Good Seed

July 23, 2023 Matthew 13:24-30, 36-43 Good Seeds 8th Sunday after Pentecost Year A Prelude Welcome Call to Worship One: As we harvest our growing abundance in this time of mid-summer, may we relish in the fruit of our labor, Many: As we harvest the fruitful seeds of nature and God’s Garden, let us share in the bounty with our neighbors. One: While we channel resources – water, light, fertile ground to the produce we desire in our gardens, Many: May we also recognize that the weed, the rabbit, the caterpillar also has needs for sustenance. One: We have enough, and an attitude of plentifulness increases through sharing. Many: For what our land grows with our tending, is only ours for a moment in time, filling a short term and immediate need. All: May we share the harvest by tithing back to nature, feeding the hungry among us, storing for the future without hoarding, and setting enough seed aside for the next season of planting. (United Church of Christ Worship Ways, Dr. Sherry Warren) Invocation God of many names, mother of all creation, father of all that is, womb of life, and wellspring of all that we can ever know, we invite your presence here as we seek to embody your loving spirit and create your presence among us. We are in need and we turn to you to be with us as we practice creating the kin-dom of heaven here on earth. (United Church of Christ Worship Ways, Dr. Sherry Warren) Song Guide me O Thou Great Jehovah Children’s Sermon Have some very small pots of dandelions or other native weed ready to be given to each child. Today our Bible message is about God as the gardener. Jesus told this story to his friends to help them to understand how the love of God workd. He told them that the farmer lavishly scattered seeds in the field. There were weeds already in the field and the good plants and the weeds grew up together. When it came time for the harvest, God separated the weeds from the good plants. At first some people would say that God should have thinned out the plants earlier and gotten all the weeds out, casting them into the fire. But that didn’t happen. Weeds and seeds grew up together. Then came the time of harvest. Each plant was harvested with the others, weeds and good plants alike. God will decide what to do about the weeds. God is loves us all very much and wants the best things for us. We have a lot to learn. Life isn’t always just good things; sometimes we encounter difficult times. We can learn about courage, perseverance, hope, and forgiveness in these times. I’m going to ask each one of you to take a special plant home with you. Take good care of it. Give it just the right amount of sunlight so that it will grow. Make sure to water it, but not too much. Take time to get to know your little plant. Think about the ways in which that plant is very special. Talk with your parents about planting your little weed in a place of its own where you can care for it. Thank you for coming up here today. Good luck with your plants. (United Methodist Ministry Matters, Nancy Townley) Prayer for Transformation and New Life God of creation and plenty, it can be easy for us to forget the abundant nature of your love. We forget that there are ample riches from this earth if we manage your resources you and we share generously among all your beloved children. We forget that we are all created in your divine beauty, perfect specimens of your holy vision for a people who can love without bounds, share without tallying, and celebrate among the great diversity you created to thrive together. Guide us to give of that abundance, to receive with grace and gratitude, and to turn our hearts from the perception of scarcity. We confess that we fall short; and we ask that you show us the path again to your fruitful garden where all things grow and flourish. (United Church of Christ Worship Ways, Dr. Sherry Warren) Words of Grace Let us know that God has always provided us with growth and abundance and will continue to guide us in the care of bounteous fields that spring forth with plant and animal, both weed and seed. We are all worthy of this enduring joy and sustenance as beloved children of God. (United Church of Christ Worship Ways, Dr. Sherry Warren) Passing of the Peace Scripture Matthew 13:24-30, 36-43 Sermon Good Seeds Some of you can relate to one unknown homemaker who wrote: I don’t do windows because . . . I love birds and don’t want one to run into a clean window and get hurt. I don’t wax floors because . . . I am terrified a guest will slip and get hurt then I’ll feel terrible (plus they may sue me.)I don’t disturb cobwebs because . . . I want every creature to have a home of their own. I don’t Spring Clean because . . . I love all the seasons and don’t want the others to get jealous. I don’t put things away because . . . my husband will never be able to find them again. I don’t do gourmet meals when I entertain because . . . I don’t want my guests