GREATEST STORIES EVER TOLD | Sower & The Seed | Ben Anderson

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Transcript

SPEAKER_00 0:00

Well, good morning, everyone. It's so great to spend some time with you this morning. If we haven't met before, my name is Ben Anderson. I'm one of the pastors here. And I'm so glad you guys are here. I thought maybe you'd still be up eating food, or at least some of you maybe bring in like a burrito with you or whatever is up there. I'm yet to see it, so I'm excited for it. Uh but it is so great to spend some time with you. Hey, a couple of quick things before we jump into our sermon today. We are entering into Holy Week, which means there is a lot going on here, and I don't want you to miss any of it. It's gonna launch with our Monday Thursday service where we're gonna spend some intentional time gathering as a family and receiving communion in a very meaningful way, and that's gonna be in the sanctuary, so up there at 6 30 p.m. It's gonna be followed by a good Friday. And there's a couple things going on at a Good Friday. If you are a grandparent or a parent, or you have neighbor kids, they're getting out of control, you need something for them to do. Uh, we have a good Friday day camp all throughout the day. I know many schools are in spring break, so it's a perfect time for our kiddos to come and learn about Jesus. And then in the evening, we're gonna have a good Friday experience where we're gonna work through the stations of the cross. It's highly reflective, incredibly meaningful, and challenging. And so we would love for you to join us right here at 6 30 p.m. And don't worry if you're thinking, well, that might not work for my kids. I totally get that. We have a separate experience for them that evening as well, of course, which brings us into Easter, which is a can't miss opportunity. And so if you have an invite card, make sure you use it. If you don't have one, the best invitation that you can do is simply say, Hey, come sit next to me. I got a spot for you. I'll I'll push somebody over. Like we'll make a spot for you, for them, and so don't miss that opportunity. Well, before I forget, I also want to welcome our first-time guests. If you're joining us for the first time, we hope that you have a great experience this morning. But I know you will, because you walked in, maybe you didn't even realize that you're about to experience the best breakfast buffet on the planet. And so you've got food. Hopefully you'll have some good fellowship and make a friend before you head out the door. But today, we are gonna step into our latest sermon series called The Greatest Stories Ever Told, where we are once again exploring the parables of Jesus Christ, the greatest storyteller to ever walk the face of the earth as he tells these timeless stories, these great stories. Now, why do I call them great? Well, because they do what all great stories do. They reveal truth, they challenge our hearts, and they invite us into something better. In fact, today we get to talk about my favorite, favorite parable. But before we get there, let's let's talk about Palm Sunday. Because these two things are going to connect. Of course, Palm Sunday is a big Sunday in the life of not just our church, but all churches. A significant moment in history in the life of Jesus, his disciples, and everyone who experienced it, and the people that still talk about it. Now, how important was this moment? Well, it's actually one of only five events that are mentioned in all four Gospels. Now, if you're new to church, and right now you're thinking, I don't know what a gospel is, don't worry, I'll clean it up here for you really quick. The gospels are Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John. These are five accounts of the life of Jesus Christ from different perspectives, different eyewitnesses that came together and wrote down things that were important in the life of Christ that they wanted to hand on to the next generation. So if you read through them, sometimes you'll find things that are only in one gospel, sometimes you'll find things that are in a couple gospels, but you know they're really significant when they are in all four gospel messages. In fact, if you're new to reading the Bible, or maybe you've been reading the Bible for a long time, but you need a fresh way to encounter it, here's what I love to do. I love to read the Bible chronologically, which means people much smarter than me take the four gospels, bring them together, and put them in order, and so I get to see the life of Christ in its fullest senses. So check that out. But let's step in to Palm Sunday. But to get to Palm Sunday, we have to back up a touch to get to the calling of the disciples. Because it's so important to understand the transformation that's happening in these men's life. There's 12 disciples. Ultimately, we end up calling them the 12 apostles, the