Sun Kwak, “The Kingdom of God”

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AapCM8nykjs

TEXT: Mark 4:1-20

[1] Again he began to teach beside the sea. And a very large crowd gathered about him, so that he got into a boat and sat in it on the sea, and the whole crowd was beside the sea on the land. [2] And he was teaching them many things in parables, and in his teaching he said to them: [3] “Listen! Behold, a sower went out to sow. [4] And as he sowed, some seed fell along the path, and the birds came and devoured it. [5] Other seed fell on rocky ground, where it did not have much soil, and immediately it sprang up, since it had no depth of soil. [6] And when the sun rose, it was scorched, and since it had no root, it withered away. [7] Other seed fell among thorns, and the thorns grew up and choked it, and it yielded no grain. [8] And other seeds fell into good soil and produced grain, growing up and increasing and yielding thirtyfold and sixtyfold and a hundredfold.” [9] And he said, “He who has ears to hear, let him hear.”

The Purpose of the Parables

[10] And when he was alone, those around him with the twelve asked him about the parables. [11] And he said to them, “To you has been given the secret of the kingdom of God, but for those outside everything is in parables, [12] so that

“‘they may indeed see but not perceive,

and may indeed hear but not understand,

lest they should turn and be forgiven.’”

[13] And he said to them, “Do you not understand this parable? How then will you understand all the parables? [14] The sower sows the word. [15] And these are the ones along the path, where the word is sown: when they hear, Satan immediately comes and takes away the word that is sown in them. [16] And these are the ones sown on rocky ground: the ones who, when they hear the word, immediately receive it with joy. [17] And they have no root in themselves, but endure for a while; then, when tribulation or persecution arises on account of the word, immediately they fall away. [18] And others are the ones sown among thorns. They are those who hear the word, [19] but the cares of the world and the deceitfulness of riches and the desires for other things enter in and choke the word, and it proves unfruitful. [20] But those that were sown on the good soil are the ones who hear the word and accept it and bear fruit, thirtyfold and sixtyfold and a hundredfold.”

SERMON: “The Kingdom of God”

I don’t know how many of you are into riddles. I was given this riddle in college that just drove me crazy. It was during finals week, which is, of course, perfect timing for things like riddles. But I couldn’t get it out of my mind, which made it impossible for me to get any actual studying done. I eventually did figure it out, but it’s one of those riddles where the answer is so intricate and complex that you have to make sense of the answer even as you say it and after you’ve figured it out. And I remember when I was trying to explain it to the person who initially gave me the riddle, I was sitting there wondering mid-explanation — Wait, did I actually figure it out? Questioning myself mid-sentence. Because again, the answer seemed like a riddle in and of itself. And if we’re honest, I think that’s how parables can feel to us at times. It’s almost as if Jesus speaks in this code. And in the case of this particular parable, Jesus gives the answer, and it still reads like code. If you remember from your grade school days, it’s like the back of math textbooks that provide the answer to the question (usually the odd ones), where if you don’t know the formula or can’t figure out the logic, you still have no idea how that particular answer was derived. And so, it still remains somewhat of a mystery. And that’s a little bit like how this parable reads to us. And we’ve technically seen a parablealready in The Gospel of Mark, with Jesus’ usage of the parable of coming into the house to bind down the strong man. But the parable we just read this morning is what many scholars deem to be the parable of all the parables — the parable that describes the rest of the parables. And so, here’s Jesus unpacking to his disciples and to us this new way of teaching, his pedagogy. We read toward the end of the chapter in verse 34, and we’re told that Jesus did not speak without a parable. And that’s not to say he only taught in parables. But just like the parables did, as we’ll see, Jesus did not teach to please the crowds. But he taught in order to sift and to decipher. His words were intended to separate and order — those who belonged to him and those who didn’t. And if you observe the creation story, this is what his word always does — separate and divide, in order to create order. And so, here’s Jesus giving us a parable regarding what happens to those who receive his Word, all which describes what his kingdom is like.

