I have to admit I know that every time a pastor gets up in front of a congregation and says, well, today we're going to talk about stewardship. There is a nice ripple of groans that happens out there. People go, oh, that is not what we want to talk about. And I get it. I also have sat in those spaces, and we have somehow or another tied stewardship to bills and to begging, to pressure and to the sense that the church just needs more. But that feeling comes from a place of weariness. It maybe even comes from a place of fear. Fear that there isn't going to be enough. Fear that whatever we have to give won't actually matter. Fear that the second that we start doing this, we talk about money more than we talk about God.
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Churches have a way of having made a big mistake because we're not very honest about this. We have tied the faithful act of stewardship to the work of budgeting. And those two things actually are not synonymous. Budgets and stewardship do not always go together, because stewardship is sharing the table of grace. It's the radical welcome that refuses to settle for people just feeling comfortable. It's the kind of hope that grows so large within you that it goes out into the world because. Because you cannot contain it any longer.
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Stewardship is what happens when we believe that even when the world seems to be full of pain and brokenness and heartache and need, that God has already scattered so many seeds of abundance that we can see the possibility of a harvest of hope. Those seeds grow into courage that allows us to fight injustice. They're seeds that grow into voices that speak out against racism. They're seeds that grow into hands that step up to stop harm when we see it. They're seeds that grow into lives that share the incredible love and grace that God has planted in us so that others can see it in tangible and meaningful ways.
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This defines what true stewardship is, not budgeting and spreadsheets. This is what God invites us all to cultivate together, not just here, but in all aspects of our life. And so, as we join together in this season, we envision what is possible for our collective future. For more than 65 years, this congregation has been sowing seeds that have blossomed into an abundance of love, shaping our church's relationship with Boulder and beyond. And now it is our turn again.
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Each and every one of us is a steward of God's love and God's hope and God's possibilities out into the world. So let's take a moment and think about that Scripture passage. We got to hear it both from Annie and for our amazing children who acted it out for us. And Jesus tells this scripture in all of the synoptic gospels. So we think of it as the parable of the sower. But if we listen really closely, this is a little bit less about the sower and a little bit more about the seed and the soil.
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So a sower goes out and he throws the seed everywhere, and it goes on the path and on the rocks and on the thorns and on some good soil. And I can imagine that farmers today and for farmers in Jesus time, would have shook their heads. That's not how you plant if you want to be careful. It's not how you plant if you want to maximize your yield. A careful farmer saves the seed and places it precisely and calculates where it's going to have the best chance to grow. But this thrower just throws it out there. The farmer is just tossing seed wherever. Maybe even with reckless extravagance, maybe even what we perceive as wastefully.
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A careful farmer prepares the soil, rotates the crops year to year, cares for the land, and monitors what's going to happen so that every year the best harvests can come. So when we hear this text, sometimes we get caught up, just like those farmers. We interpret the parable as being about all those places where that seed won't grow. But theologian Gail o' Day points out, this story isn't about scarcity. It's not about where it's not going to grow or unfertile ground. And Jesus tells this parable to remind us of God's extravagant generosity. God doesn't calculate risk or keep CDs in reserve. Instead, God scatters love and grace and hope everywhere, even in places where it seems nothing could possibly grow.
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And then Jesus sharpens the point even a little bit further. The harvest of that seed in the good soil produces a hundredfold more grain than what was scattered. The writer of Luke wants us to see that even when some seed doesn't take root, God's harvest will always surpass what we had originally imagined.
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So if the seed, as Jesus tells us this time, is the word of God, then what makes the difference is how we receive it. Sometimes we hear the word, but allow it to be distracted away from us. Sometimes we hear it, but we don't let it sink in deep enough, leaving us unsurprisingly uncertain where to turn when trouble arrives. Sometimes we hear it, but we become entangled in the thorns of our daily life, overwhelming problems, harmful systems, or using our privilege to shield ourselves from some of our neighbors suffering. But sometimes we hear it and we hold fast to it. We let it grow and bear fruit.
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John Wesley, the founder of Methodism, believed that good soil is not just about receptivity, it's about perseverance. It's about holding fast for what the writer of Luke calls a noble and good start. And for Wesley, fruit is never an abstract idea, even though we use it that way all the time. Time fruit is always holy living, love of God and love of neighbor made visible in acts of mercy, justice and care. That's how Wesley lived out his faith, and he invited others into it over and over again.
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So to echo o' Day's insights, when Jesus tells this story, he isn't giving us a lesson in agriculture. He's naming a truth about the kingdom of God. God sows generously, even in places where we might have written it off, said, well, nothing can grow there. That place is too hard. Those people aren't going to produce fruit. God keeps sowing over and over again because God reveals for us what God can accomplish in our lives when our gifts are rooted in hope.
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Today, we witness that hope in a particularly profound way. Today is World Communion Sunday, and Christians across every continent gather together in Catholic cathedrals and storefronts and open fields and hidden rooms, breaking bread and sharing the cup. Each of these tables represents a field where God's seed takes root. Across diverse languages and cultures, we participate in one unified harvest, a harvest of hope.
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Henri Nouwen once wrote that stewardship is not about begging or budgets. It's about the invitation. When we ask one another to give, we are really saying, come and belong to this vision. Plant your seeds here. Tend the soil with us in this place, share in the harvest that God is bringing. Because stewardship, at its heart, is communion. It's not a transaction.
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And let's be honest, some seeds in our world fall among thorns. As Raj Nadella, a professor of religion at Adrian College, reminds us, it's not always about the bad soil inside us. Sometimes it's the systems around us, Injustice that chokes out possibility and poverty that robs people of a future and divisions that are hard on the ground. So part of our calling as people of Faith is to work as farmers, to plow the field, to pull the thorns, to soften the hardened paths, and to continue to believe that growth is possible within us, around us and beyond us.
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So here's our call today to embrace God's seeds of hope, love, justice and grace. Already scattered throughout the world, these seeds encounter us in different seasons and states. And many of us find ourselves in varied soil. Some of us have been hardened by grief or fear, or maybe just the daily news feed that comes across on our phones or our TVs. Others of us are entangled in the thorns of worry and responsibility. And some of us have just enough depth for momentary joy. But we lack the depth for endurance. But the good news is that God transcends our individual limitations by bringing us together in community.
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In community. God's scattered seed creates abundance, impossible to achieve if we do it by ourselves. The parable of the sower teaches us that harvesting happens in the multitudes of life. The seeds of faith break open. They stretch for the sky. They produce fruit. In the incredible and intricate life of community.
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As we hold fast to the word of God together, when we carry one another through tests and trials, our call isn't to struggle alone. Instead, it is to trust what God is trying to accomplish. Accomplish with all of us. Together we plant with courage. We nurture with love and place our faith in the one who transforms our effort into a hundredfold harvest. Amen.
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As we come to the table, we are reminded that God provides enough for all and calls us to share in abundance. We are different in age and race, in gender and orientation, in language and culture, in faith and story. And yet together we discover our differences are not obstacles to overcome, but blessings to be cherished. So come, beloved of God, come just as you are. Bring your longing, your questions, your gifts, that the table is set with hope and plenty.
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Go now. As people of God's abundant harvest. Plant seeds of compassion wherever you walk. Tend the growing signs of justice and love. Share the abundance of grace beyond these walls with God's peace and possibilities ever before you. Amen.
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