messengers of Jesus Christ, and he invites them into a discipleship relationship for a bunch of people who were never invited to anything like that before. Jesus says, Come follow me, come walk in my footsteps, come spend time with me, come become like me. That was the goal of a disciple to become exactly like your rabbi. They would call it walking in the dust of your rabbi, just falling so close that even the dust of their feet is kicking up on you. And so for these 12 men, breakfast, lunch, and dinner, every moment, every conversation, every miracle, every teaching, every story, they were there for it. They experienced it. They saw the good days and the bad days when life was easy, when life was tough. And you know what these 12 men came to believe at the end of that three years? That Jesus was the Christ, the Son of the living God. That he was the Messiah. And there was an energy around Jesus as time was going on, that more and more people were coming to believe that, that he was the Messiah. But in the first century, what did that mean? What did it mean to be the Messiah? Well, for most people, they they viewed the Messiah as an earthly king who would sit on a throne and push out the Romans who were subjugating the people. That's what they expected. And so when Jesus came to his disciples and said, I need a donkey, of course, they're thinking, this is weird, but we're used to this. Jesus does weird stuff all the time. Where do you want us to find it? Go into town, grab a donkey. Well, what's gonna happen when they try to stop us? Don't worry. Just tell them the Lord needs it. This is a real story in the Bible, by the way. I'm not making this up. So they're like, Jesus, we're gonna go in, we're gonna grab a donkey, it's gonna be cool. Yeah, it's gonna be cool. Then tell them we'll bring it back afterwards. Okay. So they go and they bring the donkey to Jesus. They put Jesus on top of the donkey, and he rides into town. And the people who've been following Jesus, they catch wind of this and they start gathering around. In fact, the Bible tells us they they laid down their cloaks, which is so significant. Because when we think about it, like, yeah, I took off my t-shirt, laid it on the ground, that's not what's happening here. That cloak was important to these people. It was costly to have it. It was an element of security, it was an element of social status. Imagine laying that on the ground and then having an animal walk across that. That's the sacrifices that these people were making. They took down palm branches, they laid those on the ground, they waved them, and then they yelled, Hosanna, blessed is the king. What they were saying was, Jesus is the Messiah. This is quite an event. This is quite a moment. But it was a moment that actually was predicted. In fact, if we go to Zechariah 9:9, it says these words, listen, listen to this. Rejoice greatly, daughter of Zion. Shout, daughter of Jerusalem. This is where they were at. See your king comes to you, righteous and victorious, lowly and riding on a donkey on a colt, the full of a donkey. That prediction about this specific moment that we call the triumphal entry happened over 500 years before this moment takes place. Unbelievable. I mean, if you're a skeptic in the room, I want you to wrestle with that. That's over twice as long as our nation has been around, 500 years. They predict this moment with so much specificity as Jesus rides in on the donkey. And all this energy and all this excitement and all this momentum pushing in that direction. It must have been amazing to be a part of. But what really amazes me about this moment is even though all these people experienced something that feels like it would have changed your life, not all the lives were changed. For some people, they had this moment, and maybe in their hearts, or even in their minds, or maybe they even said it, they thought, I'm this changed everything. I'm never gonna go back, but soon they felt themselves going into life, normal life. They forgot all about it, they moved on. For others, this moment was just something that codified their belief in Christ. Like, I believe he is the Messiah, I believe he is the Son of God, but it didn't really change how they lived. For others, like the disciples, I mean, this changed everything. They believed, and when they saw the resurrected Christ later on, of course, they really believed then. And they were willing to give up and sacrifice everything in their life for the cause of Christ. And then there's the Pharisees. The Bible records that the Pharisees in this moment were upset about this. Jesus, tell them to stop yelling these things about you, that you are the king. Christ's responses well, if I quiet them down, the rocks themselves will cry out. One moment in history with four different responses. And what I've come to believe and what I've come to know with interacting with people is that every