A farmer’s worst nightmare was for a nor-westerly to start blowing just when the crop was ready to be harvested, as when the head is ripe the grains are easily shaken from the stalks and the harvest lost.

In Mark’s Gospel Jesus is again using an image that was well known to his hearers to teach an important truth about God’s kingdom. He says that the kingdom of God is like a man who sows seed on the ground. Once that was done there was little the farmer could do but to patiently watch and wait. It was now up to the soil to warm and moisten the seed so that it would germinate. The force of life within the seed pushes the shoot up through the soil towards the sun, which is vital for its growth and development. The soil must then provide the necessary nutrients for the plant to grow to maturity. Quietly, “night and day,” the soil nurtures the plant until the grain is ready for harvesting. The farmer might not understand how it all happens, but he knows if he does his part by preparing the ground well, sowing good seed, he can leave the rest up to nature. The soil is then the critical factor in the outcome. Jesus said, “All by itself the soil produces grain - first the stalk, then the head, then the full kernel in the head.”[2]

What can we learn from this story that is important for you and I today? Jesus is telling us “what the kingdom of God is like.”[3] We need to remember what whenever Jesus talks about the kingdom, he is talking about God’s reign and rule on earth, that he is the supreme being in the universe and is in control of the affairs of all of life. Jesus’ primary purpose for coming was to announce this fact. His first words as he began his public ministry, according to Mark were, “The time has come, the kingdom of God has come near. Repent and believe the good news!”[4] Jesus came to announce the arrival of God’s reign in human affairs. It is what Jesus taught his disciples to ask for in their prayers. They were to pray, “…your kingdom come, your will be done on earth as it is in heaven.”[5] You and I are to do the same. If you are a follower of Christ, you are a citizen of God’s kingdom, and you are to live as such. You might be a New Zealand citizen, or hope to be one day, but as a Christian you are also a citizen of heaven. Therefore, you are not to focus only on earthly things. The Apostle Paul says, “…our citizenship is in heaven. And we eagerly await a Saviour from there, the Lord Jesus Christ…”[6] If you are a follower of Christ, that is where your focus is to be. You have responsibilities to both realms, but the primary one is that of God’s kingdom. Earthly kingdoms are temporal, but God’s kingdom is eternal. We are to live each day in the light of that knowledge. God has set eternity in our hearts,[7] and one day his rule on earth will be as complete as it is in heaven. This is the first thing to remember.

Jesus then likens God’s kingdom to sowing and harvesting grain. What Jesus is saying is that just as a crop does not come to maturity and be ready for harvesting overnight, so the coming of God’s kingdom will come to pass over a period of time. It started with Jesus, and has been developing ever since. Although it is a process that will take time, the outcome is never in doubt. The harvest is inevitable. One day there will be a climax, just like when the time for harvesting comes. This is why the crop was sown in the first place. The farmer always has in mind the outcome of what he is working for. He can picture it in his mind, the fields of grain, their heads heavy with precious seed, swaying in the breeze waiting to be gathered in. At the critical moment the harvesters come and put their sickles to the crop. The sheaves are taken to the threshing floor where the grain is separated from the stalks. The chaff is blown away and the good seed saved. God’s kingdom is like that. There will be a climax to history. It will happen when Jesus returns. He will come in the Father’s glory and at his name every knee will bow and every tongue acknowledge that he is Lord.[8]

