"Grow Where You Are Planted" (July 12, 2026 Sermon)

Preaching: Rev. Edyth Potter

Texts: Romans 8:1-11 & Matthew 13:1-9, 18-23

What if the pressure to “make something of yourself” is exactly what keeps you from becoming who God already designed you to be? We start with Romans 8 and the promise of no condemnation, then follow Paul’s sharp contrast between life in the flesh and life in the Spirit. The question underneath it all is painfully human: if God’s Spirit dwells in us, why do we still feel stuck, scattered, or unsure of our purpose? 

We then step into Jesus’ Parable of the Sower and treat it like a diagnostic tool for real life. Some of us feel like the hardened path, where the Word never gets a chance to sink in. Some of us live like rocky ground, fired up for a moment but rootless when trouble hits. Others know the thorns well, where anxiety, disappointment, and the lure of “more” choke out the life we meant to grow. And when the soil is good, the fruit looks different for each person, because thirtyfold is still good. Along the way we tell stories that make the parable tangible, from a flower blooming overnight in the desert to the ways childhood creativity gets trained out of us. 

The turn comes when we ask a harder question: what if we are not only the seed or the soil, but also the sower? Faithfulness might look less like performing and more like being fully present as the real you, scattering love without controlling results. We reflect on Mother Teresa’s “three pennies and a dream,” the slow training it takes to run your own race, and the simple challenge to “dream small” and let Jesus use you right where you are. If this encouraged you, subscribe, share it with a friend, and leave a review so more people can find it. What’s one small act of love you can sow today?

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Transcript

Prayer And Romans Reading

SPEAKER_00 0:00

God, your word goes out and does not return empty, but prospers that for which it was sent. By your Spirit, open our minds to your word this day, that we might walk according to your ways for the sake of Jesus, in whose name we pray. Amen. The first lesson comes from Romans 8, verses 1 through 11. Therefore, there is now no common condemnation for those who are in Jesus Christ. For the law of the Spirit of life in Christ Jesus has set you free from the law of sin and of death. For God has done what the law, weakened by the flesh, could not do by sending his own son in the likeness of sinful flesh and to deal with sin. He condemns sin in the flesh so that the just requirement of the law might be fulfilled in us, who walk not according to flesh, but according to the spirit. For those who live according to the flesh set their minds on the things of the flesh. But those who live according to the spirit set their minds on the things of the spirit. To set the mind on the flesh is death, but to set the mind on the spirit is life and peace. For this reason, the mind that is set on the flesh is hostile to God. It does not submit to God's law. Indeed, it cannot. And those who are in the flesh cannot please God. But you are not in the flesh, you are in the spirit, since the spirit of God dwells in you. Anyone who does not have the spirit of Christ does not belong to him. But if Christ is in you, then the body is dead because of sin. But the spirit is life because of righteousness. If the spirit of him who raised Jesus from the dead dwells in you, he who raised Christ Jesus from the dead will give life to your mortal body also through his spirit that dwells in you. Holy wisdom, holy word.

SPEAKER_01 2:25

Our

Gospel: The Parable Of The Sower

SPEAKER_01 2:26

second lesson today comes from the Gospel of Matthew. This is one of the parables that is in all of the different synoptic gospels, but this is Matthew's account. That same day Jesus went out of the house and sat beside the sea. Such great great crowds gathered around him that he got into a boat and sat there while the whole crowd stood on the beach. And he told them many things in parables, saying, Listen, a sower went out to sow, and as he sowed, some seeds fell on a path, and the birds came and ate them up. Other seeds fell on rocky ground where they did not have much soil, and they sprang up quickly since they had no depth of soil. But when the sun rose they were scorched, and since they had no root, they withered away. Other seeds fell among thorns, and the thorns grew up and choked them. Other seeds fell on good soil and brought forth grain, some a hundredfold, some sixty, some thirty. If you have ears, hear. Hear then the parable of the sower. When any one hears the word of the kingdom and does not understand it, the evil one comes and snatches away what is sown in the heart. This is what was sown on the path. As for what was sown on rocky ground, this is the one who hears the word and immediately receives it with joy. Yet such a person has no root, but endures only for a while, and when trouble or persecution arises on account of the word, that person immediately falls away. As for what was sown among thorns, this is the one who hears the word, but the cares of this age and the lore of wealth choke the word, and it yields nothing. But as for what was sown on good soil, this is the one who hears the word and understands it, who indeed bears fruit, and it yields in one case a hundredfold, in another sixty, and another thirty. Holy wisdom, holy word. Last

