From the Daily Office – March 7, 2012

Jesus said….

The sower sows the word. These are the ones on the path where the word is sown: when they hear, Satan immediately comes and takes away the word that is sown in them. And these are the ones sown on rocky ground: when they hear the word, they immediately receive it with joy. But they have no root, and endure only for a while; then, when trouble or persecution arises on account of the word, immediately they fall away. And others are those sown among the thorns: these are the ones who hear the word, but the cares of the world, and the lure of wealth, and the desire for other things come in and choke the word, and it yields nothing. And these are the ones sown on the good soil: they hear the word and accept it and bear fruit, thirty and sixty and a hundredfold. (From the Daily Office Readings, Mar. 7, 2012, Mark 4:14-20)

Priests and preachers are sowers of the seeds of the gospel, but we are called to do more than simply cast the seed on the ground. Many of us are called to the additional tasks of clearing rocks, tilling the soil, watering and fertilizing, fencing the field, pulling weeds, chasing away pests, and so forth. Paul wrote to the Corinthians, “I planted, Apollos watered, but God gave the growth. You [the church or the unchurched in the mission field] are God’s field.” (1 Cor. 3:6,9) He might have carried the analogy further (as I have done). The analogy breaks down, of course, because weed-choked soil cannot relieve itself of weeds nor can rocky soil relieve itself of stones, but human beings influenced by “the cares of the world, and the lure of wealth, and the desire for other things” can turn from these things. The Lenten “fast” is a time and a mechanism whereby we may make the conscious effort to do so.