Scripture: Matthew 13:1-9; Matthew 13:18-23; Matthew 15:23-28; Matthew 25:31-40 Series: Welcome
Preaching on the Parable of the Sower (Matthew 13), Pruitt argues that not all growth is good—weeds are easy, low-effort growth, and churches and souls can produce green-looking but choking, deathward growth. He walks through the bad soils (weeds, rocky hill-country soil, trampled roads) as conditions of our hearts and our world, insisting that since Jesus is the one who sows, our task is tending the soil—both our own hearts and our neighbors’. True evangelism is soil-care, a continuous affair, not a single sermon or initiative. Good soil is found beyond ourselves in people most in need of God: faith in desperation (the Canaanite woman) and faith in action (the least of these in Matthew 25). Finally he turns to grace: no one can make themselves good soil; the tilling and seeking is only a response to the Holy Spirit’s prior movement, and the hope is that soil—like the soul, the neighbor, and Covenant UMC—is never finished.
Illustrations: weeds-i-do-not-like, chemical-weed-killers, caro-hill-country-trap, wild-kratts-polly-paver, big-yellow-taxi-paved-paradise, roman-roads-efficiency, continuous-gardening, canaanite-woman-good-soil, least-of-these-faith-in-action
July 16, 2023
Growth
Matthew 13:1-9, 18-23
I am not the world’s biggest fan of weeds. I do not like weeds. I do not like them in my yard. I do not like them on a barge. I do not like them in gardens. I do not like them in sidewalks. Weeds are very annoying and, unfortunately, they are the easiest thing to grow. If you don’t do anything with your land, weeds are what you get. You get weeds, low effort, high return, weeds. The existence of weeds are an important reminder to all of us that not all growth is good. Good growth is good. Bad growth is bad. We need some kind of qualifier for growth. We want to avoid that bad growth. We want to avoid those weeds.
In this passage from Matthew, Jesus offers a wonderful parable about growth.
We’ve got the weeds, the rocks, the road, and then good soil.
Weeds
Let’s start with the weeds and the thorns. Weeds are easy to grow. They always show up. The modern world’s solution to weeds is chemicals, lots and lots of chemicals. Unfortunately, those chemicals have other consequences. They do more than just kill the weeds. Some of the seed fell with the brambles and the weeds and they were choked. I think this part of the parable is one of the most accurate aspects of what it means to be a Christian today or even a person trying to do good in the world. The word of God is shared and it grows up amidst the weeds competing for the resources around it. There’s only so much water, only so much sunshine, only so much phosphorous and nitrogen, to be extracted from the ground. To plant seeds in a yard full of weeds would not predict success. Why waste seeds on the weedy ground?
We have these other examples.
Rocky Soil
We have the dry, rocky soil where you cannot take up roots.
In the first volume of Robert Caro’s biography of Lyndon Johnson, he writes: “The hill country was a trap bated with water.” The westernmost longitude of the US that receives 30 inches of rain a year is the 98th meridian which runs through Bee Cave, Texas. Caro notes how the hill country looks green but it doesn’t get enough water to farm and the grass is only there because it has always been there. It is not good soil.
Rocky soil can look good on the outside but it doesn’t have what is necessary to grow. There can be a lot of green, but when you look closer it is really just ash juniper and mesquite and the seeds you plant will not take root.
The road
And the road where the birds peck at it. It makes me think of a children’s show on PBS called the Wild Kratts about these brothers who love to protect animals. They go against a cadre of villains, including Polly Paver, whose only desire is to pave all the world in asphalt. She is the person who cheers during the Joni Mitchell song, Big Yellow Taxi, when we hear that paradise has been paved.
There wasn’t asphalt in the ancient world, but there were lots of roads. The reason the Roman empire lasted as long as it did was the ability to maintain roads between places. But to build a road meant to take away soil. Roads are necessary links between communities and people. If we don’t have roads, everything gets trampled. Roads are made for the sake of efficiency. The ground is trampled and hard in certain places for efficiency. But roads themselves are no longer sources of growth.
Then we have the good soil and the seed finds a home and grows spectacularly.
Faith in general
Let’s start thinking about this with the Christian faith in general. We want to have good soil for the word of God so that it can take root. As a world, we want to make sure that there’s good soil, so that means taking care of the land where the seed is going to spread. Taking care of the people where these weeds are, where the people have been hardened so that their hearts are like roads, ready to be picked off, hardened by bad experiences, hardened by life. We also can read this passage for ourselves.
Ourselves
I think all of us, at different times in our life, have felt like our hearts were full of brambles and weeds. There were so many things hungry for our interest that we couldn’t focus and our hearts went dry.
I think all of us, at different times in our life, have felt that our hearts were rocky like the hill country. We may look green or put together on the outside, but we are really not getting enough water or rest and the seeds can’t put down roots.
I think all of us, at different times in our life, have felt that our hearts were like roads. That is, we were so busy going from place to place that parts of us were trampled for the sake of efficiency and birds peck at the seeds that have been strewn about.
