The Collect.
O LORD, we bessech thee to keep thy Church and household
continually in thy true religion; that they who do lean only upon the hope of
thy heavenly grace may evermore be defended by thy mighty power; through Jesus
Christ our Lord. Amen.
The Epistle. Col. 3. 12.
PUT on therefore, as the elect of God, holy and beloved,
bowels of mercies, kindness, humbleness of mind, meekness, longsuffering;
Forbearing one another, and forgiving one another, if any man have a quarrel
against any: even as Christ forgave you, so also do ye. And above all these
things put on charity, which is the bond of perfectness. And let the peace of
God rule in your hearts, to the which also ye are called in one body; and be ye
thankful. Let the word of Christ dwell in you richly in all wisdom; teaching
and admonishing one another in psalms and hymns and spiritual songs, singing
with grace in your hearts to the Lord. And whatsoever ye do in word or deed, do
all in the name of the Lord Jesus, giving thanks to God and the Father by him.
The Gospel. St. Matth. 13. 24.
THE kingdom of heaven is likened unto a man which sowed
good seed in his field: But while men slept, his enemy came and sowed tares
among the wheat, and went his way. But when the blade was sprung up, and
brought forth fruit, then appeared the tares also. So the servants of the
householder came and said unto him, Sir, didst not thou sow good seed in thy
field? from whence then hath it tares? He said unto them, An enemy hath done
this. The servants said unto him, Wilt thou then that we go and gather them up?
But he said, Nay; lest while ye gather up the tares, ye root up also the wheat
with them. Let both grow together until the harvest: and in the time of harvest
I will say to the reapers, Gather ye together first the tares, and bind them in
bundles to burn them: but gather the wheat into my barn.
Our
Gospel lesson for this final Sunday in Epiphany touches on seed sown in four
different soils. Most of you know that I grew up on a farm, so I have
familiarity with sowing grass and cutting hay:
I helped my Father bale hay and truck it to the barn to be stored for
winter feed of the angus cattle we raised.
But
Jesus isn’t giving us an agricultural lesson: he’s not really talking about how
to raise a productive crop of grain, for example. It is true that a parable, as used by Jesus,
are scarcely more plainly spoken than this one, since Jesus interpreted the
meaning. We have a clue concerning the
importance of true religion—that is, religion pleasing to God: if the Word falls on receptive ears, the
harvest will be great.
As
I was saying, when Jesus wanted to teach, he often looked around for an example
which he could use to illustrate his points.
Teachers call this a “teachable moment,” when something unplanned for
illustrates the lesson.
Anyway,
most of you aren’t farmers and don’t know much about seeding a field, except
perhaps what you’ve seen in passing.
Parenthetically,
I have a little book of the Gospel of John published in 1952 by a group called “Sunset
sowers”. The logo d shows a man striding
along slinging the seed into the earth: here again the direct representation of
the Holy Scripture.
I’ve
always thought it an appropriate imprint for those of us living at the western
edge of the continent in California, and concerned with the word of God, as
indeed we all are.
Anyway,
I was talking about sowing. For a small
patch of ground, not worthy of mechanical seeding, my Dad would load a bag or
sack with seed, such as alta fescue. It
looked sort of like a pack, but he wore it across his front.
As
I was saying, He would strap the bag on his front, and walk across the field,
turning a crank mechanism at the bottom.
The seed would come shooting out in a golden arc across the tilled
earth. He called this “broadcasting” Another way to seed fields is to use a seed
drill which is towed behind a tractor and plants the seed in the furrow: it’s a little tricky adjusting the flow with
a ratcheted handle at the back of the hopper holding the seed: not enough flow and you will get blank
patches in the field and too strong a flow and you will waste seed by getting
it all bunched together and running out of seed before you get across the
field.
William
Barclay, a well-known New Testament commentator of the last century, tells us two
methods of seeding (or sowing) were known to Jesus’ audience. One was walking across the field, slinging
the seed from one’s hand, trying to get coverage: in other words, a non-mechanical way of
broadcasting that I just told you about. As you can imagine, some seed fell on places
that weren’t conducive to healthy growth. The second way, the lazy way, was to bind a
sack of seed to a donkey, cut a hole in the corner of the bag, and drive the
animal back and forth, while the seed dribbled out on the ground.
Some
people believe the telling of stories which have a hidden meaning was a
fulfillment of the prophets’ sayings that not everyone’s ears would hear. So it is with pastors and ministers and our
weekly message: we can never be sure
whether the hearts of the congregation will be receptive to our words. Sometimes, as Strother Martin said in “Cool
Hand Luke,” What we have here is a failure to communicate.”