to stress out over what to make when they invite me over for dinner. I don’t iron because . . . I choose to believe them when they say “Permanent Press.” And finally: I don’t pull weeds in the garden because . . . I don’t want to get in God’s way, He is an excellent designer! So, what is a weed anyway. I have heard many different definitions over the years. The dictionary defines a weed as any plant that is growing in the wrong place. Of course we can add other criteria, such as a plant that is invasive. A plant that you do no want. And you definitely don’t intentionally plant weeds. And yet interestingly when Jesus refers to weeds and planting goods seeds for the harvest. Jesus says that the weeds are intentionally planted by the devil. He says that just as you plant wheat in neatly controlled rows – the devil did the same thing. Wheat is broadcast – you just throw it out on the ground. So perhaps Jesus wasn’t a farmer, so he wasn’t clear about technique. Or perhaps he wasn’t talking about plants at all. Perhaps he was talking about the weeds that grow inside of the church. In chapter 13- Jesus is talking to the disciples about the kingdom of heaven. They have never seen heaven, but they live in a world where seeds, plants and harvest are common. So Jesus is just explaining heaven in terms that they have heard. I just learned that all weeds are volunteers, but not all volunteers are weeds. Volunteers could be people or plant. So Jesus may be saying that in the church some of us are sincere and here for the right reasons and some of us are not. Some of us are good seed planted here by God and some of us are bad seed planted by God. But Jesus gets it wrong again when he says that you harvest weeds in the same way that you harvest good plants. Usually you pluck up the weeds long before you pluck up the harvest. Yet Jesus says to hold off on the weeds and pull up the weeds and the harvest at the same time. He says to burn the weeds. Once again it is only the human weeds that get thrown into the fires of hell so that they can burn. The question or question of the day is – which one of us here are weeds and which ones are good seed? And who is it that is responsible for the harvest? In Matthew, Jesus takes the time to explain the players in the story. The landowner who does the planting is Jesus. The enemy is the devil. The harvesters are the angels. You and me are just the seed. Some of us good seed and some of us bad. A Glorious Mess Hear now a recasting of the parable (courtesy of the wonderfully innovative work of Barbara Brown Taylor): One afternoon in the middle of the growing season, a bunch of farm hands decided to surprise their boss and weed his favorite wheat field. No sooner had they begun to work, however, than they began to argue ... about which of the wheat-looking things were weeds. Did the Queen Anne's lace, for example, pose a real threat to the wheat, or could it stay for decoration? And the blackberries? After all, they were weeds. But they would be ripe in a week or two. And the honeysuckle ... it seemed a shame to pull up anything that smelled so sweet. About the time they had gotten around to debating the purple asters, the boss showed up and ordered them out of his field. Dejected, they did as they were told. Back at the barn, he took their machetes away from them, poured them some lemonade, and made them sit down where they could watch the way the light moved across the field. At first, all they could see were the weeds and what a messy field it was ... and what a discredit to their profession. But as the summer wore on, they marveled at the profusion of growth. Tall wheat surrounded by tall goldenrod, accented by a mixture of ragweed and brown-eyed Susans. Even the poison ivy flourished beside the Cherokee roses. It was a mess. But a glorious mess. And when it had all bloomed and ripened, the reapers came. Carefully ... gently ... expertly ... they gathered the wheat and made the rest into bricks for the oven where the bread was baked. And the fire the weeds made was excellent. And the flour the wheat made was excellent. And when the owner called them together ... farm hands, reapers, along with all the neighbors ... and broke bread with them (bread that was the final distillation of that messy, gorgeous, mixed up field), they all agreed that it was like no bread they had ever tasted before. And that it was very, very good. Let those who have ears ... and half a brain ... hear and consider. Barbara Brown Taylor, www.Sermons.com _______________________ Jesus lesson for us today is not about the good seed and the bad. It is about our favorite hobby in the church – judging. As Christians we are obsessed with the thought that we are the good seed. And if we are the good seed, anything that does not look like us, that we don’t agree with, that we don’t understand, or doesn’t fit into our picture must be bad seed. Jesus is reminding us that we are