Sermon: Growth

2007

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Sermon: "Growth"

2nd in the "The 5 "G's" of Discipleship" series.
Delivered September 23, 2007 by Rev. John Schmidt.
Other sermons in this series - 1 / 2 / 3 / 4 / 5

Theme: Christ followers participate in the transformation of their minds, character, actions, and influence through intentional life-long interaction with Jesus.

The audio file of this sermon is available for download and listening in MP3 format.

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Sermon Text: Matthew 13:1-9; 18-23

I have the capacity to grow. Let me tell you about some friends of mine. They are not really a real couple. They are sort of a composite couple. Let me call them Phil and Valerie. Before Phil and Valerie got married Valerie was interested in mission work in Latin American countries. She learned Spanish and spent some of her summers during college in Central America and South America. She was concerned about the poor and deeply concerned about sharing the gospel and always talked about that in our campus fellowship. After Phil and Valerie got married, they moved up to Boston. In Boston they made trips down in to the inner city to try to connect with some inner city ministry there, because of their concern about that. They even considered becoming part of a community, a Christian community that actually lived in the city. That did not work out. It was hard for them to keep their connection strong with the city ministry because they lived out in the suburbs, you know out beyond the beltway and their jobs were out there as well.

Then Phil got a transfer to Cincinnati; he had a real job now. Management Track. Took a lot more than 40 hours a week, and they were able to buy a nice house at that point. They had a good size back yard and put all kinds of playground equipment on it, because now they were building a family and it grew up to three kids. Once the kids got to school age, Valerie had more time to devote to other things and so she started teaching in a women's group on weekdays. Every day at around 2:00 o'clock a four hour odyssey began where she had to go pick up the kids from the different schools and take them to all their after school activities in the SUV. And then, after that she would make sure that they had a good healthy supper and then moved them in to doing their homework. Eight or nine o'clock the kids go to bed and she and Phil have some time together. Then Saturday comes. What we just described happens every weekday. It begins at 5:30, but on Saturday it is a little different. Saturday's have soccer games and swimming practice. On Sunday morning there is church. Sunday afternoon there is softball leagues. Sunday evenings small groups and Valerie is dreading the day that her children get old enough to go in to a youth group, because its one more thing on Sunday night.

Valerie and Phil still have a heart for God. Valerie still kept up her Spanish because of her interest in Latin America. She still reads everything that the church publishes on ministry to Latin America. They both still have a part in them that want to touch the needs of the inner city, but they feel guilty every time they hear of a new need or as their pastor puts it, ministry opportunities. They can't add one more thing to their over-busy lives. So what does it mean for Phil and Valerie to follow Jesus at this moment in their lives? What does it mean for their lives to be bearing fruit? In other words, what does it mean for them to grow?

Jesus wants us to grow. There is no doubt about that. God wants grace to come flowing in to our lives with such power that it changes us and fills our need and then overflows from us to meet the needs of other people, to bless them. And the reason that God wants that for us is because he wants us to be like him and he is a God of overflowing blessing. And so, growth and discipleship is that movement in our lives to become more like God, more like Jesus Christ.

Now Jesus taught about growth. He taught a lot of different ways. We are going to look at one section of his teaching in Matthew Chapter 13. It's a parable. What a parable is; is a short story that makes a point in some concrete way that we understand about some spiritual reality that we might understand as well. And that is what he is doing in Matthew 13 and we are going to pick it up at the first verse of that chapter. Let's pray.

God, as we go in to your word help us to understand and then help us to have soft hearts, to be a fertile place for your word to work. For we ask it in Jesus name, Amen.

"That same day Jesus went out of the house and sat by the lake. Such large crowds gathered around him that he got into a boat and sat in it, while all the people stood on the shore. Then he told them many things in parables, saying: "A farmer went out to sow his seed. As he was scattering the seed, some fell along the path, and the birds came and ate it up. Some fell on rocky places, where it did not have much soil. It sprang up quickly, because the soil was shallow. But when the sun came up, the plants were scorched, and they withered because they had no root. Other seed fell among thorns, which grew up and choked the plants. Still other seed fell on good soil, where it produced a crop-a hundred, sixty or thirty times what was sown. He who has ears, let him hear."