Hopefully we’ve had those moments when we felt the good soil, when the word of God has taken root in our hearts and grown in amazing ways. Those moments of good soil usually happen because we have been cared for. Someone has weeded us. Someone has given supplemental soil and compost that fills in the rocks.
Evangelism
I think this parable gives us a great example of what we can actually do as Christians in this world, about what actual evangelism looks like. You see, in the parable, Jesus is the one who spreads the seeds. What we can do is take care of the soil. We have to start is by taking care of the soil in our own hearts. What kind of soil is your soul today? Is it rocky? Is it dry? Is it full of weeds? Is it trampled over? The weeds grow for sure. They grow, but it’s not what we want. We don’t just want to grow. We want good growth, healthy growth, growth that builds life, not growth that builds death. Growth that looks outward, not growth that looks inward. Growth that is with our neighbors, not growth that’s against our neighbors and our own hearts. There are many different competing weeds and it takes time for the soil to be cared for. As well, the soil needs to be refreshed. You can’t just weed once and then never do it again. If a gardener thought that they could till the soil once, weed, put in some compost and fertilizer and then never have to do anything in the garden again, they would not grow a thing. Gardening is a continuous affair.
Covenant UMC
We can take this parable to our church, to where we are, to our immediate surroundings. Some of the seed of Jesus Christ was spread where brambles and weeds were present and the good seed and the weeds grew up together and the weeds choked out the good seed. Some seed was sown on the rocky soil where roots could not be made and it washed away, some to the road where it was eaten up. Some to good soil. Everything we do is not going to result in amazing fruit of the Spirit. Everything we do as a church or as individuals. We should not assume that. We should not see that, but what we can strive for and hope for is in some straightforward way to keep on working the soil and have faith that God will be there. A good tree does not bear bad fruit. Growth isn’t the result of a single sermon or a pastor or an initiative or a funding source, and all growth is not good. Some growth is just weeds. It may look green from afar, but when you get up close, it has choked out what is actually good. There are churches throughout history that have sacrificed their faithfulness to Jesus in order to get immediate gains in the world. That is not good growth. That is not what anyone needs.
Where the Good Soil Is
The good soil for the word of God is found in people who are most in need of God, who are desperate for hope, who are broken by this world. We read many examples in the gospels. Jesus is teaching and a Canaanite woman comes up to his disciples seeking help.
“Send her away; she keeps shouting out after us.” Jesus replied, “I’ve been sent only to the lost sheep, the people of Israel.” But she knelt before him and said, “Lord, help me.” He replied, “It is not good to take the children’s bread and toss it to dogs.” She said, “Yes, Lord. But even the dogs eat the crumbs that fall off their masters’ table.” Jesus answered, “Woman, you have great faith. It will be just as you wish.” And right then her daughter was healed.” Matthew 15:23-28 CEB
She was good soil. Her genetics did not make her good soil. Her social status or blood did not make her good soil. Her desire for God did. Her need for God. Her willingness to step out in faith.
Examples of good soil are also found in Matthew 25.
“Then the king will say to those on his right, ‘Come, you who will receive good things from my Father. Inherit the kingdom that was prepared for you before the world began. I was hungry and you gave me food to eat. I was thirsty and you gave me a drink. I was a stranger and you welcomed me. I was naked and you gave me clothes to wear. I was sick and you took care of me. I was in prison and you visited me.’ “Then the king will reply to them, ‘I assure you that when you have done it for one of the least of these brothers and sisters of mine, you have done it for me.’” Matthew 25:31-36, 40 CEB
They are good soil who put their faith into practice. We have these two forms of good soil: faith in desperation and faith in action. Believing something enough to step out of your comfort zone and seek Jesus. And believing something enough to step out of your comfort zone and love others for their own sake.
The good soil of personal faith is found beyond itself. The good soil of the church is found beyond itself. When we stay enclosed, the weeds grow, the soil dries up and the ground is trampled.
Growth is not the result of seeking growth but seeking Jesus Christ, whether as a Canaanite woman dismissed by society, or the people who do the humble work of God and serve Jesus without realizing it.
With all of that, these are not the only two options: a Canaanite or a saint.
GRACE
No, in fact, on our own, all of us fall short. None of us can make good soil by ourselves because none of us can save ourselves. Though I said tilling the soil is one of the few things we can do, the work is not enough. The work doesn’t save us. The work, the seeking Jesus, the serving the least, can only be a response to the prior movement of God in our hearts through the Holy Spirit.
The examples of the Bible show us ways of living faithfully and responding to the word of God.
The most hopeful thing about soil is that it is never finished. There is not an expiration date for the ground. There is not an expiration date for your soul. God is not finished with you and God is not finished with your neighbor. God is not finished with Covenant. Take heart in that.
Let us receive the grace to til the soil of our hearts. Let us receive the grace to see the brambles and thorns we grow and spread and to take them out. Let us remove the rocks we place in people’s way and the rocks we place in our own way. And let us seek Jesus together and serve him where we can.
In the name of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit. Amen.