Because this will take time, patience is necessary. The fact that Jesus speaks of the farmer’s rising and sleeping can be understood as evidence of his patience. James says that farmers can teach us the kind of patience we need in their patiently waiting “for the land to yield its valuable crop…”[9] This can be the difficult part, for we live in an age where people want instant gratification. This generation has been rightly called the ‘NOW’ generation. (Story about microwave cooking) But God does not work that way. Things to do with his reign and rule on earth do not happen all at once. It takes time, just as slowly and surely as a crop grows and matures. Jesus makes reference to this when he outlines the different stages in the development of the crop – “…first the stalk (or grass, for that is what it looks like to begin with), then the head, then the full kernel in the head.”[10] This suggests an appointed order of development that may not be hurried or skipped over, nor can it be delayed. The growth process continues “night and day.” It is constant, never ceasing. You may not see any difference from one day to the next. The daily growth is almost unnoticeable. But over a period of time the changes are clear. Something is happening. When you apply this truth to daily life it means that God’s kingdom is constantly at work in you individually, within this congregation and in the world about you. Don’t miss the significance of Jesus’ using an ordinary image like this. It is not in the spectacular things like “marching armies, heroic deeds, and (valiant) exploits” that God does his work, but in “the humble, homely imagery of sowing, tilling and harvest.”[11] That is how he operates in your life, too. When you look back over the months and years the difference can be dramatic. There is a dynamic power at work that is unmistakeable. God’s reign in your life, and in the world around us, will bear fruit. Just as with nature, it is consistent, steady development that is the best type of growth. Things that spring up quickly often fade and wither just as fast. The seed of God’s kingdom will grow, but it is in his time and in his way, and cannot be hurried.

There are principles involved about the harvest, both physical and spiritual, that we cannot fully understand. We have to accept that this is the way God has ordered things.

We cannot make it happen. “All by itself the soil produces grain…” The Greek word used here carries with it the implication that the growth is automatic. This would be better translated, “without visible cause,” “incomprehensibly,” or even “effected by God” because many Jews considered the growth of plants to be the wondrous work of God, and not simply the result of a law of nature. This is equally true of God’s work in people’s lives. Paul was aware of this. He could share the good news and pray for its effectiveness, but the rest he had to leave to God. He said, “…only God … makes things grow.”[12] This truth is so important that Paul says it twice in this passage. God is the source of all life. When it comes to healing prayer it is exactly the same. You and I cannot heal people, but we know Jesus can. We can ask in prayer, and anoint with oil, and then seek to cooperate with the Spirit of God and bless what God is doing in the life of the person we are praying for. The critical thing is having the discernment to recognise what God is doing and then working with him.

This parable is further a timely reminder that we can never take over God’s work and leave him out of what we seek to do in his name. We are completely and utterly dependent upon him for the harvest. We do have a vital role to play in making the truth of God’s kingship known, but it is his power, not ours, that will bring that kingdom to fruition. It is reminder of the truths Jesus spoke of in his use of the image of the vine and its branches. He said, “…apart from me you can do nothing.”[13] This story keeps us humble. It is not of our doing that people are blessed through our ministry. It is the work of our sovereign God. We can do absolutely nothing without him.

Now you may be tempted to think that this story implies that we do not need to do anything about aiding the coming of God’s kingdom on earth. On the basis of this passage alone we could think that we can sit back and watch it all happen. But when we look at other parts of the Gospels, we see Jesus sending out the twelve and later the seventy with a sense of urgency to summon people to respond to the announcement of the kingdom of God, as he himself has been doing with a similar sense of urgency.[14] For example, we sense the same urgency in Jesus words to his disciples when he said, “The harvest is plentiful but the workers are few. Ask the Lord of the harvest, therefore, to send out workers into his harvest field.”[15] There are time constraints when the harvest is ready in both the physical and spiritual realms, as there is only a small window of time to gather it in. So this passage does not absolve us of our responsibility to carry our Christ’s Great Commission to win followers of Christ,[16] as our church’s vision statement says.

