Mix Tape | Week 5 | Betty Bassett | Five Lakes Church

Well, pastor button encouraged you to take notes for those of you who are onsite, uh, the notes are in your service guide.

If you are online, we encourage you to take notes, whatever method is best for you as well.

Well, my name is Betty Bassett.

I'm the outreach director here at five lakes church, and we are in week four of our mixed tape series.

We said that a mix tape is like a playlist.

Um, you're hearing different voices each week.

They might all be different genres, but all of our messages are coming right from the Bible.

And so if this week is my song, then I want my song to be a country song because I do drive a truck, true story.

And I grew up on a farm.

And so for me, I want this to be a country song.

Um, so many of you know, that I grew up in a big family.

I have there's.

I have 11 sisters.

There's 12 girls in my family.

I didn't have any brothers.

So that means on the farm, us girls were doing the work with my dad.

And so I like to say that I grew up in a very female empire empowered environment where there wasn't boys work and there wasn't girls work.

There was just work and it had to be done.

One of the funny stories my dad likes to tell is that my dad said he liked having daughters because when you put a girl on tractor and you tell her what gear to drive in, she'll drive in that gear.

And she won't try out the higher gears where boys might be more apt to try that out.

My sisters might have a different story on that.

Um, but it was fun growing up on a farm.

And it was this experience on the farm that I think God uses to give me a unique perspective on the passage that I'm going to share with you today.

It's the parable of the sower and the seed, and we're going to find it in mark four.

It's a familiar parable.

It's Jesus speaking to his disciples and he's sharing with them the secrets of the kingdom.

And so we're going to jump right into our passage here in mark four, Jesus says, listen, a farmer went out to plant some seeds.

As he scattered across his field, some of the seed fell on the path.

The birds came and ate it.

Other seed fell on the shallow soil with underlying rock, the seed sprouted quickly because the soil was shallow.

But the plant soon wilted under the hot sun.

And since it didn't have deep roots, it died.

Other seed fell among the thorns that grew up and choked out the tender plants.

So they produced no grain and still other seeds fell on fertile soil.

They sprouted grew and produced a crop that was 30, 60 even hundred times.

As much as plant was as much has been planted.

It's a parable about showing what happens when we put God's seed in the ground.

And it's not that hard to understand, but as Jesus is meeting with his disciples, he goes on to actually explain the parable to them.

And so we get that explanation as well.

In mark 14 is he says that the farmer plants seed by taking God's word to others.

Some people are a lot like the seed along the path where the word was sown.

As soon as they hear it, Satan comes and takes away the word that was sown in them.

The seed on the Rocky soil represents those who hear them message and immediately receive it with joy.

But since they, I don't have deep roots, they don't last long.

They fall away.

As soon as they have problems or persecuted for believing God's word, the seed that fell among the thorns represent those who hear God's word, but all too quickly, the message is crowded out by the worries of life, the lure of wealth, the desire for other things.

So no fruit is produced, but the feet, the seed that fell on the good soil represents those who hear it and accept God's word and produce a harvest of 30, 60, even a hundred times.

It was as much has been as was planted.

So this parable is easy enough to understand Jesus gives us the parable and then he explains the parable.

So the point of the parable and our, the idea today is that the condition of the soil determines the potential for growth.

So when we talk about the condition of the soil, we're talking about the condition of the heart, the condition of someone's heart will determine whether a C read God's word will take root and grow.

The parable was a field guide to growing the kingdom.

Now, because of my farming background, I got thinking about my dad going through the fields and he would plow, and he was used a cultipacker that would like break up the lumps in the soil.

And I even spent a lot of time walking fields, picking up rocks so that they didn't get in the way of the harvest.

And I got thinking about these things in it got me to thinking, could we, as individuals, as a church increase the chance of successful soil, could we break up the hard places, remove the rocks, deter the birds, shade, the sun, weed, the thorns, and fertilize, the soil all in an effort to improve the system.

Yes.

And the yield of the seed.

And that's when I saw our strategy for outreach in our community CPR.

It's how to save a life, not the CPR that you have, thinking of CPR, cultivate, plant, and reap, and not surprising.

Those are our three thoughts for today.

Cultivating, planting and reaping.

It's how we reach our community and save lives.

The number one cultivating increases the chances of a fruitful harvest.

So when we cultivate soil, the seed is more likely to take root in an agricultural sense, or in farming sense, cultivating is preparing us oil to receive seed.

It increases the chance.

