Seeds of Kindness | Bob Merritt

God so loves every one of you that he sent his son to die on this cross that whoever, look at this phrase, whoever believes in him, this does not mean, oh yeah, I believe there's a God. Doesn't mean that. What this verse means is this, whoever puts their full faith in Jesus Christ as their Lord and Savior, whoever trusts him with their life, whoever repents of sin and asks Jesus into their life with the intent to follow him the best they can, that's what it means to believe in him. Well, good to see you Embrace at all campuses. Glad you made it to church. It takes an effort sometimes to get to church and that says something about who you are, that you made the effort to get here at all of our campuses. Those watching online as well, glad that you could dial in. I am Bob Merritt. I am from the Twin Cities. Please don't hold that against me. I think that South Dakota is my second home and thank you for adopting me at least for a little while. I spend quite a bit of time in your state, mainly pheasant hunting and other things like that. Hey, when I was a boy, we grew up, I grew up in Julian, Illinois and our backyard bumped up to a yard that was surrounded by thick, tall bushes and it was like a fortress to us little kids and during those five years that we lived there, we never once met or even talked to or even got a look at the people who lived on the other side of those bushes. They were Greek people, we knew that much. The old man's name was Mr. Angelopoulos and we kids could never see this mysterious man on the other side of the bushes. All we could see was the top of his straw hat, some cigar smoke from his stogie and an occasional garden rake that he would use to whack down on top of the bushes to kind of shoo us kids away when we got too close to his bushes. He got a little jumpy at times whenever we'd shoot our BB guns or build a little grass fire too close to his bushes or snap off one of his branches and whenever one of our baseballs or soccer balls sailed over his bushes, he never threw them back. We lost dozens of balls during those five years but instead of walking around to the front of his home and knocking on the door and asking for our balls back like normal people would do, we would stick a firecracker and a crabapple. We

would toss it over the bushes and just run like idiots. He would yell some Greek cuss words but not once did he or we come around those bushes to speak to each other. He was probably a very colorful man with a wonderful Greek wife with Greek food but we were a mystery to each other and honestly gang, there is a part of me that still sees people as these mysterious creatures on the other side of the bushes and though I don't toss firecrackers at people as much anymore, my natural bent is really to mind my own business and avoid people. As an introvert, that's kind of how I feel. It's not natural for me to walk around the bushes and attempt to build a relationship with someone and it's really not natural to try to start up a conversation about matters of faith with people. Even though Jesus tells those of us who are believers we're supposed to be salt in this world and light in this world, my normal bent is to mind my own business and let people make their own decisions about God and faith. Well, Jesus tells a parable in Mark 4 that's really helped me kind of get a handle on this and it's about a farmer who is sowing seeds and in those days farmers didn't have machinery that planted seeds and nice neat rows, they just had a bucket of seeds or a bag of seeds that they would scatter with their hands. I want you to see how Jesus tells this story, he's describing four different kinds of people in Mark chapter 4. He says 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 thorns, which grew up and choked the plants so that they did not bear any grain. Still other seed fell on good soil. It came up, it grew, and produced a crop multiplying thirty, sixty, even a hundred times more."

Now, four types of soil in this parable represent four kinds of people. People who are hard, thorny, rocky, or those who have a soft heart. Some people have hard soil. Some people have a hard heart. So the seed, the seed of God's Word, of God's truth, just kind of bounces off, and there's no plant that starts to grow. Some people are like this, by the way. They're just hard-hearted. There's nothing you or I can say or do, really, to change or to affect or impact someone who has a hard heart. Jesus says others have rocky soil, where the seed sprouts up quickly. You know, they get excited when they hear God's truth, but it soon dies off because the soil is just shallow and very surfacy. The Bible says others have receptive soil, but it's so full of thorns, it's so full of weeds and thorns that it chokes out the growth. Jesus says it this way in another verse. It gets choked out by three things, the worries of life. I worry about everything. Do you worry about things? You know, spiritual growth can get choked by just this worry in life or the deception of wealth. Nothing wrong with wealth, but we tend to want to have wealth do what it can't do.

