Let The Dirt Do It's Work

Hey, this is Stephen Ferdick.

I'm the pastor of Elevation Church, and this is our podcast and I wanted to thank you for joining us today.

Hope this inspires you. Hope it builds your faith.

Hope it gives your perspective to see God is moving in your life.

Enjoy the message, Mark four twenty six.

He also said, this is what the Kingdom of God is like a man scattered seed on the ground night and day, whether he sleeps or gets up, the seed sprouts and grows, though he does not know how.

All by itself.

The soil produces grain, first the stalk, then the head, then the full kernel in the head. God knows the order in which things need to happen in our lives, and trusting him is in one sense, just allowing him to do not only what he wants to do, but when he wants to do it. Touch somebody say there's an order to this. That's what we preached about last week from Mark three, and we said that when you get things out of.

Order, they stop working.

So that's why spending your money before you tithe is a bad idea, because it's out of.

Order too early, too soon.

That's why sex before marriage is a dangerous proposition. Too much, too soon. Now he doesn't value you. Instead, he objectifies you. And there's an order to things. There's an order to things.

Enter his gates with thanksgiving, and his courts with praise.

My time with God goes a lot better if I start with thank you for what you've already done. I got some things I need, I've got some unresolved issues that I.

Want to bring before you.

But first of all, God, I just want to thank you because somebody's lying on a ventilator this morning, and I have breath in my body, and you said, let everything that has breadth.

Praise the Lord, and I got breath to praise you with.

So God, right now, in spite of how I feel on what I'm going through, I just want to give you about sixteen seconds of praise. There's an order, there's an order, and then comes the result as soon verse twenty nine. As the grain is ripe, he puts the sickle to it, and some of us put the sickle to stuff too soon before it has the chance to take root. And we spend money to impress people, and because we don't know when to use what God has given us, we end up ruining the very provision anyway.

That's true.

I'm just reading scriptures, has nothing to do with my sermon. But I'll be honest with you. When I walked around the corner, Valentine was singing like they love Jesus, and I just got excited and the Holy Spirit just kicked me into gear. So as soon as the grain is right, he puts the sickle to it because the harvest has come. But the real focus of this message is going to be verse twenty seven B and twenty eight A. It says the seed sprouts and grows night and day, whether

He does not know how.

And then it says, all by itself, the soil produces grain. And so to me, that made me think about grace, and that made me think about God's sovereignty, and that made me wonder, if I'm staying up stressing about stuff, if I would get out of my own way and let God deal with it the way that he knows how to deal with things, I would be so much better off, you know. So what I came to tell you today. This is my sermon. Title is let the dirt do its work. You may be seated. Let's work

That time I was.

Taken by the temporal implications of this text and the timing of God. I believe the title I gave that little message was called the Seed is on schedule, and I was using it to illustrate how things in our life in some ways show up. Like the wise teacher said that when the student is ready, the teacher will appear. That's what I was trying to say two years ago. And in the last two years, either this text has gotten better.

I'm being sarcastic.

The text didn't change, but God has opened my eyes to see it in a little different way. And since we been going through Mark's Gospel very slowly at a leisurely stroll, to talk about savage Jesus, and all I keep hearing from people as I see you out and about is don't stop preaching savage Jesus. This series, just

By the way, that's always the case. Everything that makes impact creates opposition.

You know that, right if the devil touch somebody say, if the devil is in messing with you, he doesn't consider you a threat. So we've seen now five different examples of controversy in the ministry of Jesus, which makes me want to go back and have a conversation again. One pastor, I said, what's your goal in ministry?

He said, my goal is that on the Wikipedia page.

And he didn't have a Wikipedia page, but he said, if I have a Wikipedia page, this is already weird hypothetical Wikipedia page.

Is your goal for ministry?

He said, I hope there's no controversy section. He said that was his main goal in ministry. By that standard, Jesus Christ was the ultimate ministry failure.

Why are you looking shocked? What do you think the cross was? You think it was jewelry.

