Today's Gospel

Sow Generously

Welcome back to Radical and Relevant. Today's reading is from the Gospel of Mark, chapter 4 verses 1 through 20. Jesus began to teach beside the sea, and a very large crowd gathered so that he got into a boat and sat in the boat on the sea, and the whole crowd was beside the sea on the land, and he taught them many things in parables. And in his teaching, he said to them, "A sower went out to sow. And as he sowed, some seed fell along the path, and the birds came and devoured it. Other seed fell on rocky ground, where it had not much soil. And immediately it sprang up since it had no depth of soil. And when the sun rose, it was scorched. And since it had no root, it withered away. Other seed fell among the thorns, and the thorns grew up and choked it, and had yielded no grain. Another seed fell in the good soil and brought forth grain, growing up and increasing and yielding 30-fold and 60-fold and 100 fold." And he said, 'He who has ears, let him hear." And when he was alone, those who were about him with the twelve asked him concerning the parables. And he said to them, "To you has been given the secret of the kingdom of God.

But for those outside, everything is in parables so that they may indeed see, but not perceive, and may indeed hear, but not understand, lest they should turn again and be forgiven." And he said to them, "Do you not understand this parable? How then will you understand all the parables?" The sower sows the word. And these are the ones along the path, where the word is sown. When they hear, Satan immediately comes and takes away the word which is sown in them. And these in like manner are the ones sewn upon rocky ground, who when they hear the word, immediately receive it with joy, and they have no root in them to endure for a while.

Then, when tribulation or persecution arises on account of the word, immediately they fall away. And others are the ones sown among thorns. They are those who hear the word, but the cares of the world and the delight in riches and the desire for good things. Enter in and choke the Word and it proves unfruitful. But those that were sown upon the good soil are the ones who hear the word and accept it and bear fruit. 30 fold and 60 fold and 100 fold. So it's not a short reading today.

And remember, our approach is to look for a word or a phrase or an idea that catches our attention that God is using to feed us or direct us or coach us or encourage us or challenge us today. There are things in this reading that may be confusing. There are a lot of readings where we might read something and think, oh, what does that mean? That's a bit confusing. There are times in our lives when we should explore that. That's a form of studying the gospel. But our exercise here each day is to allow God to feed us and to encourage us and to direct us.

And if there's something you don't understand, I just encourage you to move over it and to trust that God is going to feed you in some other way in that reading today. What was it that jumped out at you? This is one of my favorite parables. This might be my favorite parable. This parable is like at the heart of what we do at Dynamic Catholic. What does the sewer do? The sewer goes out and he sews generously. For 20 years, people have been saying to me, well, not everyone who gets a book is going to read a book. Right. We know that. And that's okay.

The sewer goes out and he sews generously. That's his job. His job is to go out and sow generously. His job isn't to take the one seed and put the one seed in the good soil. And no, the sower goes out and sows generously. And that's our calling. That's our calling at dynamic Catholic. That's our calling as human beings. That's our calling as Christians is to go out and so generously. Some people are going to receive it and not receive it well. Some people are going to receive it. They're going to be excited about it. But then that excitement's going to go away when they get distracted. That's life. So his job is to go out and sew generously. And that's our job. Let's get out there in the world today. Have a great day. That's so generously. And remember, Be Bold, Be Catholic.