just seed – we don’t have the power to judge. That is not our place in the story. A Word of Caution to Champion Weed-Pullers I'll never forget the day I became a champion weed-puller. It was a little embarrassing. About thirty summers ago I was a young boy of eight or nine, living with my family on a farm in rural Wisconsin, not far from Milwaukee. My older brothers used to spend a good deal of June and July helping the neighboring truck farmers weed their gardens. I don't know how they do it today, but then it was a matter of doing everything by hand. You got down near the ground and pulled the weeds one by one. The pay was about a dime for a row of radishes a hundred feet long. One day I thought I would get in on this money making venture, so I too presented myself to the neighboring truck farmer, who agreed to pay me a dime for each row of radishes I would weed. He quickly inquired whether I knew what a radish plant looked like. I quickly replied that I did, not wanting to be turned down for the job. So I went to work, and about an hour later, I stood before the farmer, expecting a shiny silver dime. But sure enough, I had picked all the tender young radish shoots and left the ignoble weeds standing there gloriously in the sunshine. Clearly it would have been better for this farmer and his radishes if I had never pulled his so-called "weeds" at all. A champion weed-puller indeed! Richard Patt, Challenge of Christ's Harvest As Christians we like to think that we have some special power to judge others, and we forget that in the bigger story – we are just seeds. We don’t even know how to determine if we ae even considered a good seed. We ae just seeds. A Line Through Every Heart I have colleagues who continually want to cull the field, making decisions on the basis of belief ... behavior ... even baptism. As many of you know, my wife is into genealogy. She's traced portions of her family back over 500 years. Just a few months ago, we learned that she had a relative who was burned at the stake in Switzerland. Why? Because he had the wrong understanding of baptism, that's why. They weeded him out. Then they burned him up. As for me, I don't always know whether I am weed or wheat. Wasn't it Alexander Solzhenitsyn who said: "If only there were evil people somewhere insidiously committing evil deeds, and it were necessary only to separate them from the rest of us and destroy them. But the line dividing good and evil cuts through the heart of every human being." Which, I suppose, includes my heart. For all I know, I may even be the weed in somebody else's garden. Perhaps in your garden. Collected Sermons, William A. Ritter, ChristianGlobe Networks, Inc. Sometimes we are the weed, and sometime we are the wheat. A Limerick for the Wheat and the Weeds I enjoyed the book by Archibald Hunter, Parable Then and Now. In his comments on today's parable, he had one limerick that I really enjoyed: "There is so much good in the worst of us, and so much bad in the best of us, that it hardly becomes any of us, to talk about the rest of us." Edward F. Markquart, www.Sermons.com The kingdom of heaven is like a field, but the kingdom of heaven is in God’s realm. And Fields only grow on earth. How to determine between the weed and the harvest is an earthly question. Weeds are only a negative thing in our own minds. In heaven every volunteer has a unique purpose and place. We have all heard the term, judge not and be not judged. That comes in Matthew 7. But in practical terms what does it mean not the judge others. How can you possible go through life without judging. We have to be able to identify the bad seed, the dangerous seed, those who are fake and phony. Better to Have Weeds than Nothing at All I asked the people at my last church to imagine what would happen if we adopted a policy of weed-pulling, if we drew a circle around the little town of Wingate, North Carolina, and made a vow that no evil would cross that line, that no weeds would grow within that border. I said, "You know, you and I could spend the rest of our lives protecting that boundary, standing shoulder to shoulder with pitchforks and clubs, making sure that we kept drugs and alcohol and pornography and gambling safely on the other side. I think it would take all of our energy and most of our time. But what if we did it? What if we succeeded? What would we have? We would have a town characterized by the absence of evil, which is not the same as a town characterized by the presence of good. And maybe this is what Jesus was talking about all along, that it's better to have a wheat field with weeds in it than a field with nothing in it at all. When a church in Wingate, North Carolina, began a ministry to the children of a nearby trailer park, they had to decide what kind of ministry it would be. They could have chosen to root out all the sources of evil in that place-to chase down the drug dealers and the deadbeat