Jesus said this because he was talking about his ministry and he was trying to explain to people how he could be preaching this good news about God sending his kingdom to intrude in to reality and to make things different and new, and yet people responded to it in so many different ways. Some people just didn't respond at all. Other people became his disciples. And so Jesus explains this mysterious spiritual reality by using this parable. We don't have to wonder what Jesus meant because Jesus himself teaches what he meant. And so we are going to go down to Verse 18 to begin that.

Verse 18: "Listen then to what the parable of the sower means: When anyone hears the message about the kingdom and does not understand it, the evil one comes and snatches away what was sown in his heart. This is the seed sown along the path."

So the initial part of the parable is talking about people who are so hardened, there is so much traffic right now in their souls that the word doesn't penetrate at all. The message doesn't get any comprehension. Within moments, any vestige, any memory of that truth is gone in their lives. Maybe some time later in their lives they will hear it again. At that point, they may be more receptive. But the fact is, in that moment it simply bounces off and it gets lost. The second kind of soil, the rocky place is described in the following verse.

"The one who received the seed that fell on rocky places is the man who hears the word and at once receives it with joy. But since he has no root, he lasts only a short time. When trouble or persecution comes because of the word, he quickly falls away"

Here is somebody who does understand it on some level. They respond, but they are shallow. And when things become difficult, when things don't go their way, when they have to suffer or sacrifice, at that point any vestige of the kind of life, any response to the gospel goes away. They put it aside, it's not worth it and there is no fruit.

Now most of those kinds of people are not here on Sundays. So I am not going to spend a whole lot of time talking about those two kinds of people. I am going to focus on the next two, because the next two kinds of soil are the kind of people that come to church on Sundays.

Verses 22 and 23: "The one who received the seed that fell among the thorns is the man who hears the word, but the worries of this life and the deceitfulness of wealth choke it, making it unfruitful. But the one who received the seed that fell on good soil is the man who hears the word and understands it. He produces a crop, yielding a hundred, sixty or thirty times what was sown."

There are two kinds of soil that we still have yet to talk about. And one struggles against weeds, against thorns, against other plants that can out-compete it in life. Now it's interesting that Jesus points out what the thorns, what the weeds are that compete against our growth. It's not what you would expect. Jesus does not say, "there are some things that are competing with the gospel in your life that are going to strangle it out. It's sexual sin and drug abuse." That is not what he says. We could image him saying, "Its racism and intolerance; these are bad things" and it can destroy you spiritually, but that is not what Jesus says. Jesus doesn't even say, "Watch out for idolatry and false religion", which will definitely kill our spiritual life. That is not what he says. What does Jesus talk about here? He talks about two middle-class problems; two problems that you can have in the heart of suburbia. He talks about the worries of this life and the deceitfulness of wealth as being two things that will strangle out our fruitfulness and there is no one here that doesn't struggle with both of them.

David Goetz wrote a book that several church members recommended that I read. It's called "Death in the Suburbs". He observes these same two problems, but he gives them different names. He gives different names for these weeds. For the worries of this life he re-describes that as being: "I am in control of my life." That is the particular American way of expressing that. And for the deceitfulness of wealth, he rephrases that as being: "I am what I do and what I own." So let's take a look first at that first weed; worries of this life. "I am in control of my life." Have you ever thought about how much of American middle-class life is about control? Moving out to the suburbs is an effort to control. It's an effort to get to a safe place for so many people; to put the right protections, the protection of distance between us and the problems of the city. Once we get in to that community, it's amazing how much control is part of the life of some communities. Some communities have a community covenant that you sign and in some of these places you can't repaint your house, even if you repaint it the same color unless you get the permission of the community association. Heaven forbid that we live near bad taste. My goodness. We've got to control that.

We had some friends that lived in the neighborhood in Baton Rouge where every mailbox had to be the same and when Christmas came around they had to have the same Christmas decorations on all the doors. We've got the have the right decorations. This is Christmas; this is important stuff. Control; control means that we have the right to live in a no risk society. So churches all over the nation are eliminating tag from the list of approved playground sports. It's not supervised well out on that playground so you can't have some kids kind of loose too often in a game or not get picked for a team or to get hurt and scraped up while they are playing or to get touched accidentally in the wrong way. "We have to eliminate those risks over these children. We've got to protect them from that." Dodge ball was outlawed years ago. No risk. "Our car has to be bigger than their car." Now this is not just ego. "Our car has to be bigger than their car so that if we crash on the road we win." This is really the reason many people buy them. I have heard it. "I am buying this 4,000 pound, 36 foot long machine for my 16-year-old daughter because she has got to be safe." Control. No risk society; at least no risk for us. Since we believe we can control our lives, we then think that we are justified in giving all of our time to making things work out our way. That situation, when we are spending all of our time worrying about the risks of life and dedicating all of our time to beating every one of these risks, believing that it all depends on us, this is what Jesus means about the anxieties of life and he says it will kill your soul.

