by Rev. Robin White
There are few Gospel stories more familiar than the Parable of the Sower. It goes like this:
A sower went out to sow. And as the sower sowed, some of the seeds fell by the wayside and the birds came and devoured them. And other seeds fell on stony ground where they did not have enough soil, and they sprouted quickly because there was no depth to the soil – when the sun rose they were scorched, and because they had no roots they withered away. Still other seeds fell among the thorns, and the thorns grew up, choking them, and they produced no fruit. But some seeds fell on good ground, sprouted and grew up, bringing forth: some thirty, some sixty, some one hundred fruit. [Mark 4:3b-8]
And I suspect it would be hard to find a more well-known story than this. Even for those of us who were born and raised among skyscrapers instead of fields of amber grains, Jesus’ story is immediately understandable. And yet, the Disciples did not understand it. So, Jesus tried again:
The sower sows the Word. These are the ones by the wayside: when the Word is sown and they hear it, Satan immediately comes and takes away the Word sown in them. And these are the ones sown on stony ground: when they heard the Word, they received it immediately with joy, but not having roots they endured for only a short time. Afterwards, when oppression or persecution occurs because of the Word, they are quickly offended. Still others are those sown in the thorns: these are the ones who hear the Word, but the anxieties of the age, the deceits of riches, and the desires for other things creeping in, these things choke the Word and they become unfruitful. But there are those sown on good ground, who hear the Word and accept it, bringing forth some thirty, some sixty, some one hundred fruit.” [Mark 4:14-20]
So, I ask: what is this Word which is being sown? It is the Truth of God’s Reign – it is the very Power and Authority God spoke when creating all which is – tailored to fit the needs of each and every day. This Word is what the World needs now to take that next step forward instead of backwards. And not just the World, but each and everyone of us, whether we believe or not: for this Word is sown on believers and unbelievers alike.
Few would argue that the World needs an injection of truth-telling with respect to COVID-19 and the vaccines which redeem us and our neighbors from its horrors. But not just another word of truth – another word which no matter how truthful could all too easily get lost in the noise of competing truths, but a Word of Truth which has the Power of Divine Creativity in it to make a way where there is no way.
So, how does this ancient parable help us obtain the Word of Truth we need today? How does it speak to the dilemma we face in wrestling with the disinformation, fear and willfulness chasing us daily? I believe it helps us to understand why so many of us can hear the Truth but not recognize it as the Truth.
Hear a word the Living Christ speaks to us this very day:
- These are the ones by the wayside: the great deceiver, our adversary, prowls in the shadows and in the dark spaces on the web, longing for opportunities to snatch the words of Truth the Holy Spirit has sown among us.
- And these are the ones sown on stony ground: those who find their joy in discovering the Truth over-whelming until the next best idea comes along and so they wind up going back and forth from one conspiracy theory to another, never finding Peace.
- Still others are sown among the thorns which choke out the many flowers of Truth growing alongside them.
- But these are sown in good ground: those who hear the Truth and are blessed by it.
Traditionally, the Church has heard this as a story that explains to us why things are the way they are. But allow me to introduce one small but very important idea into our story telling this morning. Remember when Peter recognized Jesus as the Christ? It goes like this:
…and on the way Jesus asked them, “Who do people say that I am?” And they answered, “Some say you’re John the Baptist, others say you’re Elijah and still others say you’re one of the Prophets.” Then Jesus asked, “But who do you say I am?” And Peter answered, “You’re the Christ.” [Mark 8:27b-29]
Living as we do on the other side of the Cross Event, on the other side of the Resurrection, we tend to focus on Jesus as our Savior, and rightfully so, but Jesus is not just a Savior, Jesus was also recognized as a Prophet. Indeed, Matthew tells us that Jesus is the fulfillment of the Law and the Prophets. [Matthew 5:17] And I think we lose some of the impact of Jesus’ Teachings if we only read them in the key of salvation – for what understanding may we gain if we read this Parable of the Sower as Prophecy, as a prophetic warning of what may happen, instead of just as a nice, neat story of why some are saved and some are not?
Jesus tells us that the Great Deceiver – the Caster of Lies – the Tweeter® of Disinformation comes and snatches the Truth from some who hear it. But is it their fault that all they hear are lies? Who are we to judge their vulnerability to the information ecosystems they find themselves trapped in? For, where were we and our umbrellas of truth when the showers of lies turned the truths they heard into quicksand?
