How God's kingdom grows

A Parable for Every Kind of Year

It's so good to be here with you this evening. Technically this is a thank-you evening — but rather than standing here for 45 minutes saying thank you, the best way I can do that is to give us some encouragement from God's word.

I hope this will be encouraging to us whatever kind of year we've had in our ministries. We might be coming off a year full of encouragements — good, consistent numbers, great discussions, people seeming to grow in their faith, maybe even coming to faith for the first time.

On the other hand, we might be looking back and, honestly, struggling to find things to give thanks for: poor attendance at Bible studies, frustrating stretches with very few people coming consistently, stodgy discussions that don't seem to go anywhere, not much evidence of spiritual hunger, group members making baffling life decisions. We've been praying, but frankly, not much seems to be happening. I know what that's like.

Well, whatever sort of a year we've had, this parable contains great encouragements. I need this parable myself in the city, in these lunchtime talks with very few people coming.

Some have called this the parable of the lazy farmer. Perhaps better, the parable of the patient farmer, or the parable of the spectating farmer. I've called it — not quite as pithy — the parable of the farmer who contributes almost nothing but gets to enjoy everything in the end.

And this isn't just about this year. It's about the rest of our lives as we look ahead. Jesus's purpose, I take it, is to liberate us for a lifetime of sowing in faith that God will certainly bring about fruit in the end — that our lives will not be spent in vain.

Let's look at Mark 4:26–29:

And Jesus said, "The kingdom of God is as if a man should scatter seed on the ground. He sleeps and rises night and day, and the seed sprouts and grows; he knows not how. The earth produces by itself, first the blade, then the ear, then the full grain in the ear. But when the grain is ripe, at once he puts in the sickle, because the harvest has come."

The Context

The subject of this parable is: how does the kingdom grow? Those who know Mark will know the context. Jesus is teaching how his kingdom will grow in this age — through the advance of his word.

In chapter 4 we get one main picture: the parable of the sower and the four soils. Then we get four sub-pictures which hang off it — like a main painting in an art gallery with four satellite paintings adding different perspectives on the same thing. Here we're focusing on the third of these, in which Jesus adds two lessons about how his kingdom grows.

The Mystery and Miracle of Kingdom Growth

First, kingdom growth is mysterious. Verse 27: the seed sprouts and grows, "he knows not how." And from the farmer's perspective, it's also miraculous. Verse 28: "the earth produces by itself."

The point, of course, is that it's God who grows his kingdom, and he does so in a way that is mysterious — we cannot understand, grasp, or predict it — and miraculous, because only he can do it. The farmer cannot grow the seed. He is a mere spectator as he watches the earth produce by itself.

The seed sown is the word, as established in verse 15. The earth must symbolise the power of God as he takes his word and grows it miraculously in the lives of countless people.

I am officially a middle-aged man. I know that not only because I'm 42, but because I've started to take an interest — an unhealthy interest, according to my wife Anna — in our lawn. I've been planting grass seeds, finding the gaps, reseeding. When I get home, one of the first things I do is go and check whether it's coming up. I have no idea what's happening under the ground. It's miraculous.

God has embedded in his creation illustrations to help us understand the gospel — sheep and shepherds, rocks and fortresses, mountains and rivers, and also seeds and harvests — to show us the mysterious miracle of the growth of his kingdom.

Who Is the Sower?

Who does Jesus mean by the man who sows in verse 26? He may have himself in mind in the first instance — he is the source of the gospel word, teaching beside the sea. But he can't be limiting the farmer to himself, because in chapter 3 he has just sent out his apostles to preach the very same message. Therefore the man is the church in this age. Therefore it is us today.

We Sow; He Grows

Once the seed of the gospel word is sown, God grows his kingdom in a way that cannot be known or predicted by us. We can't understand it — and we don't need to. We just need to sow, like the farmer. Ours is to sow; his is to grow.

You might say we know the A and we know the B. The A is sowing; the B is the harvest at the end. But how God gets from A to B is a mystery. This means we don't know the how, the who, or the where.

