Steve's Letter: "For All Frustrated Perfectionists!"

I read the Bible this morning and found something I can hardly wait to share with you, that is, if you're a frustrated perfectionist (all perfectionists are frustrated), care what people think about you, are driven by getting it right and stay awake at night worried that you did it wrong.

That's me, by the way.

You too. I'm just honest about it.

At any rate, I was reading Jesus' parable of the sower in Matthew 13. You will remember that Jesus talks about a sower who goes and sows his seeds. Some seeds fell along the path and birds snatched them up; some fell on rocky ground and didn't grow much before they died; and others fell among thorns and the thorns killed them. But some of the seeds fell on good soil and produced a good harvest.

After Jesus told that parable, the disciples said to him, "Huh?"

So Jesus had a family time and explained the parable to his disciples. He said that the seeds represented the word of the kingdom and how various people who hear it receive that word.

I've taught that parable a thousand times. Whenever I've taught it, I've focused on the seeds.

I repent.

That parable is as much about the sower (that would be you and me) as it is about the seeds (that would be them). In fact, it might be far more about the sower than the seeds.

I believe that Jesus looked at the disciples and realized they were a motley crew of the unqualified. He was going to ask them to do things that were not only impossible...but way above their pay level.

Peter, for instance, had a far higher view of his ability than the facts warranted. You'll remember he told Jesus that the other disciples would run when the going got rough, but then he said, "I'll be here." There was Thomas who had to get the details right before he believed. Don't forget about Nathanael ("in whom there was no deceit") who had no armor and would be devastated by his failure. And consider James and John ("Sons of Thunder"), sort of the Hell's Angels of the disciples, who would try and force success and then be really shocked and dangerous when their message was rejected. Andrew was a kind of "people person," working on networks (he was the one who introduced Peter to Jesus when Philip introduced Andrew to Jesus). He would be the one who would care deeply about what people thought.

So Jesus looked at them and said, "Let me tell you a story." He told them about an unsuccessful sower. As I count the seeds in the parable, only 25% of the seeds grew to harvest and the rest died.

You've probably heard me say that if you get 51% in a fallen world, you should file it under success. Let me tell you something else. If you're a farmer and you get only 25%, you probably should give up farming.

Now let me tell you what I learned when I started thinking about the sower.

First, I learned that if you can't deal with failure, don't play the game.

I'm reminded of the priest who, when he began his ministry at 20, prayed, "O Lord, grant that I may win the world to Christ." When he was 40, he prayed, "O Lord, grant that I may win my city to Christ." When he was 50, he prayed, "O Lord, grant that I may win my church to Christ."

When he was 60, he prayed, "Lord, don't let me lose too many!"

I tell my students that if they have biographies of "famous Christians" in their libraries and those books don't tell about the failure and the sin, they should burn the biographies. The ones that don't tell you the truth about the humanness of being human will make you go into vinyl repair.

I also learned from the parable of the sower that I don't own the farm or the seeds. I'm just a "hired hand."

Have you ever seen the picturesque stone walls in New England? The stones came from the fields that can't be farmed without first putting the stones somewhere else. So they made those stone walls.

When the New Yorker drove by a New England farmer digging up stones from his field, he stopped his car and said, "Mister, that's a hard job."

"Yeah, it is," the farmer replied, stopping and wiping his sweating brow, "but it isn't as bad as it seems. I don't own this farm."

Sometimes I get anxious about my family, my church, Key Life and other places where God has asked me to serve. Then I realize that I don't own anything.

"How much did he leave?" a visitor asked a friend at the funeral home.

"Everything!" the friend replied.

I also learned that what God does, he does quite well and what he doesn't do, doesn't matter.

I said that the farmer in the parable was a failure at farming. That isn't entirely true. Jesus said, "Other seeds fell on good soil and produced grain, some a hundredfold, some sixty, some thirty" (Matthew 13:8).

Years ago, I was the opening speaker for a large missions convention for high school students. Maybe I didn't make a fool of myself, but I could see it from where I was. I remember walking backstage after I spoke and moving as fast as I could to the cab that would take me back to the airport.

For years, every time I thought about that sermon, I blushed.

A couple of years ago, a young man came up to me after I spoke at an engagement and said, "You don't know me, but I was at a youth missions conference where you spoke. That was years ago."

I thought, Lord, don't do this to me. I'm a sensitive person and, if you really loved me, you wouldn't do this.

"Just thought you would like to know," the young man said, "I became a Christian that day as a result of what you said and am now serving as a pastor."

Is God great or what?

Oh, and I learned one other thing from the parable of the sower. I learned that one should never define oneself by the seeds, the soil or the harvest. If you define yourself that way, sometimes you'll feel that you're "pond scum" and at other times you'll think they ought to expand the Trinity to make room for you.

Both are inappropriate for a Christian.

The only appropriate way for a believer to define himself or herself is by the One who loved us enough to make us acceptable and to give us the seeds to sow. Wherever you are, just throw the seeds God gave you. It doesn't take a brain surgeon to do that and you don't have to be trained at a leadership seminar. All you have to do is to take the seeds God gives and, wherever you are, throw them on the soil.

And don't keep digging them up to see if they're growing. That's not your concern.

He asked me to remind you.

In His Grip,