October 21, 2012
Preached by Pas. Carlos Barcelona
KEY TEXT: I Corinthians 15:36
“How foolish! What you sow does not come to life unless it dies.”
John 12:24
“Verily, verily, I say unto you, ‘Except a corn of wheat fall into the ground and die, it abideth alone: but if it die, it bringeth forth much fruit.’”
Introduction:
2 weeks ago when I was informed that I will be preaching for this day, I asked God what to share. It was also about that time that I heard an old song which I once I heard when I wasn’t a Christian yet. I tried to brush it off my mind until I started preparing this sermon and it came to my mind again. So I said, maybe God is telling me what to share. And last night while I was preparing the SCG, the lesson talks about Joseph and it double confirmed my message to you today. There are 2 scripture texts that we will read, so let’s open our Bible first to I Cor. 15: 36 and John 12: 24
This morning I want to entitle my sharing, “FALL TO THE GROUND AND DIE”.
I’m sure that many eyebrows were raised that day when Jesus made this statement. In essence he was saying in ‘order to live you need to die’. Dying to live?
We are living in a world that does everything it can to stay alive so this statement definitely confounds its concepts because actually this world is living to die. Only in death that we find life. True living only begins after we die. It is a paradox, a seemingly contradictory statement that nonetheless is true.
The Bible tells us that…
We see unseen things (2 Cor. 4:18);
We conquer by yielding (Rom. 6:16-18);
We find rest under a yoke (Mt. 11:28-30);
We reign by serving (Mark 10:42-44);
We are made great by becoming little (Luke 9:48);
We are exalted by being humble (Mt. 23:12);
We become wise by being fools for Christ’s sake (1 Cor. 1:20, 21);
We are made free by becoming His bond servants (Rom. 6:10);
We wax strong by being weak (2 Cor. 12:10);
We triumph by defeat (2 Cor. 12:7-9);
We find victory by glorying in our infirmities (2 Cor. 12:5);
and we live by dying (John 12:24,25; 2 Cor. 4:10,11).
These precepts seem to defy human logic but in them God has outlined a wonderful pattern and a wise design for believers who want to enjoy a successful, overcoming life.
Because spiritual growth is a mystery that is beyond rational analysis or human technique, metaphors are needed. Metaphors are figures of speech providing sacred hints that express reality in ways that appeal to the imagination.
The seed—is an agricultural metaphor. Growth includes germination, development, transitions, fruition and multiplication. For example, in his public teaching Jesus used the seed metaphor for the life of the kingdom sown into the soil of people’s hearts (Matthew 13:4 or parable of the sower) and for the sowing of the children of the kingdom into the world (Matthew 13:38 or the parable of the weeds).
No one plants a seed without expecting a crop (Hebrews 6:7) or a harvest (Galatians 6:9), the very thing God wants. The seed metaphor not only communicates the unfolding of the life contained within the seed but also suggests the pain and price of growth and growth involves transformation—the changing of forms.
The seed also includes our ambitions, desires and plans for our family, career or ministry. What does God want to tell us through the passages we have read?
1. SOWING SEEDS IS NOT ALL THERE IS TO REAPING A HARVEST. IF THERE IS GOING TO BE A HARVEST THE SEED HAS TO ROT, DECAY AND DIE.
Falling into the ground and dying is a method for living. It has nothing to do with the funereal business of dying and being put into the ground, and everything to do with approaching each episode of life in the best and most effective way. It is expressed through the symbolism of organic germination and growth.
In giving this formula for living, the Lord was talking to a group of people whom John called “Greeks.” These were descendants of Jews who had been resettled after Alexander the Great conquered Israel some generations before, and who now returned from Greece to observe the Passover in Jerusalem. As a group they were better educated than many of the audiences Jesus addressed. Although he spoke to them in simple terms, he dealt with a deep paradox that philosophically trained minds might comprehend.
“Unless a grain of wheat falls into the ground and dies, it remains just a grain of wheat. But if it dies it bears much fruit.” In context, the teaching concerns Jesus’ imminent crucifixion and resurrection. But in a more universal sense, it speaks of every treasure we have, including our greatest treasure: life itself. It includes the teaching in Matthew 25 about the talents given to the different stewards–and that is a teaching that applies to our life. If we hang back, protecting ourselves from the challenges of life, we remain no more than a seed, valuable for our potential, but otherwise useless. We have to risk failure and even destruction if we are to fulfill our potential and be of use to ourselves and to others.
