Date: 07/10/2005
Feast: 15th s in o
Church: LHPC
Bible text: Genesis 25:19-34 and Matt. 13:1-9,18-23
Theme: Parable of sower


NARRATOR

These are the descendants of Isaac, Abraham's son:
Abraham was the father of Isaac,
and Isaac was forty years old when he married.


REBEKAH

A late bloomer, eh?


ISAAC

I had a traumatic childhood. Effected my emotional life.
My father once tried to sacrifice me on a mountaintop.


REBEKAH

Really? What stopped him?



ISAAC

There was a ram with its horns caught in a thicket,
and the voice of God told him to sacrifice the goat instead.


REBEKAH

A much tastier choice.


ISAAC

Yes, but it took a lot of therapy to get over it.
I still can’t eat barbeque.


NARRATOR

…and Isaac was forty years old when he married Rebekah, daughter of Bethuel the Aramean of Paddan-aram,
sister of Laban the Aramean.


ISAAC

That’s quite a last name there, Becky.




REBEKAH

I come from good stock. Healthy genes are everything.


NARRATOR

Isaac prayed to the Lord for his wife, because she was barren;
and the Lord granted his prayer,
and his wife Rebekah conceived.
The children struggled together within her;
and she said,

REBEKAH

Owwwww!!!!!


NARRATOR

And she said, "If it is to be this way, why do I live?"


REBEKAH

That’s another way of saying it.


NARRATOR

So she went to inquire of the Lord. And the Lord said to her,
"Two nations are in your womb.”


REBEKAH

Tell me something I don’t know.


NARRATOR

Please don’t interrupt the Lord.
"Two nations are in your womb,
and two peoples born of you shall be divided;
the one shall be stronger than the other,
the elder shall serve the younger."


ISAAC

Oh dear. What was that therapist’s phone number?


NARRATOR

When her time to give birth was at hand,
there were twins in her womb.
The first came out red, all his body like a hairy mantle;


ISAAC

Ew.


ESAU

A manly man’s man if ever there was.


NARRATOR

so they named him


JACOB

Harry?


ESAU

Shut up.


JACOB

No you shut up.


NARRATOR

so they named him Esau.


JACOB

Tell them what it means in English.


ESAU

Harry.
Such creative parents, we’ve got.


NARRATOR

Afterward his brother came out,
with his hand gripping Esau's heel;


ESAU

He’s touching me!


JACOB

Am not.


ESAU

Get off me you little girly man.


NARRATOR

so he was named Jacob.


ESAU

And what does Jacob mean in English?


JACOB

Heel-holder.


ESAU

Yeaaaah.


NARRATOR

Isaac was sixty years old when [Rebekah] bore them.


REBEKAH

To say nothing of how old Rebekah was.


NARRATOR

When the boys grew up,
Esau was a skillful hunter, a man of the field.


ESAU

Give me a 4-wheeler, a shotgun and stand aside.


NARRATOR

while Jacob was a quiet man, living in tents.


JACOB

Mom! Dad!
The Food Network is having a special on barbequed vegetables!

ISAAC

Don’t say barbeque!


NARRATOR

Isaac loved Esau, because he was fond of game;


ISAAC

Game on, son.


ESAU

Game on, Dad.


NARRATOR

but Rebekah loved Jacob.


ESAU

Mama’s boy.


JACOB
Brainless beefcake.


ESAU

Veggie-tail.


JACOB
Mommm!


NARRATOR

Once when Jacob was cooking a stew,
Esau came in from the field, and he was famished.
Esau said to Jacob,


ESAU

“Let me eat some of that red stuff, for I am famished!”


JACOB

For your information,
it’s a tomato-lentil bisque
with garlic and a touch of Tabasco.


ESAU

Yeah. Just like I said. Red stuff.


NARRATOR

(Therefore [Esau] was called Edom.)

JACOB

Let me guess, it means, “ghastly creature.”


ESAU

It means, “ruddy man.”


JACOB

Makes “heel-holder” sound better all the time.