time people are encountered with Christ, they land in one of these four camps. In fact, Jesus knew this. He told a parable about it. It's called the Sower and the Seed. So once again, I want to bring you into that moment. He tells a story in the height of his popularity, there's a large crowd gathered. In fact, there's so many people, you might remember this if you went to Sunday school, that he has to sit on a boat to get away from the people, to create some space. So he's sitting on this boat, and I always thought that's so cool. Like to preach someday, well, sitting on a boat, like that, that would be awesome. I want to do that. But then I remembered I get emotion sickness, and it would go really, really poorly for everyone involved. But here's Christ: He sits down, the people are leaning in. What story is he gonna tell? He tells a story of a farmer, he throws a seed, and as the seed falls to the ground, it lands on different types of soil. The first one is a hard, packed path that people walk on. And because it's so hard, well, it takes time for the seed to make its way down. In fact, it doesn't make its way down, there's no roots. Birds come in, they take the seed away. Then he talks about the next one. It's a rocky soil. There's a little bit of topsoil, but most of it's rock underneath, and so there is growth. It has a root, but it dies off quickly because there's no place for it to really, really grow and thrive. So there's life, but then life goes away. Then there's another soil. This time it goes into the thorny areas. So it grows, it has life, it doesn't go away, but it never quite reaches its potential because the thorns are taking away the nutrients and the sun. And then there's the fourth soil. The fourth soil is good soil, it's full of nutrients and the perfect amount of sunlight and the perfect amount of shade, and the seeds go in and they produce this amazing, abundant crop. And all the people hear this story. Like they heard maybe many of Christ's stories, and they didn't know what to do with it. What does this story mean? In fact, that was actually the point. Jesus would tell these stories, and people would lean in, they'd remember them, they'd memorize them, they'd go home, talk to their spouse, talk to their neighbor, talk to their friends, like, what does this mean? And they'd wrestle with it. And over time, weeks, months, maybe years, they'd have that epiphany, and God would give them that wisdom, like, oh, this is what he's talking about. But Christ's disciples, they had a little bit of an advantage. They could pull them to the side, they didn't want to look silly in front of the people, but they could pull them to the side and say, What did that mean? Like, if you could fill us in. Well, one of those responses is recorded for us in the book of Luke. We're going to explore that today. Starting off in chapter 8, verse 11, it says, This is the meaning of the parable. The seed is the word of God. Those along the path are the ones who hear, and then the devil comes and takes away the word from their hearts, so they may not believe and be saved. So, who are these people? These are people who are hardened skeptics. These are people who maybe they were raised in a different faith, and it's so hard to be raised in a faith. Grandma taught me, mom taught me, dad taught me, we always went to. And then to find truth someplace else. I mean, that's hard. That's challenging. Maybe for some people, it's just being hurt by the church. I was raised in church, I had a good experience in church until I didn't have a good experience in church. And they said something or they did something or I saw something, and now I'm just hard. Really, these are people who are guarded. Guarded. Because what if? I mean, I I've been spending all this time debating and being an intellectual in the opposite direction. What am I gonna look like when I go to all my friends and say, yeah, you know what? I used to make fun of people who believed in Jesus and now I believe in Jesus. I mean, that's tough. Can I really go to grandma and say, I used to believe this way, you raised me this way, but I found some truth over here, and I need to go where truth leads me. Can I do that? Can I wrestle with that? These are challenging things. But something that's important here is to see this. Notice this, it's not God rejecting these people. It's not Him not putting seed on this area, it's these people being guarded, they're pushing back and they're rejecting Christ. Here's the next soil Jesus talks about in verse 13. It says, Those on the rocky ground are the ones who receive the word with joy when they hear it, but they have no roots. They believe for a while, but at the butt in the time of testing, they fall away. So who are these people? These people have a momentary faith, a moment with Christ. It's undeniable, but then if time goes on, they completely reject it. They walk away. Maybe this