And I don’t know if you’ve thought this before, when hearing about these different soils. But it almost seems wasteful, as if this sower is just spraying seeds everywhere without aim or purpose. But scholars agree that what Jesus is describing is something very ordinary and something regularly done with seeds  and sowing in that context. It’s as if we were to talk about those on the road in our context here in Camarillo and said — Some took the 101, some took Ventura Blvd, some took the 118, some took Las Posas Rd. It’s normal language and would not be heard as anything aberrant. And that would have been the case in Jesus’ context. But what is aberrant is at the end — not the soils, not the method. But it’s the outcome we read in verse 8 — And other seeds fell into good soil and produced grain, growing up and increasing and yielding thirtyfold and sixtyfold and a hundredfold. Have you ever heard kids talk about something ginormous. Rowe would do this when talking about God, when he was little, saying — God is bigger than this house. No, he’s bigger than this neighborhood. No, he’s bigger than the whole world. And you get this unrealistic ending here in verse 8 — thirtyfold and sixtyfold and a hundredfold. And everyone around would have been asking — How do you do that? Because a tenfold yielding is a good haul. A thirtyfold yielding would have been the haul of the season. Something everyone was talking about for the rest of the year. A sixtyfold yielding would have been something once in a generation, maybe even a lifetime. Something that wouldn’t be repeated for years and years. But then, a hundredfold yielding. Now, that’s just unheard of. Things and events like that just don’t happen. And so, it would have been shocking for the people listening in. Everything seems normal and ordinary — the sower, the seeds, the sun, the water, the soils, the methods. But then, this out of this world kind of yielding. And they would have thought — I’ve sown on good soil before. And this has never happened to me. There must be something I’m missing here.

And we’re going to get back to the individual soils in a later sermon. Because they’re a part of the passage, but they’re not the main point. In this day and age of Enneagram tests and Meyers Briggs and the Six Working Genius tests, aren’t we guilty of thinking — Which one might I be? And again, we’ll get to that question and consideration. But how many of us have read this parable wondering first — I wonder which soil my heart is most like right now? But that would be the wrong first question. Because it’s not the main point. I think we read this parable and think — Oh, the solution is to make my heart into good soil. But that would be pointing our hopes at the wrong protagonist. And the problem with that is also that the initial reaction from the initial audience here wouldn’t have been to make their hearts into good soil. Because once again, the reaction would have been — I’ve sown on good soil before, and this has never happened to me. Maybe not even the thirtyfold. Because what he seems to be saying is that this is not just something happen chance. But there is a regularity and expectation to this foreign way of sowing seeds and expecting yields. So, what’s Jesus doing here? What he’s trying to do is bring about a reaction. That what they’re expecting is wrong. And that they needed to look outside of themselves and the usual way of things in order to find this growth. Where ordinary practices amount to supernatural growth and outcomes. Not because of the methods but because of what Jesus calls the secret here. And in order to understand this secret, you have to undergo a perspective change.

You might hear these repeated statements throughout the parables of Jesus, where he’s saying — The kingdom of God is or The kingdom of God is like. And kids, what do we call that way of constructing words? These are metaphors and similes. And metaphors and similes are customarily used in order to be emphatic and forceful about the description of something. They strike familiar feelings about something that might seem mundane or foreign. Because here, these analogies serve to show that there really is no earthly parallel. And to understand these parables, you need a perspective change. Ancient philosopher Epictetus once said that it’s impossible to teach something to someone he thinks he already knows. And this is what Jesus is confronting here by using a parable. Because that word parable in the Greek is made up of two words that are put together — παρα and βολη. And these two words are next to and throw, respectively. And one particular emphasis with the usage of parables is that these are heavenly truths that are put next to earthly stories, that people might be able to understand the things of God. And in order to invite us into the thoughts and the things of God, he puts the kingdom of God side by side with the stories of everyday living. But then, we get to the second part of the word, which is to throw. That in order to put these things next to each other, one side needs to be thrown. And this is more literally to hurl. This not just a light toss, like how you might throw a Nerf ball with a child. But this is hurling. And for Jesus’ initial audience in his disciples, some of who were fishermen, knew something about a hurling. This was the activity of fishermen going out to sea to hurl a net into the sea. And as we noted from one of our first sermons here in The Gospel of Mark, this act of hurling a net into the sea was to bring creatures from one realm to another. That unlike our day and age where the ocean and the beach are seen as a place of tranquility, in antiquity, this was the deep abyss of unknown darkness. And in many depictions, the sea was the representation of the realm of evil. And the starting point to understanding these parables is identifying, once again, this secret, which comes in the one who joins heaven and earth, who was hurled from one realm into another — from the realm of glorious light to the realm of deep darkness.

