This is a sermon that I preached on Sunday, 07/12/26, at Berkeley Friends Church. The scripture reading for this sermon was:
Matthew 13:1-9,18-23.
I’ve read the parable of the sower more times than I can remember. Most of the times that I’ve read it, I have treated it as a schema for the ways in which God has approached me throughout my life – sowing the word or God into my life, despite my readiness or lack of readiness to receive it.
I have been the rocky ground where God has cast his seed and found no response. I have been the shallow soil that got really excited to hear the good news, but then wasn’t able to endure when things got tough. I have been the ground full of weeds that chokes out the seed. I have been distracted and selfish. I’ve cared more about money and status than I have about giving my life fully tqo the truth.
There have also been some times in my life where I think I’ve been the good soil where God’s seed has been sown in me and I have yielded a harvest of one hundred, or sixty, or thirty times that which was given me.
What’s funny is that although I hope I’m less rocky and shallow and choked with weeds than I used to be, I am still all of these things sometimes. And while I believe that I am becoming good soil more often, I know that I’m very much a work in progress. My journey is not linear. The trend line of my life is not always “up and to the right.”
God’s grace isn’t just a one time event. God is always sowing his seed on us, reaching for us with the word of his kingdom. He’s sharing his unlimited life, his everlasting power, his ability to transform who we are to be something almost unimaginable. He can transform us into much more beautiful than the dreams we have for ourselves. We can become people who show a love far beyond, far deeper than the shallow love that we would generate on our own.
God has been so great, so generous with me. He continues to give so abundantly to me, in and out of season. He sows his seed in my life and offers me the good news of the gospel, even when I’m rocky or shallow or choked with distractions. But this morning I’m thinking about the role that I myself play in sowing the seed of God. God is the ultimate sower, but I, too, am called to become a sower of the kingdom.
That’s happens when the seed of God lands in good soil in my life. When I’m truly responding to the good news and showing love and generosity that people around me, my life becomes a source of good seed to others. I am the abundant soil. My life is sowing the seed, sowing the kingdom, multiplying the word and presence of God out into the world – one hundred, sixty, or thirty fold.
I am so inconsistent. Unlike God, I fail to sow the word in and out of season. I want to reserve the word for good soil only. I don’t want to make the mistake of sowing it on rocky ground where birds will eat it. I don’t want to waste it on shallow soil where it will be futile, or among the weeds where it will get lost. I try to be more strategic than that. I want a better return on my investment. I don’t want to waste the my love on lost causes.
That’s how the world thinks. That’s the way the world operates. Since coming out to live in California and serve Berkeley Friends Church as pastor, I have been working in Silicon Valley, which has been a new cultural experience for me. Over the years, I’ve learned a fair amount about how the financial side of Silicon Valley works, including how the tech ecosystem is financed and directed through venture capitalists.
At first glance, venture capitalism seems to operate very similarly to the sower in this parable. A venture capitalist will invest not just in one or two companies. They might invest in hundreds with the expectation that most of those startups might fail. But they hope that at least one of these companies will provide such a high return on investment that it will make up for the loss or low returns of the other investments. This is where the term “unicorn” comes from. A company that’s a unicorn has returned such a massive amount for the investors that it’s able to offset whatever losses they’ve sustained in their other investments, and then some.
But venture capitalists are not engaged in charity. They’re not engaged in the non-transactional, free-will giving that we see in the parable of the sower. Investors don’t intentionally sow their seed on rocky ground where there won’t be a harvest. They do their best to make sure that everywhere they invest has the best chance of giving them a good return.
I worry that, all too often, I operate more like a venture capitalist in my relationships rather than as a sower of the seed of the word of God. More often than I’d like to admit, I hold back my love, my attention, my human investment in other people, because I’m not sure what I’m going to get back. I worry it won’t make a difference. I try to calculate in advance whether my love, time, and attention will build the kingdom and yield a harvest.
The message I’m getting this morning from Jesus’ parable of the sower is that this is entirely the wrong way to think about it. We are not called to be venture capitalists looking for the best possible return on investment. We are called to be like the irresponsible sower of Jesus’ parable, who scatters the seed all over without regard for the quality of the ground.
We are called to love in spite of the odds, to pour out our lives for those who apparently offer us nothing but who need God’s love, need God’s message, need the gospel of the kingdom in their lives – just like we do. We are called to scatter the seed of God everywhere, even on rocky, barren ground that seems guaranteed to reject our love and the good news of the kingdom. We are called to sow the seed of God everywhere.
This feels very hard. It goes against all of my natural inclinations. I don’t want to waste my time on fruitless endeavors. I don’t want to use up my energy scattering my seed on rocky ground. I want to scatter my seed on ground that is going to yield a harvest. I want results!
But then I remember that Christ died for me while I was still rocky ground. I remember that the Holy Spirit has continued to work in my life, despite all the times when I was unresponsive, or even hostile to the good news. God keeps working on me, in spite of all my failures and setbacks. He’s sowing the good news in my life, even when I’m not ready for it.
Why does he do this? Because he loves me. God so loves the world that he sows his seed in season and out of season, on rocky ground and on good soil, on shallow patches and in weedy corners. God loves each and every one of us and he won’t stop showering the good news of the kingdom and pouring out his love on us. We are called to imitate him and send rain on the just and the unjust, on the rocky and on the ready.
This is how the good news transforms the world: not through careful strategies and calculated investments, but through jars of perfume broken open and wasted for the sake of love.
Where is the rocky and shallow and weedy ground in your life where God continues to sow his seed and pour out his love? How might you respond?
Where are the rocky and shallow and weedy places in the people around you, where God is calling you to sow extravagantly so that there might be an abundant harvest in ways that you cannot possibly foresee? What does it look like for you to scatter seed, in and out of season?