is the person who they go to a Billy Graham crusade a number of years ago when he was still around, and he says, Come on down, like come come forward, pray the prayer, and they run to the front. Something's stirring within them. Life is never going to be the same. And they go home. And as years go on, they're not interested in that anymore. They reject that moment, they reject that faith. Or maybe it's someone who was raised in the church. I mean, they were baptized. Their parents did all the stuff you're supposed to do. They got confirmed, they went to a Christian university, whatever that might be. But as time goes on, it's not for me. And they push against it. Or maybe it's that person who had a misunderstanding of what faith was all about. They thought, if I believe in Jesus Christ, then everything will be perfect, and they go home and guess what? It's not perfect. And if it's not perfect, then Jesus must not be real because that's the faith that I was buying into. They didn't buy into the true Christian faith. Because we don't believe that life is gonna be perfect. We believe eternity is gonna be perfect. We don't believe that life is gonna be perfect. We expect that through the challenges and troubles of life, we're gonna have a perfect relationship with a perfect God who can help us through every one of those moments. Here's where Christ takes us next in verse 14. The seed that fell among thorns stands for those who hear, but as they go on their way, they are choked by life's worries, riches, and pleasures, and they do not mature. So who is this person? This is the unfocused or distracted Christian. They just never grow. Maybe it's somebody who would think in their mind, they'd probably never say this, but I'm so glad Christ sacrificed for me, but I'm not really willing to make the sacrifices for him. I mean, I want heaven, but I really like the stuff down here too. And maybe the stuff down here is kind of winning most days of my life. See, Christ calls us to something more. Because that is a form of Christianity, but it's really beginner Christianity, right? It's not mature Christianity where we begin to make the sacrifices that Christ calls us to. Which leads us to our last soil, verse 15. But the seed on the good soil stands for those with a noble and good heart who hear the word retain it and by persevering produce a crop. So who are these people? These are the people who think Christ got uncomfortable for me, so I'm gonna get uncomfortable for him. In the Bible, it's called carrying your cross. That you see what Christ has done on his cross, and now you have your own cross. In other words, I'm gonna spend my life sacrificing in light of what Christ has done for the people around me, for my spouse, for my family, for my neighbors, for the mission of Jesus Christ. These are the type of people that view every single interaction, every single moment of life through the lens of eternity. A number of years ago, I was preaching on this sermon, and as prepare to prepare for it, I actually grabbed a farmer. I was serving in a church in a very rural area, a lot of farmers. I said, I want you to take a look at this parable and tell me what you think about this parable. Not from like a biblical standpoint, tell me from a farming standpoint, what do you see? And he said, Well, what I see is a horrible farmer. I said, help me understand. He said, Well, a good farmer, right? Our goal is to produce fruit, to make money. And so your seed is precious. Your seed is expensive. And so you wouldn't just throw seed everywhere, you you would pick your spots and buy your land so that it would have an abundance. So, yeah, of course, you would throw seed in the good soil. But you wouldn't just throw it into the weeds without taking care of the weeds. And you wouldn't throw it into rocks without picking the rocks first, right? Because you know it would never grow, that'd be a waste of your time. And you would never throw it on a path. I said, What do you do when there's a path? He said, We dig it up. If there was an old barn, there's cement, like we will tear that all up, and then after the nutrients are right, then we will finally plant the seed. We would never do it before then. In fact, sometimes there's certain areas of our property that we will just never plant. He said, if I look at this parable from the viewpoint of a professional farmer, I'm telling you, this guy is not a good farmer. And I thought, I think that's the point. The way Jesus farms and spreads the seed is so much different than how we would. In fact, I I want to learn from this farmer. I want to learn how to sow. It's our first, our first step here. If we want to farm like this farmer, we gotta sow in Romans 1.20, it says this for since the creation of the world, God's invisible qualities, his eternal power, and divine nature have been clearly seen, being understood from what has been made, so that people