A SOWER WENT OUT TO SOW
A sower went out to sow
He sowed the seeds of the gospel
And scattered them far and wide.
He preached and taught in synagogues
But even in his own home town
The people rejected his message
Threatening to stone him for blasphemy.
He healed the sick
Yet the religious leaders
Chided him for healing on the Sabboth
And when he reached out to heal lepers with a touch
Towns closed their gates to him
Because he had dared to touch the untouchable.
He proclaimed the truth
And people were amazed
At the authority with which he spoke.
Yet they clamored for “proof”
That he was a prophet.
Everywhere the sower went
He sowed seeds
And they criticized him for that too.
For he preached good news
To both rich and poor
To sinners as well as saints
Daring to eat with tax collectors and known sinners.
Even inviting at least one of those tax collectors
To join his band of disciples.
Like Rodney Dangerfield,
Even the sower’s own mother, brothers and sisters
Gave him no respect.
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Sure that his message of radical love
Was going to get him killed,
Like it had his cousin John,
They set out to convince him to give up his sowing
And return home.
All to no avail, of course.
It wasn’t that the sower couldn’t draw crowds.
Indeed some days the crowds were so large
He had to climb a mountain
Or push out from the shore in a boat
Just to be seen and heard by the multitude.
But the sower knew
That despite the great numbers
Few would hear
And even fewer would understand
His message of grace and love.
And so he began to tell them a parable…
“A sower went out to sow…”
The parable at first seems quite tragic
As indeed did the life of the sower himself often seemed.
For despite the sower’s diligence and faithfulness
The odds always seemed stacked against him.
Sometimes it must have seemed
As if three-fourths of the soils
To whom he sowed his seed of grace
Rejected it.
And often rejected the sower as well.
Some heard the words
And even seemed eager to respond
But then withered away just as fast.
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Like those who would one day shout, “Hosanna!”
And the a few days later, “Crucify!”
Still others would seemingly hear
And even to believe
Yet all to soon find their love of the things of this world
Money, possessions, status, power and prestige,
Choking out his message of love and forgiveness.
Not a very hope filled story
Is it?
Indeed we are moved to pity the poor sower.
And sometimes we pity ourselves as well.
For you see the sower
Also sent us out to sow.
And we too have known the tragedy
Of a world filled with mocking birds
Who ridicule us
And snatch our seed from the path
Even while we are sowing them.
And we too have known
The frustration and despair
Of those who seem to respond with enthusiasm and zeal
Only to burn up in the heat of the day
And disappear.
And we too
Know of the choking power
Of the cares of the world.
They even choke us at times,
Don’t they?
With their demands of allegiance
And their siren songs of temptations.
And the sad truth is
That even in this so-called Holy City
Still better than 60% of the population are unchurched
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And we also know that on any given Sunday
Less than half of those who admit that they are church members
Actually attend worship.
The sower still sows
And the seeds still fall on well beaten paths
Only to be snatched up by birds
And on shallow soil
Only to wither and die.
And among thorns
Only to be strangled.
So, it’s not surprising
That many would-be sowers
Choose to stay home.
Why risk rejection?
I certainly know of no one
Who enjoys having doors slammed in their faces.
Or even worse
Having people patronizingly listen
Only to walk away and ignore both them and their message.
When I was developing a new congregation back in the late 80s
I knocked on about four thousand doors
Telling people about the good news
Of a new Lutheran Church
Starting in their community
And our message of love and grace.
But out of those four thousand contacts,
We organized that church with about twenty-five families.
And that was considered a good response
By those who tracked such statistics in those days.
As I have noted before
While many of us grew up in the 40s, 50s and even early 60s
In a predominantly churched culture.
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We now live in a society
That is less churched
Than those nations
We once thought of as mission fields.
One of those mission fields we used to lift up regularly
Was the country of Namibia in southwest Africa
That became a protectorate of South Africa
During the long years of apartheid there.
Well I learned recently that Namibia
Is now over 90% Lutheran.
And one the fastest growing church in the world
Is the Mekane Yesu Church in Ethiopia
Which is Lutheran and Reform.
It might surprise you to know
That the majority of Lutherans,
Still the largest protestant church in the world,
Are no longer people of northern European descent
But people of color from Africa and Asia.
The mission field is no longer Africa and Asia
It is James Island and West Ashley, South Carolina.
And we like Jesus
Have been called and sent
To be sowers of the seed of the gospel in this mission field.
That doesn’t necessarily mean that we need to go out knocking on doors
Although maybe we should be doing more of that too.
But it does mean that each of us
Should be sharing the good news,
Not just of Martin Luther Church
Although that too I hope,
But most importantly the good news of Jesus Christ,
With our children and grandchildren
Family and friends.
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With those with whom we work,
Neighbors where we live,
And even people we encounter daily
As we go about out routines.
We should be sowing the seed to everyone
Everywhere we go
Precisely because we know so few will respond.
You know the reason you and I get so much junk mail,
Not to mention junk e-mail and phones calls?