This chances that a seed will take deep root thrive in less than ideal conditions and produce an increased harvest, 30, 60, a hundred fold in a community sense.

It means that we work to create environments where God's word can be shared in effective and meaningful ways.

And if we're going to do that, then we need some tools to cultivate.

Now they give you a few tools today.

This is not a comprehensive list.

It's not meant to be all encompassing, but it's intended to inspire you to do your part, to cultivate the soil and our community.

And those around you.

The first is that cultivators are intentional.

We called a bait where we hope to plant and reap.

And by intentional, I mean that we have an ultimate purpose.

Our ultimate purpose is kingdom-minded we plant and we call debate where we want to see God's word, grow and thrive.

So we decide we want the word to be spread in our community.

That's why we cultivate in our community.

That's why we deliver groceries during the pandemic.

It's why we serve at the farmer's market for 20 weeks, because we have an opportunity to cultivate in our community for 20 weeks, with the same people weekend and week out, it's intentional.

We see an opportunity here to plant seeds and watch them grow.

It's why we do love your neighbor for one nine, because we are planting God's seed in our community.

We're preparing the soil and we are developing relationships in our community.

See cultivators are relational.

Not only are they intentional, but they are relational because relationships are the most effective method to cultivate the soil.

So one of the things we do here at the church, if we do, uh, laundry outreach, and I have said from the beginning that the laundry outreach has never been about laundry.

That is always been about relationships, building relationships with the people that we serve.

And I know that it's working and here's how I know that it's working because sometimes our laundry guests will send the vacation pictures

To our team members

Because they have a relationship with them.

Right.

I also know because the laundry guests will start asking us.

At some point, they started asking us, well, how can I pray for you?

That's a reciprocal relationship.

We are building a relationship where the seed can be planted.

I really knew what that it was working.

When one day I got a call from our laundry guest and she said, you know, I won't, I won't be there tonight because my husband passed away today.

He'd been suffering from a long illness.

So I was very surprised when three hours later, she walked into the laundromat three hours after she found out her husband had passed.

I said, I'm surprised you're here.

But I realized she needed to be with her family.

We had built a relationship where people see us as their family.

They see us as the people that they want to run to in those times of needs.

I'll tell you another story that blows my mind.

Um, when we build relationships in our community, I was at a community meeting a few months back, um, all community leaders.

I want to say from the beginning, this was not a church.

This was a meeting of community leaders.

And the question had been asked, what is something that you learned about yourself during COVID that you will take into the rest of your life with you?

And so people share it and it comes to one individual.

And this individual says, you know, I was sick and I was in the hospital, um, during the pandemic.

And he said, I just had this come to Jesus moment.

And when he said, come to Jesus moment, I didn't think anything because people will say come to Jesus moment about a lot of things.

But he said, I had this come to Jesus moment.

When I realized that I was not living my life for Jesus Christ.

And so he said, so in that moment in the hospital, I gave my life to Jesus Christ.

You could have knocked me over with a feather in that moment, but that is not where he stopped.

He said, and I can't say, thanks enough to five lakes, church for all that they have done for me.

This is an individual who doesn't even attend our church.

They might follow us online, but this is an individual that we've just had relationship with in the community.

We added another soul to heaven because we were intentional and we were relational.

We build these relationships in the community because we see a path forward to plant and reap.

So armed with these tools of being intentional and relational, each type of the soil that Jesus talked about can be cultivated.

First Jesus talked about the path and here's what you need to understand about the path.

The path is hard and you can throw all the seed you want at it.

And it will not.

Stick is hard.

I watched my dad plow fields to break up the hard soil and what we need in our community is people who in those hard places can just soften the hard places.

So I think a tool, a good tool for us to use there is to just be encouragers.

Do you know how many people don't have an encourager in their life?

Someone who just says positive things to them, I'm not talking about false flattery here.

I'm talking about encouraging words that build people up.

Many people don't have family that builds them up.

Their family is a place of chaos and drama.

They need those people in their life who will speak positive words to them.

It's not hard.

You know, a few weeks ago I was in Kroger.

I was in the checkout line and it was a really busy time of day.

And they only had three cashiers on.

So people in line were getting really impatient and by people, I mean, me Just being honest, I was getting a little impatient.

So after I check out and I start putting my groceries in the cart, the next guy comes up in line behind me.

And he looks at the cashier and he says, thank you for serving me today.

Thank you for working hard to get us through the line.