And you look at Israel’s history. They had the unfortunate proclivity of forgetting that they belonged to God. And instead, they looked to kingdoms around them. Israel initially asked Samuel — Give us a king like all the other nations. And instead of looking to the thoughts of God, they were and would continue to look at the patterns of the world to guide their thoughts and hopes. And so, you might know that Jesus is referred to as Jesus Christ. And that word Christ is not his last name. He’s not Mr. Christ. But the word Christ is used interchangeably with the word Messiah, which is the anointed one. And in God’s Story, this was the anticipated king who was to bring lasting chnage. Because he’s meeting this anticipation, this expectation of the people who were longing and waiting for something related to their understanding of the kingdom. By this time now, you’re probably tired of me talking about this thing called the chiasm, if you’ve been with us throughout our series here. But it’s not me — it’s Mark. But he’s at it again with one of his sandwich structures. And this one is, perhaps, even more deliberate than his last. Because he talks about the parable on the outside, on the buns. Then, he gives the purpose to parables on the inside, with the meat. And we kind of already touched upon the meaning of parables unlocked with a perspective change — to look upon he who joins heaven and earth and was hurled from heaven to earth. And with describing the purpose of the parables here, Jesus gives familiar words. And they’re pretty chilling words, with what we read in verses 11-12 — To you has been given the secret of the kingdom of God, but for those outside everything is in parables, so that ‘they may indeed see but not perceive, and may indeed hear but not understand, lest they should turn and be forgiven.’ And if these words sound familiar to you, as in sound like something from a different passage, you’d be onto something. Because those words in verse 12 are in quotations, meaning Jesus is quoting something from before these words. And these are words taken from Isaiah 6, when the prophet Isaiah is looking at the impending devastation and doom and ruins in the city and its people, where buildings will be turned to rubble and the streets will be without inhabitants, without dwellers. And there, in Isaiah 6, he’s wondering and asking — How long, O Lord? With the simultaneous acknowledgement of the current void and of future promises anticipated and waited for — wondering if the right king will come to rule and make all things right.

I don’t know if you’ve ever seen a city in ruins. Our family used to live in Philadelphia, and there’s this area that we would always pass by when en route to entering center city. And it’s around where Rockywas filmed — the first one (and as Tim Keller would say in his sermons where referencing Rocky, it’s the good one). But there are these buildings that you pass by that have just been left in ruins. And I would see the abandoned buildings and the broken windows unfixed. And I would see the people who were equally devastated in their current condition. And there was no way anyone currently inhabitingand dwelling there could fix what was broken with the city. Help would need to come from the outside. And in Isaiah 6 is the prophet Isaiah looking at the ruins and the rubble and the city without inhabitantswondering not — How long, O Lord? Meaning he’s aware his people, if leaning on their own efforts, were completely helpless. And so, here is this prophet who’s waiting on a promise. And so, you see, when Jesus speaks these words, he’s calling for a perspective change. But he’s not dropping something new. But he’s cracking open an old story. And it’s as if he’s saying — I haven’t left that story. And in fact, the story only makes sense when we understand that he would not only pour into the devastation. But he would become part of the devastation. Because the Word who became flesh and dwelt among us (John 1:14), here was the one who entered the story. Because as we noted, the ruinsand rubbles and the devastation that left the city without inhabitants and without dwellers would never see repair and restoration unless help came from the outside. Where one came into the ruins, into the rubble, into the sadness of the story — for reparation and restoration. And in the Kingdom of God, that’s what we have. We have one who was hurled into our story in order to bring heavenly truths to our earthly realities. He came into the story, as the Word who became flesh and dwelt among us to a place where no one else would dare to come — into our ruins, into our rubble, into our devastation. Into this history of his people’s rebellion and wayward wandering. It’s there he would come to inhabit and become part of what was broken and needed repair. And in the messiness of our sinning and our livingand our mistrusting. It’s into this that Jesus dove into — for your reparation and for restoration. Where the author of life came into his story. Where the Word who became flesh was unbecome when on the cross for the sins of his people, in committing fully to our reparation and our restoration — becoming not just a part of the devastation but sin so that we might become his righteousness.

