The Good Earth (2005)

The Good Earth (July 10, 2005)

Other seeds fell on good soil and brought forth grain, some a hundredfold, some sixty, some thirty.” Matthew 13:8

Two years ago I was on my pulpit exchange in Forfar, Scotland, at St. Margaret's church and Rev. Jean Montgomerie was here. One of the things I found out is that ministers in the Church of Scotland are expected to appear in local schools from time to time, and I was invited to do this at Langland's School for their final assembly, with the oldest classes being about 13 or 14 years old. It was a great opportunity and I chose to tell the children this story by Jesus we know as the parable of the Sower. At the end I said that the teachers had been much like the sower, planting the seeds of knowledge, and it was now up to the students what they were going to make of it, whether they would be just shallow soil, or rocky soil, or soil along the pathway, or truly good soil – the good earth, to use Pearl Buck's famous phrase – and bring forth fruit.

I was glad I chose that story. Although a majority of the students were Christian and most of them Church of Scotland, even if only nominally, there were also students from other religions and backgrounds there, and this story could speak to them.

But of course Jesus is talking about it especially with regard to the Gospel, the Word, his teachings and his ministry.

There must have been some point at which Jesus' disciples wondered why some people stayed with them and followed Jesus for a while, then drifted away, why some responded immediately with joy but gradually lost enthusiasm and went on to other things, or came up with various and sundry excuses. To the disciples this is good news: the long awaited Messiah has come, he has the Word and indeed he is the Word, why doesn't everyone just receive this good news with joy? Why do so many not stay committed to Christ and his Church?

This is an age old question. And there's no good answer to it. It is comforting that we aren't the first to ask it.

There are first of all those with “no depth” of soil. They have no preparation for receiving the Word of Life. And the Word doesn't have a chance. William Barclay called this the group of the shut mind. Their minds are made up already. No matter how good the seed is, it is not going to penetrate. They do not have what Calvin called “a teachable spirit”. And the last thing they want to do is ask a question. Sometimes, it should be said, these folks are in church!

Then there are the folks who represented the “rocky ground”, of which there is a lot in Palestine. It is ground with a very thin layer of soil over a rough, rocky ground. They receive the Word with apparent joy, lots of enthusiasm. But they are likely to be swayed by the very next thing that comes along, and they can't be counted on to stay the course. They have no resources in themselves.

Billy Graham was in town recently. He liked to tell the story of the time he was on a plane trip and a man in the seat in front of him started acting belligerently and was very loud. He'd obviously been juiced up before the trip. The flight attendant tried to calm him down. “Don't you know that's Billy Graham sitting behind you?” she said. Whereupon the man got up and turned around and said, through his beery breath, “Billy Graham! I'm so glad to meet you. I went to one of your Crusades years ago and it changed my life!”

Then there's the thorny ground. These are the hearers with so many interest in life that often the most important things – such as are clearly outlined in the ten commandments, the first four of which are entirely about God – these things get crowded out, choked. People become too busy to pray, too busy to attend to the public worship of God, too busy to read the Bible, too involved in business that they forget “mankind is our business”, as Dickens wrote.

There's an old saying that the good is often the enemy of the best. It is not to say there aren't important things demanding our attention. It is to say that the biblical witness is clear that nothing is more important than God and our relationship to God. Jesus made this crystal clear, so did the Old Testament prophets, as well as the commandments on Mt. Sinai.

In his later life Charles Darwin admitted that his mind was “a withered leaf to everything except science.” He even used to enjoy listening to Handel's Messiah, but he couldn't anymore. This is the way it is when the pressures of life crowd out from our minds the things of the spirit.

I received an email the other day from Ruth and Ivor Napier, two of the folks at St. Margaret's church, Forfar, Scotland. They wrote that considering the number of members in the parish church attendance is disappointing, as it is, they said, throughout Scotland. But because of the unique situation of being part of the national church, many people expect the services of the church, such as for baptisms and funerals, but they themselves never attend. It is one of the sources of discouragement for a person such as Rev. Jean.

The psalmist said, “I was glad when they said unto me, Let us go into the house of the Lord.” But today many Christians would rather not.

Finally, there is the good earth. It is important to say that this is what the parable is really about. It is not about the three others, though it is so tempting to focus on those three. Instead, it is about the good earth, the good soil, in which the Word is planted and it grows, miraculously, abundantly, incredibly. A fantastic harvest. We see that this morning in the numbers of people helping out in our Vacation Bible School. What a terrific witness this is.

It is always easier to see the evil at work in the world. We saw that this week in London. How absolutely horrible. A form of bestiality, the Times said. In our modern world this kind of evil is known immediately all around the world. But the good news of the kingdom is that good is growing, too, in people with deep soil. Only very occasionally is it as obvious as evil, and it often is overshadowed by the evil. C. S. Lewis was one of the truly great Christian writers of our time, and his works are still read by millions, and his novels for children are still best sellers. He died on November 22, 1963. That day his death was only a footnote. We were overwhelmed by the horror of the assassination of President Kennedy.

But good earth, such as Lewis was, produces good fruit, some thirty, some sixty, some hundred, and today in Banes and Noble Lewis' Chronicles of Narnia in ever new editions is leaping off the tables, and we have adjusted to the horrible evil of John F. Kennedy's assassination, just as we will adjust and overcome the evil of mindless, despicable terrorism. The people who bring good depth of soil, who know that their first calling is, as the Westminster catechism put it, to glorify God, and who work at and work at it, are signs of the kingdom of heaven.

To make the earth good God needs people of good earth.