Thank you for showing up and being here at work today.

And I was blessed by that.

He was encouraging her, but I was encouraged because you know whose fault it wasn't that there were only three cashiers.

It was the cashier that came to work that day.

It's not her fault that there were three cashiers on that day, you know, whose fault it wasn't.

It was all the people standing in line up around me who were also being impatient.

A kind word was a blessing to meet.

And it was a blessing there.

It's not hard.

I'll share with you a story.

I heard a dad tell a few weeks ago he was telling that he took his daughters to Disney.

And, um, he was saying they were lined up for this electric parade.

That's on main street.

I've never been to Disney.

So I might have that wrong, but apparently there's electric parade.

And they were standing there waiting for it.

When this Disney employee comes up to his daughters and he says, we have a problem.

We forgot to turn the lights out.

And could you help us turn the lights out?

And the girls of course said, sure.

And he says, well, hold out your hand.

And he pulls out of his pocket, some confetti, and he puts these couple of little pieces of confetti in their hands.

And then he, I don't know some other something.

And, um, and, and then at the end, he says to the girls now close your eyes.

And, and the confetti goes and they open their eyes and the light turns off.

And this is what he said.

He said, Disney made a believer out of me, tell you what I said inside.

Are you serious right now?

That was like a 19 year old who had a Penny's worth of confetti in his pocket and who had some attention to detail.

Okay.

So it was good timing, some attention to detail.

And I thought, here we are.

We are Christians in our community and we carry more than confetti in our pocket.

We have a God who can close the mouth of lion, who can park the, see the spirit of God that raised Jesus from the dead lives in us.

And we can't encourage people like, come on, you have more than confetti in your pocket.

Do you have something that you could give to someone around them that would encourage them?

That would break up the hard soil that would get rid of the rocks.

You have a living, God that walks with you, and I could talk and talk about this point.

I'm not going to continue, but it's not that hard to be an encourager because you are walking with the spirit of God in you while cultivators are encouragers.

They're also consistent.

So before I came to my faith, I, and I didn't really come to my faith to my late twenties.

Um, but early on, and my first teaching job, I worked with a girl named Julie and Julie was the first person.

Now I want to be careful to say the first person I met, I want to say that it was the first time in my life.

I was aware of someone who was a Christian all the time.

I was aware that there were plenty of people who went to church on Sunday and acted one way at church and then acted another way the rest of the time.

But I noticed that Julie wasn't like that, that Julie was the same person, whether we were at work or whether we were out to dinner or whether we were at a bar or whether we were playing games.

Some of you, um, Julie was consistent in her faith.

She took me to a Bible study and I met other people who actually believed that God's word was true.

And my response, all of that was that's interesting.

I was not yet ready to receive the seed, but Julie was breaking up some hard ground in my heart.

See, I have onto a rock that said, Christians are hypocrites.

They act like one thing.

Then they treat you another.

But Julie wasn't like that.

And her friends weren't like that.

So I had to drop that rock.

Yeah.

And I have onto another rock that I think maybe I got in college that said religion is for people, all who are weak and need a crutch.

But Julie wasn't like that.

Julie was smart.

And she knew what she believed in, why she believed it.

Julie was a strong person.

So I had to drop that rock.

Julie was a cultivator in my life.

And I think in your lives, you can probably see that you had some cultivators as well.

People who prepared your heart to receive God's work at just the right time.

She was consistent in her faith.

And I believe that this consistency, if we live it out, our, how we reach people, Jesus talks about the thorns and how these are the people who get distracted by other things.

They get distracted by your faith.

But what if your consistent faith made them continually keep focused on the things of God?

And we too have mixtape.

Pastor Benton talked about joy and choosing joy.

Does your life encourage other people to ask the question?

What is your source of joy?

Does your life make other people have want what you have?

Do people want the source of your patients, your kindness, your goodness, your faithfulness, your love and gentleness.

Does your life encourage people to seek that?

I read a joke one time that I said that there are two reasons that people aren't Christians the first is that they don't know any Christians.

So that just means that they live in an area of the world where Christianity isn't the predominant religion.

And they've never been exposed close to the faith.

But the second reason is that they do.

And it's funny because it's partly, it's not 100% true, but there is some truth to that.

Have you ever met people that think if that's what Christianity is, I don't want to be a part of it.

Does your life

Make Christianity and following Jesus attractive?

One of the things I remember about my friend, Julie, is that she talked about God and Jesus in a way that they were people, that they were people.

