Matthew 13:1-9, 18-23
“Falling in Love is the Easy Part”
By: Rev. Ken Sauer, Pastor of Grace United Methodist Church, Soddy Daisy, TN www.graceumcsd.org
Being a Christian is ‘messy business.’
Being a Christian may mean eating with our enemy.
It may mean we have to hang out with everyone who is declared wrong by everyone else.
Think about it.
That’s what Jesus did.
In his book Soul Graffiti: Making A Life in the Way of Jesus author Mark Scandrette writes about a time that he and a friend decided they would practice the kind of radical openness to people that Jesus modeled.
Riding on a bus one night they met an elderly man, who happened to be a transvestite.
The man seemed lonely and in need of a friend.
He had some mental health issues and lived in a bus parked in a vacant lot where he lived in filth.
He called himself “The Emperor.”
Along with some other friends from the community Mark began visiting the Emperor several times a week, bringing groceries, helping to cut his hair or clip his toe nails, and cleaning up around his camp.
The Emperor had a plan to kill himself on New Year’s Eve.
“Nobody has ever cared about me,” he told Mark.
Mark told him that he hoped that the Emperor considered him a friend.
At Christmas Mark and his friends decided to throw a party for the Emperor, including his favorite foods and a birthday cake.
Mark brought his family along.
Mark writes: “There was a full moon on that December evening when I knocked on the door to the emperor’s bus.
He came out wearing an elegant purple bonnet, with freshly painted fingernails.
A thin young woman, who we knew was a prostitute, lived in a trailer on the street nearby, joined us, along with one of her ‘clients.’
We ate by candlelight serenaded by music from a transistor radio.
The emperor declared that the food—a collection of favorite dishes he requested—was delicious.
Mark continues, “After dinner my wife Lisa put candles on a cake.
‘Let’s sing Happy Birthday to someone who hasn’t celebrated their birthday in a while,’ I said.
‘Who could we sing Happy Birthday to?’
Just then, beaming, our three-year-old son Noah blurted, ‘It’s Christmas, let’s sing Happy Birthday to Jesus!’
Mark writes that he waited to see how the emperor would react.
You see, when they had first met the emperor he had become very angry at the mention of the name of Jesus.
So Mark was nervous about what the Emperor’s reaction might be.
Mark continues, “Slowly, with a big toothless grin, [the emperor] said, ‘Yes, let’s sing Happy Birthday to Jesus.’
Under a clear and starry night the eight of us sang together—Lisa, me, a streetwalker and her john, a sixty-three-year-old transvestite, and three small blond children with red cheeks.”
Mark continues, “As I helped the emperor back into his bus, he turned to me and said, ‘This was the best night of my life. Thank you.’”
I can think of no better illustration of how we—sowers of God’s Good News—are to live our lives in radical obedience to Christ.
Notice that in the parable of the sower, the seed is scattered extravagantly!!!
Some seeds land on the path.
Some fall on rocky places.
Other seed fell among thorns.
And some seed fell on good soil.
We are to be extravagant in sowing the Word of God in our community.
We are not to discriminate as to where we sow it or where it lands!!!
God’s Good News is for everyone!!!
We have no way of knowing where the good soil is…and where the seed will take root.
And it’s not up to us to know.
Not all the seed produces a crop.
Some of the seeds do take root, though, and start to grow…but something happens to stop the growth.
The soil just isn’t right.
I had an interesting conversation on July 4th with a man who’s child was having her face painted in one of our booths.
He told me that he used to be a follower of Jesus Christ.
And he used to be really involved in reaching out to folks and sharing the Good News.
But he said, “Following Jesus is hard work, and I just got way too selfish.
You can’t be selfish and follow Jesus.
The reason people don’t follow Jesus is because they are too selfish.
Following Jesus involves humbling one’s self.
It means reaching out to other people—even when it is not convenient to do so.
It’s hard work.”
As we continued to talk, I said, “Well. I hope you decide to start following Jesus again.”
His reply was this, “Yeah. I plan to. My life is just so miserable now. I have been so unhappy ever since I stopped following Jesus. Life is hardly worth living anymore.”