We don't know how. How will God's word go to work in the hearts of our group members this year? Which truths or verses will hit home? Will it be one of my main points that I worked really hard on, or some detail I hadn't even noticed myself? Will it be something they can tell me about, or something they can't yet articulate because they don't even realise what God is doing? It's why so often the study or sermon we think is the worst is the very one God seems to use.

We don't know who will be good soil — often the people we least expect. We had a women's worker called Julia who remembers reading the Bible with someone from a background where they would only read the KJV. She recalls these awful one-to-ones — the person was argumentative, batting everything back, seeming to have no desire to follow the text at all. Julia thought it was a complete failure. They carried on for a bit, then life circumstances changed. Two years later, Julia got a call: "I'm so sorry, and thank you. God has been at work in my life in the last two years, partly because of reading the Bible with you." The follow-up text said, and I quote: "Couldn't be more ecstatic to be convinced of the gospel. So thank you for being faithful to him while I offered so many stubborn rebuttals."

I think of another, when I was in your position leading one of my first RML groups. A lovely guy, but socially awkward, slightly prickly early on, who didn't give the impression he was hugely spiritually hungry. This week I went online and was really encouraged by one of his sermons — 15 years later he's leading a church and preaching God's word faithfully every week. Because God grows his kingdom. We know not how.

Why is gospel ministry so full of happy surprises? Because God's ways are mysterious to us. We sow; he grows. And that's really exciting.

A guy I was chatting to last week told me my new favourite conversion story. He had a friend at uni who was, in his words, "every colour of the rainbow" in terms of sexuality and gender. He invited her to a carol service, then rather forgot about it — until months later his church came up in a conversation and she said, "Wait, you go to that church? I should come." So she does. And the pastor has decided this is the week to address issues of sexuality and gender. This guy is sitting next to his friend in a cold sweat, unable to concentrate, just wanting to get to the end and get out. At the end there's a prayer team, and for the first time ever he gets up and goes straight to them. Relieved, he sees one of the pastors — who himself has struggles in this area — come and start chatting to his friend, and he steps back. Then the pastor turns to him and says, "What are you worried about? She's a Christian." It turned out she'd come to faith months earlier and just hadn't told him. She was baptised weeks later and is still going strong.

On the Largest Scale Too

This principle of mysterious, miraculous growth must apply both on the small scale, in individual lives, and on the largest scale. As with one stalk, so with the whole crop.

Consider Eric Nash — "Bash" — who founded the camps that became the Titus Trust. Back in the 1920s or 30s, he had a vision that if he could reach independent schools with the gospel, he could influence the leadership of Britain and transform the country. That didn't happen. But lots of other things did — things well beyond Nash's small vision. On one of those early camps was a young boy called John Stott. A little later, another young boy called Dick Lucas. God's plans were much better than Nash's. Nash didn't need to know; he just needed to sow.

We don't know how, who, or where God will give the growth in the coming years — which countries, which cities. We just know that he will, and that he will do it in a way that defies our expectations and busts our dreams.

Implication 1: A Liberating Strategy for Growth

This parable is liberating in many ways. First, it contains the Lord's liberating strategy for growth.

There are possible misunderstandings. This parable does not liberate us from hard work. Sowing the gospel is hard work, as you know only too well this year. Paul says in Colossians: "Him we proclaim... for this I toil, struggling with all his energy that he powerfully works within me."

Nor does it lower what qualifies as sowing. Jesus means more than a throwaway comment at work — "I'll pray for you," or "I heard a great talk about Jesus." Those things might lead to sowing, but they aren't sowing in themselves. Jesus was teaching this crowd beside the sea, not passing by with a fleeting comment. Sowing here is sowing the gospel, which takes time.

The point is not that we're liberated from the hard work — it's that we're liberated from responsibility for the results. Through this parable the Lord Jesus says to his church: "Leave the results to me. I'll sort that bit out. You get on with sowing."

I don't understand it when churches adopt a five-year plan for growth with specifics — "our plan is for 5% conversions over the next five years." Brother or sister, may God bless your plans, but I suspect he'll do it in a different and far better way than anything written on your piece of paper.