NARRATOR

Jacob said,


JACOB
“First sell me your birthright.”


NARRATOR

Esau said,


ESAU

“I am about to die; of what use is a birthright to me?”


NARRATOR

Jacob said,


JACOB

“Swear to me first.”


NARRATOR

So he swore to him, and sold his birthright to Jacob.
Then Jacob gave Esau bread and lentil stew,
and he ate and drank, and rose and went his way.
Thus Esau despised his birthright.
Matthew 13:1-9 (Children’s Sermon)
Later that same day, Jesus left the house and went down to the beach, where a huge crowd soon gathered. He got into a boat, where he sat and taught as the people listened on the shore.
He told many stories such as this one:
“A farmer went out to plant some seed.
“As he scattered it across his field, some seeds fell on a footpath, and the birds came and ate them.
“Other seeds fell on thin soil with rock just underneath. The plants sprang up quickly, but they soon wilted under the hot sun and died because the roots had no food or water from the shallow soil.
“Other seeds fell among thorns that shot up and choked out the tender blades.
“But some seeds fell on fertile soil and produced a crop that was thirty, sixty, and even a hundred times as much as had been planted.
“Anyone who is willing to hear should listen and understand!”



Matthew 13:10 His disciples came and asked him, "Why do you always tell stories when you talk to the people?"
11 Then he explained to them, "You have been permitted to understand the secrets of the Kingdom of Heaven, but others have not.
12 To those who are open to my teaching, more understanding will be given, and they will have an abundance of knowledge. But to those who are not listening, even what they have will be taken away from them.
13 That is why I tell these stories, because people see what I do, but they don't really see. They hear what I say, but they don't really hear, and they don't understand.
14 This fulfills the prophecy of Isaiah, which says: `You will hear my words, but you will not understand; you will see what I do, but you will not perceive its meaning.
15 For the hearts of these people are hardened, and their ears cannot hear, and they have closed their eyes-- so their eyes cannot see, and their ears cannot hear, and their hearts cannot understand, and they cannot turn to me and let me heal them.'
16 "But blessed are your eyes, because they see; and your ears, because they hear.
17 I assure you, many prophets and godly people have longed to see and hear what you have seen and heard, but they could not.

Why would Jesus intentionally make himself hard to understand?
Why would he tell stories that sound simple enough for children to get, but tough enough for adults to miss?
And why would he teach down by the beach?
Sitting in a boat?
Instead of in a classroom where people could take proper notes?

If we were able to take a look around the crowd of students who came to hear Jesus, what kind of people would we see?

Some of them might be farmworkers.
Men and women (and children) who made their living planting seeds and praying that they’d grow into produce.
People who shooed the birds away.
People who carefully chose land with deep, rich soil.
People whose hands were sore from cutting away thorns, whose hands were swollen from the thorns that had cut them in defense.

Some of Jesus’ students might be women.
Women were forbidden from getting an education in the synagogue.
They might have come to hear Jesus teach them about the scripture and its laws that ruled their lives with an invisible, stern hand.

Some of Jesus’ students might have been people sick with disease.
Again, people with birth defects, people with certain illnesses, were kept off of God’s holy ground by the religious leader-men (and God forbid any of the leader-men should ever become sick, or produce children whose bodies were less than perfect).
But whomever came to hear Jesus preach on the beach, all of Jesus’ students were sinful creatures.
This much we know for sure.
The difference is, they were well aware of being sinful creatures, probably because they had been told as much by their religion.
There’s a big difference between organized religion and faith.
And, the even bigger difference is that Jesus was well aware of his students’ sinful condition, too.
And he still taught them.
He taught them where he found them.
He taught them where they found him.
And he didn’t teach them as the leader-men did, with big words and pompous attitudes.
He told them stories about – farmers.
He told them stories about seeds, and birds, and harvests.
He spoke in words even children could understand, words so simple they mystified the grown-ups who liked feeling religious when they heard big words and took on pompous attitudes.