My friends, falling in love with Jesus is the easy part.
Staying in love with Jesus is not the same.
Staying in love takes work.
It’s much like a marriage.
And it is worth every bit of the effort!!!
Christianity is messy.
Being a Christian means being part of a radical new community that is based on grace—not on our snobby exclusiveness.
Being Christian means we are part of a radical new community based on the heart and not the pocketbook!
Someone recently said, “If you are not willing to share your money…
…you’re just talking about Jesus.”
Being a Christian means we live what we pray, “forgive us our sins as we forgive those who sin against us.”
That’s some pretty hard stuff!
That’s radical.
That is way cool!!!
That is the Way to live!!!
So how do we stay in love with Jesus?
Well, we are the Church and we’ve got to make sure that our church is centered in God’s Holy Spirit.
The Holy Spirit must be allowed to work and transform all of us!!!
We cannot be Christians if we are not being transformed into the likeness of Jesus Christ!
We have to reclaim the power of the Holy Spirit.
What else do we need to do if we are to stay in love with Jesus?
According to the Founder of the Methodist Movement…and yes, it is a Movement…
We keep our relationship with God vital, alive and growing by regularly worshipping God, studying the Scriptures daily, daily prayer, fasting, and Christian fellowship…
…This is how being Christian becomes 2nd nature!!!
It doesn’t happen any other way.
It is in these daily activities that we continue to be positioned in such a way that we can hear and respond to God’s slightest whisper of direction and receive God’s promised presence and power every day and in every situation.
It is in doing these things that we learn to hear and respond to God’s direction.
It is in these practices that we learn to trust God as God is revealed to us in Jesus Christ!!!
Regular worship, studying Scripture daily, daily prayer, fasting, Christian fellowship…
…this is where our love for God is nurtured and sustained.
This keeps us in love with God!
But that’s not the entire picture.
There is no holiness but social holiness.
We must get involved in our communities!!!
We are called to actions that heal the pain, injustice and inequality of our world.
It is impossible to stay in love with God and not desire to see God’s goodness and grace shared with the entire world!!!
Sharing God’s love with others—sowing the seed if you will—is as much about our spiritual well-being as it is about the spiritual well-being of our neighbors.
If we aren’t shouting it from the rooftops…
…we aren’t in the game.
And we are all called to be in the game.
There are no bench-sitters or spectators within the Kingdom of God!
And we play the way we practice!
If we don’t practice staying in love with God it will be impossible to be a person who walks like, talks like, and plays like one who loves God!
How’s kingdom practice going for you?
What are you doing to stay in love with God?
We have a new group of players.
We call ourselves “Monday Morning Quarterbacks.”
What we have been doing for the past several weeks is meeting at the church at 8:30 every Monday morning…
…and then going out into our community together for a couple hours putting up door hangers, and being in conversation with those who live around us.
We’ve already seen fruit from this endeavor.
It’s one of the reasons we had over 40 kids show up for Vacation Bible school each night this week!!!
About 12 of the kids came as a direct result of the work of the “Monday Morning Quarterbacks.”
And we’re just getting started.
I hope you will join the team.
Wayne Loftis was speaking with one family last Monday.
They were impressed.
They said to Wayne, “Churches don’t come around anymore. Christians are always talking about reaching out to the community, but we don’t see that happening anymore.”
Wayne’s reply?
“Well, we’re trying to do better.”
How awesome is that?
People are actually impressed when they see Christians doing what they say they believe!!!
Within every seed that is sown is the potential to grow up into what it was made to be.
We are created to flourish and grow…
…to fulfill our good destiny in the Kingdom of love.
Jesus said that our lives are the soil in which the seeds of God’s Kingdom can grow.
Those seeds fall on soil that is hard and dry, or shallow and weedy, or fertile and healthy—where they produce a crop “a hundred, sixty or thirty times what was sown.”
If indeed, God’s seed has been planted in each of us, then it is the task of a lifetime to discover how to cooperate with the Holy Spirit’s activity…
…the activity of God which is yearning to sprout up inside us!
Let’s continue the hard but fun and exciting work of staying in love with God!!!
Amen.
