The Rev. Dr. Brandon Perrine
Proper 10 A
Matthew 13:1-9, 18-23
July 12, 2026
That same day Jesus went out of the house and sat beside the sea. Such 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 anyone 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 lure 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 yields in one case a hundredfold, in another sixty, and in another thirty.”
~o~
There’s something deeply satisfying about planting vegetables from seed. There’s nothing wrong with the seedlings you can pick up at Schaefer’s, but there’s just something more satisfying about starting with seeds, don’t you think? You make neat rows and then drop the seeds in according to the depth and distance indicated on the package, and then you top them with a powdery layer of fine soil before a good watering. Then you wait. Sometimes you wait a long time. But I get seriously giddy about the first little saplings poking their tiny green heads through a crack they’ve made in the dirt. This year, the pole beans were the first ones up. I’ll admit, I feel a sort of pride at their can-do spirit and the way they’ve got to work a little for their first feel of morning sunshine.
You don’t get that experience with the seedlings from Schaefer’s. And you definitely don’t get it from buying full-grown tomato plants in 2gallon pots and fruit already on the vines. I’m not proud of it, but I judge people a little bit when I see them buy those. I judge them even more when they proudly run around telling anyone who’ll listen that they already have garden-ripe tomatoes. But I digress. Seeds are the way to go if you have the time and the patience to wait a couple of extra weeks—carefully planted, lovingly tended—seeds.
As I read this morning’s text from Matthew again this past week, my first thought was the sower in that reading is an absolute moron! What kind of a farmer would just walk out the door and start throwing their precious seeds around willy-nilly? What idiot gardener would toss a handful of seeds on the path, for goodness’ sake, to be trampled underfoot or gobbled up by birds? What fool gardener would toss a handful of seeds into a gravel pit, and a handful of seeds into a briar patch? And when this farce of a farmer accidentally threw a handful of seeds onto the good soil—finally—how in the world did he manage yields of 100, 60, or even 30 to 1? Even by modern standards, those yields are astonishing. There’s no earthly way this joker is getting 30, or 60, or 100!
I’ll be honest, this story really irked me—Jesus too. What kind of nonsense was he rattling off that day? Surely, the farmers and fishers he was preaching to shared my indignation. What could he have possibly hoped they would walk away with? And what are we supposed to make of this tall tale today?
Apparently, the disciples were wondering the same thing because Jesus shares his interpretation of the parable with them. This is the first of only two instances in the gospels when Jesus actually explains one of his parables. Truthfully, I disliked the story even more after Jesus explained it. He said the seeds are the words about the realm of heaven and people are like the soil. Bad soil yields no fruit and good soil bears lots of fruit. That’s it. No mention of the idiot farmer. We get nothing. Zilch. So unsatisfying.
I read commentaries, searched articles, pored over others’ sermons, but nobody seems to care that Jesus concludes his inspiring TED talk with no mention of the main character. Who happened to be a dunce! So I talked to my mother. I should have started there. Moms can be really good sounding boards. My mom also happens to be a person of deep faith. “We’re the sower,” she said when I’d finished my tirade. He’s us. I think she’s right. Maybe it’s that obvious to you too, but it was a revelation to me.
We’re the idiot farmer foolishly and wastefully scattering our seeds here, there, and yonder—at least we’re supposed to be. Remember, the seeds are the word of the kingdom. Apparently, we’re meant to be scattering them everywhere. A little mercy over here, a little patience over there, a bit of service, some grace in the path, a handful of unconditional love and some inclusion in the rocks, a sprinkling of justice and hope among the thorns, a dash of peace and plenty on the good soil. Some of them will bear fruit beyond themselves—yield more kindness, more compassion, more love—and some of them won’t. Whether every seed grows isn’t ours to determine. Our calling is simply to keep sowing. Our job is to scatter the seeds and to scatter them everywhere—forget the rows. If we do our job right, then there will be more mercy and patience, service and grace, love and inclusion, justice and hope, peace and plenty in the world than when we started. And there might even be a lot more, but that’s not for us to worry about. Just scatter the seeds.
Sometimes, I get overwhelmed by what’s going on in the world around us. It’s too much to sit with, too much to obsess over, and certainly too much to try and fix as just one person. But, in the masterful way that Jesus always does, he reminds us that we don’t have to. We just scatter seeds of the kingdom. That’s what we do. That’s how we live our faith. And that feels so much less crushing to me—less scary. I hope it’s good news for you too. We’re not personally responsible for fixing the world. Jesus does tell us to scatter seeds though and see what grows. So may we do just that. May we do it with the same wonderfully indiscriminate generosity as that foolish farmer. And may we see the growth.
Amen.
