"GROWING THE KINGDOM"
Fourth Sunday after Pentecost (Proper 6)
June 17, 2018 (Fathers' Day)
Bethel Evangelical Lutheran Church
Glenshaw, Pennsylvania
TEXT:
[Jesus] said, "The kingdom of God is as if a man should scatter seed on the ground. He sleeps and rises night and day, and the seed sprouts and grows; he knows not how."
Mark 4:26, 27 (ESV)
It appears that one of our Savior's favorite teaching methods was the parable. The term "parable" has been defined as "a method of speech in which moral or religious truth is illustrated from an analogy derived from common experience in life" (The New Westminster Dictionary of the Bible, page 700). When Jesus told parables, it was not unlike what we do here on occasion when we have children's sermons--particularly the ones that include an object lesson of some sort. The lesson itself is no different than what is merely spoken or read, but somehow it seems to make a greater impact and is more easily remembered if there is something visual attached to it. A lost sheep or a lost coin, for example, seems to stick with people more than a story about straying Christians would. Putting the lesson in terms that the hearer lives with every day helps him or her to relate to what he or she is being taught.
In the Gospel for this morning Jesus tells a parable in which He uses the image of scattering seed and watching it grow to teach a lesson about how the kingdom of God grows. This is certainly a relevant and timely topic for the Church, especially since churches are constantly being bombarded by "Church Growth experts" with all kinds of studies and principles regarding the right and wrong way to "grow the Church." We are often told, in very secular and businesslike terms, what will work and what will fail--what is worth our effort and what is not. We are told that, in order to succeed in today's world, the Church has to market the Gospel of Jesus Christ in very much the same way that McDonald's markets its hamburgers. However, if we are really interested in seeing the kingdom of God grow, it only makes sense that the place to look for authoritative information on the subject is the Lord of the Church Himself.
The first thing that the Savior addresses in this parable is what we (His people) are able to do. He says with utter simplicity: "A man should scatter seed on the ground." This is what we are called to do--no more, no less. The seed that Jesus is talking about here (as we have learned from His other, more famous, parable of the sower) is the Word of God--specifically the Gospel of Christ. This is the means through which the Holy Spirit establishes the Church and causes it to grow. All of the programs and strategies of humans cannot do a thing to bring sinners to genuine repentance and saving faith. Only the Holy Spirit can accomplish that and He does it only through the Gospel as it is shared in Word and Sacrament. The Great Commission, with which we are all very familiar, is really nothing more or less than a commission to spread the Gospel through the Lord's appointed means of grace.
So the problem is not with the Gospel that we share; the problem is that we don't always share it. We have forsaken our real calling in life in favor of other things. Contrary to what many people seem to think, we who are the Church have not been called to be "nice guys" who are always agreeable and always give people everything that they want. We have not been called to make people feel good regardless of what they believe or how they choose to live. We have not been called to make everybody like us or admire us. What we have been called to do is to lay before people the Law and the Gospel--to preach sin and grace--to comfort the afflicted and afflict the comfortable. Being "nice guys" and meeting people's material needs and making people feel good and hoping that they like and admire us may or may not be things that support our proclamation of the Gospel, but none of these are ends in themselves. If we are not making it clear to people that they are sinners who deserve God's everlasting condemnation but who have nevertheless been saved by the grace of God revealed in the life and death of Jesus Christ, then we are neither plowing the ground nor scattering the seed that Jesus is talking about in the parable before us.
The Good News is that it's not up to us to produce the results of our sharing of the Gospel. Jesus says of the one who scatters the seed: "He sleeps and rises night and day, and the seed sprouts and grows, he knows not how." We need to be very careful in this growth-minded culture of ours not to pay so much attention to the "experts" and the "strategies" that they employ that we forget Who and what it is that really makes the kingdomof God flourish. In discussing the mission work of himself and other believers, Saint Paul warns against making too much of the human components of this work. He writes to the Corinthians: "I planted, Apollos watered, but God gave the growth. So neither he who plants nor he who waters is anything, but only God, who gives the growth" (1 Corinthians 3:6, 7). When the Gospel is preached and faith results, we praise God for it. But when the Gospel is preached and faith does not result, we don't despair and we don't try something different either. We continue to preach that same Gospel of Jesus Christ, confident that, according to the Lord's own promise, "[His] Word . . . will not return to [Him] empty, but will accomplish what [He] desire[s] and achieve the purpose for which [He] sent it" (Isaiah 55:11 NIV).
It is sad to see so many good Christian people trying so hard to do what only God can do. No matter what people may say or how nice it may sound, we are not called to win souls to Christ, because we cannot do that; only the Holy Spirit can. Neither are we called to be "effective" or "successful" as the world judges these things. What we are called to be is faithful--preaching "nothing . . . except Jesus Christ and Him crucified" (1 Corinthians 2:2) and not giving up on that Gospel of Christ no matter how many times it seems to fall on deaf ears. If we judge the validity of our witnessing on the basis of results that we can see, we will quickly become discouraged and despondent. And if we think it is up to us and our preaching to save the world, then we are playing God, because we are attempting to do what only He can do through His Holy Spirit. Don't misunderstand me: We have no choice but to share the Gospel, since it is through the Gospel that the Spirit works. But even when we faithfully proclaim that Gospel, the results are in God's hands.
To me, one of the comforting things about being a Lutheran is not having to keep score when it comes to being a witness for Jesus Christ. The question is not: "How many souls did you lead to accept Christ?" The question is: "Have you been faithful in sharing the Gospel of Jesus Christ?" The Lord doesn't hold us responsible for what is beyond our control. But just so we're not tempted to use that as an excuse, He does hold us accountable for making faithful use of the Gospel that He has given us and committed to us. The late Dr. Alvin Barry, when he was elected synodical president back in 1992 (right here in Pittsburgh, as a matter of fact), instructed our church to "keep the message straight" and "get the message out." This is the twofold goal of those who seek to grow the kingdom. That's all that we can do--and that's all that we need to do--for the Lord Himself will do the rest. That's the assurance that He Himself has given us in Scripture, saying through His apostle Paul: "In the Lord your labor is not in vain" (1 Corinthians 15:58).
Amen.
May the Lord bless your hearing of His Word, using it to accomplish in you those things for which He gave it. May you be enriched and strengthened in faith that you may leave here today to go out into our world armed with the whole armor of God, prepared to be able ambassadors of your Savior Jesus Christ. He who calls you is faithful, and He will do it. Amen.