We Are Venture: Tell Everyone

I want to welcome you to Venture Church. If you don't know who I

am, I'm Pastor Brandon. I want to welcome those that are watching online,

listening on our podcast, listening from one of our other campuses. If

you would do me a favor, if you would grab your Bible, I

want you to turn to Matthew chapter thirteen as you're turning there. I guess

this is a little bit of a confession to make. I love doing yard

work. I'm one of those people that will stare at my front and my

backyard and begin to imagine what it could look like. I think like my

favorite thing to do springtime all the way to fall, until it becomes oppressive

around here. My favorite thing to do is to put on headphones and listen

to a good book and spend two days just piddling around my yard. Does

that make me old? I just out of curiosity. How many of you

enjoy yardwork? Okay? Oh good? All right? Then you will agree

with this that the greatest status symbol for somebody who cares about their yard is

their grass. I mean, you want your grass to be lush and full,

the opposite of Morgan Butcher's hair. It's free. You want that was

totally free. I don't know where that came from. I saw a person

with Morgan's hairstyle and it just popped into my head and that moment, Uh,

you want it to be very dark green, nicely edged, and for

those that really care, you want the mole lines to be just right.

If you're like me, I care about, uh, the way the lighting

comes. I care about the flowers, the different colors, the height and

width of my shrubs and my trees. If you have ever seen my house,

I care about all the statues in my yard. I want to show

you what my dream statue is right here. I want an eight foot tall

chainsawce sasquatch in my yard. I want to be the person that you meet

me in muckle te O and you're like, hey, where do you live?

And then I get to say, oh, have you driven by that

house with the big, huge sasquatch. Yeah? I always wondered who lived

there? That's me, I live there. I want to be able to

say that. But you know, when it comes to your grass, there's

things that we're fighting again. Sometimes your grass gets too much water, sometimes

it gets not another, sometimes it gets too much sun. Sometimes the weeds

take over. But I feel like I spend all spring, summer and fall

in a battle trying to protect my grass. Kind of reminds me of a

parable that Jesus said. I want to read it to you, Chapter thirteen,

verse one. That same day, Jesus went out of the house and

he sat by the lake. Now this is the peak of Jesus' popularity.

People were coming from all over just to hear him teach. They heard he

was this incredible prophet, rabbi teacher. They begin to hear about the miracles.

They just wanted to be around him. In this particular day, verse

two, it says there was such large crowds had gathered around him that he

got into a boat and he sat in it while all the people stood on

the shore. Then he told them many things in parables. So I want

you to get this image. Jesus is standing in a boat, everybody's on

the shoreline. It's kind of made a natural amphitheater as he begins to teach

in parables. I want to ask everyone to buy your heads, close your

eyes, repeat this prayer after me. Everyone say, dear Jesus, speak

to my heart, change my life in Jesus' name Amen. For those of

you that are newer to church, you've probably heard the word parable, but

weren't really sure what it meant. For those of you that have been around

church for a while, if I was to corner you in the lobby and

tell you and ask you tell me what a parable is, you'd have trouble

answering it. You'd say it's one of those weird stories that Jesus told.

Depending on who you're talking to, what scholar Jesus shared between thirty minimum of

thirty up to fifty individual parables. Now, Jesus taught this way because he

was trying to excite and interest people. He was trying to arouse their curiosity.

Basically, a parable is a metaphor for something that you can relate to

in everyday life. It would be the equivalent of sharing a story that you

could connect to, but deriving a principle, a spiritual principle that had deep

meaning for you. Now, parables, by their nature are meant to have

one primary meaning, but most parables have many different principles that you can additionally

derive from them. Parables weren't meant to be confusing. The meaning was meant

to kind of unwrap as the story is told, but it was meant to

be obvious, and the purpose of it was to express a moral or spiritual

truth utilizing this realistic story, this parable Parable of the Sower. Until I

preached it in the first service. This is our twentieth year, twenty years

of vision Sundays. Here we are. I have never preached on the Parable

of the Sower before, so this is my second time now. But the

Parable of the Sower is one of Jesus' most famous parables. It's one of

only seven parables that is in the three Synoptic Gospels. It is one of

only two parables that Jesus wanted you to catch the meaning so much that he

actually told you what the interpretation is. The Parable of the Sower. I

want to read it. A farmer went out to sow his seed. As

he was scattering the seed, some fell along the path and the birds came

and ate it up. Some fell on rocky places where it did not have

much soil. It sprang up quickly because the soil was shallow. But when

the sun came up, the plants were scorched and they withered because they had

no root. Other seed fell among the thorns, which grew up and choked

the plants. Still, other seed fell among good soil, where it produced

a crop one hundred, sixty or thirty times what was sown. And Jesus

usually ended his parables with some sort of statement like this. He said,

whoever has ears, let him hear. So the parable of the sower,

which is familiar to many people. Most of us know, it's meant to

mean that a plant, for it to bear fruit, must be rooted in

soil and exposed to sunshine. So we understand that principle. But I want

you to catch what Jesus is trying to tell you. So I want to

explain what this metaphor means today. Literally, I am going to dumb this

down so that you might be a kindergartener here and you will understand this.