You think, you think, you think the cross was a celebratory moment. The Roman Empire used that tool to torture people who represented a threat. And everywhere Jesus went people were threatened. The Pharisees, the teachers of the law, they were threatened by Jesus. He was upsetting their entire system. Were you here last week? Their entire system was being overturned by.

The things he was speaking and the things he was doing.

Not only that, but the demons were threatened by Jesus every time he got in the presence of an impure spirit and started shrieking and convulsing and begging and falling.

Down at his feet.

Is a funny thing, because the demons knew better who Jesus was than the teachers of the law did. Isn't that crazy? The demons saw Jesus and they fell down at his feet. The teachers of the law saw Jesus and they crossed their arms to judge him. Sometimes we should be more like the demons than we should be like the religious people. At least the demons knew this guy's in charge. At least the demons knew he has

This is the son of God.

I wonder do we really worship him today? I wonder do we really regard him as the supreme authority in our lives?

Or is he just an accessory. This is what we've been studying, and.

It all fits within the context all of the controversy and all of the compassion of Jesus. They were both growing together. Both grow together, the wheat and the terrorist. That's when parable Jesus used, it's not our parable today, but he was talking about the wheat grows and right beside it all the weeds grow that want to choke out the wheat. And what we tend to want to do that is reflected in that parable in Matthew thirteen is to separate the weeds from the wheat. But Jesus said,

And now Jesus is teaching us about.

The nature of the Kingdom of God and our faith. Maybe you've heard the parable of the different types of soil that he starts with in Mark chapter four. He's getting into this idea that there is always seed going forth. God is always speaking to you. Stop asking God to speak to you and start listening. It's the weirdest thing we pray.

God, speak to me, Speak to me, Speak to me, Speak to me, Speak to me. If you'd shut up, you'd hear that.

I already am. So the seed's always going forth. But while my Bible calls it the parable of the sower, it's really the parable of the soils. It's really about our hearts. The soil is our soul, our mind, our will, and our emotions. And in this passage he shares with us how there are some seeds that fall on the path, and the birds come and snatch them up. How many of you have some seed snatchers in your life? Joy Joy thieves, people who want to ruin your day.

And it's not nine thirty yet, and here they come.

How many you have some seed snatching apps on your phone? You know that one with the bird. What's it called twitter? Jesus said? Jesus said, the birds of the air will snatch the seed and grab your attention, so that you don't act on what you heard, but you forget what you heard. Because a lot of us have a stash of seed.

That we've never put in the ground.

We've gotten to be professional seed collectors who know how to highlight our Bibles and fill notebooks with information. But without application, without soili, the seed only represents unused potential.

And to me, that's a sad thing.

Woldn't be sad for God to show you in heaven how much seed you sat on while you were here on earth. Do not merely listen to the word. Instead, do what it says. You are not blessed by the word you hear, but the word that you do a lot of times. If you think we need to know more, I found out that I already know enough. Let me give a few examples. I know not to talk bad about people. If I would just do that, I think I'd be working seventy hours a week.

Just that that alone.

I know that I'm supposed to consider others as more important than myself.

I know that, and you know that.

Touch somebody say you know this, and if you know how to say man after it, you could say man after But if you.

Don't know how, don't try to be embarrassing. You know this. You know this.

In fact, look back at him one more time. I need your help, because everybody looks a little bit resistant to this point. We always want to know more. You know, I want to grow spiritually. Look back at him and say, if you would do what you knew, you would grow spiritual growth. It's always been a tricky concept to me because I thought spiritual growth required more knowledge. And I don't have many regrets in life, but I do have

Had my kids.

It's just something I think about often. How some my parenting book would have been if I had written it before parenting, because the time that I knew the most about parenting.

You know what, I wish the same thing.

Here's another recred I wish I would have written a book about being a pastor before I started this church. It would have been so profound. It would have had diagrams and informational concepts.

It would have been it would have been seven hundred and.

Seventy three pages of how to be a pastor? And then you showed up and screwed up all my theories about how to be a pastor. People messed up my ideas about how to be a pastor.

What's up with that? Now? It would just be a pamphlet. It wouldn't even it would just be illustrated.

