Everybody tells me that the best things are "organic". Organic veggies. Organic eggs and chicken (an egg product). Organic milk.
They tell me those things are "better" for me. I really don't know about that. I just can't bring myself to pay the premium price. In my mind a tomato is a tomato. An egg is an egg. Milk is milk (except chocolate, but that's for another post).
But then there are other "organic" things. Certain chemicals are "organic". As a swimming pool professional I know that certain chlorine compounds are organic and others are inorganic. In that case it's a matter of the presence of carbon in the molecule.
In the computer and search engine marketing universe there are "organic" searches and "paid", or you could say "inorganic" searches. Organic searches are those that come up "naturally" via good and proper key-wording or meta-tagging and so forth.
Then there's God's Kingdom. God's Kingdom can and should be looked at as being "organic". Being under the control of the Trinity (God) in general and the Holy Spirit in particular, His Kingdom is growing and spreading "organically". "Earthly" kingdoms usually come about by force and bloodshed that are rushed into existence flourish for a time and then rot from the inside and eventually die. Just look over the history of the human race and you'll see exactly that in every single circumstance.
But God's Kingdom is vastly different. In fact it's so different that we sometimes find it frustrating. Let's look at the nation of Israel before Jesus. Because of their sin, God allowed them to be ruled over unjust kings, then various conquering nations. Some allowed them to live rather autonomously, others didn't. By the time the Romans came along, the Jews had had enough. They wanted the Romans overthrown and kicked out of the land. They expected Messiah to do just that and set up what they believed was God's Kingdom. As was just said, God doesn't work that way. His ways are far different from ours. We just don't and can't grasp that fact (Isaiah 55:8).
I think that main difference is one of perspective. God is looking way out into the future; and I mean way out. In fact, He already knows every single detail and goal. From our finite point of view, we can only see a couple of days out, at best! How many long term plans do you know of that have come to complete and exact fruition? That's right; none. Circumstances change. People change. Conditions change.
And God doesn't change. He's immutable. He has set His timetable and nothing will prevail against Him. In fact if any power even tries to, that's even part of God's Plan. That's astounding!
Download and print this week's lesson for thought and discussion. Download Modern Parables - 6.
Let's briefly look at how God's Kingdom has grown and spread "organically" over time.
First of all, I don't kow about you, but if I were God (that's a scary thought) I don't know if I could have waited all these thousands of years. Adam and Eve messed up really bad; just start fresh. Why not? Why go through all of this time, and all of these people? Virtually every single character listed throughout the pages of Scripture is a scoundrel. And even the "righteous" were sinners.
But that's how God works. He uses ordinary "organic" people (we are carbon based life forms) in supernatural ways and sometimes with supernatural circumstances to purposefully spread and grow His Kingdom to accomplish His Goals.
God used men like Noah, Abraham, Joseph and Moses. They struggled and persevered for decades, waiting patiently for how and what God was going to do in their lives. They knew, by faith, that the Lord has something much greater in mind.
Then there were the prophets like David, Isaiah, Jeremiah, Hosea and Daniel. God gave them a vision of what He was going to do through them as He purposefully grew His Kingdom. These men waited upon God. Sometimes, like the patriarchs before them, God asked them to do unpleasant or "counter-cultural" things.
He does the same today. We are not that much different from those saints of old. We're just a bit more "sophisticated".
I'm so glad Jesus readily referred to farming or gardening. It makes such good sense. The ideas and pictures painted in the parables instruct us well. Let's look at a few of these gardening or farming ideas and apply them to our lives and the Church.
First there's the soil. Last week, we looked at the soil in greater detail, so we'll just skim it. How do we compare and contrast our lives to soil? Is it hard and packed down so that in order to do anything new we have to struggle with great effort to break through that outer crust just to find some good soil that will sustain life or a relationship or new friends or other people who are unlike us? Is our soil so packed that new and potentially life changing opportunities can't settle in and germinate and then are stolen by the worries and intrusions of life?
Then there are the rocks of life. We all come across them. They often cause us to stumble and fall at worse or are just a plain nuisance at least. We start off "well" in a relationship or in ministry and then there's this rock. Sometimes we can move it out of the way. Sometimes it moves US out of the way. Either way, this rock can cause us to not be as fruitful as we want to be. Or as God desires us to be. Sometimes we may even pick up certain of those rocks and stick them in our pockets. Eventually we become laden down and we struggle. Maybe worst of all, we think that at least some of those rocks will be eventually useful in our lives. In reality, they are a burden and must be discarded. God wants to lighten our load.
Then there are the weeds in the soil. Now, by and large, I don't mind weeding my flower beds. I know that these floral pests are interfering with my flowers. I set aside a 2 or 3 hour block of time to weed a certain patch and then go for it. The thing about weeding is that you just can't pull some of them. You have to pull all of them in a particular patch or it looks awful. But they grow back. No matter how much preventative I put down, those stinking weeds come back.
Weeds are like sin in our lives. Often times while I'm weeding, God reminds me of the "weeds" in my life that are choking out my relationship with Him. As I pull out a handful of dandelions or crabgrass, I confess a particular area of my thought life or something that has invaded my eye-gate or a poor attitude toward someone or something. And like weeds, those thoughts and attitudes do come back. And they come back with a vengeance if I don't use the pesticide of God's Word on a daily basis.
When God has me in good soil, I seem to flourish. It's not fast, but my roots are made stronger. My roots can grow deeper searching out nutrients that grow and sustain me. For those of you with "deep roots" in Christ, you also know that one of the real benefits of a hardy and deep root system is that when life's storms come about, you can weather them. The storm may be financial or physical or emotional or relational. The storm in your church body may be similar in nature; the death of a significant leader or the moving away of an active member. Maybe there's significant growth of new believers. New growth that has been grafted in. There's discomfort with these new grafts. They're not at all like you.
But you're not the Farmer. You're not the Gardener. God is. He knows what is best for your body; whether it's the individual or the corporate church body. Either one, they're God's anyway.
I am not my own. I was bought with a very high price. It is the power of the Holy Spirit who sowed me. It is the Holy Spirit who causes me to germinate and grow. He waters me. He will also harvest me and use me to plant more crops to grow His Kingdom. His slow, purposefully growing, organic Kingdom.
Those are God's Goals. God's Goals are stationary. His Goals were formed at the foundation of the World. They have not changed. They may not all necessarily be my goals, but they are His. And God has given me a choice: participate with Him and sow and harvest or not. If we participate, we have hard work to do, but we revel in the Harvest. The crop will be abundant. He will do wonders that we can only imagine.
Do we believe and trust the prayer that Jesus taught us, His Kingdom come, His will be done? That's the Goal. That's the Harvest.
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Music video: Casting Crowns - "Lifesong"
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