Are you ready? So he refers to a farmer, a sower. Who

is that? That's me and you. We're the farmers, We are the

sowers. Okay. The second thing is he talks about seed. What is

the seed that the farmer, you and I are sowing? That is the

gods, That is the word of God. It is our testimony, it's

our story. It's that moment that we tell people about where we were heading

this way and at just the right moment, Jesus crossed our path and everything

changed. The song that our worship team let out before I came out to

preach, talked about your story, your testimony, that it describes this moment

where I was desperate and you came to my rescue. That is the seed

that you sow, which is your story of your life transformation. What is

the soil. The soil represents the various hearts and their response to the gospel.

So you know that as you invite people to church, you share your

testimony with people, there are some people there quick to say, hey,

I'm not I'm come on, man, I'm not into that religion thing.

There are other people people that you know, you can't even bring up the

topic because it will end the relationship. And then there are other people that

you know, hey, if I invite this person to church, they're probably

going to come. So we understand the different types of soil. But then

there's the sun. So in my yard and we live on about three quarters

of an acre, and we have landscape front yard and landscape backyard, and

the sun hits our yard at certain angles, and all of the plants in

our yard grow towards the sun. No matter where I plant them, they're

growing towards the sun. Well, in this parable, the sun represents persecution

that will come. And this persecution will come because you're a person of faith,

because you follow Jesus. There will be people that don't agree with you.

Because you are a follower of Jesus, there will be people that will

immediately assume where you land politically, where you stand on social issues. They'll

think things like you're just judgmental. Persecution will come simply by the word of

your testimony. Jesus said it this way. He said, Hey, all

men are going to hate you because of me. But here's what the parables

trying to help us understand. The persecution helps us grow. Just as the

sun helps crops grow. Persecution helps you and I grow. Sunshine causes your

plants to grow and thrive, But sunshine will also kill your plants if their

roots are shallow. Persecution should cause your faith to be strengthened unless your roots

are shallow. And if your roots are shallow, persecution will cause you to

put your tail between your legs and run away. Persecution will cause you to

change your mind because it's not popular. And then, finally, in this

parable, Jesus describes the crops in the fruitfulness of the crops, the crops

represent the fruit of a person's life. You can truly tell the spiritual depth

of a person by their long term fruit from their life. Do they live

a life of holiness? Do they live a life with Christian character? Do

they desire to do good and impact the world in a positive way? Do

they win other people to the faith? Are they generous? Are they people

that live a worshipful life? The fruit of your life, you see,

the truth of God's word must take root in the heart of a person,

be cultivated and permitted to bear fruit. Fascinating thing about this parable is that

three quarters of the seed that was thrown didn't bear fruit. Did you notice

that most of it didn't work? But fruit is the true test of the

spiritual life of a person. Jesus then goes on and he translates interprets the

parable. Let's read the interpretation verse eighteen. So listen then to the parable

of what the soer means. When anyone hears the message about the kingdom and

does not understand and it the evil one comes and snatches away what was sown

in their heart. This is the seed that was sown along the path to

someone who hears the word and at once receives it with joy. But since

they have no root, they last only a short time. When trouble or

persepcution comes because of the word, they quickly fall away. Then he says,

the seed falling among the thorns refers to someone who hears the word.

But the worries of this life, the deceitfulness of wealth, choked the word,

making it unfruitful. But the seed falling on good soil refers to someone

who hears the word understands it. This is the one who produces a crop

yielding one hundred sixty thirty times what was sown. So if a plant is

to bear fruit, it must be rooted in soil and exposed to sunshine.