It would only have the whole book would be prayer, you know, the emoji with the prayer hands. That would be the whole How to be a parent, how to be a pastor?

But I knew so much.

You notice, those are the people who give the most advice, those with the least experience. When I went down, I tell you what I would do if it were me. And I know, I mean, I'm not judging. I'm just saying, now, okay, so three things.

It's right here in the text. I know you think that I'm confuser loss. It's as that the farmer, this is crazy.

The farmer who puts the seed in the ground, not the seed on the shelf, but the seed in the soil.

He let's look at the verse on the screen again, he.

Experiences the maturation of that seed, though he does not know how.

What kind of farmer is this?

If you don't know how the seed grows, you could at least google it.

There you would.

Find that the seed needs what light or the correct temperatures and water. Yeah, and then it needs to be planted in the right place. I can tell you exactly how the seed grows. That's exactly how it grows. I can explain that to you. And so if the scripture says this parable, which is always used to get us beneath the surface to the deeper meaning, if the parable is included in Jesus' illustration of what the Kingdom of God is like, he said, this is what the Kingdom

Yet he does not talk about the.

Kingdom of God being like Wakanda. He does not talk about the Kingdom of God being like a spaceship.

He does not talk about the Kingdom of.

God being like a rocket. Instead, he says, and this must have been anti climactic for those who gathered to hear his message on this day, the Kingdom is like a seed.

And on this alone, we understand that often what.

God does in our life will feel insignificant, and then it will go into the soil where it will be invisible. And that a lot of times when God is working in our lives in the greatest ways. We won't even know how He's working. We will be ignorant. That's three eyes. It makes an outline. Write it down.

Three things about the Kingdom of God.

It often sees, means insignificant, It often appears invisible.

And often you feel ignorant. So the greatest proof that you are growing in your relationship with.

God is sometimes the fact that you don't feel like you.

Are growing in your relationship with God.

I'm sorry for everyone who always needs a goose bump to feel.

Like God is with you.

But sometimes the greatest growth in your life is not going to be on the surface of your emotions, your feelings, or your senses. Sometimes the deeper work that God will do is much greater than the highest work.

That God will do.

For what is the building without the foundation? Jesus said, the Kingdom is like this is.

Something so small, seemingly.

So insignificant, and it goes through stages that are so invisible, and a lot of the times you will feel so ignorant. Like the farmer who puts the seed in the ground and doesn't know when he'll see it again. Sure he can water it, Sure he can plow the ground. Surely we have a part to play in our relationship with God.

How.

You're telling me what, but you're not telling me how. I don't know how. I don't know how to read my Bible.

I don't know how to pray for over.

Thirteen seconds without thinking about my need for cereal at the grocery store. I don't somebody try.

It, say, I don't know how.

That's the most spiritual thing you've said all week. Who did God pick to be the disciples of Jesus? Religious professionals with academic no how he picked the people? Who did God pick to carry his son? What's the first thing Mary said? When the Angel said the one born of you is the Holy One of God?

What exactly how?

What's the first thing that the disciple said when Jesus said, feed these big crowds, even though you didn't pack of lunch. What's the first thing they said that is the starting place of spiritual growth?

To admit? I sorry I'm screaming, but.

Sometimes it screams inside of me when God calls.

Me to do something. But I don't know how. I don't I don't know how. I don't know how to raise these kids.

I don't know how I did before I had them, but.

Now they're here, and I don't know how. I read the book, the baby book. It told me that if you.

Swaddle the child, but I found out my firstborn child was unswaddleable.

I don't know how.

I hear you preaching these great sermons.

Keep your eyes on Jesus, and don't look at the wind, and don't look at the waves. But how do I look at something that's invisible.

I hear what you're saying, and I want what you God, But I don't know how.

How many don't know how?

Just to see how I'm preaching to and who I can leave alone?

I don't know how.

I don't know how to forgive somebody, but then make sure that I keep an appropriate distance so that they don't continue to violate me.

I don't know how.

I don't know. And here's a farmer doesn't know how to make a seed grow, and Jesus says, is like that. Growth is like that. There's a part that you will play, and you will know what to do.

