If you haven’t read or heard today’s Mass readings for this 15th Sunday of the year please read them first and then return here for my thoughts.
 

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Please know that, in view of the heat, I just read the shorter version of this Gospel. 

There are many ways to explore it. It surely proclaims the power of God’s Word to move hearts. Over the long stretch of time God’s Word has changed the hearts of millions. 

“My word shall not return to me void but shall do my will,” God said through the prophet Isaiah.

But I think the parable is also a commentary on love. The very reason God shares His Word with us is because of His great love for us.

Love! There are many definitions of love but when you get right down to it love always  wills the good of someone else. 

To illustrate that point, here are a few humorous descriptions of love I’ve heard over the years...from children.

Rebecca, aged 8, said, “When my grandmother got arthritis, she couldn’t bend over and paint her toenails anymore. So my grandfather does it for her all the time…even when his hands got arthritis too.  That’s love.”

Billy, 4 years old, said, “When someone loves you, the way they say your name is different. You just know your name is safe in their mouth.”

And one of my favorites is from Chris. He’s 7. “Love is when Mommy sees Daddy all smelly and sweaty and still says he’s handsomer than Robert Redford.”

Love always thinks about the other. And God’s love, Jesus tells us in this parable, gives and gives,  even when nothing is given back. 

Like seed, God’s love is flung widely. That ‘sowing’ of seed certainly hopes for growth, hopes for a response from us, but even when there’s no response from us it’s flung in our direction again and again.

So Jesus has us think about different kinds of soil as if to ask what kind of soil are we? He’s talking about our hearts, of course, different kinds of hearts!

In the parable, some seed can’t penetrate the footpath because people have walked on it for hundreds of years. Well, that’s kind of like when hearts are beaten down because people have walked on us. It’s very hard for the seed, the Word of God, or love, to penetrate hearts when they’ve been ‘walked on.’

Other land had large outcroppings of rock. How does the seed, or God’s love, penetrate hearts hardened perhaps by life’s difficulties?

In some places, prickly bushes prevent the seed from penetrating the earth. Those bushes are like the distractions in our lives that cause us to lose focus on what’s really important. Today, we live with more distractions than ever before.

And, of course, some soil is rich and fertile like hearts always open to hearing God’s Word and wanting to live by it.

In Israel, land was cheap because the soil was so poor. But seed was expensive. Even so, seed was flung generously, in every direction, just the way God loves.

Farmers flung seed on good soil and bad hoping that some of it would take root, knowing that some seed wouldn’t. They flung it almost, you’d say wastefully. 

The point? That’s the way God loves! He lavishly flings love upon us: on those who know and love Him and those who don’t know or love Him.

In another place Jesus said, “God makes the sun shine on the bad and the good alike.” God loves those who respond to His Word as well as those who don’t. And all the time He’s flinging that Word in every direction to invite everyone into His life.  

In still another place Jesus said that we’re kind to people who are kind to us. But God offers love to those who turn away from Him as well as those who respond.  Since “God is love,” God  only knows how to love us.

So, something to think about:  If God flings love widely, shouldn’t we as well? Even when we may not see results? Even when it appears that our love may fall on deaf ears?

And shouldn’t we do this repeatedly? 

This parable is a commentary on sharing the gift of faith with others, which is always a form of loving.

Many folks, some here today, have shared their faith with their children only to see some of them or even all of them drift away from the faith or become lax. Maybe they drift for a time and return later. 

Some return. Others don’t.  

But don’t give up!  Be patient! The seed sown years ago may just be taking root now - or maybe that’ll come in 5 years - or maybe many years from now.  It’s impossible to know. We do the best we can and we don’t give up.

Faith-sharing is sharing love. It must continue on! So, keep sowing! Keep planting God’s Word in others! And do it with hope!