This is also an encouraging story because of the unshakeable confidence that the promised harvest will come. There is a certainty and confidence about it, and the Scriptures confirm it. This will be so because it is not dependent upon us. God himself will produce it. The Bible says, “…he who began a good work in you will carry it on to completion until the day of Christ Jesus.”[17] God does the work. We must cooperate with him, and the harvest of righteousness is assured. It is helpful at times to remind ourselves of who is it who works in us. Last week I was reading from Isaiah. In chapter 40 it gives an inspiring description of the God who is at work in our life and circumstances. Isaiah wrote this for his people in exile in Babylon to encourage them. He wanted to remind them of what was going on behind the scenes. They could only see their current situation. They believed God had forsaken them. They had given up hope. They could not believe for a different tomorrow. But God had not forgotten them. He was at work on their behalf, just as he is with every person and nation. Isaiah reminds them of who their God is. He is the One who measures the water in the hollow of his hands, who holds the dust of the earth in a basket, who weighs the mountains on scales, to whom the nations are like a drop in a bucket. He is the One who “sits enthroned above the circle of the earth,” who “stretches out the heavens like a canopy.” He is the One who “brings princes to naught and reduces the rulers of this world to nothing.” He is the One who created the heavens, who “brings out the starry host one by one, and calls them each by name.” And then he finishes by saying, “Do you not know? Have you not heard? The Lord is the everlasting God, the Creator of the ends of the earth. He will not grow tired or weary, and his understanding no one can fathom. He gives strength to the weary, and increases power to the weak. Even youths grow tired and weary, and young men stumble and fall; but those who hope in the Lord will renew their strength. They will soar like eagles; they will run and not grow weary, they will walk and not be faint.”[18]

This is the God we worship this morning. A God who can make streams flow in the desert, who can restore the years that the locust has eaten, who can bind up the bruised and broken hearted, who says, “I am the Lord who heals you.”[19] He is the One “who is able to do immeasurably more than all we ask or imagine according to his power that is at work within us.”[20] As we move to the time for healing prayer, he invites you to come to him today.

Prayer:

Thank you, Lord, that your kingdom is established by your own power, not by our ability. Help us to cooperate in your sovereign work, and to have full confidence that in our day, as in the days of Jesus, you will produce a harvest.[21]

David E. Garland, Mark: The NIV Application Commentary (Grand Rapids, MI: Zondervan,1996)

176 The growth of the seed into a blade, a head, and then the full grain suggests an appointed order of development that may not be hurried or skipped over, nor can it be delayed.

178 A second interpretation construes the details of the farmer’s rising and sleeping as an evidence of his patience. The parable encourages those who excitedly await the kingdom of God to have the same unhurried patience as the farmer. The growth of plants cannot be forced. Cf James 5:7-8

179 (This parable along with the one that follows) both … address the deceptive insignificance of the coming of the kingdom before its final manifestation. God’s purposes will be fulfilled in God’s way, and God entrusts the secrets of those purposes only to those who are willing to trust him despite unpromising appearances.

183 (God’s kingdom) comes incognito. And up to the very end, one can only trust that Jesus’ movement is God’s work when all things will finally be revealed. The kingdom of was present with the coming of Jesus. It was hidden but not invisible. Most did not see it. They were looking in all the wrong places for all the wrong things. Times have not changed, because people continue to fix their attention on all the wrong things in their search for God and meaning in their lives.

The ordinary imagery of the parables in Mark 4 is significant. It is “not that of marching armies, heroic deeds, and valorous exploits, but the humble, homely imagery of sowing, tilling, and harvest. …the kingdom of God appears lowly and vulnerable. (Quote from Gilbert G. Bilezikian, The Liberated Gospel; A Comparison of the Gospel of Mark and Greek Tragedy (Grand Rapids, MI: Baler, 1977) 74

184 The spectacular exercise of power is not always a sign of real strength. God’s reign, as Jesus pictures it, is not some massive juggernaut that mows down everything in its path. The signs pointing to God’s reign are incredibly humble… That is why so many will overlook its presence, underestimate its power, and shrug off its claim on their lives.

The working for the reign of God in the world rarely if ever makes the headlines. It will seem inconsequential to outsiders and even to insiders because God so often works silently and in ways human eyes are prone to overlook.