Illustration:
It was a stormy night. The wind blew in all directions; the rain came down in torrents. An elderly man and his wife sloshed up to the desk of a small hotel in Philadelphia. Half in apology he asked: “Can you possibly give us a room? All the big hotels are filled.” “Every room is taken, sir,” replied the clerk, “But I can’t send a nice couple like you out in the rain at one o’clock in the morning. Tell you what: you can sleep in my room.” “But where will you sleep?” asked the guest. “Oh, I’ll make out,” replied the young clerk, “don’t worry about me.”
Next morning as the guest paid his bill he told the young man who had given up his room: “You are the kind of manager who should be the boss of the best hotel in the United States. Maybe some day I’ll build one for you.”
Two years later the young clerk received a letter with a round-trip ticket to New York and a note from the guest of that stormy night asking the clerk to meet him in the big city. The old man led the young man to the corner of 5th Avenue and 34th Street. Pointing to a towering new building, the old gentleman declared: ”There is the hotel I have built for you to manage.”
Almost speechless, the young man, George C. Boldt, stammered his thanks. His benefactor (that old man) was William Waldorf Astoria. The hotel was the most elaborate of that day, the original Waldorf Astoria.
A small act, but a big dividend. The young manager must have put himself out that night when he gave his room to this elderly couple. We say he “died to himself” in thinking of others. If he had only known, he was putting a seed into the ground; that seed would sprout some years later when he would be made manager of the fanciest hotel in New York.
It is only by service comes greatness. The people whom the world remembers with love are the people who serve others.
“The grain of wheat must fall into the ground first before it can bring forth much fruit”. This is a principle in the spiritual life: only dying to ourselves brings forth a harvest of fruit. We find that hard to believe, much harder to live. But it is what Jesus did in letting himself be crucified for us on the cross: for in his dying to himself, redemption was won for all mankind
2. WE MUST BE PREPARED TO GIVE OUR SEED AWAY IF WE REFUSE TO BURY THE SEED AND HOLD IT BACK, WE SHALL NEVER REAP A HARVEST.
Some seeds serve a dual purpose: they serve as food, as well as filling their essential function as seeds. But all seeds share an inherent power to become something far greater than what they are. If we fall into the ground and die, as a seed does when it is planted, we can become radically greater–and of greater use–than we are now.
The grain of wheat was ineffective and unfruitful so long as it was kept in safety and security. It was when it was thrown into the cold ground and buried there as if in a tomb that it bore fruit. It is only by spending life do we retain it. The man who loves his life is moved by 2 aims: by selfishness and by the desire for security. Not only once or twice but many times insisted that the man who hoarded his life must in the end lose it, and the man who spent his life must in the end gain it.
There was a famous evangelist called Christmas Evans who was always on the move preaching for Christ. His friends besought him to take things easier but his answer always was: “It is better to burn out than to rust out.”
When Joan of Arc knew that her enemies were strong and her time was short, she prayed to God: “I shall only last a year, use me as you can.”
A while ago I was telling you about an old song that I tried to brush off but it kept on coming back, it was actually the prayer of St. Francis of Assisi, and it says….
Lord, make me an instrument of thy Peace.
Where there is hatred, let me sow Love.
Where there is injury, thy Pardon, Lord.
Where there is doubt, let there be Faith.
Oh Lord, make me an instrument of thy Peace.
Where there is despair, let me bring Hope.
Where there is darkness, let there be Light.
Where there is sadness, let there be Joy.
O Divine Master, grant that I may not so much seek:
To be consoled, as to console,
To be understood, as to understand,
To be loved, as to love.
Lord, make me an instrument of thy Peace.
Where there is hatred, let me sow Love.
For it is in giving that we receive,
It is in pardoning that we are pardoned.
And it’s in dying that we are born
To eternal life, to eternal life.
Lord, make me an instrument of thy Peace.
An instrument of thy Peace. Amen
The world owes everything to people who recklessly spent their strength and gave themselves to God and to others. It is no doubt that we will exist longer if we take things easily. It is no doubt that we will exist longer if we avoid all strain. It is no doubt that we will exist —but we will never live.