That is the primary meaning of this parable. But I believe that there are

secondary principles that are actually just as important for you and I today, adventure,

I want to share with you quickly five principles that I want you to

catch from this parable. Are you gouna still with me? Everyway? With

me? All right. Number one is the farmer just sewed. The farmer's

job was to spread seed. He just scattered seed. And did you notice

he wasn't really careful with where he scattered the seed. He just scattered it

everywhere. Some went along the path, some went in rocky places, some

went among thorns, some went on good soil. There is this thought in

the church today that we don't want to throw our pearls before swine, and

we don't want to like invite people that we know will just be opposed to

it. We don't want to sit down and talk to people about our testimony

or our story that we know aren't gonna listen. There is this thought that

you only plant seed where you know, beyond a shadow of a doubt,

it is gonna get a good response and grow. Did you notice that the

farmer doesn't do that. The farmer understands his job. His job is to

plant seed. He just sows. Because the farmer understands something that applies to

you and I today, you ready, this is like so profound. You

can't run out of seed. You have an unlimited supply of seed to sew,

So why wouldn't you just spread it everywhere? Since you can't out,

there will never be a shortage of it, So just throw it everywhere.

That's what this farmer does. Paul said this to Timothy, said, Timothy,

preach the word, share the gospel, tell your story, sow seed.

He said, you need to be prepared in season, out of season.

Correct, rebuke, encourage with great patience and careful instruction, because you

and I are not responsible for the results. Paul then and Corinthians makes this

great statement. He says, I planted the seed. I told you guys

last week that the Bible was full of these farming metaphors, this idea of

reaping and sowing, that we plant seed, that we cast our bread upon

the water, and it will return to us. That metaphor is used over

and over Old Testament, New Testament. Paul calls back to it over and

over again. He says, I planted the seed, but Apollos watered it.

What does that mean? It means there are people that you shared your

testimony with five years ago that rejected it. But then a moment came in

their life where they decided they got a flyer in the mail and they thought

I should go check out church, and they showed up at another church somewhere

else, and then someone else discipled and poured into that person. But you

planted the seed, Apollos watered it. And then Paul says, but God

makes it grow. What's the farmer's job? We just plant seed. That's

what your job is. Your job is to sow seed, and you have

an unlimited supply of seed. Second principle from this that I want you to

catch that the farmer went to sew like he had to go. He wasn't

going to reap a harvest staying in the farmhouse. He had to go outside

the farmhouse to plant seed. He had to walk along the road and toss

it on the path and toss it in the rocks and in the thorny place

and on the good soil. He had to go. Why do we do

things like have gatherings where we say we're gonna do a bunch of short term

missions trips you should consider because we're trying to get you to go, to

leave the comfort of your home, to leave the comfort of everything that is

the status quo in your life, and get you to go because you and

I will never impact the greater Seattle area if we never leave our houses will

never impact Western Washington. If we only stay within the comfort of the people

that agree with us, our closest friends. You have to go the farmer

when to sew. We are to share the Gospel, our story, our

testimony wherever we go, whatever situation we find ourselves in. Third thing that

we need to learn from this, this is something I learned studying this this

week, that the farmer is broadcast seating seating, broadcast seating. I love

the word broadcast what it means to us today, but what it means for

a farmer. The term phrase broadcast seating is the term that they use for

spreading seed everywhere by every means possible. You just lump it into broadcast seating.

That's what the farmer does. Now, come springtime, I'm going to

assess my grass like all of you will. And I'll notice I gotta do

some work, and I have two bags of grass seed in my shed,

and there's gonna be a time where I'm gonna grab a arator and I'm gonna

erate the entire yard and then I'm gonna put it in a spreader that I'll

push and it will evenly spread seed throughout the yard. But there's also areas

that I will need to like rake up and turn over, and I'll give

the little handspreader thing. I've got them all, and then there's other places

then I'll just spread the seed by hand. That is broadcast seeding. It

means that you're not stuck in one way that you're gonna sow seed. You

spread it every way imaginable. What does that mean for you and I today?

It means that we spread the gospel every means possible, every way necessary.

If I was to grab every single one of you in the lobby after

the service and ask you this question, how did you end up starting to

come to venture, It'll be all over the place. Some of you will

say I found you online. If you've ever wondered why do we invest all

this time and energy into social media, into our website, Because you're sitting

next to people, that is how the seed took root in their heart.

There are other people they're gonna say, I came because I saw your a

frame signs. There's a group of people that every Saturday set up a frame

signs for our church all around the community. They wonder why they do it

every time they do it, and they're sitting next to people that are like,

I found your church because I saw a sign. There are some of

you you came because someone invited you. You would say, why are you

constantly handing us top five cards and challenging us to invite people? Because we

know statistically, especially on Easter, that eighty five percent of people say,

if I'm invited to an Easter service, I would come. There are many

of you you came because at just the right moment, your heart was ready

and a coworker said, you can come visit my church with me if you'd

like. Some of you came because you got a direct mail. Some of

you came because someone put a door hanger on your door, and every way

in between. Some of you found us online. You know how many people

I talk to that say, yeah, this is my first Sunday, but

I've watched a bunch of your services online. A farmer's job is to sew

seed. He's got to go to sew seed, and he wants to sew

seed every means at his disposal. You guys still with me Number four principle

that I want you to get today. Oh, this one's good. Soil

doesn't always remain the same that's why he spread it everywhere. Remember, we

see someone else might water, but God makes it grow. I had someone

after the first service pull me aside, and actually had multiple people tell me

that they'd heard this parable before, but they always thought we were the soil,

that the whole parable was meant about us and the openness of our hearts.

