Ed, my neighbour next door, likes to point out how I have missed the mark. According to Ed, I have come too late for the dance. The girls are all taken and I'll stand at the wall watching in vain. That was his long-winded way of telling me I was planting lawn seed way too late in the year, as it is already summer.
We have been storing our camper trailer in our yard. When we moved it recently, there was a large patch of bare ground. Yesterday, I raked the spot, wet it down and sprinkled some grass seed on it. Then I added a dusting of kitty litter. Then I watered it again. Ed came to the fence to tell me that it is too late to seed. Grass seed, he explained, needs the cool and wet of spring. He also saw me sprinkle the little covering of kitty litter on the scattered lawn seed, which he considered about as foolish as it gets.
I tried to explain that I just sprinkled it on lightly to help hide the seeds from the birds and wind and used it because it holds moisture. Ed, of course, said he would add this action to the list of crazy stuff I am always doing. I told him he really doesn't need to watch what I'm doing, but he claims it is his laugh for the day.
When we plant seeds, it is always a matter of "wait and see." Grass seed is light and cannot be buried deeply, so it is easy pickings for the birds and strong winds. It was fun planting my bare patch by scattering or broadcasting seeds on the ground as an ancient way of seeding.
Jesus spoke in one of his parables of planting by scattering. "A farmer went out to sow his seed. As he scattered the seed, some fell along the path; it was trampled on, and the birds of the air ate it up. Some fell on rock, and when it came up, the plants withered because they had no moisture. Others fell among thorns, which grew up with it and choked the plants. Still other seed fell on good soil. It came up and yielded a crop, a hundred times more than was sown."
Jesus was referring to God scattering His word upon each of us. Some of us are like a path ? the seed just sits on top of us. We hear the word, but it gets snatched away like seed being eaten by birds or blown away in the wind. Some of us are like thin soil on rock ? we hear the word and it springs up in us, but it then withers and dies because its roots lack power in our thin rocky soil. Some of us are like soil that becomes overrun with weeds or thorns. God's word grows, but gets choked out by life's weeds of worry, riches, and pleasures. The success is in the soil that receives the word of God, retains it and produces a crop.
What kind of soil are we when it comes to God's word landing on us as seed? All of us need to soil-test ourselves and ask God to improve our hard, rocky or weedy soil.