3. THE ONLY WAY TO PROSPER IS TO MORTIFY YOUR DEEDS.
IF THE SEED REFUSES TO DIE, THE QUICKENING POWER REFUSES TO ACT. THE QUICKENER CAN ONLY WORK THIS NEWNESS OF LIFE WHERE THERE IS DEATH.
Falling into the ground and dying is the necessary precondition of this growth and greater usefulness. But it is a risky, frightening, even painful thing to do. We tend to resist it. When we meet the challenges of life, our natural inclination is to work, to fight, to do what we have to do to overcome them. But our greatest power to accomplish things is a power we find only when we surrender; only when we let ourselves fall into the ground and die. That is, we succeed best when instead of trying, we surrender. The greatness of a man’s power is the measure of his surrender according to William Booth.
Story:
Amy Biehl was stoned to death in Africa where she had gone to work for the poor. The follow-up on her death has to do with how her parents reacted. They went to Africa to meet with the young men who had killed their daughter. The Biehls met the parents and friends of these young men and they saw the` miserable conditions in which they lived.
The Biehls went to the trial and did not object when the four young men who killed their daughter received a relatively light sentence. In fact, the Biehls, who are rather well-to-do, set up a bakery in the neighborhood where the young men lived. The young men and the Biehls have become grown so close that the Biehls have invited them to their home in the States. They considered them their sons; and the four young men in return called the Biehls their mother and father.
We can’t imagine such self-sacrifice, such dying to oneself, as the parents of young Amy Biehl, show in their forgiving attitude. And yet they are simply living what Jesus said in today’s gospel: Unless the grain of wheat, fall into the ground, die, it remains alone ; but if it dies, it brings forth much fruit” (Jn. 12:20).
Falling into the ground and dying is so much like the clay in the Potter’s hand. There is a poem that tells us about being cast down, molded and trodden under foot and yet through it all it becomes precious and beautiful.
To the Potter’s house I went down one day
I watched him while molding the vessels of clay
And many a wonderful lesson I drew
As I noted the process the clay went through
Trampled and broken, downtrodden and rolled
To render more plastic and fit for the mould
How like the clay that is human, I thought
When in heavenly hands to perfection brought
For self must be cast as the dust at his feet
Before it is ready for service made meet
And pride must be broken and self-will lost
All laid on the altar, whatever the cost.
But lo! By and by, a delicate vase
Of wonderful beauty and exquisite grace
Was it once the vile clay? Ah, yes; yet how strange
The potter has wrought so marvelous a change
Not a trace of the earth, nor mark of the clay
The fires of the furnace have burned them away
Wondrous skill of the Potter- the praise is His due
In His hands to perfection and beauty it grew
Thus with souls lying still, content in God’s hand
That do not His power of working withstand
They are molded and fitted, a treasure to hold
Vile clay now transformed into purest of gold.
The Bible tells us about the life of Joseph, like a seed he had to fall to the ground and die to his plans, desires and dreams. He died to himself in slavery and in prison in Egypt before he experienced growth and fruitfulness. In order to be a leader he had to be a prisoner. In order to rise he had to fall and die.
I had an experience of falling and dying. It happened many years ago when I felt I was crushed, stripped and left with nothing. I remembered then what a pastor prophesied over me 3 years before it happened that I will be facing a big mountain but I have to press on. I accepted that trial as chastening and I allowed God to whip me and turn me into nothing. It was from that point that I had to fall into the ground and die. Die to my pride and desire and believe one day God in His proper time and according to His will, will make me fruitful.
CONCLUSION:
Sowing seeds is not all there is to reaping a harvest. If there is going to be a harvest the seed has to rot, decay and die. If we refuse to bury the seed and hold it back, we shall never reap a harvest. The only way to prosper is to mortify your seeds. If the seed refuses to die, the quickening power will not act because it can only work where there is death.
It was by the death of the martyrs that the church grew. It is always because men have been prepared to die that the great things have lived. But it becomes even more personal than that for it is sometimes only when a man buries his personal aims and ambitions that he begins to be of real use to God.
By death comes life. By the loyalty which was true to death there have been preserved and born the most precious things humanity possesses. By the death of personal desire and personal ambition a man becomes a servant of God.