Some of us think that wealth is going to solve my problems, going to take care of the emptiness in my soul, but wealth can't do that. So sometimes, though, the spiritual growth in our life gets choked out by the deception we think that wealth will do for us and the desire for other things. And again, this can happen to any of us. It happens to me to get so consumed by worries, wealth, and stuff that it crowds out what God wants to do in my life. But then Jesus said, some seed falls on good soil, it takes hold and produces a hundred times more than was sown. Is God producing things like love, joy, peace, kindness, goodness in us? That would be a sign that you have good soil. But Jesus' point is there's really nothing you or I can do about the condition of somebody else's heart. All we can control on our end is really the sowing part. But when I came to this part in my message preparation, I began thinking about, but what does sowing seeds really look like, practically speaking? And as I thought about this and prayed about this, honestly, I think it looks a lot like love. Really.

1 Corinthians 13, Paul gives a definition of love. He says love is patient, love is kind. By the way, love is primarily a behavior, not a feeling. These are behavior words. Love is patient. I have never once felt like being patient in my entire life. Never. Not once. I'm very impatient. It's very difficult for me to be kind. Kind is a behavior. It's a choice of the will. I need to tell myself, Bob, be kind here. Be patient. He goes on to say love keeps no record of wrongs. That's the forgiveness piece. It doesn't keep score. Oh, you wronged me. I'm going to get you back. That's what I want to do. That's my feeling. But love is a behavior. It's a choice. I'm going to choose to not keep a record of how many times you crossed me. Sowing seeds, friends, is less about what we say and more about how we love. So at some point, those of us who are Christians have to stop throwing firecrackers,

I'm talking to myself here, and start tossing seeds of patience. You're never going to feel like being patient, but tossing seeds of patience, kindness, and forgiveness, because if we start doing that, people are going to encounter Jesus in us, and some of them will come to faith. My wife and I used to vacation in Palm Springs, and there's a very private golf course out there called Stone Eagle. And I tell you, I just absolutely obsessed over wanting to play golf. play this golf course, but it was so private. It was just out of the question. I would get glimpses of it from a hiking trail that was across the canyon, and I just dreamed about playing on this course. But then, Lowland Bevericks, whose house we used to stay in out there, said to me one day, "'Bob, do you ever want to play Stone Eagle sometime? "'We have a friend who belongs there.'" And I'm like, you've got to be kidding me. You just have no idea how badly I want to play this course. Can we play tomorrow? And so he called his friend, Kelly Cadwalder, who's the member out there, and Kelly's a trucking friend of his, and I'm telling you, right out of the gate, I knew this was going to be interesting.

I heard more cuss words than normal words all before the first tee, but we were on Stone Eagle, and Kelly was paying. So I thought, man, cuss away, I'm good. About the eighth hole, at the eighth hole, Kelly asked what I did for a living. And I said, didn't Lowell tell you? He said, well, are you in trucking? I said, well, I like trucks. I thought, if I tell him what I do, he'll never invite me back, and I just can't take that chance. Well, on the 12th hole, he said, you still haven't told me what you do. When I finally told him I was a pastor, he almost drove the cart off a cliff. No kidding. He said, you're a bleeping priest? I said, yeah, kind of. But the following year, the following year, Kelly invited us back again, and the year after that, he paid and cussed, and off we'd go. And at first, all I cared about was the golf. But along the way, something very unexpected happened to me. I began caring for him. He'd gone through some health scares. He lost a son in a very tragic death. So this past summer, Kelly texted,

and he was in town, the Twin Cities, and he asked me if I'd join him and his son and his grandson for golf in a nearby town, and I hadn't seen him in three years. But I can tell you, driving over to the golf course that day, I had this unshakable prompting from God to talk to Kelly about his faith. And I'm like, I don't want to do that. But the prompting was there. The nudge was so strong in my spirit that when I got to the golf course, I gave him a hug and I said, Kelly, after our round today, I want to talk to you about your faith. I said, I don't want to get to heaven someday and have God chase me down and say, Merritt, I put this guy in your golf cart 10 times. How come you didn't tell him about me? I said, Kelly, I don't want to have that conversation with God. So after the round today, we're going to talk about this. You're good? He said, good. He paid and cussed and off we went, no kidding. After the round, we went into the clubhouse for drinks. This was the moment. Sat down right across from Kelly. I said, Kelly, I'm going to walk you through some verses in the Bible,