And this was the first time they realized, No, we're the farmers,

Like this is Jesus challenging us to tell everybody about him. And one

of them said, Pastor Brandon is a crazy thing. He said, for

thirty years I have invited the same person to church and he said no,

And he said it was just six months ago. I kept inviting him and

he finally started coming. God changes the soil. Just because something's rocky today

doesn't mean God isn't going to chisel it away tomorrow. Oh, I've got

this verse that I want to quote. This is my personal theme verse for

twenty twenty four Dian. I teach Biblical preaching and teaching at Northwest University at

all the Bible College students, and I'm actually gonna make this the theme verse

for preachers. And here it is. Jeremiah twenty three twenty nine. Isn't

this good? It's talking about your story when Jesus changed your life. This

is the power of that story. Is not my word, Like fire declares

the Lord is not my word. Like a hammer that breaks rock into pieces,

that's God's word. Your testimony of God transforming your life is like the

hammer of four I mean, the hardest hearts, It chisels them away.

When you share your story, it is like fire. And God has a

supernatural ability to change the quality of soil. But remember, you and I

aren't to worry about that. Our job is just to sow seed. We

just plant. We plant everywhere. We got an unlimited supply of seed,

so if some doesn't work, we don't care. We just plant. We

just we So see, God makes it grow hard, hearts soften. Just

because someone's heart is hard today doesn't mean it won't soften tomorrow. Finally,

the fifth principle that I want you to get from this passage, it's going

back to the rocky soil or the thorny soil. It's still received God's word,

but it couldn't handle the pressure of all the outside forces. What does

that mean for you and I? Since our job is to plant seed.

What does it mean the reality that rocky soil, thorny soil eventually dies and

withers because of outside forces. It means just because you plant seed doesn't mean

your job is done. That when somebody raises a hand or praise a prayer

comes forward to an altar, that is the beginning, not the end.

That we need people in our church that find value in walking alongside other people.

Some of the heroes that we have in our church. And tonight at

our annual Vision dinner, you're gonna hear us talk about all the growth groups

that we've had this year and the thousands of people that were involved in growth

groups. Can I tell you who some of my heroes are people that are

willing to lead growth groups cause you don't like it's easy to stand in front

of six hundred people and preach right now, you're great. Even if like

a hundred of you don't like what I'm saying, there's enough of you that

do that. I don't know who the other ones are, but these are

the people that are willing to teach a group and walk alongside a group of

people that might be four or five people. These are the people that are

willing to come on Wednesday night and do one of our venture U classes and

teach. Those are the people that are saying I'm willing to come alongside you

and walk this spiritual journey with you. I have the heart of an evangelist,

so I love seeing people respond to faith. And if I've ever met

with you after you have begun the journey of following Jesus, I always tell

you this. It's almost depressing when I say it. I remind you that

you're on this like spiritual high. But eventually this wears off. And what

I mean by that is, if you had marriage problems before Jesus, professing

faith in Jesus doesn't make your marriage problems go away. That if you had

financial problems before Jesus, professing faith in Jesus doesn't make them go away.

The life still goes on, the world still happens around you, and you

need to realize that problems are still going to come. You still faith the

same challenges with Jesus that you had without Jesus. Again, hopefully your perspective

with which you faith problems be begins to transform as you begin to transform into

the image of Jesus. But those problems are still there, Jesus. In

one of the other versions of this in Mark, he described it this way.

He said that there are still others, like seed sown among thorns.

They hear the word, but the worries of this life, the deceitfulness of

wealth, the desires of other things to come. Did you notice that those

are the same things you wrestled with before Jesus, You'll still wrestle with them

afterwards. He said, Sometimes those things choke the word, making it unfruitful.