You Are A Soul With A Body

SPEAKER_01 4:21

week we gathered here to worship, and I invited you to consider what a marvel and a paradox it is to be a human. In my words to you, I invited you to consider us the consider the miraculous thing that binds all humanity get together. That we are made. Yeah, we are made. Absolutely. Y'all remember, that's good. Flawed, yes. A dim image most of the time, but still true. That binds us all together. But today I want to kind of turn it a little bit and I want to look at what makes us each unique. Each one of us. I would like to begin with Paul's affirmation to us. There is no condemnation for those in Christ. There is a caveat, however, or rather a clarification. There is no the no condemnation comes when we are living in the spirit, when we are claiming that Christ consciousness that God calls us to. Living into the image of God, living into the consciousness of the seed of Christ within us. Paul also talks about the paradox, there's that word again, of being in the body, but also being in the spirit. There's a great quote that I've read once, and it's attributed to C.S. Lewis, but the more I've researched it, the more I find that C.S. Lewis never said this, and nobody knows where it quite came from. Might be God. This quote says, You do not have a soul. You are a soul. You have a body. It's amazing, isn't it? Usually we think of our body and our soul planted within it, but in reality we are a soul. We happen to have a body that holds it. What came first? The flesh, as Paul puts it, or the spirit? It's the spirit that gives us life. It's our souls that make us who we are. Made in the image of God and each one unique. I

Three Adjectives And True Identity

SPEAKER_01 6:35

want to take just a few moments of silence if we can stand it, because this church is not a very silent church, is it? And I want you to reflect for just a minute or two or two. I want you to kind of close your eyes, and I want you to think, what is it that makes you unique? If you had to tell someone three adjectives that sum you up, what would they be? What are three things that make you uniquely you know. We become so enmeshed in what we think we should be that sometimes we really don't know who we really are. Sometimes if I think about who I am and people would ask me to give me adjectives of who I am, I'd say, well, I'm a mother, I have an amazing daughter. Um, I'm a singer, I'm an actress. I love doing that. And we tend to define ourselves on things that are external instead of internal. But really, who we are, who we uniquely are, we don't really know. If you're like most people, you may not be able to do that. And that has real consequences because when we can't really define who we are, if we don't know our real purpose, if we miss out on who we are as individuals, we're in danger of missing our purpose in life as well. One

Alignment: Designed For Your Purpose

SPEAKER_01 8:28

of my great vices is TikTok. I don't know if y'all are familiar with TikTok, it wastes most of my time, especially when I'm trying to go to sleep at night. But every once in a while, something will come up on it that's really profound. And this next little quote comes from a guy I only know him by his TikTok name. His name on TikTok is Prince Enie. But I ran across this one day and I was like, oh, that's gonna stick with me. He said this. So God created fish to swim, but fish don't take swimming lessons because the swim is already in the fish. God created birds to fly, but birds don't go to flight school because the flight is already in the bird. God created trees to become trees, but seeds don't take gardening classes because the tree is already in the seed. So you see, success is built in. Now here's the part most people miss. If you are doing what God created you to do, success is not the goal, it is the default. All of God's creation succeeds naturally when it functions according to its design. And humans are exactly the same. The problem is most people are disconnected from their design. Most people are trying to succeed outside of what they were created for. A fish looks untalented on land. A bird looks weak underwater. A seed looks dead on concrete. But none of them are failures. They're just in the wrong environment. So success isn't about effort, it's about alignment. When you are doing what God created you for, there's a different level of grace attached to it. And it's not because it is easy, it's because you were literally designed for it. When a fish swims it looks effortless. When a bird flies, it looks effortless because they were built for it. You're the same way. When you are operating from your purpose, it should look effortless too. Because success is just a byproduct of being in the right environment, on the right assignment. So the problem was never that success isn't in you. The problem is you are trying to function somewhere God never designed you to live. Find your water, find your sky, then watch how natural it all becomes. A sower went out to sow some seed, and where the seed falls determines how well it does. According to Jesus, that seed is the word of God. According to Scripture, Jesus is the word of God in the world. It is the purpose inborn in all of us, just like flying is to a bird and swimming is to a fish. We are created in the image of God to be Christ in this world, each in our own unique way. Each of us with our own unique talents, talents, and experiences and gifts and ways of thinking. To some degree, how well we grow depends on how we nurture the seed of Christ within us. The funny thing is, the sower doesn't seem very intentional. The seed falls wherever it will. The potential for growth depends on where it lands. And the funny thing is, you never know when the seed's gonna spring up. Back

