Today marks Sexagesima Sunday in the Church of Norway. We call the day ‘såmannssøndagen’ (Sower Sunday), as the text of Year 1 (of 3) in the Church of Norway lectionary is Luke 8:4-15 (the parable of the sower). We celebrate it a week early (on what is actually Septuagesima), as we also celebrate the Transfiguration on the Second Sunday before Lent).
This year, we are in Year 2, and the texts are as follows: Jeremiah 20:7-9; Romans 10:13-17; and Mark 4,26-34. In this sermon, held (in Norwegian) at Eid Church and Uskedal Church in Kvinnherad, Norway, I will use the New Revised Standard Version of Scripture (NRSV), unless otherwise noted.
Today, we have heard three passages from the Bible, all three of which emphasise how important the message of God to us is and how important it is that we preach it. In the first text we were taken approx. 2,600 years back in time, to the 6th century before Christ. There we meet Jeremiah, who had been called to be a prophet by God and who at that time had been a prophet for several years. He looks back on his work as a prophet, a task that had been extremely demanding, and he writes about how he had first tried to get away: “O Lord, you have enticed me, and I was enticed; you have overpowered me, and you have prevailed” (Jeremiah 20:7). At the beginning of the book of Jeremiah, the prophet first tried to say that he was too young, but God had a use for him. And God said, “Now I have put my words in your mouth” (Jeremiah 1:9).
For even though God could perhaps have done things differently, He has chosen to use ordinary people, yes, ordinary sinners, to preach His message. God calls, God equips, God sends out. St. Paul also tackles this in today‘’s second reading. He emphasises that someone must be entrusted with the task of bringing the message of God to people. How else would people come to believe and be saved? Starting with a quotation from Joel 3:5 (or 2:32), Paul writes that those who “calls on the name of the Lord shall be saved” (Romans 10:13). But then he asks, in vv. 14-15: “how are they to call on one in whom they have not believed? And how are they to believe in one of whom they have never heard? And how are they to hear without someone to proclaim him? And how are they to proclaim him unless they are sent?” All this is central. We who are given the task to preach the message here in the church have not authorised ourselves. We have been called by God and this call has been authenticated by the Church, who calls people to work in the great harvest. We plant, we water, and perhaps also we reap, if others do not, but it is God who gives the growth.
This mission was first given to the Apostles. The word ‘apostle’ is a loan word from Greek, where er have the verb apostéllō (which means to send out), as well as the nouns apostolē (which means apostolate or apostolic office) and apóstolos (which means envoy or emissary or, apostle). The main point is that they are sent out, not on behalf of themselves, but on behalf of God. We can then compare this to a sower. The sower has not created the seeds. They come from nature, from the creation of God, yes, ultimately from God Himself. And as a priest, I am should be like a sower who sows the word of God, without changing it.
I shall preach the gospel as I have received it, purely, and I shall administer the sacraments rightly, according to the institution of Christ. A sower is important, for how can anything grow if no one is there to sow (to slightly change St. Paul’s question from Romans 10)? But the sower is not important because he is exalted, but because he has been given a task. We should not exalt ourselves but we have a responsibility to hand on what we have received. We shall sow the word of God. We are not lords, we are servants. I have been called to preach the word, the word of God, the gospel. Not the word of the priest but the word of God. For God is the Lord. He has given meg the word to hand over. But it is He, not I, who gives growth. And we see this clearly in today’s Gospel.
What we bring when we preach may seem small, but even the smallest seed can become a big tree and the grain almost grows by itself, but only if it is sown. But when it is sown, when the word of God is preached, God creates life through the word. This was an important point for Martin Luther, the great reformer in our evangelical tradition. He emphasises that God does not use ‘magic’ to reach us. He uses completely ordinary things, in this case texts that convey the grace of God to us, read or heard. The word conveys that which it is about. When we read or hear the word of God, understand it and apply it, then we become partakers of it. When we hear the message that we are righteous in Christ, and take it to heart, we are justified completely free of charge without having to do anything. When we read about the works of God in history, as this is conveyed to us in the Bible, we can accept this in faith and apply it to our own lives. The words of Scripture conveys divine realities to us and we can receive them, in faith. When we read about King David asking for forgiveness and proclaiming the salvation of God, this also applies to us. For Christ comes to us and He does to through the message about Him. The story about Jesus is precisely the story about salvation. As Knut Alfsvåg, a Norwegian theologian puts it:
[It is] simply not true that the Bible is unclear in a way that invites openness and interpretative diversity; on the contrary, the point of the biblical revelation is unmistakably clear, and became at the same moment that the stone was rolled away from the tomb of Christ. In this way, it was revealed which message the biblical narrative conveys: It tells that Christ, the Son of God, has become man (and thus that God is triune), that Christ suffered for us, rose from the dead and will live in all eternity.1
This is the gospel, the good news. And we can receive it in faith and become one with Christ. And when we become one with Him, all this becomes ours. We share in eternal life because we are identified with Christ, incorporated into Him. Luther called this the ‘happy exchange.’ Jesus took on our properties – not just our human nature but also our weaknesses and our sins, without being sinful Himself – and He makes us partakers of His properties – the divine oneness, justice or righteousness, life, etc. We give our sins to Jesus, He gives us His righteousness, His love and His holiness in return. As St. Paul puts it, in 2 Corinthians 8:9: “For you know the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ, that though he was rich, yet for your sakes he became poor, so that by his poverty you might become rich.”