dads, to confiscate handguns and arrest child abusers. Instead, they chose to put up a basketball goal, to tell stories from the Bible, to put their arms around little children, and sing songs about Jesus. And two years after they started that ministry, two years of going out there Saturday after Saturday to do those things, the pastor got a note in his box at church with five words on it: "Adrian wants to be baptized." Adrian. The terror of the trailer park. That little girl who had made their work most difficult during the previous two years. Who would have guessed? Instead of pulling weeds in the field where she lived, they just tried hard to be wheat, and somehow Adrian saw that and fell in love with it and wanted it for herself. After she was baptized, there was a little more wheat in the field. And because she was there, soon, there was even more. James Somerville, A World Full of Weeds God has a dream for us , Jesus told his friends, God wants us to live in a way that makes everybody happy – It is called God’s shalom – God’s Peace. It is called the kingdom of God. Let us love everyone and let God sort it out when we get to heaven. . Song This is My Father’s World Morning Prayer Summer is just about halfway over. Some of us have been able to travel, to spend special time with family and friends; but for others there is a sameness about this season. It brings pressures to work to provide for our families; it reminds us of the many people who are ill and who are unable to enjoy some of the special delights that this season is supposed to bring. This morning we take a few minutes to name our dear ones and situations of pain and loss as we ask for prayers from this congregation. Some people will remain unnamed because of the anguish we feel about their difficulties. But you are with them, every step of the way, even when they don’t feel like you care. You are there with them, offering them peace and hope. Let us turn our hearts to you as we silently offer these special people to your care. [Silent Prayer]. Lord, you have heard the cries of our hearts. You see our tears and feel our pain. Be with us all. Give us healing for our broken spirits and bodies, for we ask these things in the name of Jesus, the Master Healer. AMEN. (United Methodist Ministry Matters, Nancy Townley) Stewardship Moment Moment for Stewardship (inspired by Romans 8) One of the legal realities of adoption in the United States is that the person being adopted becomes an equal heir with others born to or adopted bythat family. The law sees a legal adoption as the mechanism by which the adoptee is seen in the same relationship as a child born into that family. So when Paul uses language of adoption, it’s to assure Gentiles they have the same status before God as Jews. We are ALL children of God. That makes each of us an “heir”, and joint heirs with Jesus. Of course, not all families are the kind of family we might want to claim. But God’s family takes us away from fear, slavery, and living as debtors to the flesh. In God’s family, we no longer live in futility, but we’re set free, by adoption, to redemption and salvation. These big words mean we can live our lives buoyed up by HOPE. Claiming this as our truth leads us to a natural inclination to want to offer our thanks to God. That may come in a variety of ways, but it certainly includes an eagerness to share what we’ve been given with the Giver. We can give our time, our energy/talent, and our finances as offerings to the God who has created us and claimed us in Christ Jesus. So this Sunday, and EVERY Sunday, is a day to offer our gifts. With joyful hearts, filled with gratitude that we’ve been adopted into God’s family, let us share our gifts. Prayer of Thanksgiving Gracious God, you’ve named us, claimed us, and call us “my beloved daughters and sons”. With thanksgiving, we return to you these symbols of our live. Help us breathe in the assurance of our adoption, which will inspire us to offer all we are and all we have to your service. AMEN (Disciples of Christ Center for Faith and Giving) Announcements Closing Prayer for Facebook God’s people, you are called to go forth and appreciate the weeds among us, as we have each been in the wrong place at times. Go from this place during this harvest time and taste the ripeness of a plump tomato, the sweetness of fresh steamed corn, the crisp coolness of cucumbers. Please go in the knowledge that there is enough for all, be it God’s earthly blessings that are so delicious and nourishing or God’s love that connects us. Share in these gifts and know that we are all enough. (United Church of Christ Worship Ways, Dr. Sherry Warren) Community Time – Joys and Concerns Benediction Get ready to go into God’s world. Bring messages of hope to all. As we have been blessed, may we bring blessings to all in the name of Jesus Christ. AMEN. (United Methodist Ministry Matters, Nancy Townley) Additional Illustrations