It’s because businesses have discovered that direct mail
Is one of the best forms of advertising available.
And yet even those in the direct mail business themselves
Will tell you that a 2 or 3% response for a mailing
Is the most that you can expect.
The growth of the church in places like Namibia
Didn’t happen overnight either.
Everyone didn’t convert to Christianity
Just because a few Danish or American Lutheran Missionaries
And started teaching them how to sing chorales.
The main reason, I suspect so many people there are Lutherans today,
Is because back in those terrible days of Apartheid
We did not abandon them,
But stood by them
Often at great risk.
More than once seeing our church offices there bombed
And church officials harassed
And even pastors arrested for the gospel they preached
And truth they proclaimed.
I remember that Lutheran World Relief sponsored a radio station in Namibia
That was the only place that people could get unbiased reporting.
Not surprisingly someone kept blowing up the transmitting tower
And the authorities never could find out who.
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We, never-the-less kept rebuilding that tower and broadcasting the truth
And in the end the truth
And Nelson Mandela who lived the truth
Set them free.
And in Ethiopia
Where they are once again suffering from a severe drought and famine
We have continued to offer
Not only emergency assistance
But also help in finding and developing clean reliable sources of water
And sustainable crops to grow.
Who will sow those kinds of seeds on James Island?
Or in the Tri-county area of greater Charleston?
Or the mountains of Pendleton County, West Virginia?
Or on the streets of Arequipa, Peru?
If not you and me?
And yet the truth is
That if we do go out to sow
We too go out facing great odds.
Three fourths of the seeds we sow
Will fall on soil that will not let them take root.
So?
Jesus faced the same odds
And even greater ones then we will ever face
Not only did the sower go out to sow,
He went out to sow
Again and again and again.
And so should we.
They even hung the sower on a cross
And laid his body in a tomb
And even then, he would not give up
Rising from the grave
To resume his tasking of sowing the gospel seed.
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Why? We ask.
Why bother?
What’s the use.
If Jesus couldn’t reach 75% of those to whom he preached
How are we supposed to.
Ah, but there is more to Jesus’ story isn’t there?
Yes a sower went out to sow
And some fell on the path
And some on rocky ground
And some among the thorns,
But some also fell on fertile soil
Where on grain produced a hundredfold
And another sixty
And another thirty.
Let me tell you why,
After thirty-four years in the ordained ministry
I’m still sowing.
It’s because of my Dad.
He too was a pastor,
A sower of the gospel,
And served churches in North Carolina, Texas and Louisiana.
None of them would be considered mega churches
By any stretch of the imagination.
Most of them were new missions
Or small to medium churches in need of transformation.
Still, when he retired,
He received letters from people all over the world,
A missionary in Japan,
And a Bishop in North Carolina,
Who among many others said that Dad was one of those
Who had led them to seek a call to public ministry.
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Former members from Good Shepherd, Brevard, North Carolina
And Messiah, Austin, Texas, where he served as the pastor/developer.
And St. Paul’s Baton Rouge where he followed the pastor/developer
And built the first unit back in the sixties
And was leader in the community in the civil rights movement
Serving as the first president of the integrated ministerial associations
One of the first in the nation.
From the church he served in Grand Prairie, Texas
Where they started a social ministry program
That is even now serving the needs of that community
In much the same way Tri-county ministry does here.
Not to mention many, many others
Who wrote just to say how he had touched their lives
And made all the difference.
And I continue to go out to sow
Because I have the privilege
Of sowing alongside of the this caring family of God,
That sponsors cub scouts and boy scouts, girl scouts and brownies,
Two AA groups, an ALANON group and an Overeaters Anonymous group,
Collects food and other items for James Island Outreach and Tri-County ministry,
Packs grocery sacks for needy people twice a month
Prepares a meal for the families of critically ill children at the Ronal McDonald House
Once a month.
Builds Habitat Houses both here and in West Virginia,
Participates in INASMUCH days,
Cares of caregivers of people suffering for memory loss,
Offer VBS and Day Camps for the children of our community
Seeking in the coming months to start a wee school for infants and toddlers,
A lot of our seeds may fall on unproductive soils
But some of them
Definitely produce a hundredfold.
Don’t they.
Ninety or so people
Gathering each week to listen to God’s word
And feast at his table,
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May seem pretty insignificant
In a world of mocking birds
Rocks and thorns that strangle.
But then so did that sower
And his motley band of disciples.
And yet,
Within a generation
The message they proclaimed
Had reached to the very ends of the earth.
Sowers,
Don’t get discouraged.
Sow the seed far and wide.
And never give up
For the seed of the sower
Does not return empty.
It’s really just simple arithmetic
Three quarters of the field
May produce little or nothing,
But the one quarter that does
Will produce thirty, sixty or a hundredfold.
Not a bad return
On our investment of seed.
After all,
A sower named Jesus went out to sow
And he redeemed a whole world.
So,
Sow the seed far wide
Fellow sowers,
God is going to produce one heck of a harvest.
Because,
God loves you!
And sow
Do I.
Amen.
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