Jesus was so simple in his speech that he even mystified his disciples.
They came to him asking, “Why do you always tell stories when you talk to the people?”
Then he explained to them, “You have been permitted to understand the secrets of the Kingdom of Heaven, but others have not…. That’s why I tell these stories, because people see what I do, but they don't really see. They hear what I say, but they don't really hear, and they don't understand.
And Jesus must have seen the puzzled look on their faces because he went on to say to them…
(Matthew 13:18-23)
“Now here is the explanation of the story I told about the farmer sowing grain: The seed that fell on the hard path represents those who hear the Good News about the Kingdom and don't understand it. Then the evil one comes and snatches the seed away from their hearts.
The rocky soil represents those who hear the message and receive it with joy.
But like young plants in such soil, their roots don't go very deep. At first they get along fine, but they wilt as soon as they have problems or are persecuted because they believe the word.
The thorny ground represents those who hear and accept the Good News, but all too quickly the message is crowded out by the cares of this life and the lure of wealth, so no crop is produced.
The good soil represents the hearts of those who truly accept God's message and produce a huge harvest-- thirty, sixty, or even a hundred times as much as had been planted.”
If we do the math on the parable, then only one in four of the people who hear the word of the kingdom really hear it, really understand it, and really bear its fruit.
One in four, and that’s probably optimistic.
The Bible tells us that human beings are made from the earth. We are dirty men and dirty women.
(Which is not license to be dirty OLD men or dirty OLD women.)
In fairness, there’s a bit of hard soil, and some shallow soil, and a little thorny soil all mixed into all of us.
We human beings are a mixed bag.

The people who put paragraph headings in the Bible are almost universally agree this parable should be called, “The Parable of the Sower.”
But when we read it, we usually read it thinking about ourselves.
As if the parable were called, “The Parable of the Dirts.”
As if the whole point were for people to decide, What kind of dirt are you?
Or even better, what kind of dirt is the person sitting across the row from you?

If God is the sower, then the word of God is planted in all kinds of dirt.
The seed that God plants is good.
And the seed is sown in all kinds of soil – whether it’s hardened, or shallow, or thorny, or fruitful.
All the soil has the same seeds of the word within it.
When we read this as “The Parable of the Dirts,” it’s a parable of judgment.
“What kind of dirt are you?” it asks.
“Better clean up your act,” it says.
Sounds more like the preachers in the synagogue than Jesus on the beach.

But if this is “The Parable of the Sower,” then it’s a parable of grace.
Incredible grace.
Unmerited grace.
Universal grace.
If this really is about the sower and not about us, then by grace the sower is careless enough to fling seeds into all types of people – rich, poor – good, bad and ugly, too.

The sower is careless, but the sower is care-full, too.
And so should we be careful.
Even in grace, there is a taste of judgment.
A sower doesn’t so for no reason at all.
Someday a sower will return, and a harvester he will be.
Someday he’ll come back to check on the growth that has come from his planting.
So even though this parable isn’t about us, it still is a wake-up call.
That we have the chance to hear and understand, that we might just turn out to be one of the one in four, is grace itself.
There’s time to listen, time to understand, time to turn your life around.
Some will produce a hundredfold, some sixty, others thirty.
The good news of God is that all of us have the chance to be spiritually fruitful, no matter how successful we appear to the world.

No matter how much dirt, or what kind of dirt, you’ve built up in your own life, there are also seeds of the kingdom of God within you.
The same goes for the strange people in your life that make you shake your head and throw up your hands.
Even if they’re family.
Even if they’re as messy as Isaac and Rebekah and their kids.
The sower is just careless enough to plant seeds of the kingdom in everyone.
AND the sower is caring enough to build the paths of grace with some very wide shoulders.

So before getting overly concerned with figuring out what kind of soil you might be and getting bummed out because you’re not producing what you think you ought, remember:
it’s not about you.
This is “The Parable of the Sower.”
And we are the ones who are planted with good news.
Men and women, young and old, fit and unfit, clean and dirty.
”If anyone has ears to hear, listen.”