You sow, you water, you plow, but you don't have to know how.

This is the dirty little secret of the Kingdom that they don't want me to tell you.

They want you to.

Think that God chooses and uses and blesses people who are experts and who are the epitome of perfection. But I want to tell you who God's looking for. Fishermen like Peter, prostitutes like Rahab, people who don't know how. That's what God is looking for, humble people. Blessed are those who hunger and thirst for righteousness, not those who are so full of their own wisdom that they cannot receive the wisdom of God.

So if you.

Came here today with a I don't know how hard God can feel what you will empty before him. I don't have to know how. I don't have to know how it works. If I did, I'd still be at the house because I drove my Maxima here and I have no idea how that that button told my tires to spend. I have a little bit of a concept, but not much. I found out something about my car that I found.

Out about God.

I found out I don't have to understand it. See it got me from here to there, and from there to here and here. I am preaching, but honestly, I don't know how. I have an iPad. I put my notes on my iPad. I turn on my iPad, the notes appear on my iPad.

I preach to you. I understand what button to push.

I push it. I know what letters to type. I typed them. But as to how the words appeared on the iPad, I don't know how. It didn't stop me from preaching, it didn't stop it from working.

There may be somebody.

Here today who is in a situation where you.

Don't know how. God.

I'm not smart enough. God, I wasn't trained for this. God, I've never been this way before. God, this is new to me. God, I feel like a rookie. God I've never God said from heaven, you don't have to know how when you.

Know who, an't twitting? Come on five.

Five seconds, four seconds, yes, three seconds, two seconds. Now, let's prace him like we know who he is. He's the lord of the harvest. To see this mind what the.

Harvest this is? And I don't have to know. I just gotta sew.

Don't let what you don't know keep you from sewing.

The farmer didn't know how it was gonna happen, but he knew what to do.

I gotta keep sewing.

I gotta keep praying, I gotta keep believing.

I gotta stay in this house. I gotta be present. I gotta show up. All I gotta do is sow.

Find twelve disciples and tell him you don't have to know how.

You don't have to know how. You don't have to know how.

I will make you fishures of men. All I need is your boked. All I need is your will, All I need is your want to. All I need is your surrender. All I need is your obedience. But you stop sewing because you didn't know how. You don't have to know how. Let's get it in our spirits, say I don't have to know how. I could be like Abraham who set out from Erth without knowing where he was going. He didn't have to know how because he knows. He knows.

Are you getting a lesson?

It's not just one text, it's the principle of this parable that is illustrated.

The Kingdom of God is like a man who sowed, he did so.

Notice there there there is a part that you play. But once you do what you know, there is a poet that you reach where you can't make it rain, and you can't control the rate of growth of the sea. And there are so many people who will hear this message online and in our campuses, who are waiting to know before you.

Sow, and it's out of order.

As much as I want to preach theologically right now, I just want to minister to you personally.

Let the dirt do its work.

Because the greatest growth happened not when the farmer was doing his part, but when the dirt was doing its part. There's a cooperation that happens in each of our lives. That's between the things we can control. I can plow, I can water, and.

I can sew.

I can speak words of encouragement, I can speak words of life. I can invest my resources into the Kingdom of God. I can do all of that, but the part that produces the fruit is not attributed to the farmer and the passage. And I think we fall into an extreme where we either think it's all about what we know or it's all about what God does. In

Check it out.

It spells dirt, the disappointment, the insecurity, the rejection, and the trouble.

Now, this will be an excellent lesson.

On its own because it illustrates the principles that will apply to any area of our life. And right here we could tell you to make lemonade out of limits. And right here we could tell you it doesn't matter how many times you fall down, you know, get knocked down nine, get up ten. We could say anything we want right here, and the principle would be powerful.

But this is not a principle this is a parable, and.

A parable is a picture that appears simple on the surface but carries a deeper meaning. When I read the passage two years ago, I thought that the far was Jesus and the seed was the word of God.

The problem with this interpretation of.