And here’s how we’ll begin closing our time. Because I wonder, for some of us in here, who are wondering if our brokenness is beyond repair. That you’ve tried everything in line with the patterns of this world. But you’ve always been left wondering — Is that it? Or, am I waiting for something else? Maybe you’ve tried everything and you’re exhausted, and the messiness is just too overwhelming — kind of like a toddler’s happenings in a living room unsupervised and for an extended period of time. And much like that parent who’s looking at the duplos and crayons and magnetiles spread all across the floor and mixed together, thinking — Not now. It’s too overwhelming to commit to at the moment. Maybe that’s where you are with your mess and your stench in your sinning. Maybe it’s something from your past, something hidden in your present, something ongoing that seems to extend past, present, and future. And for us with messes and ruins and soil, what we need is not to pull ourselves up by our boot straps. We’ve tried that before, and it doesn’t work. Our hopes lie in something different from what this world offers — through the one who came from heaven to earth, to be hurled into our mess — to bring life where death is expected. Because here’s the thing about sowing. And this is all theoretical knowledge, because I’ve never grown anything. And I think sowing and soils are the same now as they were in the first century. But from what I know, good soil doesn’t just happen. And I know I said this wasn’t about being a certain kind of soil. But hear me out. Because I’ve never heard of soil saying — I want to be a different kind of soil. The work and effort comes from outside. And thats the case with good soil. It needs tilling and fertilizing. And you never have good soil unless you’re willing to till through the dung and the rotting and the fermenting in order to fertilize the soil.

And it’s into these depths and fermenting that Jesus says the seed would bring about otherworldly growth. It’s completely unexpected, where growth would happen not in spite of but because of our admitting to what’s broken and flawed with us. But so is the secret of this parable — the one who joins heaven and earth. It’s completely unexpected. Because in Jesus, we have the Word who became flesh and dwelt among our ruins, as the seed who is the Word who was plunged into our rotting. It’s into that depth that Jesus dove into, where he was hurled into — in order to bring life where death was expected. Because the story of salvation is never clean — it’s messy. It involves our fermented history and our pungent sinning, and our confession and admitting to these things. Because salvation is never clean, it’s messy. And in Jesus, it’s bloody messy. And for that overwhelming clutter in your heart, wondering if things will ever be right. We look not to the strength we don’t have but need to conjure up. But rather, we look to the one who committed to entering our stories, into our mess, into our sinful history — in order to bring life where death was expected, as the one who brings heavenly truths to earth realities. Does life seem like a parable to you sometimes? Does it feel like a riddle, where the answer seems like another riddle? Maybe you’ve been asking questions, and it doesn’t seem like the answers are coming. Something about your marriage, something about your upbringing, something about your hurts and trauma, something about your habits and patterns, something about your circumstances, something about wanting to change but not being able to. Whatever it is, I want to invite you to bring forward those questions to the cross and empty tomb. Because all of life’s greatest and deepest mysteries find our most profound answer in Jesus. Who as the King of all kings was hurled into this world, to come next to, to be alongside his sinful, rebellious, and wayward disciples and us, in order to establish his kingdom. And so, may the Word of God continue to till our hearts, convicting us of our need, and showing us the commitment of our Savior who dove into deep brokenness to bring otherworldly restoration, reparation, and growth. Part 1 of 3. Come back to hear about this seed’s relation to the soils next week.