and I'm going to show you how you can know God, how you can have your sins forgiven, how you can get a peace that the world doesn't give. I said, you okay with that? He said, yep. I took him to Romans 3, 23. All of us have sinned. I said, Kelly, I've sinned, you've sinned, especially you, you've sinned. We've all sinned and fallen short of God's standard. Romans 6, 23 says there's a penalty for sin. Bible says the penalty for sin is death. We're all going to die a physical death. That's part of the curse. That's part of the penalty for sin. And gang, there was a death. God sent his son, Jesus Christ, to die on our behalf, to pay for the world's debt of sin. Only the precious, perfect son of God could pay for the debt of just the sin in this room. My sin. Only God could pay for that. And God did by sending his son. But there's also the fear or the possibility of a spiritual death. We all die physically, Kelly, but there's this thing called a spiritual death. Some people will be separated from God for all eternity because they don't put their faith in him. They're walking away from God.

Bible says there's a penalty for that. But the verse goes on to say the gift of God is eternal life through Jesus Christ. Why did God send his son? Here's the reason, John 3, 16, because God so loves you, Kelly. God so loves every one of you that he sent his son to die on this cross that whoever, look at this phrase, whoever believes in him, this does not mean, oh yeah, I believe there's a God. Doesn't mean that. Oh yeah, I believe there's a man upstairs. Doesn't mean that. Oh yeah, I believe there's a, what this verse means is this, whoever puts their full faith in Jesus Christ as their Lord and Savior, whoever trusts him with their life, whoever repents of sin and asks Jesus into their life with the intent to follow him the best they can, that's what it means to believe in him. They will have eternal life. And then Romans 10, 9, Kelly, if you confess with your mouth, if you believe this, that Jesus is Lord, you can be saved. So I said, Kelly, can I lead you in a prayer right here in the clubhouse at this golf course and you can receive forgiveness and peace and eternal life when you die? And he said, yes, and I just couldn't believe it. I said, well, here's the deal, here's how this is going to work, I'm going to pray a prayer and I want you to repeat it after me, just we'll go word by word. So I'm going to pray, dear Jesus, Kelly, and you just say that, dear Jesus, okay? He says, yep, dear Jesus, dear Jesus, thank you for loving me.

Thank you for loving me. Thank you for coming to this earth to die and pay for my sins, and he repeated that. Right now I put my full faith in you, Jesus, as my Savior and Lord, thank you for saving me for all eternity, amen. I looked up and Kelly's eyes were soft and moist. The bravado was gone. I reached across the table to shake his hand and as he held my hand, he said something I will never forget as long as I live. He said, Bob, why did you wait so long? Why'd you wait? I was just afraid. I said, Kelly, I said, this is just the start. This is the beginning. The Bible says you've been born again. We've all had a physical birth, but the Bible says you need to have a second birth, a spiritual birth, and you've done that right now with this prayer. So you're just a baby. You're just a baby Christian, and you need to be fed, and you need to grow, and you need to be cared for every single day. If you don't do that, you'll starve to death. I said, there's three things you got to do. You got to go to church or watch online. There's no excuse in today's world. You got to dial into a church every single week. Second, you got to read God's love letter to you every single day. If you just read this once a week, you're going to starve and make a mess of your life.

You got to get into God's word. Start with Proverbs. Start with the book of John. Don't start with Genesis or Leviticus. It's too hard. Start somewhere else. Start in the Psalms. And then the third thing is prayer. You got to start praying. Learn how to pray and learn how to trust God in this. Friends, a couple weeks later, Kelly sent me a picture of him and his wife, and I think it's his mother-in-law. They were standing in the lobby of our church back in the Twin Cities, taking a step towards spiritual growth. I am telling you, there is nothing on the planet that compares to sowing a seed that can change somebody's life. Real quick, I want to give you six observations about what I learned and what I'm learning about sowing seeds of kindness and love. The first thing I'm going to tell you is that love has a speed, and it's slow. Love is never in a hurry. I'm always in a hurry. But I've noticed Jesus was never in a hurry. Gang, love has a speed, and it's almost never convenient. You've heard someone say, hey, I'd love to talk to you. I'm like, oh, man, not now. That's like the worst time. It's always the worst time. Love takes time.