The parable, upon further reflection and study, is that Jesus can't be the farmer because the farmer doesn't know how Jesus is the wisdom of God. So to compare Jesus to the farmer who scatters the seed is to is to miss the parable that is beneath the principle. The principle is this, don't let what you don't know stop you from sewing. But the parable, the parable, the picture that Jesus is painting is of something that hasn't happened yet.

Everyone around him, in his.

Inner circle, which he has just selected in Mark chapter three, everyone around him is trying their best to keep him from going to the cross. For him to go to the cross means the death of the movement that he came to initiate.

In their eyes. And so when he stood.

Before the judges, both the Jewish Sanhedrin and the Roman government prelates, he was silent as a sheep before the sears. Everything in those disciples wanted to see Jesus come down from the cross to avoid being buried in the grave. But Jesus stood before Pilot and he allowed those accusations to be heaped on him although he was innocent, because.

He knew that the dirt had a purpose to fulfill.

And so as he stood before those who accused him condemned him and sentenced him to die.

He could have stopped it, and he could.

Have called for legions of angels to come and rescue him from the rejection.

But this is what he came for.

So he said, with his silence something that is illustrated in the parable. He said, let the dirt do its work, because if they accuse me, then my father in Heaven doesn't have.

To accuse you.

So I'm going to take your accusations and your shame. I, the innocent, am going to absorb your punishment so that you, the guilty, can go free.

So when they heaped.

Their accusations on him, he took it. When he died on the cross and they took him down and buried him in the grave, he did not resist the burial. Instead, he stayed dead three days to let the dirt do its work. Now, we thought we were attending a funeral, but really what it was was an agricultural lesson. Jesus was not buried on Friday, he was planted. Now, because he was planted on Friday, there is the expectation of harvest. He is the first born among many brethren. So when

Up the sea because you don't like the season. Let the dirt do its work.

This is the Gospel of Jesus Christ.

This is what the Kingdom of God is life. There's nothing man can do to you that God cannot use for his good. And I believe that. I believe that all.

Things work together for the good of him that love the Lord and are called according to his purpose.

But I I don't always know how.

But I don't have to know how, because I know who.

The emphasis on Romans eight twenty eight isn't on things. All things work together for the good. The emphasis is not on good because it might not feel good, and I might not know how it's good while I'm in it. The emphasis of Romans eight twenty eight is that I'm called that I love God, and I'm called according to his purpose. So his purpose is the promise that lets me know that it seems insignificant, that to me it's invisible, and I don't know how, but I know.

Everybody who wants to praise God for it.

And I'm gonna give you thirty seconds to do what you need to do. Maybe your neighbor doesn't want this word. Maybe they want to let a bird snatch it or a thorn choker. But there are some people here who have been in the ground for a little while. And I promise Cyris to every person.

Who's been in a depression.

You've been in a funk, You've been in a failure.

The devil sent it was in.

But surday came.

Where you at Matthews, where you at Valentine, where you at you see.

You know what's crazy.

I'm calling out all these campuses, and somehow they see me on their screens and I don't.

Know how, but I don't have to know how. And you know what. Somehow I'm preaching this word and.

It's getting in your heart, and God's gonna use it, and it won't return forid, but it will accomplish what God sent it to do.

But His ways are higher than my ways, and his thoughts been my thoughts. I don't have to know. I just have to sew. I just have to go. I don't have to know.

I don't know how I'm gonna make it, but I don't have to know how. I don't know who God's gonna use to get me through this, but I don't have to know how.

It might be manna that falls from the sky. It might be a widow at Zaraphat that God uses to femie. It might be a little boy's lunch that I didn't even count in the official total because I thought he was insignificant.

But the seed always looks small. God might use a little boy, a little thing that's a littless thing. I don't have to know how. And some of you are stuck because you need to know too much.

You need to be perceived as someone who knows, and so you remain in darkness. You want to be perceived as someone who understands things that the soil represents uncertainty. And I think it's good every once in a while for us to hear a sermon where the farmer admits.

I don't even know how.

Come on, because if you had to call somebody who just lost their child in a car wreck, like I have to do off it, and you were telling them that God is going to get you through this, you wouldn't be.