He knew that they were people that I could come to know.

She was a cultivator in my life.

So we do all this cultivating.

But if we just cultivate without planting gods word, then we're just nice.

People.

See the path of cultivation needs to lead to Jesus through planting God's word.

And so our thought number two is on planting in mark four 14.

Jesus says that the farmer plants the seed by taking God's word to other.

That's what planting is.

We take the seed, we take it out.

It says the farmer takes God's word.

He didn't invite them into the church.

He took the word to the street, right?

We take it out of the pew into the pavement.

You are, the farmer says the farmer plants, the seeds.

You are the farmer.

And the farmer is intentional.

You go out where you hope to plant and reap.

The farmer, sees that the field is ready and it's time.

So thought number two is to plant the seed.

You have to have the seed.

Now that seems pretty obvious, right?

But sometimes we forget that part to plant the seed.

You have to have the seeds in week.

One of mix tape pester, Micah made a great point.

He talked about that private devotion results in public expression.

You can't plant what you don't have.

The parable that says the parable says that those who hear and accept God's word, produce a harvest.

Remember pastor Micah talked about, like, if you can say that you, um, believe in healthy eating, but then if you ate like a whole cheesecake last night, eventually it's going to show up, well, what you do in your private time, that's eventually going to show up.

And so I have three tools of planting today.

Not coincidentally.

They all start with the letter P cause why not?

And we're going to talk about how that private devotion results in public expression.

So the first tool is prayer, obviously prayer, private prayer results in public prayer.

Now, when I'm talking about prayer, I'm not talking about that.

Like, here's what I need for you to do for me.

God, here's my to-do list.

Here's my laundry list.

Here's my, here's what I need.

God, prayer is a two way conversation, right?

So we, we talked about to God and then we also listen to God.

And it's in that private time when you're listening to God, that you will learn to hear and distinguish the voice of holy spirit.

And in that private practice, you'll be able to start walking out and publicly hear the holy spirit and how the holy spirit is leading and guiding you with the people around you.

I'll give you an example.

So we were eating at a local restaurant and, um, I felt like the holy spirit was saying to me, offered to pray for the waitress.

And I don't normally do that.

I know some people make a habit of doing that.

I don't normally do that.

So I thought, okay, is this from the holy spirit?

And I didn't want it to get weird.

So I turned to my husband and I said, Hey, just so you know, I'm gonna, uh, ask this waitress like, um, you know, is there anything I can pray for you about?

And he said, I don't know.

She's, she's really busy.

It's really busy tonight.

And I said, okay, I'll tell you what, if she pauses at our table, then I will ask her.

It's just, you know, I'll know that it's the holy spirit.

She pauses at our table.

So our food is out and everything.

She comes by and she says, is everything okay?

And you know, we said, yeah, that's great.

And then she turns around, she comes back and she puts her hands on the empty chair.

And she said, was there something else?

Okay, that was the holy spirit.

And I said, yes, actually I was going to ask you if there was anything I could pray about for you.

Her eyes got big and they welled up with tears.

And she said, yes.

And it started a relationship with that waitress whom I still see today.

We just had that moment where I just heard the holy spirit and I just acted on it.

But it's through that private devotion to prayer that I'm able to hear the holy spirit.

The next tool that starts with a P is prophecy.

And prophecy is just another word for God's word.

He gives us his word.

I said in the beginning that to plant the seed, you have to have the seed, right?

And so your private motion to Bible study gives you God's word to give away.

You can't give what you don't have.

And so in that time, when you are studying God's word, he's planting seeds in you.

I don't know if you've ever had a situation where somebody shared just the right word from God's word with you, but it's a blessing.

And you will be able to do that.

If daily, you make Bible study apart and God is planting his word in you, private Bible study, we'll give you God's word to give away the final tool that I'll talk about.

And again, this is not a comprehensive list.

It is just intended to inspire you, to seek God and how you might cultivate plant and reap and in your own life.

But the third tool is praise.

Praise God for the great things he has done for you, because private Thanksgiving will turn into public praise.

You ever seen people just on fire for God.

And you're like, how do you have that?

I want what you want.

Does your life make people want what you have that public praise people are.

Wow.

She believes in a God.

That is real.

How can I know that guy planters must have the seeds and be willing to release them a seed that has held onto dies.

It will not reach its potential.

And the problem is not with the seed.

God's word does not return empty to him.

Isaiah 55 11 says, so my word goes out from my mouth, but it will not return to me empty, empty.

