Sermon for Sexagesima by Caroline Stone

Delivered by Caroline Stone in the King’s Chapel, February 23, 2025

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“[O]n the good ground are they, which in an honest and good heart, having heard the word, keep it, and bring forth fruit with patience” (BCP, 135). “Unto you it is given to know the mysteries of the kingdom of God: but to others in parables; that seeing they might not see, and hearing they might not understand” (BCP, 135-136). O Lord, “[a]rise, and help us, / and deliver us for thy mercy’s sake” (BCP, 386).

May the words of my mouth…

In the gospel lesson today, Luke 8:4-15, Jesus addresses a crowd, speaking in the form of a parable. Jesus describes a sower going out to sow seed. While some of the seed falls on good ground and becomes fruitful, some is eaten by birds, or trampled by bypassers. Some sprout on rocks, where it thrives a short while before shriveling up and dying. Some spring up among the weeds, which choke it out as soon as it can grow (BCP, 135-136).

His disciples ask Jesus what the parable means – what spiritual realities are conveyed through the symbolism He employs. Jesus, in turn, explains that the seed is the word of God. The devil takes the word from believers, as the seeds fallen by the wayside, who then lose their faith. Those whose faith thrives a short while, but attenuates when hard times or temptations beset them are as the seeds that wither away on the rock. Among the weeds are those who languish in bondage to the flesh, or are too captivated by worldly things, to bring forth fruit. But the real life of this parable is illuminated by the example of those who patiently bear the hardships of this life, and persevere to bring forth fruit “an hundredfold.” These are the servants of God we are called to be (BCP, 135-136).

When His disciples ask what the parable means, Jesus explains that they get to intimately know the Kingdom of Heaven, “but to others [this knowledge is imparted] in parables; that seeing they might not see, and hearing they might not understand” (BCP, 136) In other words, those who listen to Jesus may deny the apparent truth of what they hear and apprehend. This also implies that all those present, who do not have intimate knowledge of the Kingdom of God, as the disciples have, are able to comprehend the same truths as Jesus’ disciples, by heeding the lessons Jesus imparts to them. Likewise, we who receive Jesus’ teaching through this parable, though separated by millenia, along with the whole church, are extended the privilege of attaining to the level of understanding bestowed upon his disciples. Jesus wants all of us to learn from him, to receive the grace of serving God, by understanding His word and doing His work.

In the pre-Lent season of Septuagesima, three Sundays marking the approximately seventieth, sixtieth and fiftieth days prior to Easter “prepare us to undertake the journey and the labour, the pilgrimage of Lent,” (Crouse, par. 1). Last week, on Septuagesima Sunday, and the adjoining Octave, we began to transition from the exuberance of Christmas, where we hailed the incarnation of our Lord, the sower descending to sow the seed of His Word, to the more somber and penitent tone of Lent (Chrysostom, par. 4). Throughout the Octave of Septuagesima, we asked God to hear our prayers, and to deliver us from our sins, as the Epistle urges us to fervently pursue the reward of salvation, to obtain the “incorruptible crown,” (BCP, 133). The Gospel for Septuagesima gave us the sobering reminder that the gift of salvation is extended to all who labour for its procurance–regardless of when we come to know the gospel, and not excluding those whose spiritual endeavors begin later, or in different ways than our own, who we must not resent (BCP, 133). Next week, for Quinquagesima, we will be urged by the Epistle to cultivate charity, which “beareth all things,” (BCP, 137). The gospel teaches that drawing nearer to Christ through faith can make us whole; His presence is strong enough to heal us, even through the tenuous bond of our frail human wills. Today, on Sexagesima, we are called to reflect on this foremost theme of Lent, in the Parable of the Sower, reflecting on Jesus' command to “bring forth fruit with patience,” and humble ourselves to strive to do so until the death and resurrection of our Saviour dispenses with our Lenten observances (BCP, 136). We are strengthened in this message to remain steadfast and to overcome those things which serve to hinder our fruitfulness.