We live in an era in which trust has been eroded by the lies of convenience which all too many politicians, pastors and parents have spoken to us for all of our lives. Is it any wonder some of our neighbors, and yes, even some of us, cannot believe that vaccines are safe, and that COVID-19 can destroy our lives? I mean, they lied to us about weapons of mass destruction and the jobs they promise us every election cycle are always one more election away. And it seems like every day, we read of another church rent apart by sexual abuse and families torn asunder by domestic violence. Are we really surprised then when those who have been proven to be liars speak the truth, that many find it hard to believe their truths? It reminds me of the folk saying, “You will reap what you sow.” And we are living through the terrible consequences of the multiplicity of lies and half-truths which have been sown among us for generations – for although there is a Divine Sower sowing the Truth, there are many sowers not touched by Divine Grace sowing half-truths and outright lies.
And because it is so hard to believe authority figures, we should not be surprised that many seek a truth – indeed, any truth – everywhere else. But because they have no depth of soil, nor bedrock truths to anchor themselves in, they have no means of knowing what is true. Is it any wonder that so many chase after more and more fantastic explanations to why things are the way they are? Those explanations we rightfully call conspiracy theories.
And what about those who genuinely do believe but are caught in webs of unbelievers? This is perhaps this aspect of this parable which fits our current circumstances best. One half of our country found it in themselves to trust the science, and leaders they could respect, and have received the vaccine and are like those flowers of truth growing in a garden. But the other half of our country, which doesn’t trust science or the leaders who are currently in charge because they do not like their politics, are like thorns of lies threatening to choke out those flowers of truth.
So, how do those of us who find ourselves planted in good soil, vaccinated, and relatively safe, but who are worried because of the other half who are not equally planted in good soil right here alongside us? May I suggest that the Living Christ has at least 3 very powerful Words of Truth which can help us.
First, as the first century of the Christian experience was drawing to a close, the disciples had lived long enough with the miracle they had received to come to an extraordinary understanding – an understanding of God that sets Christianity apart from all other religions and philosophies. And that Word of Truth which John’s Disciple wrote in 1 John 4:8 is “God is Love.” Think about that for a moment: this great, some would say greatest, confession of our faith says there is an equal sign between God and Love. And that means we can talk about “Kingdom Work” as “Loving Work” – we can talk about the Reign of Love as a way of describing the Reign of God. What an incredible gift this Word of Truth is to us! For if God is Love, and we are baptized into the Reign of God, then we live, we breath and we have our entire being in Love. That greatest power in the known universe: Unconditional Love is our first tool to stop the lies and grow the truth – for what are those who have no trust missing most in their lives? Love.
Think of it this way. When we come across someone lost because they cannot trust or because they are so anxious that they cannot stop chasing after the next big lie – they cannot experience truth because they have no framework for understanding what truth is. They are in Pilate’s seat, asking, “What is Truth?” So, let us remember what Paul told us in I Corinthians 13: “Love is patient, Love is kind…Love bears all things…Love hopes for all things and Love endures all things – Love never fails.” [selections from vv. 4-8] The one thing we can do, because it is in our very DNA as Christians, is to love those who cannot see the Truth into seeing the Truth which will set them free. We must ask those who are in denial, “How is your denial an expression of love?” And, “How are you loving yourself, how are you loving your neighbor and even more so, how are you loving that young child who is too young to be vaccinated when you love the lies of the anti-vaxxers more than the love the revelation of God’s Truth through the miracle of the COVID-19 vaccinations delivered sooner rather than later by God’s Good Grace? It will not be easy, it will not be quick, but the Love we possess will not fail if we do not give up on it.
The second Word of Truth was also captured by Paul in that other verse 3:16, “Don’t you know you are God’s Sanctuary — and that God’s Spirit lives in you? If you destroy God’s Sanctuary, then God will destroy you. For God’s Sanctuary is Holy, and you are that sanctuary.” [I Corinthians 3:16-17] Think about this a moment, all the beauty, the majesty and the glory described in Exodus 25-31 of how the Sanctuary was to be made; the description of Solomon’s Temple in I Kings 5-8 and the descriptions of Heaven and the New Jerusalem in Revelation 7 and 21-22 – these sanctuaries are you – because that is where God chooses to live: not out there, but in here!