are without excuse. What the Bible is saying here is that no one is beyond saving. No one was is without excuse. Now, the reality is we we all have different exposures to Christ, but we all have some exposure to Christ. Like for some of you, like maybe you're like me. I grew up in church, I grew up across the street from church. I mean, when the doors were open, we were there, I had a ton of exposure to Christ. No excuses if I wasn't gonna follow him. It was very clear to me. I couldn't follow him, I could reject him, but who Christ was was crystal clear. I had so much exposure. For other people, they had very little exposure. Think about the criminal on the cross. One exposure to Jesus in a moment, and he looks at him and says, That you truly are the king. And Christ says, Today you will be with me in paradise. But then we have those other things. What do we do with little exposure? What do we do? We always have this theoretical. What about the people who live in an island? They never have any missionaries, like all that type of stuff. Well, the Bible talks about that, that through the light of creation, they have just a little bit of spark, they have a little bit of exposure, that their hearts can incline themselves towards Christ. Here's the next way. Beyond sowing, we don't just want to sow, we want a crop that grows. In 1 Timothy 2, it says this this is good and pleases God, our Savior, who wants all people to be saved and to come to a knowledge of the truth. Now, once again, notice this He wants all people to be saved. That's why he sows like this. He throws the seed everywhere, but he doesn't stop there. What does it say next? It says this and come to a knowledge of the truth. You see, there's so much benefit to believing. Christ, but there's even more benefit in following Christ. It changes everything in your life because following Christ will change your eternity, but following Christ in this everyday life will change your everyday rhythms in life. It will change the important relationships that you have. I mean, think about this. If you are following Christ and you have a wife and you are truly doing this, your wife's gonna love this. She's gonna have a better husband. Your kids, no matter what age they are, if they're think that you're the hero because they're three or they're 16 and they think you're a moron, whatever it might be. The truth is, no matter where they are, if you are following Christ, you become a better mom, you become a better dad, you become a better parent, you're more patient, you're more loving. I mean, this creeps into every area. As a person who gets to oversee staff, I know for you people who own a business, who are managers, when someone is following Christ in the workplace, man, that changes how you interact with them. They're the best workers on your team. Because they aren't just believing, they are following in every single area. Here's the final farming strategy is to show. This is what I mean by this. God is giving us an example of how to live, right? We sow, we grow, right? He's showing us this is how I want you to farm. Forget your farming strategies where you're picking the soils and things like that. Just throw it everywhere. This is how the Bible captures it in Acts 1, 6 through 8. It says, Then they gathered around him and asked, Lord, are you at this time going to restore the kingdom to Israel? Now, this moment is happening after the resurrection of Christ. So he's died, he's come back, he's hanging out with his disciples. This is one of the last conversations they have, and they said, Hey, is this when you're going to be king? He goes on. He said to them, It is not for you to know the times or dates the Father has set by his own authority, but you will receive power when the Holy Spirit comes on you, and you will be my witnesses in Jerusalem and all Judea and Samaria and to the ends of the earth. Now let's back up. Palm Sunday. The crowd is gathering. What did they expect? What were they hoping for? They were hoping for a conquering king, like King David, who is going to come in there, sit on a throne, drive out the Romans. They didn't get it. And apparently the disciples, after everything they had experienced, the resurrected Christ, they didn't get it either. Jesus, this time when you're going to be king, is like, no, you're not getting it. I want to do something more important. Because there's power to being a president, there's power to being in the Senate, there's power to being a king, there's power in governmental authority. I tell you what to do, you have to do it, or I'm gonna get you in trouble, right? There's power there. But that's not the authority that Christ wants. He wants the authority of being placed on the throne of your heart. And his enemy isn't the person across the street or another country. His enemy is very simple. It's sin and Satan. That's what he wants to do. And when you do that, that