THESIS:
The Kingdom of God does not grow by man’s knowledge, but we do have a
responsibility in its growth nevertheless.
Introduction
It
was the weightiest ever grown. This heaviest tomato was grown by Dan Sutherland
in Walla Walla, Washington, and weighed 8.61 pounds. He grew this monster in
2016.
It
was the longest ever grown. In September 2010 a 78 year old Clare Pearce grew a
cucumber 42 inches long. Mrs. Pearce planted the Cucumber Melonie seeds in the
greenhouse in the back garden of her home in Whittlesey, England.
And
what about the tallest ever to grow? That would be a coastal sequoia which is
named Hyperion (the high one) in a
hat tip to Greek mythology. It is 379.7 feet tall. It may also be one of the
oldest. In the past sequoias have been cut down that appeared to be 3220 years
old (by counting the tree rings).
And
what about the oldest seeds ever sprouted. In 2002 a Chinese lotus was
germinated that was at least 500 years old. In 2008 a date palm seed from
Masada near the Dead Sea was germinated. This was from a small cache of seeds
dating to about 2000 years ago! In 2012 a Russian flower, the Silene Stenophylla was germinated. This
seed may be older than the date palm!
All
these things have one commonality, they grew from seeds. But how does this
happen? How do things grow?
Scripture
reading:
26 And He said, “[In this way] The
kingdom of God is as if a man should scatter seed on the ground, 27 and should sleep by night and rise by day, and the seed should sprout and grow, he himself does not know how. 28 For the earth yields crops by itself: first the blade, then the head,
after that the full grain in the head. 29 But when the grain ripens, immediately
he puts in the sickle, because the harvest has
come.” (Mark 4:26-29)
Let’s
examine the parable, in the sense of what is being laid down:
A-
The Agricultural
example.
a.
The
man throws the seed.
Where? On the ground. What is this called?
Planting.
b.
The seed sprouts, and grows on its own, or
automatically. How this happens the man
does not know. We are told that the earth itself yields the crop.
c.
The
man harvests the crop. The man, seeing the ripened crop gathers it up.
And
now let’s examine the parable, in the sense of what it is being compared, and
this is the work of the interpreter. The lesson is a spiritual one.
B-
The Spiritual
reality taught.
a.
God’s Word is
spread – by people who preach and share their faith.
i. We are commanded to
witness.
It is our work to do the planting, the
sowing. We are the preachers and the teachers. Christ gave us this injunction
in the Great Commission, Go therefore and make
disciples of all the nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of
the Son and of the Holy Spirit, 20 teaching them to observe all things that I have commanded
you; and lo, I am with you always, even to the end of the age.” God
gives us the responsibility to spread the word just as a farmer needs to sow
the seed if he is to expect a harvest. And this is
a faith making work. By that I mean to say that apart from God you can have no expectation of a harvest. Consider
the risk a farmer could take, in planting and getting no increase for all the
labor! How much faith do you have? In Genesis 13 we read of a dispute Lot’s men
had with Abraham’s men. This dispute caused the two to separate. Lot chose the
well-watered fertile plain of the Jordan. Lot had some faith, but Abraham had more. And remember
the great commission – it is a command!
Paul speaks of this in almost the same
metaphor as Christ in 1 Corinthians 3:5-9, “Who then is
Paul, and who is Apollos, but ministers through whom you believed, as the Lord
gave to each one? 6 I planted, Apollos watered, but God gave the increase.
ii. It is to be done indiscriminately.
Notice verse 26, The
kingdom of God is as if a man should scatter seed on the ground. This
scattering is like throwing indiscriminately. The sense of the Greek word
behind scatter is to throw. And we
only need look up to the prior parable of the soils to see it was indeed
indiscriminate. Thrown on the trodden down pathway, and among stones – how did
this farmer ever expect to harvest anything! The secret is the Kingdom of God. He
didn’t concern himself with all the particulars of farming. This is where the
analogy breaks down folks. We do have our methods and means to make things
grow. Some among us can be said to be ‘green thumbs’ but according to the
Spiritual application, we cannot manipulate the outcome. Indeed we are only to
be faithful in the witness, to whomever crosses our path.
iii. How beautiful are the feet
of those who do!