Christ is the sower, who bestows unto all the good seed, whether slothful or diligent, rich or poor, wise or foolish; all are given the opportunity to accept the good seed of Christ’s love into their hearts (Chrysostom, par. 7). This mercy is extended to us to atone for our sins, for on the day that Adam and Eve ate the fruit, they inaugurated a fatal proclivity for sin, which has since plagued all mankind. We continue the carrying out of original sin, by perpetually thinking, speaking and acting in a manner congruous with this transgression; exercising agency over what isn’t ours, taking what isn't offered to us. In so doing, we profane God’s creation; we curse the ground God made to sustain the good seed he made a part of us, and doom us to the agony of separation from God. We can only overcome our enslavement to sin and death by accepting the great mercy extended to us in the Incarnation; and the coming resurrection of our Saviour, which acknowledges the brutality of death by vanquishing it (Schmemann, 100). To attain the reconciliation of humanity, the world, with our Creator, we begin with penitence and the Word. Only then can we become like God, as we are called to, a promise the serpent once fatefully tempted us away from God with. All who desire to receive, who take the time and expend the energy to cultivate “ears to hear” become workers of sanctity, who facilitate the restoration of the relationship between God and man.

This sin becomes the grounding purpose of Lent – a time dedicated to turning us back to God, to reconcile the discordance of ourselves, besought by the evil ways we so easily succumb to, with the righteousness that Christ, the sower, promises to us. We so often forfeit the “cup of salvation” through the frailty of our souls and misdirected will; this is the sin that turns us away from God and renders us incapable of accepting the salvation He has rendered for us (BCP, 482). How we are to turn from this constitutes a significant challenge for our life in Christ. Jesus was made man, in the words of John Chrysostom, not “to destroy the ground teeming with thorns [... or] to take vengeance upon the husbandmen,” who have been careless with the seed. Rather, God has been made incarnate “to till and tend it, and to sow the word of godliness[,] [f]or by seed here He means His doctrine, and by land, the souls of men, and by the sower, Himself” (Chrysostom, par. 4). As such, the sower sows, he has come not to weed out the thorns from among us, but to save us. Our self-inflicted alienation from God can, through the good seed of the Word, be healed. During this week, we will continue to ask God for help in this endeavor, acknowledging in the collect for Sexagesima that we “put not our trust in any thing we do” (BCP, 134). The absence of trust in our own selves, and our ability to accept the love of God and gift of reconciliation, is precisely what makes room for us to accept the mercy that God confers upon us. As such, in the Introit psalm for today, we beseech God to “Arise, and help us, / and deliver us for thy mercy’s sake” (BCP, 386). The season of Lent gives us an occasion to put God in the forefront of our lives, to allow Him to do this work in us (BCP, 134).

In his Sermon on both iterations of the Parable of the Sower, St. Augustine charges us with this most salient Lenten mission; “Be ye changed whilst ye may: turn up with the plough the hard ground, cast the stones out of the field, pluck up the thorns out of it. Be loth to retainthat hard heart, from which the word of God may quickly pass away and be lost” (St. Augustine, par. 3).

Let us then take this time, the Octave of Sexagesima, to begin to turn ourselves back to God, to prepare for our Lenten devotion, and to accept the condescending, merciful love of Christ.

Now unto God the Father…

Works Cited:

Augustine, of Hippo, Saint, “A Sermon of St Augustine on the Gospel Parallel On the words of the gospel, Matt. xiii. 19, etc., Where the Lord Jesus explaineth the parables ofthe sower. https://www.lectionarycentral.com/sexag/Augustine.html, Lectionary Central.

Chrysostom, John, Saint, “A Sermon of St John Chrysostom on the parallel Gospel (a portion of Homily XLIV in V ol X, NPNF (1st)).” https://www.lectionarycentral.com/sexag/ChrysostomGospel.html, LectionaryCentral.

Cranmer, Thomas and The General Synod of the Anglican Church, 1962, The Book of Common Prayer. 1962. Toronto, https://www.anglican.ca/wp-content/uploads/BCP .pdf, Toronto Anglican Book Center, 1997.

Crouse, Robert, “A Sermon for Sexagesima Sunday (and the Purification of Our Lady). https://www.lectionarycentral.com/sexag/Crouse1.html, St James’ Church, 7 Feb. 1988. Halifax. Lectionary Central.

Crouse, Robert, “The Logic of Pre-Lent and Lent.” https://www.lectionarycentral.com/septuag/lentlogic.html, Lectionary Central.

Curry, David, “The Sunday called Sexagesima.” https://www.lectionarycentral.com/sexag/Curry.html, Christchurch, 23 Feb. 2003. Windsor. Lectionary Central.

Schmemann, Alexander, For The Life of The World: Sacraments and Orthodoxy. 1998. Yonkers. Saint Vladimir Seminary Press.