1st Sunday after Trinity

SERMON - The Kingdom of God Is a lot like Farming!

INI

Text: Mark 4:26-29

And He (Jesus) said, “The kingdom of God is as if a man should scatter seed on the ground, and should sleep by night and rise by day, and the seed should sprout and grow, he himself does not know how. For the earth yields crops by itself: first the blade, then the head, after that the full grain in the head. But when the grain ripens, immediately he puts in the sickle, because the harvest has come.”

In Christ Jesus, of whose kingdom we are by grace through faith a part, dear fellow redeemed:

Our text is one of Jesus’ parables. A parable is a word picture. In the days before digital graphics and LCD projectors, before animated cartoons and special effects—people told parables, or stories filled with word pictures, in order to illustrate the points they wanted to make. Jesus, who wanted people to understand the great truths and basic principles of His spiritual kingdom, told people parables, which used simple everyday activities of life to illustrate those kingdom truths and principles. Because in Jesus’ day the vast majority of people still lived agriculturally based lives, it is not surprising that a good many of His parables had to do with farming. The picture on the front of your bulletin today illustrates what is probably Jesus’ most famous agricultural parable—the Sower and the Seed. Our text contains a parable that is similar in nature, but which is less well known and emphasizes different truths. We note from this parable that THE KINGDOM OF GOD IS A LOT LIKE FARMING! First of all, you must diligently plant the seed! Secondly, you must patiently wait for the crops to grow! Finally, you can confidently expect the harvest!

I.

Yes, you must diligently plant the seed! Jesus said: “The kingdom of God is as if a man should scatter seed on the ground.” It sounds so simple! In a way, it was in Jesus’ day. You did not have all of the different seed companies and variety of seeds. You simply had a generic wheat or other grain seed. You would tie the bag of seeds around your waist, walk through the fields, and broadcast the seed with your hand. Yet, you had to be diligent. A man snoozing the day away in the shade of a Juniper tree did not get his fields planted!

Today, while things are quite a bit different, it remains true that farmers must be diligent in the planting of their seeds. That is why many farmers begin already in the fall selecting the particular seeds that will meet their needs. Numerous competitive seed companies utilizing the latest in genetic engineering produce different seed varieties with different genetic traits, which give farmers plenty of options. Types of soil, length of growing seasons, resistance to various pests and herbicides are all figured into the production of hybrid seeds. Farmers will at times plant different varieties of seeds in the same field in order to maximize their yields. That is why farmers spend large amounts of time attending various meetings to learn from seed companies, university extensions, and other agriculturally related businesses what will be best for their particular operations, and that is only the beginning! When spring time comes and the fields are ready, farmers will work long hours diligently planting their seed at just the right depth and at just the right distances to promote maximum production!

What does all this have to do with the kingdom of God? We are the farmers in the parable, and the seed that is sown is the Word of God. We are to plant the seed of God’s Word, and we must be diligent in doing so! Jesus’ word picture expresses His later command: “Preach the gospel to every creature” (Mk. 16:15). Just as our farmers today, however, must spent a lot of time exploring the great varieties of seeds available to them and select just the right seed for their particular fields and even portions of individual fields, so we must be diligent in exploring the truths of God’s Word and be prepared to sow those truths carefully in the fields of human hearts. We cannot be casual about our preparations for planting! If I plant law, for instance, instead of gospel when speaking to an individual sorrowing over his sin, I can destroy that individual; whereas if I plant the gospel instead of the law when dealing with a confirmed sinner, I will have wasted my efforts, for those seeds will not grow.

What is the pest we are trying to control? It won’t be rootworm, but it may be greed, or envy, or a lack of forgiveness, or pride, or laziness. I have to understand the situation into which I hope to bring God’s Word, and then I must have spent time identifying the particular seeds—truths from God’s Word which must be planted! That takes time and diligence. We need to read up regularly about biblical truth, using our Bibles or devotionals each day just like a farmer studies the seed comparison reports. We need to go to the meetings arranged by our “religion” company—Immanuel congregation: Sunday morning Bible Study or Wednesday evening Bible Study, or the Seniors’ Bible Study, so that we are knowledgeable and ready to make the proper choices of seed for a particular situation. It will not do to study the Bible like the blind-folded, finger sticker, who simply opened his Bible at random and with his eyes closed put his finger on a verse for the day! You know what happened, don’t you? One day when he was particularly distraught over how things were going in his life, he turned to the Bible for help. The first verse that he picked at random was: “He (Judas)…went and hanged himself” (Matthew 27:5). Upset by his first selection he tried again. His second verse was: “Then Jesus said to him, ‘Go and do likewise’” (Luke 10:37). My dear friends, THE KINGDOM OF GOD IS A LOT LIKE FARMING! If you are going to be successful then you must diligently plant the seed!

II.