(there are certainties) We can be certain that God’s kingdom is at work in (185) the world in ways we do not know and in a manner that is not subject to empirical verification of mathematical formulation. From our finite perspective, we are ignorant of God’s grand schemes even when we are living in the midst of them. Cf. Paul Philippians 1:12-14)

The mystery of how God accomplishes his purposes in the world – so often silently and mysteriously – also applies to our situation. One finds life by giving one’s life, power by humbling oneself, and victory by being subject to defeats (see Is.52:13-53:12). The world operates from different standards by taking life, exerting power over others, and going out in order to conquer (Rev. 6:2). No wonder the world is blind to God’s presence and rule.

One needs a special faith to risk trusting one’s whole life to something that lies hidden – when it is in the seed stage or the blade stage. Grant helps us to understand what this faith is: “Faith means believing beyond the range of the evidence – not in spite of the evidence – but beyond it. (186) Faith means trust, adventure, self-committal, and its evidences are still the “things not seen.”[22]

(1) These parables should instill confidence that overcomes despair. When we cannot see what transpires under the ground as the seed winters in the earth, we can become discouraged. Observers can easily write off this movement, particularly in our hurried, pragmatic age that wants immediate gratification and results.

(Even God’s servants succumb to this at times.) Clarence W. Jones … felt called to begin pioneer work in radio evangelism in South America in the late 1920s. He asked and expected God to do great and mighty things. In the early going it seemed that every door of opportunity closed and his zeal flagged. He was discouraged, broken, “unable to shake of the feeling of total inadequacy and failure…” He decided to scuttle his ministry and to enlist in the Navy but was rejected – ironically, for imperfect vision.[23]

We cannot see into next week, let alone eternity, and we can become impatient waiting for God’s purposes (187) to come to fruition. … The parable assures us that when we sow God’s seed, it will accomplish its purpose. We may not be the ones who harvest the bounty, but it is not our harvest (1 Cor. 3:6-9). It belongs to God.

(2) These parables make the case that the seed’s success does not depend on our feeble efforts. … Success does not depend on the one who preaches but on God. … That does not mean that one is to be indifferent to how people respond, but we do not need to try and manufacture a response.

…the harvest remains under the sovereignty of God. We do not make the seed grow; we do not know how it grows – even in our own lives. Sometimes our frenetic activity may be a smokescreen that hides our lack of trust in God. … The parable allows us to stop concentrating on what we need to accomplish or have accomplished and to reflect on what God is accomplishing.

(3) The parables encourage patient faith. In an age of instantaneous communication and a time when children may ask their parents, “Why do microwave ovens take so long?” waiting can be intolerable. We are always in a hurry. Some may expect to plough a field, plant the seed, reap the harvest, thresh the grain, and bake the cake all in one worship service. The parables do not promise instantaneous growth. God gives the growth, and it follows an appointed order that cannot be hurried or bypassed. One must learn to allow the seed to do its work, to allow the word to persuade and to convert. All anxiety is therefore superfluous since events are out of human control. One needs to cultivate patience so that one can wait for God to bring about he culmination in its appointed time.

188 Elijah must come first, the Son of Man must suffer, the gospel must be preached to all nations, the disciples must face suffering, judgment will fall on Jerusalem. Then we await our Lord’s coming, who comes in God’s name.

[11] Quote from Gilbert G. Bilezikian, The Liberated Gospel; A Comparison of the Gospel of Mark and Greek Tragedy (Grand Rapids, MI: Baler, 1977) 74

[21] Cf. Dick France, Mark: The People’s Bible Commentary (Oxford, UK: Bible Reading Fellowship, 1996) 69.

[22] F.C. Grant, The Earliest Gospel (Nashville, TN: Abingdom, 1943) 85-86.

[23] Quoted from Ruth A. Tucker, From Jerusalem to Irain Jaya: A Biography of Christian Mission (Grand Rapids, MI: Zondervan, 1983) 145.