And when someone risks COVID-19 because they are not getting vaccinated, they risk destroying the representation of Heaven on Earth which they are – the Imago Dei – the Image of God which is an inseparable part of every human being created in God’s Image. When one does not get vaccinated, they are risking the destruction of the sanctuary that is the Holy Spirit’s dwelling place in their neighbor. And that means they are not just risking a human life but the Divine Embrace of that precious human life.
In a country in which freedom is our birthright, we have forgotten what true freedom is. How many times have we heard the anti-vaxers trot out their argument of “Freedom of Speech?” We have even become so drunk with the promise of secular freedoms that many of us have forgotten what our baptisms mean. Yes, we have a personal relationship with Jesus, and yes we confess that Jesus is our Lord and Savior, but Jesus saves us through the waters of baptism into a community of believers who have been embraced by that ultimate freedom: the Truth which sets you free. Too many of our Christian neighbors have forgotten or never really understood that when Christ sets you free, you are truly free – but that is not a freedom from our neighbors but a freedom with our neighbors.
The third Word of Truth is perhaps the hardest for us to hear, and I freely confess there are many more Words of Truth which I could have chosen, but I think this one is very important. As we begin living into this Pandemic of the Unvaccinated, our front line healthcare workers are discovering a level of hostility, feelings of guilt and oh, so many other emotions which come from being betrayed by all of the disinformation. We have heard the stories of those who die in disbelief of what is happening to them or who die blaming someone or something else for their termination. And many of us feel a profound anger at the danger they have so selfishly imposed upon us and our families. And who among us has not been deeply sorrowed by the many hundreds of thousands who did not have to die? Those many who died because the lies were more convenient than the truth for too many of their neighbors. And many of us feel like we have not done enough or that we have been helplessly overwhelmed in the face of this orgy of death.
It is a hard Word but a very necessary Word. “Then Peter came to Jesus and asked, ‘Teacher, how often must I forgive when my friend sins against me — up to seven times?’ And Jesus answered Peter, ‘I say to you: not until seven times, but seventy times seven.’” [Matthew 18:21-22] Seventy times seven – that’s not to be understood as 490 times and then you are OK to no longer forgive – it is Jesus’ way of saying: you must always be forgiving. We believe that at just the right time Jesus died for our sins [Romans 5:6] – so there are none of us here today who have not been forgiven of their sins. And if we are to be Disciples of Love, Disciples of the One who forgave our sins, we must forgive the sins of others – and sometimes that means that we first have to forgive ourselves of the lie that we have done something so bad, that not even the waters of baptism can wash away our sins. Yes, it can be truly hard to forgive others when one is struggling to truly embrace that God has forgiven you.
And right now, a lot of people need, indeed crave forgiveness but are too embarrassed and too ashamed to ask for it. What we are seeing in so many hospital beds are neighbors who would rather die than admit that they were wrong. They are entrapped in a web of shame and guilt which they cannot escape on their own. So, it is up to us to take that first, gigantic step by saying, “I forgive you – because God forgives you.” And then going on to say something like, “Learn from what has happened, forgive yourself, seek the forgiveness of others you have harmed, and sin no more against yourself or your neighbors.” As Paul wrote to us, “…I have been crucified with Christ, and it is not I who live, but Christ who lives in me.” [Galatians 2:20] And so it is, we must not speak this forgiveness through gritted teeth, because it is not we alone who are saying it, but the Christ who lives within us speaking through us and with us.
Bottom line: COVID-19 may be new, but God’s Word is Eternal and as a Church we must learn to Sing a New Song that brings God’s Word to ears which heretofore have not been able to hear the Truth that the Living Christ is speaking through science and medicine today. And so let us hear the Prophetic Word that the Holy Spirit is sowing among our pews this morning, that there was a day in which a church heard a New Word from God. And daily it walked behind the Holy Spirit as it was sowing the Truth in its community. And when the Deceiver stole that Truth away, it surrounded those whose truth had been stolen and prayed for them daily, gently showing the victim what true Love could mean in their life. And when they found someone whose heart and mind had turned to stony ground, they fired up the bulldozer and the backhoe and carefully tore down the stony walls that were fencing out truth from their pastures. And when they came across gardens overrun with thorny lies, they got down on their knees and carefully, root by root, untangled and separated the flowers from the weeds and fertilized them with Truth and Love until they could stand tall on their own. And weekly they came home to the good fertile ground of their sanctuary and drank deep from the well of Jesus’s Love and Forgiveness and fortified themselves to go out again to Love the World into a better place – a World filled with Truth, Love and Peace.