So here's the liberating strategy in one word: sow. In three words: teach the word. In four: teach the word prayerfully. And then watch what God does. This farmer is a spectator — he sleeps, he rises, night and day, and he watches.

This truth is always at risk of falling on hard times, even in our circles. Sometimes people — even close brothers — suggest that simply to teach and preach the word is not enough, that it's too simplistic. A recent popular book, with lots of good things in it, essentially says we need "output-focused leaders" as the key to growth, or churches run a particular way, or particular evangelistic programmes.

Now, there is such a thing as sanctified common sense — reflecting on whether we're actually sowing the word effectively. But once we've established that it is the word that gives growth — not the word plus this or that strategy — then Jesus says God will give the growth, and it will be miraculous and mysterious.

I remember Kev Murdoch up at a growing church saying he never had a strategy apart from teaching God's word as well as he could and praying — and God gave the growth. Many of you won't be at St Helen's for your whole lives. You'll go off to other churches, smaller ones perhaps, like mine. When you do, can you be a brick in your church for this principle? Can you encourage the minister: "We want you to sow the word. We want you to teach the word. That's enough. That's the strategy for growth." We desperately need that kind of encouragement.

Implication 2: Give Thanks for a Year of Sowing

I don't know how many dozens of lives have been sown into represented in this room. The seed is in the ground — what an exciting prospect! Who is God going to reach through this cohort? Where? We don't know. We don't need to know. But at the end of time we'll look back and think, "Gosh, I had no idea you'd do that through him or her." So let's give thanks for the seed in the ground this year.

The Time Frame of Kingdom Growth

The second principle Jesus teaches is that he grows his kingdom gradually, over a time frame much longer than ours.

We are used to wanting everything now. Tesco Whoosh will get you something in 20 minutes. Netflix at 1.5 — or even 2 — speed, just to get through it quicker and on to the next episode. We live in a culture where speed is of the essence, and it's tempting to want the kingdom of God to work like that too.

But Jesus says it takes time, like a harvest growing from scratch. There is waiting, and waiting, and waiting for summer. Verse 27: the seed sprouts and grows. Verse 28: Jesus deliberately draws us through the whole process — "first the blade, then the ear, then the full grain in the ear." Even then it's not quite ready.

When Is the Harvest?

I've been chewing this over. When is that harvest of verse 29 to come? Some New Testament passages seem to put it now — "pray that labourers be thrust out into the harvest" (Matthew 9); "the fields are white for harvest" (John 4). Others put it at the end of time. As with many things in the Bible, there is a now and a not yet.

But in these parables I think Jesus means us to see the harvest as the end of time. It's explicit in the parallel in Matthew 13: "the harvest is the end of the age." In Mark, the next parable — the mustard seed — takes us through the whole process of the kingdom from start to finish. Mark 13 speaks of Jesus's return as the summertime harvest when he gathers his people. Paul has the day of Christ in view as the day of harvest in Philippians 1.

So the time frame Jesus has in view is not only longer than the last few months, and not only longer than the next few years — it's longer than our lifetimes: decades, centuries, until the return of Jesus, whenever that may be.

This is so important, for at least five reasons.

1. Patience

In the words of Take That — "have a little patience." This farmer has to be patient, and I think this is one of the main things the Lord wants to teach us.

When do you expect to see the fruits of your labours this year? We want instant results. We want to give feedback: "So-and-so has decided to become a missionary." We want members dramatically transformed within months, conversions left, right and centre. I am the prime culprit of this — so impatient about what I want to see. But that's like the farmer scattering seed in the morning, having lunch, coming back in the afternoon, seeing nothing, and wondering why.

When I planted my grass seed, I knew I was teaching on this parable and I shouldn't look too early — but I still couldn't help glancing out in the afternoon. In the same way, we are foolish to expect immediate results. That's not usually how God works, though he graciously does often give us encouragements.

This is also a word to be patient about God's work in our own lives. His work of sanctification in us is the same as in others — we're not exceptions. It's not an excuse for sluggishness in repentance and putting sin to death, but we do wish he'd speed up his work in us, don't we? His ways are gradual growth over a lifetime. Be patient with God's work in us too — and give thanks for the seed of his word planted in us this year as we've taught it.

