Already beginning our countdown to Easter, we finish out our
new-year month that has been filled with resolutions, today; sixty days before
Easter. With the parable of the Sower before us, let us reflect on true
stewardship and service to God.
Jesus speaks to you today, saying,
“To you it has been
given to know the secrets of the kingdom
of God
‘seeing they may not see, and
hearing they may not understand.’”
Jesus is preaching this to His chosen 12 stewards. They do
not understand, and even one of them will betray Him. So, what we get out of
the parable of the Sower is no more or less than the Apostles. Even when Jesus
explains it, we find no comfort in only a 1 in 4 chance of serving God
correctly.
You may think of this in terms of your own attempts to
improve your life with resolutions. They tell you it is always good to have
goals and if you can’t meet your current ones, make them smaller…and smaller…and
smaller.
For all our efforts at “doing better” this year, we find we
really don’t change much. It is so much easier to find a happy-medium, without
the chaos of change, and remain there. Who wants chaos in their life? In fact,
we always move from change towards the same ole’-same ole’, no matter our
intentions.
What can you say about this parable and your own attempts at
making it into the right soil? You can say that you know what’s right and
what’s wrong. You can say that you do your best. But there is none of that in
this parable. Indeed, what God may want you to do is to stop serving the Lord.
Now, you’ve heard this sort of thing before, which means you
need to really think about it. Before you rebel and say that you’ll never not serve
the Lord, hear what Jesus is saying here. The seed that fell along the path did
not give their offerings on time, in order that they might receive seed, much
less the birds and the feet.
The rocks didn’t pray fervently or go on a mission trip to
get some seed thrown their way. The thorns did not volunteer more and even the
good soil was not found sticking to a Bible reading plan to better their amount
of growth.
There was simply a Sower and seed that needed to be spread. There
is no mention of Christian service, moral living, or pleasing behavior. Christ
has a Gospel and its going to be spread, regardless of anything else happening
around it.
God needs nothing. He gets no benefit from your moral
uprightness. His kingdom is no more extended by a wrong decision than a right
one. God’s magnificence is not expanded by your money and He is not more almighty
simply because you say He is or you, somehow, show that He is.
God is already all these things, even without your prayers.
Before you were born and thinking about serving Him, He had already gotten all
the glory there was to be had. Which raises a couple questions, in light of all
this: how do I serve the Lord and when is God most pleased with the Christian?
Repent. If you get our answer from today’s Gospel, or any
Gospel reading for that matter, you find that you are not a part of the
equation. You don’t serve the Lord.
In fact, there are two very unflattering reasons why we can
not serve the Lord directly: 1) we have nothing He wants and 2) whatever we
have that is worth anything, He gave us.
Of course, Jesus is the key to this impossible riddle of “serving
the Lord”. The seed is the Word of God. This means that Christ is preached, but
not only preached, Jesus is offered up to death, for in order for a seed to
grow, it must first fall into the ground and die.
In order for the soil or the plants that grow to be worth
anything, Christ must die for them. Hear the parable in this way: Jesus came to
sow His Gospel. All the people He preached to grew violent and only heard the
Law condemning them and their works. They then fell upon Him and murdered Him
upon a cross.
He died and was buried.
But from the ground came new life. From the bare, lifeless
ground of human hearts, the Word sprang up and created faith. In this faith,
the birds eat, the rocks hear, and the thorns have purpose. Not of themselves,
but because the Word that died has risen again to new life and that life
overflows out of Him.
On account of Christ, God is pleased with you. On account of
what Jesus has already worked out and accomplished, you are a perfect servant
of the Lord. Jesus’ life, death, and resurrection are already yours and you
have done nothing to earn any of it.
You are free. There is no more condemnation for those who
are baptized into Jesus. For in that baptism, all of Christ’s perfection is
counted as your own. Now, any work the Christian does, in faith, is a good
work. Any service the Christian gives is holy in God’s sight.
Since God doesn’t need your good works, you get to offer
them to your neighbor: volunteering, serving, changing diapers, and even supporting
your Church. Through Christ, God has already accomplished all the better, more
holy living you can come up with. All so that you’re free to live and receive
these things from Him.
You aren’t really great at serving your neighbor, but its
not about that, it is about God serving you. Because, before you go out to
serve, you have an incurable corruption of sin that needs forgiving. Before you
even think about good works, you need your works killed and raised to new life.
Jesus remains with His own Church, whom He has spread His
seed of life upon, and made absolution sprout up an hundred fold. God is most
pleased with His service: that when His Gospel is preached and the Sacraments
are administered for the forgiveness of sins and that Faith is there to receive
and believe, then heaven rejoices.
This is because Jesus came to steward His own Church,
Himself. This is because Jesus came in order to forgive sins, even the sins of
good works.
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