So quick to tell them how.

I don't know how, but I pray right now in the name of Jesus that the God of all comfort, that's who.

Would surround you with his angels. That's who.

I don't know how, but I know whom I have believed. So I pray, I sew, I scatter, some seed gets snatched, some seed gets scorched, some seed gets strangled.

I'd make a good sermon, wouldn't it. They all start with the letter.

S and the temptation is when the seed is scattered but it does not produce. You never want to sew again. So then you prayed and the cancer still ate their body. What's to make you ever want to pray?

Again?

So you stopped sewing, you stopped expecting, you had a funeral, and stopped expecting a harvest.

The business failed.

That one child is on drugs, and you got very confused about the difference between God's job and your job. Obedience is the job of the farmer. Jesus is not the farmer in this parable. He's the seed. He's the seed. He is the seed of God, and he was planted in the soil of the earth for three days, and his resurrection gives us an expectation that we don't have to understand the events of our life.

To walk in a posture.

I think it's better sometimes that we don't know. I think it's better sometimes that we stay in a state of uncertainty so that we don't get confused and think that we're.

The seed, that we're the source.

And I pray that this message has been practical today and you'll be able to take something from it for your life. But really, I think it's supposed to be prophetic. That doesn't mean a crystal ball or a nine hundred number. To me, that means that you receive this seed personally. It's all about the soil. And if this seed gets snatched or scorched by the trials of life, or choked out by the deceitfulness of riches, the cares of this life,

If you receive this seed, though, I'm trying.

To tell you that God has set you free of the expectation to understand obedience is your job.

Outcome is God's. Let him do his job. Let him do his job.

Let the dirt do its work.

Let the sufferings of this present time producing you a glory that is not worthy to be.

Compared in comparison. Is so much bigger than that dirt.

Some of you are a dirt stage right now of your dream. The first thing that happened to Joseph when God gave him a dream.

Do you remember, they held a parade in his honor. Huh?

He printed up his business cards and started handing them out. He got four million followers on Instagram.

Huh. They threw him in a pit.

Every promise needs a pit, every dream needs dirt.

Your faith needs fertilizer.

All by hisself, the ground produces grain, water it, plow it. Get your heart right, and let the dirt the rejection, the insecurity, the confusion.

God is not the author of confusion.

God did not reject you, but he will use Genesis fifty twenty. What you meant for evil, God intended it for good and the saving of many lives.

Let the dirt do its work.

Praying for people right now in this moment, everyone's standing. Who needed this word today? Because you've got something in the ground in your life. If it's you and you're not ashamed to respond to the word of God, and you don't need to appear to have it all together. If you are in a situation in your life where you don't know how, you don't know how it's going to come together, you don't know how to do what you've been positioned to do.

Your responsibility exceeds your experience.

If that's you today, at every location, lift your hands to your Father, Lord. Whoever's lifting their hands right now, they're saying to you without words, I don't know how, and.

I believe this is a posture that you can honor. Father.

You said, if we would umble ourselves in your sight, you would lift us out. But that when we're proud and that we're haughty, that you have to oppose us. And God, we want to line up on the right side today and understand that there's a part of this process of our growth and our faith and our families.

And our psychology.

And our life experiences and our goals, our visions, our ideas that we just don't know how. Some of us are standing at the crossroads of multimillion dollar business deals and we don't know how. Some of us are trying to buy a next meal, and we don't know how.

Some of us are.

Trying to figure out how to get married, and we don't know how.

Some of us are trying to figure out how to stay Mary.

Then we don't know how. Pray the prayer say, I don't know how, God, but I know who. I believe that you are with me, and I declare that by your spirit I will rise like a seed planted in the earth, I will rise.

I believe in resurrection. I don't know how, but I know who.

Now, let me tell you something about resurrection. With your hands still lifted, Resurrection is not an event. Resurrection is a person. Jesus said, I am the resurrection and the life so if you've got a situation in your life that needs to be resurrected, you don't have to know how. I don't have to understand that I know who is with me. I got the seed of the Word of God.

Thank you for joining us.

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