Tuesday, October 1

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Matthew 13:3-9

“A farmer went out to sow his seed. As he was scattering the seed, some fell along the path, and the birds came and ate it up. Some fell on rocky places, where it did not have much soil. It sprang up quickly, because the soil was shallow. But when the sun came up., the plants were scorched, and they withered because they had no root. Other seed fell among thorns, which grew up and choked the plants. Still other seed fell on good soil, where it produced a crop – a hundred, sixty or thirty times what was sown. He who has ears, let him hear.”

Matthew 13:22

The one who receives the seed that fell among the thorns is the man who hears the word, but the worries of this life and the deceitfulness of wealth choke it, making it unfruitful.

A few weeks ago a friend gave us tickets to a Cubs game. So, against our better judgment (just kidding), we loaded up the family and headed to Wrigley Field.

We don’t often make the drive into Chicago, and, as most of us Chicago-landers know, it can be a pleasant or harrowing experience, depending on traffic. Our trip went smoothly until we hit a pocket of congestion right as we entered the city. Traffic was moving about 55 MPH but cars were almost bumper to bumper.

Just as we were merging into an onrushing stream of traffic, we noticed that a young woman in a car right next to us on the crowded freeway was holding her cell phone up against her steering wheel and was clearly sending and receiving texts as she drove.

Now, I have to admit here, for the sake of transparency, that I have occasionally succumbed to the temptation to sneak a peek at my phone for emails and texts - usually at traffic lights. But I think watching this woman with a death wish might have cured me forever from that particular vice!

A recent study claims that “distracted driving” is not only dangerous, but is up to six times more dangerous than driving while intoxicated.

In his disarmingly simple parable about a farmer and his field, Jesus points out that a distracted heart can be even more dangerous than distracted driving!

The one who receives the seed that fell among the thorns is the man who hears the word, but the worries of this life and the deceitfulness of wealth choke it, making it unfruitful.

Look at those last three words again: “making it unfruitful.”

It makes me think of an apple tree with no apples; or a stalk of corn that fails to produce ears of corn. There’s something sad and almost tragic about an unfruitful apple tree or a corn-less cornstalk.

Think of our own lives for a moment. Who wants to get to the end of earthly life and have this written on his or her tombstone: “An unfruitful life.”

Jesus is saying that the way to get to that destination is to live a distracted life. But what is that? 

It seems to me that a distracted life, like a distracted driver, is a life focused more on lesser, trivial things than on the greater, more important things. 

A father so focused on his career that he fails to notice that his wife has become more business partner than marriage partner.

A mother so focused on the academic or athletic success of her child that she forgets to teach her son or daughter how to pray.

A college student so focused on fitting in with the peer group party scene that she doesn’t even notice the weeds beginning to choke out the goodness and joy of her own life. 

The truth is that God has many competitors when it comes to the attention and direction of our hearts!

That day driving into Chicago I wanted to shout to that young woman, “Watch where you are going! Put down the phone and pay attention! Nothing on your phone is as important as the road in front of you!”

In other words, nothing is as unfruitful as driving your car into an accident because you were distracted by an LOL on your phone!

Jesus is saying that the word of God, the gospel of the Kingdom, is designed to bear fruit in our lives; fruit like joy and hope and goodness and salvation. But it can’t grow unless we pay attention to it; unless we cultivate the soil of our hearts with prayer and confession and obedience.

Is there any way in which you have allowed your heart to become distracted by trivial things?

Pastor Brian Coffey