2. Liberated from Short-Termism

This is the same point from the other angle. If we think we must see fruit now, we're not only foolish — we'll give up on gospel ministry in the end. We might give it a burst for three to five years, but we'll quickly grow despondent. Nothing seems to happen, or it happens too slowly and mysteriously for our liking.

If we're going to keep going through our 30s and 40s when responsibilities grow, and into retirement however much discouragement we've seen, we need this parable to liberate us. Otherwise we may grow bitter towards God — "Why aren't you doing anything? There's nothing to show for my labours." We'll lose confidence in the power of the word, like the foolish planter thinking something's wrong with the seed because the grass hadn't sprouted by lunchtime.

Be patient. The seed is only just sown; it might take years to develop. It's not that we won't see anything — the farmer watches and sees it sprout and grow — but what we see will be slow and gradual, like watching a plant grow over a whole year. Let this parable liberate you from short-termism, or you will give up. God's timeline is much, much longer than ours.

3. Liberated from Measuring by What Can Be Seen Today

The harvest is on the last day. That's when we get to put in the sickle (verse 29). That's when the results come out. Until then, there is no point in measuring what God has done with our lives.

One of the most encouraging things about the Apostle Paul is that he died looking out at very little visible fruit. In his last letter to Timothy he says, "All in Asia have deserted me" — think about that, the place where he'd done most of his missionary work. Yet he also died rejoicing, because he knew the gospel seed was planted, and could say, "The word of God is not bound." He was looking way beyond his lifetime, to the harvest on the last day.

Christian biographies are a blessing, but they tend to focus on people who saw great growth in their lifetimes, and can tempt us to measure our fruitfulness by what we can see. Spurgeon's biography will mention the nameless man who explained the gospel in a tiny Baptist church — but not the mother who taught that man the gospel as a boy, or the worker who shared the gospel with him over a drink in the pub, people who never lived to see their seed flourish.

You have no idea what immeasurable fruit God might bring — not only from this year, but over the coming decades. On the last day you will see. So take heart. We must not measure the impact of our lives by what we see now, or even by the time we die. Most of us will probably die with nothing much to show for our lives — I expect that to be true for me. But the harvest is on the last day.

4. Liberated from the Pride of "Me and My Kingdom"

The Bible always humbles us — in a really good way. An Australian preacher once said, "Whatever humbles us is good for us." That's very true, and I need this passage to humble me.

It is God's kingdom, and it is God who gives the growth. It is God's harvest in the end, which by his grace he allows us to share in. It is to God that all the glory will rightly go. The more clearly we see the massive time-scale of kingdom growth — that the results are on the last day and it's God's harvest — the more our tiny little lives are rightly put in perspective. And that healthy humility is liberating.

5. Liberated for a Lifetime of Joyful Sowing

Finally, the Lord's intention is to liberate us for a lifetime of sowing the word of God in joy and in faith.

Look again at verse 29. Who puts in the sickle? He does — the man. Isn't that amazing? After all this waiting, and after it's been God growing his kingdom all along, he gives his church the joy of reaping at the end of time. This is the parable of the farmer who does almost nothing but gets to enjoy everything in the end.

Imagine the joy of seeing countless people saved, transformed, joy-filled and God-glorifying on that day — there through the sowing that God gave us to do in our little lives. We can give ourselves to a lifetime of sowing in joyful expectation of the harvest, and in faith that God will do as he promised.

Four Things to Give Thanks For

1. A year of sowing. Give thanks for seeds in the ground. Just think what God might do in the coming years and centuries through this cohort. It's mind-boggling.
2. Who God is. This is the parable of the farmer who contributes very little and gets to enjoy the fruits of God's work. What a wonderful God, who gives us this joy.
3. The privilege you've had this year — spending a whole year planting seeds in the lives of six, eight, ten, twelve people, and the possibilities of what the Lord might do with that seed over the years. It's hard work, but it's a great privilege, and I hope you'll consider carrying on.
4. The seed sown in our own lives this year, as we've taught God's word.