The Special Seed

Text:   Colossians 1:6b  All over the world this gospel is bearing fruit and growing, just as it has been doing among you since the day you heard it and understood God's grace in all its truth….    9 For this reason, since the day we heard about you, we have not stopped praying for you… in order that you may live a life worthy of the Lord and may please him in every way: bearing fruit in every good work, growing in the knowledge of God,... INTRODUCTION:   My dear friends in Christ, a few years ago around this time of year a pastor had an idea for a sermon using a giant pumpkin.  He drove down to a farmer he knew, who sold  pumpkins.  He explained that he wanted a huge pumpkin that would be an illustration of how big God wants to grow faith in each of our hearts.  He wanted the biggest pumpkin available.  So the farmer took him around the side of the barn, where he saw the biggest pumpkins he’d ever seen.  He gave him one of those.  It took two muscular men to lift it into his SUV.  The pastor turned to the farmer and said, “I really appreciate the pumpkin but I also need a sermon.  Would you tell me how you grew such a big pumpkin as this?”  “Sure,” he said.  “First, you gotta get the special seed, the giant pumpkin seed.  It is a seed that comes from one of these giant pumpkins, not a seed from a miniature pumpkin.”  “Good,” the pastor said, “I’ll get these giant pumpkin seeds, plant them and a miracle happens. Up comes a giant pumpkin, right?” “No, no, no.  You have to have more than the special seed.”  The farmer chose his language carefully, “You have to lay a good foundation of fertilizer, and you can’t put the seed in the hot manure or you will burn it.  You have got to cultivate and fertilize all that soil in the thirty-foot circle around the pumpkin with really good nutrients, so that the pumpkin has plenty of power to draw from.  You put the seed on the foundation of the fertilizer.”   “Is that all?” The pastor asked.  “No, no, no. There is more.  After you have the special seed and lay it on the foundation of fertilizer, you then cover the whole thing with a mound of dirt.  You put light, airy dirt mounded over that seed, so it can breathe.”  “Oh, I got it.  The seed, the foundation, the airy dirt, and I have the miracle, right?”  “No, no, no.  There is more.”   “Rain and sunshine.  Rain and sunshine will help grow that plant.” The pastor said, “Is that all I have to do in order to grow a gigantic pumpkin?” And he said, “Yep. That’s all. That’s what you have to do to grow a giant pumpkin.” Growing that giant pumpkin is a picture of what God wants for each of us.  It is God’s desire for each of us to have faith the size of a giant pumpkin.  [Confirmation Students] ...that’s what God wants for each of you.
I.  Remember that farmer started with the special seed.  With us we need the Jesus seed.  You must have the Jesus seed.
	A. You need special seed to grow a great pumpkin.
			1. You can’t use beet seeds to get pumpkins.  You can’t get faith from anything or anywhere, but solely from God and His Word. Faith in something other than Jesus and what He did, has no saving power. 2. You see God has packed the special seed with the gift of salvation.  God’s word – the Gospel is this seed.  Jesus has lived, died and risen.  Salvation has been won.  Only this seed can give what Jesus has won.
		B. That seed has been planted in you in your baptism.
			1. You have been given what Jesus has done.  He has lived, died and risen for you.
						a. What He did is given to you—a very special gift.  You are washed clean.  He has made you His.   b. This all came to you when the Jesus seed was planted in you in your baptism.
			2. 1 Peter tells us: 2:2-3   “2 Like newborn babies, crave pure spiritual milk, so that by it you may grow up in your salvation,”  Peter tells us having faith in not the end. He gives you the seed, but He wants that seed to grow. Seeds are vulnerable.  They need to grow to be more resilient.
						a.  They need the right conditions to grow – just like the farmer’s great big pumpkins. b. God has placed you into families where this vulnerable faith was nurtured.  In those families the conditions were good for the seed to germinate in you.  You were probably exposed to God’s Word at home and in Sunday School  And that sprouting has taken place in you.  But like that pastor and the farmer we must say that that’s not all.
II. Then came Confirmation time.
		A. That was also a step to grow your faith.
			1.  Here we worked on the foundation of your faith.
					a. You learned the basic doctrines of the Bible.  You learned what the bible contained.  And maybe you could look at it like the fertilizer.
			2. Some would say it stinks to have to go through all this work, but you don’t get a vine without it.  Your faith won’t grow without the fertilizer.   The vine grew because it was fed.  Whether you realize or not your faith grew in confirmation
		B. But confirmation was never intended to be the end, it’s a beginning point.  In accordance to our pastor—farmer and pumpkin illustration, so far we’ve only gotten a vine, no pumpkins yet and that’s not where God wants anyone to stop. But, here is where many people stop.