The Desert Flower That Surprised Me

SPEAKER_01 11:58

when I lived in South Africa for a year, I lived in the desert and it was barren. The Namib Desert is amazing and gorgeous, but it is barren. You could walk for miles and not see a living plant. You'd just see rocks and sand and in its stark beauty, it was it was amazing. But then something really funny happened. It rained one day. It had been months since it had rained, but it rained one day. We were out on a camping trip and it rained, and the next day I woke up, and right there in front of me, out of nowhere, was this little flower. It came up through all the sand of the desert literally overnight. Because it had just a little water. And the seed sprang up. Totally unexpected. I never would have ever dreamed that it could happen. So it doesn't seem intentional. The seed falls where it will. Potential growth depends on where it lands. But we don't know how it's gonna grow. Some

The Four Soils We Live In

SPEAKER_01 13:12

seed fell on the path. It falls on deaf ears. Our deaf ears. We don't pay attention. God may be sending us signs all around us, but we're not ready to hear it, so it falls on deaf ears. We become so hardened to the way the world is around us that we can't even hear it. Perhaps it's where we're not really open to God doing something. I never would have believed a flower would grow in a desert. It's hard not to be that way. Sometimes we don't even let the word of God sink in because we just don't want to. We ignore the possibility of who we are, and so no growth. The word is taken away. I've been there at times. I've been there. Some seed falls on rocky ground. That's where we know the good news. We know how we are supposed to live and love. We have the best intentions, but we don't nurture it. We don't think about it. And I think this is a danger zone for us, good Christian people. We just go on with life as normal. If we just say our daily devotions, if we just say our prayers and aren't really into it, we don't really think about it. If we just go on as normal, all the zeal we have in the first place can melt away. And so, no growth. I've been there. Some seed fell among the weeds, and this one hits home. We know that living as Christ in this world really is the thing to do. We really want to be more Christ-like, but man, it's hard. It gets beaten out of us by life. It gets hard loving and loving and loving and forgiving and forgiving and forgiving and living up to the high calling we're called to do. It's hard work. And when we see all the horrible things going on in the world, when we offer hope and help to someone and get rejected and the door shut in our face, it gets choked out of us. And so no growth. I've been there. You know, children are funny, and Jesus likes to talk about how children function in the world and what a fertile ground they are. I've noticed something about children. Have you ever noticed that children who are two, three, four years old before they're in kindergarten, if you ask them if they can dance, what do they say? Can you sing? Can you draw? And then they get to kindergarten. And with the best intentions, we try to teach our children the way that they should be, how to be better, how to be, how to be better, you know. And they might sing a wrong note, and somebody might say to you, Oh, you know, you really need to work on your voice. Oh, that's a really cool picture. It's got lots of colors. What is it? You call that dancing? And so it gets beaten out of us. Two, three, four-year-olds, they innately and naturally are creative and curious. And somehow we're taught as the years go by that we have to live up to a certain image to be productive. But that's not true. That's not what Christ says. That's not what Scripture says. That's not what this verse says. What we need to be is only us. Then some seed falls on good soil and it produces fruit. Some a hundredfold, which is a lot, some sixty-fold, which is still good, some only thirtyfold, but it's still thirtyfold. All of it is good. I've been there too. In

Becoming The Sower In Daily Life

SPEAKER_01 17:04

traditional interpretations, the sower is God. But in considering this passage, I realize that, like most things in Scripture, perhaps there's another interpretation as well, one that might sit a little bit more uncomfortable with us. Yes, we are the seed. I mean, yes, God is the seed and we are the soil, but what if we are also the sower? If we are the living example of the image of God in the world, perhaps we are the sower as well. If so, then how does this passage impact us as the church, as individuals called by Christ? If we bear the seed of faith within us, how do we let ourselves be used to indiscriminately sow the seeds of God's love wherever we are and leave it up to God to have those seeds grow where they are planted? This takes being really present and being really intentional and being you, the real you, the you that is living up to who you are created to be and trusting that God will make things happen. Doesn't mean you have to be somebody else, you don't have to be a grand preacher, you don't even have to quote scripture. You just have to be where you are intentionally. You just have to recognize that seed of Christ that grows in us every day, in our nature. The image of God. King