So when Paul tells us that faith comes from hearing the divine message, it is precisely because God uses completely ordinary language to reach us. Because words have power and words can create. If someone says “I love you” or “I hate you,” are these just words? By His word, God creates faith in us. In one way, this is obvisouly supernatural, as God is supernatural, beyond being, and everything is created by Him. But God uses precisely that whicg He has created to reach us. He meets us through channels we can understand; through the ear, the eyes, the sense of taste, etc.
When Luther talked about God creating life through his word, we thus see an echo from the words of Christ in today’s Gospel, about the sower: “[He] would sleep and rise night and day, and the seed would sprout and grow, he does not know how. The earth produces of itself, first the stalk, then the head, then the full grain in the head” (Mark 4:27-28). This works like this because God is the One who keeps the world going and gives all living things to work according to the laws of nature. And so it is also with the word of God: we preach the word and the word creates life where it falls on good soil. All this is connected; the word of God and the creation that He has given us. And the place where it is perhaps clearest is in the Eucharist. The grain and the grapes are transformed into bread and wine by the creative act of God and by the work of human hands. But through the word of God, the word of Christ, and on His promise, these are transformed and elevated into something bigger. There, in fruits of creation, Christ descends to us with His body and His blood, yes with all He is, to give Himself to us. By the word of God, these completely ordinary elements are transformed into a sacrament, a gift, which gives life and abundance, superabundance. We are made partakers of the divine fullness here and now, in concrete things. So receive the Eucharist today. It is not for those of us who are ‘very special.’ It is for all those who want to beliong to Christ, all who are baptised into Him.
And baptism is important here. When we were baptized, we received a faith like a small seed. And we got water which could water this seed. I was baptised myself a little over 40 years ago, in Dale Church in Vaksdal, Norway. I received a small seed, as God gave me faith in Christ. I received the seed and I was, literally, watered. When I baptise someone, I say: “NN, according to the words and commandments of our Lord Jesus Christ, I baptise you in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit.” God, then, uses me to give faith to the one who is baptised and to water him, regarless of age. But a plant also needs the sun and it needs nourishment. And so do we. We get it by reading or hearing the word of God, through prayer which is the work of the Spirit in us, and we get it by partaking of the Eucharist. There, we receive nourishment. There, completely ordinary things, bread and wine, are transformed so that we who receive it may also be transformed. For by the word of God that comes to us in the bread and wine, we can also be transformed, because God creates new life from nothing in us. As St. Paul puts it, in 1 Corinthians 10:16-17: “The cup of blessing that we bless, is it not a sharing in the blood of Christ? The bread that we break, is it not a sharing in the body of Christ? Because there is one bread, we who are many are one body, for we all partake of the one bread.” Through this sacrament we become one with God. We are all transformed and become in body, the body of Christ. And all this, because God has said so.
That is our message today. God gives us His creative word, through the word and the sacraments. Through concrete and sensible things, we receive the One who is not created but who transcends all things as their Creator. Through His creation, God gives us His word and this transforms us into His children. The word creates a seed of faith in us at the same time that it waters it and gives it nourishment. So be like Mary, the mother of God. Receive the word, keep in in your heard and ponder it, make it part of who you are.
Glory be to the Father and to the Son and to the Holy Spirit, who was, is, and will remain, one true God, world without end. Amen.
Knut Alfsvåg, “På Luthers vis: Om den sakssvarende bibellesnings forutsetninger og implikasjoner” (Theofilos Supplement 7:1, 2015), 33-44, here p. 36 (translated by yours truly): “[Det er] simpelthen ikke sant at Bibelen er uklar på en måte som inviterer til åpenhet og fortolkningsmangfold; tvert imot, poenget med den bibelske åpenbaring er umisforståelig klart, og ble det i samme øyeblikk som steinen ble rullet bort fra Kristi grav. Dermed ble det nemlig avdekket hvilket budskap det er den bibelske fortelling formidler: Den forteller at Kristus, Guds Sønn, er blitt menneske (og dermed at Gud er treenig), at Kristus led for oss, stod opp fra de døde og skal leve i all evighet.”