You got to be willing to live life with people and lovingly warn them

when you see outside forces coming. Like the biggest disservice we can do to

anybody that's beginning a journey with Jesus is telling me everything from this point forward

is gonna be great. I mean, you still deal with the exact same

things you've always dealt with, but you have hope for your future. So

I love you, I love all of you that are watching online. I

love you that are listening to this podcast. And I'm gonna warn you that

the next six months are gonna be full of extraordinary tension because we are in

an election year and you are about to experience the longest election cycle that America's

ever experienced with two of the least popular candidates ever. You're gonna have people

that are gonna try to divide you. They're gonna say things like, if

you vote for this person, you don't love Jesus. There's gonna be people

that say, if you vote for this person, you're a racist, and

they're gonna try to get you to draw a line. There's gonna be people,

some of you are gonna be frustrated with me that I am not publicly

endorsing a candidate. You're gonna be mad at me that I'm not putting a

pamphlet, a voter pamphlet on your car when you leave on Sundays. I

why am I telling you this now? Because this can be a thorn that

can choke away your faith if you let it. This can be that sun

that burns down and destroys a plant because you don't have deep roots. So

I'm lovingly warning you now that it's coming. And when it comes, I

get to say I told you, But you and I always fall back to

the same thing. Our job is we're a farmer and we sow seed,

and ultimately, what is that seed declaring, Come on now, it is

not declaring the hope of the world is the political process. It is not

declaring the Messiah is a man that we're gonna elect as now, what we

are declaring now the seed that we sow is Jesus is the hope of the

world, not some political process, not the economy, not the stock market,

not some innovative, creative ceo. Hey, God hasn't chosen a man

to be the Messiah. It's King Jesus. He's the Messiah. So for

us election year, economy goes up, economy goes down, good times,

bad times, It doesn't matter what it is. We sow the same seed.

We make Jesus famous. Period. Jesus is the hope of the world.

Well, Brandon, who do you want to be the next president?

I don't really care if presidents come and go. I just want you to

vote, But I want you to put your hope in Jesus. And I

want that to be the message that we share because that's our job as farmers.

That's the seed that we sow. We want to make Jesus famous.

He is the hope of the world. He is King, he is Messiah,

he is the answer and He's not just the answer for me and you

is the answer for everyone. So let's tell everyone. When you came in,

one of our ushers handed you a top five card. I shared with

you the stat It's so vital that you get it. Eighty five percent of

people. This stat, by the way, is only moved by a couple

percentage points over the last twenty years. Eighty five percent of people say if

someone invites me to an Easter service, I will attend. We're telling you

about Easter today because Easter's in March this year. Did you know that that

crazy March Like it's still gonna be oppressively cold and wet outside, and Easter's

gonna come. Easter is supposed to bring hope and life and blooming, and

we're gonna look outside and think I'm still depressed. But still Easter is two

months from today. You need to start getting ready for Easter. So I

want you to think of who are the five people that I I'm gonna invite

to Easter. And I don't want you to write people off because maybe they've

said no in the past. You just seek the heart of God. And

by the way, he's not gonna tell you I only want you to ask

one. He's probably gonna want you to ask fifty, but will challenge you

with five. So who are the five people that you are gonna pray for

and look for the opportunity to invite to an Easter service? Again, statistically,

eighty five percent of them will say yes if they're invited. So you

take about a month and you pray for these people that you're gonna invite,

and then once March comes around, you start looking for the right moment to

give him an invite card, to send him an email with a link to

the church website, whatever it is we are gonna do to make this as

easy as possible. Five Easter gatherings at our central campus alone. Between all

of our campus is, we'll have about fifteen different Easter gatherings. We're also

gonna do our Passover meal. If you think they would enjoy that more than

an Easter service, just invite them to something. We're also going to do

a good Friday service. So, if you want to be technical, seven

opportunities for you to invite someone to something at the Central campus the week of

Easter. You got no excuse, and you understand what your job is,

You're a farmer. You plant seed, you plant it everywhere, You plant

it as liberally as you possibly can. Good. All right, everybody,

grab this card, stand up on your feet. I want to pray for

you. Close your eyes, Lord Jesus, right now, I pray for

each person in our church, for those here live, watching online, listening

to this podcast in the weeks to come, that you would burn in their

minds and in their heart the image and names of people they need to invite.

God. I pray that they wouldn't say that person's rejected the message before,

but they would say, God changes the quality of soil. I'm gonna

trust him, and that you'd burn these names on their heart. And Lord,

that you would give them the courage and the boldness to ask the question

and to invite them. Pray that each person in our church would do this,

and that this place would be full seven times Easter weekend. And Lord,

I just humbly ask right now that people would come to know you on

Easter. And God, we give you all the glory, all the praise,

all the thanks, all the credit, knowing that before anyone responds,

you make it grow. It's not us, it's you, and we thank

you for that in Jesus' name Amen,