In another place Paul gives the reasoning
for this. Turn to Romans, we’ll be reading Romans 10:14-15, In verses 9 – 13 we read of the spreading of
the gospel by means that God creates new Spiritual life in a person. Thus
follows Paul’s question,
14 How then
shall they call on Him in whom they have not believed? And how shall they
believe in Him of whom they have not heard? And how shall they hear without a
preacher? 15 And how
shall they preach unless they are sent? As it is written: “How beautiful are
the feet of those who preach the gospel of peace, Who bring glad tidings of
good things!”
Don’t think of these questions as
hypothetical, or even rhetorical. They may be, but brothers and sisters, they
point the finger to us. We are the ones responsible to bear the good news. That
there is a spiritual gift of evangelism there is no doubt. Paul tells us
explicitly in Ephesians 4:11. And we find within Scripture such men as Philip
the evangelist, the apostles Peter and Paul. But the call to evangelize is not
for those with the Spiritual gift only. The great Commission is a command
to all believers everywhere.
And the blessing of beautiful feet! What
is this anyway? If you think about it, in the analogy of the church to a body
in 1 Corinthians 12:15-26 Paul uses the foot
in respect of an individual within the body.
Verse 15 reads, “If the foot should say, “Because
I am not a hand, I am not of the body,” is it therefore not of the body?”
Why does he use this strange logic? To snap people out of their jealous and
envious ways. They thought that some who had certain gifts were more important.
But he uses the foot because it is indeed one of the lesser members of the
body! Some people have downright ugly feet!
And yet how are the feet of those who
bring the good news called beautiful? Because even
the lowest servant who frees a man from slavery is accorded dignity. Paul’s
analogy in 1 Corinthians concludes in verse 26, “And if
one member suffers, all the members suffer with it; or if one member is
honored, all the members rejoice with it.
b.
God’s Word grows in hearts, quite
apart from the efforts of men, or their knowledge.
i. Example in Ephesians
2,
And you He made alive, who were dead in trespasses and sins, 2 in
which you once walked according to the course of this world, according to the
prince of the power of the air, the spirit who now works in the sons of
disobedience, 3 among whom also we all once conducted ourselves
in the lusts of our flesh, fulfilling the desires of the flesh and of the mind,
and were by nature children of wrath, just as the others.
4 But God, who is rich in mercy, because of His great love with which
He loved us, 5 even when we were dead in trespasses, made us
alive together with Christ (by grace you have been saved), 6 and
raised us up together, and made us sit together in the heavenly places in
Christ Jesus, 7 that in the ages to come He might show the
exceeding riches of His grace in His kindness toward us in Christ Jesus. (Eph. 2:1-7)
Jesus
tells us in the parable that the man scattering seed does not know how the seed grows. Yet here in Ephesians we see the
agent of change, the Lord God. We see the reason also, mercy and love caused
him to raise up dead men and women. We may not know the mechanics, but we do
know the source of power, the Lord God Strong and Mighty! Just as Christ raised
up the daughter of Jairus (Luke 8:41-55) and later Lazarus (John 11:1-44) – So
God today takes men dead in sins and gives them new life.
ii. Example in Isaiah
55,
In Isaiah God is
appealing to sinners, ‘Come to the waters’ he
cries aloud. And in this appeal he tells them in verse 3 Incline your ear and come to me; Hear that your soul may live.
The ever living One actually stoops to reason with his creatures! As amazing as
this is, he does it, knowing these same ones will not grasp the thing to which
he calls them. God tells us plainly that we cannot understand these matters,
though we can recognize them when they occur. So when Christ tells us the man does not know how things grow, it is
because of our limited grasp of all things Spiritual.
Even in the
physical world there are things we cannot explain. Such as how the first seeds
came to be. Apart from God’s special creation, we as men have no answer. The
question becomes as absurd as, “Which came first, the chicken or the egg?” We
answer that it is the chicken – but only because it has been revealed to us in
Genesis 1 and 2. It is not as though we know how He created this world. How do
things live?
In Isaiah 55:9-11 we
read –
For My thoughts are not your thoughts,
Nor are
your ways My ways,” says the Lord.
9“For as the heavens are higher than the earth,
So are
My ways higher than your ways,
And My
thoughts than your thoughts.