			1. After confirmation, things change.
					a. You are not in class anymore. The demands of high school, and after that, college and career, attempt to pull you away from the worshiping congregation. We often unconsciously think:  “God, I don’t need your house anymore.”  b. So the things that were unifying us with Christ and His church become less and less a part of their life. I am not a child anymore, and I don’t especially want to be your child either.  So we rebel, not only against our parents, but against God too.
			2. One of the greatest disappointments of my life is to see so many young people let go of Christ.
					a. It is no big deal, so we think.  It is not something we hold tightly onto.  It is not something precious.  How foolish.  b. And so young people and parents drop out of a regular worshipping pattern after confirmation, not realizing how valuable that worship pattern has been.
III. And I’ll agree the life of faith is not easy.
		A.  It is work. It is work to get into the Word.  It is work to forgo other activities to read the word or go to church or be involved in youth activities.  It is hard to turn from popular activities that may not be the best things to be involved in.  It is work to stick with God and His ways.  But it is worth it.
			1. Let’s look at the bottom line for a minute.  God really did make us and God knows better about how we work best.  When we turn from him and his principles we are going to run into problems we don’t need to have.  The Scriptures are on one level God’s instructions on how we work best, on how to grow. the vine and have giant pumpkins.  When we go against our Maker’s instructions, we do have more difficulties in life. 2. On another level you only find forgiveness in Scripture.  That weight of sin that you may not even realize bogs you down as you go through life.  Only in Christ is it removed.  Only through Jesus is forgiveness given. 3. Another thing is that only in Him do we have comfort as we face the trials of life.  Only in him do we have comfort as we face death.
		B. And God provides what is needed to grow our faith (great pumpkin).
			1. God gives The Sun and the rain.  The prophet Isaiah tells us:  10 As the rain and the snow come down from heaven, and do not return to it without watering the earth and making it bud and flourish, so that it yields seed for the sower and bread for the eater,  11 so is my word that goes out from my mouth: It will not return to me empty, but will accomplish what I desire and achieve the purpose for which I sent it.”  So God’s Word is given to us to grow our faith
					a. Try this experiment when you get home today. Take a trash can lid and lay it on a healthy portion of your lawn. Leave it there for a week. Afterward, lift the lid and look under it. See the pale, sickly grass? See the bugs and worms nesting in the dark decay of the withered grass. That's what sin does to us! Now, finish the experiment. Take the lid away. The bugs flee. The grass begins to receive sunshine and moisture. Its health is revived, restored. It is literally forgiven, let loose from bondage and decay. Forgiveness is just like that. What we can't pay, God pays. God lets us loose from debts of sin and frees us to new life! b. And it is no secret where this forgiving word is seen most clearly.  His Word sits on the altar in His Supper. His Word comes in the baptismal font. His Word is spoken by the mouth of your pastor. Through your continuing in these things, God’s grace will be evident in your life and you will remain one with Him and with His church.
				2. Those great pumpkins had to have a huge root system of over thirty feet.  Likewise God want us to have deep roots in His Word:  Roots give strength. Roots allow faith to grow.
						a. When trials come deep roots find water where plants with shallow roots cannot.  Shallow rooted plants whither but the ones with deep roots stay green.  b. It is the same with us when we have deep roots in Scripture we have hope in any situation.  We are sustained when trials come.
IV. Now with pumpkins, once they start growing on the vine, they can only grow attached to the vine.
		A. Once you sever the pumpkin it is dead.  It starts to rot.  The same is true of us.  If we sever our connection with Jesus our faith begins to deteriorate.  Soon it will die.  Jesus even tells us:    4 Remain in me, and I will remain in you. No branch can bear fruit by itself; it must remain in the vine. Neither can you bear fruit unless you remain in me.”  B. Fruit like a giant pumpkin is very visible – so is a grown faith
				1. Faith is shown in confident serving Christians.  It is seen as we forgive and we have been forgiven.  It is seen as we reflect our God to the world.  .  2. Jesus even tells us: 5 "I am the vine; you are the branches. If a man remains in me and I in him, he will bear much fruit; …   16 -- fruit that will last.…..”
CONCLUSION:   This is pumpkin season so I guess it’s appropriate to use pumpkins as an illustration.  The confirmation students have been given a great gift—the seed of faith.  It has grown.  Now as you go from here please don’t forget that seed, that vine.  Please remain in His Word – Grow that faith you’ve been given.  I hope to see giant pumpkins of faith in the future.  Amen.