The second thing; the second weed, is "I am what I do and what I own." Now, it doesn't take a rocket scientist to know that American society is obsessed with wealth, but it is a little harder to see that it really comes in a package where we set up our self identity around what we own and its also set up around what we do as people; what we do and what we own. American middle-class society is all about symbols of what we do and what we own. Nobody wants to go hear a pastor who leads a church of 200 speak on anything. They are not important enough. Maybe the subject of dealing with disappointment. We might go hear them, because they have got to be disappointed. The family that has no smart or athletic kids, the family who lives in a modest house: they disappear. We don't notice them because they don't have the right symbols and forget about the single mother who is just trying to make ends meet for herself and her three kids. None of these people have the right symbols of success. "I am what I do and what I own." So what our symbols are are the really big house, the really exotic vacation, the really great car and people work 60 or 80-hour weeks in order to buy the huge house, the car and have the exotic vacation. They work all of that time to own a house that they don't live in during the daylight hours, because they leave early in the morning and come home late. They get only two weeks of vacation. Now they can come back from that vacation saying, "Hey I went to Thailand. What did you do?" But they might not even take the whole two weeks, because they are too busy.

Have you ever thought about why some people get so upset? It's 8-year-olds playing softball, why do they get so upset at the umpire and the other kids on the team when they are not winning? Why is this such a big deal for a 38-year-old executive? Winning is everything. I am what I do. My kid is what they do and to a certain extent I am what my kid does. There is an incredible amount of emotional energy behind this. Why do we put up with crushing game schedules that tie up our kids three days a week, fill whole weekends, make them travel halfway across the state and they are not even 10-years old yet? Because our kids have to succeed to excel, to win, because they are a part of me. I am what I own. I am what I do. They are only what they own and what they do.

Parents do their kids assignments for school so that they will get better grades. Mothers go in to schools demanding to know why their child isn't in the gifted and talented program. Prove to me that those other kids are better. Show me "A" work if you are giving my daughter "B" work. I need a bigger and newer car. We need a bigger house. My child has to go to the best schools. All of these things are good. But when our identity is wrapped around it, when it becomes the obsessive center point of our lives, it is what Jesus called the deceitfulness of wealth; the need to have more money, the need to have more success than we have right now. The idea that contentment is only one more purchase away. It's a lie.

The fourth kind of soil that Jesus talks about is the one that bears all kinds of fruit. The gospel takes root. The weeds don't choke it out. The person grows. Life change happens. Blessings flow up in their souls and out to others. The gospel can do this. The Holy Spirit wants to do this. Life and power is there like Joyce pointed out. Christ lives in me. I have the capacity to grow. Now what is the fruitfulness that is supposed to be in our lives? Some people talk about it being our impact on others, leading other people to Christ and impacting the world. Other people talk about it being character. Love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness and self-control: the fruit of the spirit. I think it's both, but if you had to choose its got to be character, because never does God set out a goal for his people that does not include character. Godlikeness, holiness and purity. To have impact without purity is not God solution. Character and impact is the fruit of the spirit in our lives. So how can we cooperate with this life within us with the work of the Holy Spirit inside of us?

There are all kinds of spiritual disciplines. I can only focus on one. It's the quiet time. I am deliberately choosing the words quiet time. I could say devotion. I could say journaling. I could say prayer time, but I am saying quiet time because a critical component of it is being quiet. It's making a time and a space in our hearts for God and that is the most basic element of spirituality; making time for God. Now this time is not something we need to buy. Sometimes when I talk to people about getting some silence and solitude they say, "Yes, I am planning a trip to the Rockies and I am going to go out to the Rockies and it is going to be beautiful. I will be alone." Well that's great and I hope you get to the Rockies. I hope I get to the Rockies, but you don't have to buy it. You don't have to go somewhere else. You talk about solitude and all; "Yeah I am looking forward to buying five acres and have my big dog there and it's going to be great because nobody will be able to see me. I will be able to get away from the kids and have my solitude." It's great if you can get that. You don't need it. It's not something we buy. It's something we work at in our hearts. We can take time to be silent; whether we are taking a walk, whether it's in a comfortable chair in the living room or on the patio or porch. We need to just take time. And what bothers us is that nothing big happens most of the time when we give the time. What we want, is we want to give ten minutes to God and hear every time some life-changing, awe inspiring message. If we are giving the time at least I can hear an amazing message. But solitude isn't like that. It's not a big deal every time, but it has a cumulative effect.