10“For as the rain comes down, and the snow from heaven,
And do
not return there, but water the earth,
And make
it bring forth and bud, that it may give seed to the sower
And
bread to the eater,
11So shall My word be that goes forth from My mouth;
It shall
not return to Me void,
But it
shall accomplish what I please,
And it
shall prosper in the thing for which I sent it. (Isa. 55:8-11)
Using the same agricultural language God the Almighty
tells us his Word is like the rain which waters the earth. Plants need water to
grow, and God supplies this water quite apart from any power or understanding
we have. Yet the sower does have to sow. The seeds won’t grow while in the bag.
They need the earth and the rain and the sunshine.
c.
God brings in the
harvest.
Now I realize that
my outline says that God brings in the harvest, yet the parable says the man
does so. The man sees the ripening crop and gathers the harvest. But let me ask
you, how does the man know the crop is ready for harvest? He examines it. He
judges whether it is mature enough. He judges whether the full ears are come.
He determines if there is time left in the season for the crop to stand. He
makes the call. And this ought to naturally cause us to think about judgment.
Farmers make continual judgments upon the crops on their fields, and just like
the farmer, so God makes the call. Is it time to harvest?
There is an aspect
to the Kingdom of God, where the examination begins. Listen to Peter tell us
about judgment, “For the time has come for judgment to
begin at the house of God; and if it begins with us first, what will be the end
of those who do not obey the gospel of God?” (1 Peter 4:17) This is not
the only parable to speak to the issue of judgment. In my preparation I did an
analysis of all the parables pertaining to the kingdom. There are thirteen such
parables. Many of them speak to the issue of judgment! Tares in the wheat is a
familiar one (Matt. 13:24) and also the Dragnet, sorting the good and the bad
fish (Matt. 13:47). Another is the wise and foolish virgins. The harvest motif itself is found throughout
Holy Writ as a metaphor to judgment.
There was one
commentator whose insight was a great encouragement to me. He said, “Jesus by telling the story—and Mark by recording
it—encouraged disciples who were experiencing rejection of their message and
frustration at their lack of understanding of God’s mysterious purposes that God’s kingdom would surely come.”[1]
Remember how nearly everyone at the time of Christ thought the Kingdom would
come? They thought that a King would rise up to reign, almost like David and
Solomon had, over the known world. But God’s kingdom is a greater one than that
of David or even Solomon’s. Christ said to Pilate, “My
kingdom is not of this world.” (John 18:36) This world could never
contain the King of the universe. Nor could such a Kingdom be properly
represented in any form except the throne room of the King.
C-
What
is our responsibility?
So how do we
participate in the Kingdom? We cannot make it grow. We don’t even know how it
grows. How can we be responsible for things like this when we don’t even have
the power within our grasp to make it happen?
First of all, let me tell you these are the questions of a madman. Only a fool questions the living God like this. We ought to be more like the lepers we read of in 2 Kings. The situation was that the Syrians had prepared for battle outside the city of Jerusalem and these lepers, were starving. The city was in a great famine, so bad that they were resorting to cannibalism. These 4 lepers reasoned that they were to die unless somehow they could find grace with the Syrians. So they went to surrender – and they found the camp deserted! It is here that I want to read verses 9-10, “Then they said to one another, “We are not doing right. This day is a day of good news, and we remain silent. If we wait until morning light, some punishment will come upon us. Now therefore, come, let us go and tell the king’s household.” (2 Kings 7:9–10)
Using
the same phrase we use for the gospel they realized they would be held
accountable if they did not share what they now had responsibility in. And we
are in the same place folks. We have the good
news – not of a famine ending but of
the forgiveness of sins. And just as the sower scatters seed
indiscriminately so we need to spread the word. This is how the Kingdom of God
is spread. This is the mechanism God had ordained that men should here and
believe.
Earlier
I mentioned about Christ raising the daughter of Jairus, and the amazing
account of Lazarus. Both these people were physically dead. But don’t think
that God only works such miracles through His Son only. Peter raised up Tabitha
(aka Dorcas) and Paul, Eutychus. And while we shouldn’t expect such physical
miracles, we should indeed expect that our feeble effort might really result in
spiritually dead people being made alive in Christ! These people are the reward
you get for planting the seed. God is responsible for bringing new life, but we
are the planters! Let’s get out there and sow the Word! He has guaranteed it
not to fail for all His purposes!!!
Amen.
[1] James A. Brooks, Mark, vol. 23, The New American Commentary (Nashville: Broadman & Holman Publishers, 1991), 85.
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