Second, love puts a higher value on a person's eternity than our fear. Friends, at some point, I just have to push aside my fear and realize that if I don't say or do something, there's a chance that this person is going to spend eternity separated from God and heaven. That if I really believe that God sent his son Jesus to die for our sins, and I absolutely do, and if I really believe that Jesus is the way, the truth, and the life, and that nobody gets to heaven except through faith in him, then will I love this person enough to deal with my fear and try to point them to Jesus? I'm embarrassed by this, but the reason I waited so long with Kelly is I was just afraid, and I cared more about that than his eternity. I have to get over that. Third, those who have God's love give God's love. In fact, only those of us who have God's love can extend God's love to somebody else. You can't give something you don't have. 1 John 4, 19, we can love those of us who are believers because He first loved us. We can extend God's love to others because He did that for us. We can be kind, as hard as that is. We can be kind, patient, and forgiving. Why? Because God was kind and patient and forgiving to me. Question, did God love us because we were lovable? No. Look around. We're completely unlovable. I am. I'm unlovable. Romans 5, 8 says God showed his love for us in that while we were still sinners, while we were still messing things up, running away from God, God showed his love in spite of that by sending his Son. Did Jesus love and die for us because we were good? No. He loved and died for us because we were bad. I'll just be honest. There's a lot of people I don't like, really, because they're not good. Some people are abusive, dishonest, vile. The truth is, though, I don't have to like somebody in order to be loving toward them. Aren't you glad you don't have to like everybody? I'm pretty sure Jesus didn't like the Pharisees, but he showed love because it's a behavior, patience, forgiveness. We can show love towards someone who is unlikable because God first loved us.

He was kind and patient and forgiving toward us. So, those who have God's love, find a way to extend it. Fourth, love always embraces the truth. This is so important. Sowing seeds of love towards someone does not mean you agree with their lifestyle, does not mean you agree with their beliefs. John 1.14 says Jesus came full of love and truth, both. Not one or the other, but a hundred percent of love and a hundred percent of truth. And because he's a hundred percent love and a hundred percent truth, God hates certain things. Psalm 45.7, God loves righteousness, but he hates wickedness. Because God loves righteousness, he hates things like rape, child abuse, killing the unborn. He hates dishonesty. He hates fraud. He hates lawlessness because of what those things do to people. Psalm 97.10 goes on to say those who love the Lord also hate what is evil. So, gang, when you begin to hate what's evil, that's actually a good thing. When you begin to discern right from wrong, evil from good, that's a good thing. It's a sign that God's love is growing inside you. Frankly, it's why some of us throw things at the television every night during the news because of what evil does to children and marriages and families and cities and even a country. Sowing seeds of kindness and love does not mean we ignore the truth. Love embraces the truth. By the way, not my version of truth, not your version of truth. Some people say, well, that's just your truth, or this is just my truth. That's baloney. There is a truth, and it doesn't change. There is a right, and there is a wrong, and it doesn't change. It doesn't matter what politics you have. There is a truth. Jesus said, I am the way. I am the truth, and if you follow the truth and live by the truth, it will set you free. Gang, there is a truth, and Jesus is the embodiment, and God's word is the living spoken word of truth. Fifth, love compels me to prepare. I have Romans 3, 23, 6, 23, 10, 9, and 10 memorized because if I don't have those verses, which is locked in my memory, I'll be unprepared for these kinds of conversations. 1 Peter 3.15, always be prepared to talk about your faith. It's a kind of a scary verse, but we should be thinking about how to do that. And then when we get prepared, pray for opportunities to sow a seed. You know, one of my daily prayers these days is,