I
have discovered that “feed my sheep” means to provide a spiritual message. A few years ago I ran a cartoon in the
Anglican, and I’ve often used it as an illustration. Let me describe it to you: the minister is behind the lectern, looking
out at the congregation: on one side of
the aisle, everyone looking back at him appear to be sheep and on the other
side goats. The caption is, “after 20
years here, I think I’ve come to know you very well.”
In
communications theory, we speak of “filters” which interfere with the reception
of the message between the speaker and the receiver. If you think about it, this model works quite
well when applied to this parable or indeed to any situation where the message
is either not appreciated, inappropriate to the audience, or just plain
rejected.
There’s
a joke in which a little girl, seated with her mother in the congregation, gets
restive as the sermon seems to go on and on and on. Finally, she tugs at her mother’s dress and
whispers, “if we just give him the money, will he let us go?”
An
unreceptive hearer feels "That message can't possibly refer to me.
Everybody else here better pay attention, though. They need to get their act
together." Hardness of heart is like hardpan soil. Nothing can germinate there and thrive.
The
second type of soil looks good on the surface but underneath lurks rocky
ground. Such soil stands for the unproductive hearer. Where we live in Ventura,
we have to reckon with this kind of ground. Dig a hole with a shovel, and
within one foot you would encounter what some call hardpan. It’s a very heavy
clay a few inches below the topsoil that the builders scattered about the
lot. In the parable, it’s even
worse: it’s rock below the topsoil. If the roots can’t penetrate, pretty soon the
sun wilts the small seedling. It has
puny roots. Jesus describes the unproductive hearer in verse 13, "But the
ones on the rock are those who, when they hear, receive the word with joy; and
these have no root, who believe for a while and in time of temptation fall
away."
Does
the shallow soil refer to enthusiasm? Possibly. The tendency among the
unproductive hearers is to sustain an emotional high on which to rest their
faith. Religion for them hangs on an adrenaline rush, a giddy feeling, or an
emotional high. The late Bishop Stephen Neill had a relevant comment for
emotionalism. He said, "There is a certain restrained and sober quality of
devotion that is characteristic of the Anglican Church. The aim is not that of
producing immediate emotional effects, but of gradually building up a settled
resolute will to holiness, based more on the direction of the will than the
stirring of the emotions."
Is
Jesus Christ, in this parable, trying to dampen our fervor, and muzzle our
excitement? No, absolutely not! Our Lord merely wanted to put emotions and
excitement in their proper place. The warning is simply this: avoid building
your faith upon emotions or good feelings; build rather upon Christ and upon
Him alone. Bishop Wand, writing in the 1960’s on the collect for this day, gave
the cautionary note:
“The
Christian cannot rely upon anything else but the grace of God, not upon his own
skill or wealth or position. All the
things that may win us a momentary deference or service in contemporary society
are seen sooner or later to be merely transitor and to have no permanent value.”
[1]
The
third type of soil stands for the underdeveloped hearer. Most of you are beyond
the first two soils the rebellious, self-righteousness of a hard heart, and
the flash-in-the-pan emotionalism of a shallow heart. The roots of God's Word
have sunk down into your soul, but that doesn't mean you are bulletproof. The
danger of being strangled by secular things is real and ever threatening. Our
society seems to have forgotten that the Sabbath was created for men, that we
are intended to have time for rest and reflection: seemingly, an alien thought
in our “go-go” culture.
The
last type of soil is the one to which the entire parable has been heading. It
is the productive hearer. The productive hearer receives the Gospel like good
soil receives seed. The seedling breaks through the soil. The sun smiles; the
earth feeds it. What sort of fruit does a productive hearer of God's Word bear?
Surely it refers to the fruit of the Spirit love, joy, peace, long-suffering,
gentleness, goodness, faith, meekness, and discipline (Galatians 5). Today’s
epistle makes reference to the “good crop.”
How
can you be sure of your own salvation and that of others? Spiritual fruit: your
hatred for sin, and love of righteousness; your love for the Lord and your
neighbor. Your faith gradually produces the character of Christ. The fruit of
the Spirit blossoms and yields a bountiful crop.
Ask
your Heavenly Father to strengthen you against the strangling weeds of riches
and the flesh. Beseech the Holy Spirit to sanctify you. Use the means of grace
the Lord has placed at your disposal: prayer, fellowship, the Word of God. Come
now and take advantage of the Holy Communion. Come in faith. Allow the Spirit
to make the soil of your heart rich, fertile, and productive.
Let
us pray. “Heavenly Father, graciously
receive these our prayers, whether spoken with our lips or echoed in our
hearts; and answer them as may be best for us and those for who we have prayed,
for the sake of Jesus Christ our Lord.”2
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2 Colquhoun, Frank. Contemporary Parish Prayers. London: Hodder & Stoughton, 1975. Page 107
