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Reflections on Mark 4:26-29

“The kingdom of God is like this,” he said. “A man scatters seed on the ground.  He sleeps and rises night and day; the seed sprouts and grows, although he doesn’t know how. The soil produces a crop by itself—first the blade, then the head, and then the full grain on the head. As soon as the crop is ready, he sends for the sickle, because the harvest has come.”

This is Mark 4:26-29 and I've been reflecting on it for a little while lately. I think the Lord led me to this passage a few times lately as I've looked back on the past year and the growth of the ministry. This passage has felt very prescient due to how it portrays the mystery of the process of ministry. The man scattering the seed is reminiscent of the parable of the sower, which is just a few paragraphs earlier in Mark 4. That one, with the focus being on the types of soil the sower (minister/teacher) will experience is more well known and a favorite of small group leaders and pastors. With good reason! It's immediately either convicting, encouraging, reorienting or some combination of the three. Application feels clear: be the right kind of soil. Let the word of God penetrate, grow roots, and last for a lifetime. Don't let the idolatry of the world around you choke out the truth. Don't be hard hearted and blind to the truth of God. 

In this second parable of the sower, the emphasis shifts, even though on closer review, the message of this parable is also present in the first parable. This time, the message is more for the one spreading the gospel, rather than the one receiving the message. It's a reminder that this process is mysterious and out of our control. To say that we are the reason for something growing is to be naive. At best we played a small part. We took seed that we didn't create, scattered on ground we also didn't create, and then we go to sleep, and the soil and seed grow into something while we are asleep and therefore ineffective. This is a perfect reminder of the mystery of all of this process and has been helpful for me to keep an open hand towards what God will do in our ministry moving forward. If I were to focus on the parts of the process I can't control I'm pretending to be the impetus for things that are completely in God's hands. The parable here is not a call to sit back and do nothing. The farmer is portrayed as faithful. He scatters the seed, hoping and I think it's not a stretch to say likely praying for the outcome of a plentiful crop. But the process of the seed turning into the crop is in the hands of the giver and sustainer of life. 

I'm very excited about this next year. My hope and prayer is that we can capitalize on the energy and growth from this past year and let that catapult us into reaching more of the campus than we ever have before. That, to me is being faithful to spread the seed and doing what is in our control. We can be strategic and try our best to leverage the resources and people God has given us to do this work as best as we can. The parable though reminds me to stay grounded in the reality that there is little in the way of outcomes that are within my control. Just like the earlier parable of the sower tells us, the state of the heart of the hearer is all over the map. The Spirit of God is knocking on the door of the hearts of the students on the campus and myself and the other staff and our students need to do our best to join the Spirit in that work and ask God to show us people who are ready to know him. But the catalyst of all of this is God. That can be freeing, the message is simple if we're humble. Do your part, be as faithful as you can to be a good farmer and sow the seed, then leave the outcomes to God. Or it can be frustrating if we're in a place of trying to get something specific in a specific time or way based on what we want to see happen. 

Pray for our team as we prepare our leader team for this fall and plan our events and do our support raising this summer to prepare for another school year! Pray that we remember to just seek to be faithful and do our part and trust God to do what he does. He is good!

Thanks for reading,
Ryan 

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