Mark 4: The Miracle of Growth

I like Mark 4:26-29.  As a pastor, they are verses that I find very encouraging.  In those verses, Jesus says:

"He also said, 'This is what the kingdom of God is like. A man scatters seed on the ground. ²⁷ Night and day, whether he sleeps or gets up, the seed sprouts and grows, though he does not know how. ²⁸ All by itself the soil produces grain—first the stalk, then the head, then the full kernel in the head. ²⁹ As soon as the grain is ripe, he puts the sickle to it, because the harvest has come'” (NIV, 1984).

In Jesus' day, the harvest was always a minor miracle.  Farming techniques were rudimentary to say the least.  Farmers put the seed in the ground and hoped.  They chased pests away.  They hoed and did the little they could to facilitate growth.  First-century farmers certainly knew nothing of the science of agriculture that we have today.  Yet, somehow and in some way, the crop arrived.

As a pastor, I often feel like a first-century farmer.  Despite all the books I have read about church growth, I don't really know how a church grows.  I don't know how it grows in number.  I don't know how it grows in depth of spirituality.  I know the faithful things that I can do.  I know I can preach the word, and pray, and encourage and admonish.  But those aren't really things that bring the growth.  It's the movement of the Spirit.  I can't dissect that movement.  I can't explain it, predict it, measure it, or invoke it.  But I can thank God that from time to time I see it.  And in the seasons and rhythms of the church, growth and harvest comes.

In the last few months, we at FBC have been blessed to see many visitors and to see a good number of those visitors lose the visiting tag and become regular attendees, a part of our church family.  I am at a loss to explain why this is happening now.  Why not at some other point in my 5 years here?  I don't know.  There is no special program we can point to.  There has been no ministry initiative that can explain it.  All I can say is that though we don't know how, the Lord brings His harvest.  What an encouraging thought!