changes the world. But he wasn't done there. Look at what he says to them. In light of all this, in light of this truth, this is who I want you to bring the seed to. Jerusalem, Judea, Samaria. Now, when we hear that, we just think of like, yeah, further and further and further out, right? And there's some truth to that. But when these people heard it, they were like, yeah, Jerusalem, Judea, we're on board. Samaria, no. Now I don't have time to unpack all the history there, but they did not like the Samaritans. In fact, if you were a Jewish person, you wouldn't talk to a Samaritan. You wouldn't go near a Samaritan. You wouldn't go into the house of Samaritan. You wouldn't travel into their land. If they were walking ahead of you, you would avoid the dust that was kicked up by their feet. They were beyond saving. And what is Jesus saying? Go to them. Go to those people. Go to their land and throw the seed there. A number of years ago, when I was beginning in ministry, I was overseeing a very small youth group at a very small church. But over time the youth group began to grow, and it simply was growing because I told the kids, hey, if you're having a good time, if you're enjoying this, invite a friend. Invite a friend. Invite a friend. And they started inviting friends. And we started growing. And then all of a sudden, there was this one kid who showed up. And when he showed up, I thought, uh oh, this is a whole different thing. The way he looked, the way he spoke, the way he acted, I thought, this is a waste of our time. It's a waste of my time. Of course, I didn't say that, I just thought it, you know. God, why would you even bring him here? There's never gonna be a breakthrough. Nothing's ever gonna happen. In fact, when he first came, we had our youth room in the in the bottom of the church in the basement, so he had to walk down these stairs, and he walked down the stairs and didn't come in the room, he just sat at the bottom of the steps. I thought, okay, I guess I'm never gonna see him again. Week two. Comes back, walks down the stairs, sits on the bottom step. I go over to him, I said, Hey, when you're ready, you know, you can come inside, it's cool. You don't have to be a member to like come inside the student ministry room, right? We're good. And he goes, No, this is where I'm comfortable. I said, Okay, you stay there as long as you want to stay there, but when you're ready, you know you're welcome in. Week three went by, bottom of the step. Week four went by, bottom of the step. Finally, after one month, he made his way into the just the front end of the youth ministry room, where we all have all the games, dartboards, video games, you know, stuff like that. Played some games, and then he just sat there when we went over here, the other side of the room, to have the conversations around God. And he just sat there from a distance. And as the weeks went on, he started slowly moving closer to where we were talking about Jesus. And by the end, he wasn't just sitting there, he was engaging, and his life was changed. God changed the life of somebody that I was 100% convinced he was a lost cause. As I think about this parable, I think about that. Why is this farmer in our mind such a bad farmer? He just throws a seed everywhere. Well, because he wants us to do the same. Because we have no idea what soil is under the surface. We don't know what God is up to. I mean, if I would just tell this gala, like, hey, if you're not gonna come in, you just just go home, we would miss that opportunity. But how many times in our life I wonder, probably someone's in your mind right now, you thought, I've given up on them a long time ago. I stopped praying for them, I stopped inviting them, I stopped caring for them because they are a hard path. But the truth is, you don't know. You don't know what soil is under the surface. That's not our job. Our job is to throw the seed wherever we go and see what God can do. Let's pray. Dear Heavenly Father, thank you so much for these moments to explore your truth and explore your word and be challenged by stories that people were challenged by 2,000 years ago? To go home and still wrestle with it with our family, with our spouse, with our kids. Like, what does that mean? What are the implications? How do we do this? Lord, what is the condition of my soil and why am I worried about the condition of their soil? And Lord, where have I stopped throwing seed because I thought I was wasting my time? What opportunities have I missed out on? Lord, as we wrestle with that, as you challenge our hearts, as you reveal this truth, Lord, may we take you up on your invitation into something better. Because Lord, we have a world filled with people who need you in every part of their life. Lord, we pray that you are at work in our lives, in the world around us, in the city, in the twin cities, and beyond. We pray this all in Christ's mighty name. Amen.