Jesus, help me to see what you see. Help me to feel what you feel. Help me to love what you love. That simple prayer gets me in the right mindset to see what Jesus sees, to feel what he feels, to love what he loves. Is there someone God might want you to see or begin caring for or extending love towards? Someone maybe in your classroom. I can guarantee there is somebody in your classroom who would love for you to see them. To just be kind. Maybe somebody in your boardroom, your workout class, your golf cart, your hunting group. Most of us, by the way, most of us probably will not walk somebody through these three verses, and that's okay. But what if we just cracked open the door to the possibility of sowing a seed and see what God does. Maybe for some of you, it's just texting someone to say, hey, there's a new series coming up at our church. I'd love to have you come. Dang, Easter's two weeks away. Every single one of us can do this. Just text a friend or a colleague or a classmate and say, hey, Easter's coming. I'd love to have you join us at Embrace. I'll look for you, I'll sit with you. That's an easy seed to sow. I think we'd be surprised at how many of our friends

are just waiting for an invite like that. Finally, respond to Holy Spirit nudges. Remember I told you that day with Kelly, I had this unmistakable prompting from God. I couldn't ignore it. That doesn't always happen. But if you sense a spiritual prompting from God, just this nudge inside your soul, don't ignore that. Make a bold move. Speak up. See what God does. You'd be amazed. Scary thing to do. Eight weeks ago, I was hunting pheasants near here on South Dakota. And I walked over to the breakfast buffet in the Super 8 Hotel. And there was nothing super about that. But my friend Scott and I sat down and walked a 24-year-old kid who was completely alone. And so I asked him if he was traveling and he was on his way from the oil tracks in North Dakota to visit his mom and sister in Oklahoma City. I just felt this prompting from God, this gentle nudge. Want me to see what you see, Jesus. Want me to feel this moment. Want me to love this kid like you would. So I asked him his name and he said, my name is Lanson. He did four years in the military.

His exact words were, you know, I'm just trying to figure life out. Nice kid, respectful. I said, Lanson, you don't know me, but would you mind if I prayed for you? He says, well, I'm not very religious. I said, I'm not either. I said, I just believe there's a God who loves us and wants a relationship with us that'll change our life. I said, come on over, let me pray for you. He grabbed a seat next to me and I put my hand on his shoulder. I said, God, thanks for Lanson here. It's not an accident, God, I believe that we met this morning. Would you let him know in a tangible way that you love him and are with him? God, protect him as he travels. Give him a good time with his mom and sister, amen. I said, Lanson, I know of a church in Oklahoma City called Life Church. Craig Groeschel is a friend of mine, he's a senior pastor. He says, yeah, I think I've heard of it. I said, why don't you look him up online, start listening to Craig's messages. He said, yeah, I could do that. What if, what if God had me at the Super 8 Hotel in Huron that morning? Just to sow a seed with a kid who God loves

and wants to rescue from sin and fear and shame. and death. And what if someday this skinny kid from Oklahoma, who's a little lost, starts listening to Craig Groeschel at Life.Church? He finds Jesus, who fills that emptiness in his soul. And then what if someday he chases me down in heaven and says, do you remember when you prayed for me at the Super 8 hotel in Huron, South Dakota? I'm just crazy enough to think that that could happen. I'm praying it does. Love has a speed. It takes time. Love puts a higher value on a person's eternity than our fear. Those who have God's love have an ability to extend it. Love always embraces the truth. Love always prepares. And love responds to Holy Spirit nudges. As we close our time today, I just want to challenge all of you to pray this prayer every morning this week. Jesus, as I start my day today, help me to see what you see. Help me to feel what you feel. Help me to love like you love. Some of us came to church today hoping

that someone would see you, that someone would care about you, that someone would extend love toward you. We all need that. I need that. If you've never experienced God's love, that's where it begins. So let's pray a real quick prayer. Father, we open our life to you. Thank you for your word. Thank you for this truth. Right now, right here, Lord Jesus, I am putting my faith in you. Thank you for dying for me, for loving me to that extent that you would die a cruel death and raise from the dead. Would you fill me right now, Lord Jesus, with your love? So I don't feel so empty and so lost and so broken. Rescue me. Save me. Fill me with your love. In Jesus' name, amen. Great day, everybody. Thanks for having me come. Appreciate it. Hey, friends. It's Adam from Embrace. If today's message encouraged you, be sure to hit the subscribe button

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