It will accomplish what I, God desire it to accomplish and achieve the purpose for which I sent God's word.

We may not see it, but it will achieve the purpose for it is being sent out to plant the seed.

You have to have the seed.

It brings us on to thought, number three, we have to reap once we've called evaded.

And once we planted it's time to reap that.

Number three reaping is bringing the seed to full maturity.

So we're going to jump ahead a little bit in mark four, there's a, this we're going to talk about the parable of the growing seed.

This is all in a time where Jesus is sitting with it.

His disciples he's teaching them.

He teaches them about the sower and the seed.

Now the parable of the growing seed is really a continuation of this.

It is Jesus.

Just telling them what happens when the seed is planted.

That's the parable of the growing seed.

And in mark 4 26 through 28, he says a man scattered there's seed on the ground night and day, the seeds, sprouts and grows.

The soil produces grain first to stock than ahead than a full Colonel in the head.

It's a picture of biblical discipleship.

It starts small, but it grows big.

I have cilantro in my garden and I started with one little plant, but now it's this big because I always let it go up to seed and then it makes more.

And then it goes up to seed.

And then it makes more, it's like a hundred times as big as it started out because it was fruitful and it increased.

And that's the picture of biblical discipleship.

It starts off versus a stock.

It needs care.

It needs watering.

It needs someone to look after it, but then it grows into a head.

It is growing through the process of sanctification.

And finally the full Colonel in the head, the criminal is the party.

That is the seed for the next generation.

It's not age dependent.

It's not that babies are the stocks and teenagers are, um, the baby, the babies are the sprouts.

The teenagers are the head and adults are the kernels.

It has to do with spiritual maturity.

So if you want to know where you are in your spiritual maturity, are you producing more?

Are you producing more believers?

Because each believers should mature and reseed each generation plants the, because if they don't check it out and judges two 10, this was in the time of Gideon.

It says after that generation died, another generation grew up who did not acknowledge the Lord, or remember the mighty things that he had done for Israel, this generation and getting his time did not multiply.

It did not grow into full maturity, producing a harvest of 30, 60, or a hundred times.

They did not see themselves.

And when I look at this passage from judges, I think, you know, I know that God's church will prevail, but I don't want to be the one standing before God who and saying, well, we kind of let that generation in the gap.

God's people were created to reproduce from the beginning Genesis.

He says, fruitful, multiply and increase.

He says to Abraham, I will make you fruitful and increase in.

Jesus says, go and make disciples.

That's be fruitful and increase.

God's people were, God made his people to flourish.

That was God's plan from the beginning.

And it's God's plan.

Now we're to be fruitful and increase.

Today's harvest is tomorrow seed.

Now I know some of you in this room are saying, okay, but buddy, I have done the work of cultivating.

I've done planting, but I am waiting to see a harvest.

And I am with you.

We have a niece that we have prayed for for 17 years.

Praise God.

She came to her faith after 17 years, but there might be some of you in here saying 17 years.

I've just getting started.

I've been praying longer than that for my loved ones.

And I just want to share with you something that really blessed me because I hope it will bless you too.

It said after the farmer planted, we're still in the parable of the growing seed.

It says after the farmer planted mark 4 27 says night and day, whether he sleeps or get up, whether the farmer hits the snooze button or it gets up the seed grows though, he doesn't know how.

See, I can't explain how or why God answers prayer, or when he answers prayer, that's completely above my pay grade, but we can rest knowing that our God is faithful.

He is working.

If you've done the work to cultivate, if you're done the work of planting, then go to bed, put your head on a pillow, close your eyes and go to sleep.

Our God is faithful.

Our God is working.

He is able, and that's my country song.

[inaudible]

Let's pray and ask her God to take these words out into our community.

Lord God.

We are building a church here in our community, as you know, Lord and our desires that we, as a congregation would increase 30, 60, a hundred full that our new church wouldn't even hold all the believers in our community.

Lord because the people in this church would go out and we would call debate relationships that create a pathway to preempt seeds.

And that those seeds would take root and they would flourish.

And they would not be, um, choked out by thorns Lord, but that they would grow.

And that we would multiply that we would not be a generation who allows a gap Lord, but that we continue to grow the faith.

God, you, we know that you are working in that you are able, and we praise you for every good work that you are doing, that you have done and you will do in this community.

God, we thank you.

We praise you in the great name of Jesus.

Amen.

Would you stand and worship our awesome God with us?