Henri Nowen put it this way, "It's not easy to sit and trust that in solitude God will speak to you not as a magical voice, but that he will let you know something gradually over the years."

It's not the way we want it. It is something that happens gradually over the years. But isn't that what happens when you plant a seed? You plant a seed today. You cover it up and you water it. You come back tomorrow and nothing has happened. You come back the next day and it is still not there. You come back three or four days later and still nothing is going on. Then one day it's above the soil and then it hardly seems to change at all and is just growing a little bit. But then one day it has a bud and then you come back one day and it is open. Change does happen, but it doesn't happen equally every day. It's the cumulative effect across time that leads to an oak tree from an acorn. So our relationship with God takes time and a big part of that is time to listen. But if we take that time to listen to the voice of God, we are going to hear another voice and that's the voice of self. If we make some silence in our life, we are going to hear a voice back there that is whining out demands and is giving screams, fearful screams about what's happening in our lives.

I think of Bill Murray's character in "What About Bob" when he comes up and he says, "I want, I want, I need". There is a part of us that is like that. But it's okay that we hear that voice along with the voice of God. Silence gives us time to hear what our inner voice is really saying. It takes off the flowers and decorations and it lets us know what we are really like inside no matter how ugly or broken that person is. The good news in that is that at that very moment that we run in to our brokeness we receive grace. We find out that God is big enough to deal with the real us and that can bring healing and incredible growth and change.

Now we need one more set of tools for our quiet time. It's a Bible and something to write in. This is a life journal. This is something that both Pastor George and I use. We are going to have some out in the concourse if you want to take a look at them and get one. You need to have truth in a quiet time. Truth is essential in a Christian life. Verse 19 in the passage that we just looked at talks about those who don't understand. Not understanding proves to be a life and death issue. In Verse 20 it talks about them hearing the word and that implies they understand and receive on some level, but it doesn't bear fruit. Verse 22: they hear but they are then deceived. But in Verse 23, they hear and understand and bear fruit. Truth is essential. And truth is so important that is has to be fresh in us. Stale truth, just like bread, gets moldy. It's no longer nutritional. We need a fresh word from God, fresh insights, and fresh encouragement. You know, we are supposed to tell our wives, you know our spouses or our parents or our children that we love them. If you can imagine the conversation when you go up and say, "Of course, I love you. Don't you remember six years ago I told you that I loved you. Nothing has changed." That doesn't work, does it? We've got to have important truths told to us again and again and told to us at the right moments and in the right ways and that is what God's truth is like. We need to hear it from God in fresh ways often.

Fresh truth. If we hear that fresh truth and give that time to hear the voice of God to hear our own voice then we discover we are not in control, but that's okay because God is. We discover that I am not what I do and what I own. Instead, I am something so much more. I am the child of the creator of the universe, redeemed at great cost, beloved beyond my imagining. So that is what a quiet time is. Time for silence, a Bible, a way to focus and record what we hear. It might be in pieces where we talk a walk one time a day and a few minutes in the kitchen over coffee for the rest. It might in the morning or it might be right before bed. It might be 15 minutes or it might be a daylong retreat. Quiet time to meet God, to experience a relationship.

A few minutes ago I asked what should Phil and Valerie do at this point in their lives to grow? They don't have to leave suburbia and go the mission field. It would be great if they do, but it's not what they need to do. They don't have to go and buy some rural land to be closer to nature in order to grow in their relationship with God. It's great if they are able to do it, but it's not essential. They don't have to add new church meetings to their lives, even ones that I am asking them to go to. It would be great if God calls them to that, but they don't need it. They need one thing; they need to experience the grace of God. They need to experience the reality of God's presence. So what they need, is they need to be quiet and in that quietness they meet the God who loves them. That is what we all need. Let's pray.

God, what we all need is more of you and so now open up our hearts and then give us the will to pursue our relationship with you. For we ask it in Jesus name. Amen.