Secondly, you must patiently wait for the crops to grow! Jesus continued with His parable by saying: “The kingdom of God is as if a man should scatter seed on the ground, and should sleep by night and rise by day, and the seed should sprout and grow, he himself does not know how. For the earth yields crops by itself: first the blade, then the head, after that the full grain in the head.” What causes a seed that appears to be dried and dead to grow? The bio-geneticists do not even know. All we know is that seeds planted in the soil germinate with sufficient moisture and grow into plants producing their various fruits. Now it is true that farmers in Jesus’ day would cultivate their fields in order to rid them of weeds and would water them to provide sufficient moisture to help the plants grow, but mostly they had to be patient and wait for the plants to grow. In our day as well farmers are busy after planting. They don’t cultivate their fields much any more, but they do apply various herbicides to rid their fields of weeds, which in turn allows their planted crops to receive the benefit of the soil’s moisture and nutrients. They too, however, must be patient. You don’t find farmers out in their fields pulling on their plants to make them grow faster or standing on the edge of the field with a bull-horn shouting: “Now hear this plants—grow!” No, farmers must patiently wait for the crops to grow on their own!

How does this apply to the kingdom of God? Just as a farmer must be diligent in planting his seed, so we must be diligent in planting the Word of God. Even so, just as a farmer must be patient in waiting for the crops the grow, so we Christians who share the Word of God with others through our witnessing, must be patient as we wait for faith and its fruits to appear. We cannot and do not create faith in people’s hearts. We cannot force anyone to believe. Conversion is the work of the Holy Spirit using the seeds of the Word we plant! The apostle Paul tells us: “No one can say that Jesus is Lord except by the Holy Spirit” (1 Corinthians 12:3b). Likewise, we cannot properly demand fruits of the Spirit to arise from faith. Sanctification, the production of fruits of faith, must likewise flow from the heart as the Spirit causes it to come about.

This can be a most frustrating situation for many of us, especially if we have been led by the Spirit to see how important the kingdom work is for all involved. Lack of involvement on the part of some within the congregation—including members of our own families, low attendance figures for Bible Classes and worship services, financial deficits, a lack of sanctified living in daily lives can all lead people to want to lay down the law and attempt to force people to do what we know to be right and beneficial. Yet, “Without faith it is impossible to please Him (God)” (Hebrews 11:6a). Forced sanctification may achieve certain immediate goals, but it does not promote the long-range spiritual welfare of any soul. Rather, we must be diligent in our planting of the seeds of God’s Word and then patiently wait for the crop to grow. That does not mean ignoring situations, for just as farmers apply herbicide to kill weeds and must be on the alert for other pests that may arise and damage the crop, so we must be ready to act to root out sin and ward off other spiritual dangers, still we must be patient as we await the spiritual maturing of individual believers. Yes, THE KINGDOM OF GOD IS A LOT LIKE FARMING! You must patiently wait for the crops to grow!

III.

Finally, you can confidently expect the harvest! Jesus concluded His parable by saying: “When the grain ripens, immediately he puts in the sickle, because the harvest has come.” Farmers do not spend large amounts of their time and financial resources researching and purchasing seeds, then planting those seeds, and waiting all summer for the plants to grow with no hope of a harvest! The harvest, after all, is the object of all of their work, for it is in the harvest that the farmers finally receive the rewards of all of their work. Jesus speaks of the inevitability of the harvest by simply mentioning that it will come and when it comes, the farmer immediately gets to work gathering the grain.

The harvest of the kingdom of God will come at the end of time, when Jesus returns in judgment with all of His heavenly hosts. How important is the harvest to God? It is of the utmost importance, for He gave up His Son in order to secure it. It is of the utmost importance to Jesus, for He gave up His life in order that we might possess its fruits leading to eternal life. It is of the utmost importance to the angelic hosts, whom God sends to watch over and protect us. Jesus once said: “There will be more joy in heaven over one sinner who repents than over ninety-nine just persons who need no repentance” (Luke 15:7). It is and should be so very important to each of us, for while the world may reject it and many within our world may ignore it, the fact remains: “He who believes and is baptized will be saved; but he who does not believe will be condemned” (Mark 16:16). The fact remains that: “Wide is the gate and broad is the way that leads to destruction, and there are many who go in by it. Because narrow is the gate and difficult is the way which leads to life, and there are few who find it” (Matthew 7:13-14).

My dear friends—the good farmers that you know are diligent when it comes to planting their seeds, they are patient as they wait for their crops to grow, and they are confident that the harvest finally will come! The world depends upon its farmers, for they produce the food we eat—food which sustains our physical lives while we live on this earth. Jesus wants us to be good farmers—spiritual farmers in His kingdom. Our souls and the souls of countless others depend upon it. Without the Word of God souls will die! Let us be diligent in our planting! The Spirit alone can use the message we plant to create faith and produce fruits of faith! Let us be patient as we nurture the plants the Spirit causes to grow! And, finally, may we recognize that the harvest is coming! Let us be prepared for and confident of our Savior’s coming, for then we will indeed inherit life everlasting! Amen.

—Pastor Paul D. Nolting
To God alone be the glory!