Small Faith And First Steps

SPEAKER_01 18:33

Duncan tells a story about Mother Teresa of Calcutta. Whoever thought, whoe thought that she would have attained such influence when she first began? What did she have to recommend her? He says, A tiny woman, she began with the most meager of resources. Mother Teresa told her superiors, I have three pennies and a dream from God to build an orphanage. Mother Teresa, her superior, said, You can't build an orphanage with three pennies. With three pennies, you can't do anything. I know, she said, smiling. But with God and three pennies, I can do anything. Mother Teresa understood the principle of the seed. It takes very little, but very blessed by God, and miracles can occur. This, of course, is akin to Jesus' teaching elsewhere that faith, only the size of a mustard seed, can produce an enormous bush. That is a constant law in God's word. Being a sower can feel overwhelming, but when we are living into the true purpose, it is effortless. The default is success. It's just doing what you're created to do. No more, no less. Don't let it overwhelm you. When I started thinking about this marathon journey we have as the people of God, I started thinking about what it takes to run a marathon. Tell you what, I am not a runner. If I tried to run a marathon, it would be a sad day. But there was a time, there was a time when my daughter was in a program called Girls on the Run. Have y'all ever heard of it? Well, she had been training for months. They take elementary grade schools and they they go on runs and they they train together to do a 5K. Well, she had been in the program about three months. And then she said, Mom, I'm gonna be in a 5K in a month. I want you to run it with me. I did. She had faith in me that I could run that 5K. Now I won't tell you what my time was, but we finished that 5K together. A month from before the 5K, however, I realized that this is this still working. I realized that I couldn't just go on that day to run the 5K. So what did I start doing? I started by taking a walk, and then I started by taking a little longer walk until I could hit 3.5 miles walking, which is what a 5K technically is. And then I started jogging a little bit. And then I'd jog and I'd walk. And then I'd jog and I'd walk. Until finally I was able to complete that 5K with my daughter by my side. Olympians don't start by getting a gold medal. They start with just a first step. What may be big for some seems small for another, because we all have different gifts and callings. But we're all just called to do it. Doesn't mean it's easy. Sowing seeds sometimes means stepping out of your comfort zone, learning new things, or possibly even unlearning things that we've been taught. But it's gonna make a difference. It probably means you should do it. Do the scary thing. Because I'll do scary thing that you have survived, every scary thing you have done in your life. We are called to sow the seed and not worry about where it lands. Whether we produce a hundredfold, or sixtyfold, or thirtyfold, it doesn't matter because it's all good. The sower went out to sow some seed. We are the soil on which the seed falls, and we are the sower. Both can be true. Beloved children of God, none of it is dependent on us. And the mystery of faith is that God allows us to do it. Just by being who we truly are meant to be, by embracing the inherent success granted to us, we live by our true design. By being the unique you that you're created to be. It's

Dream Small And Closing Blessing

SPEAKER_01 23:36

by a guy named Josh Wilson. And he wrote it and it was published in 2018. I had never heard it before the other day. To share with you. You have to do it all. Just let Jesus use you where you are. One day at a time, live well. Loving God and others as yourself. A little ways that only you can help. With this great love, a tiny rock can make a giant fall. So dream small. Or dancing on a Friday with your friend with special needs. These simple moments change the world. Just don't miss the moments on your way to bigger things, though. Cause these two simple moments change the world. So dream small, don't buy the lie, you gotta do it all. Just let Jesus use you where you are. One day at a time, live well. Loving God and others as yourself. Find little ways where only you can help. With his great love, a tiny rock can make a giant fall. So dream small. Keep loving, keep serving, keep listening, keep learning, keep praying, keep proping, keep seeking, keep searching. Add up the small things and watch them grow bigger. The God who does all things makes oceans of rivers. So dream small, don't buy the lie, you gotta do it all. Just let Jesus use you where you are. One day at a time, live well. Loving God and others as yourself. Find little ways that only you can help. With his great love, a tiny rock can make a giant fall. Yeah, five loads and two fishes feed them all. So dream small. Dream small. Dream small. Amen. Now let us join together to sing hymn 171.