On the eve of the Feast of the Immaculate Conception in December 1990, Pope St. John Paul II released his encyclical letter Redemptoris Missio. In it, he wrote about the mission of the Church, the mission of all of us as the people of God, to carry out and bring to completion the mission of Christ the Redeemer, hence the name of the letter. The Holy Father pointed out how the work of evangelization, of sharing the Gospel message of Jesus is far from over because “the number of those who do not know Christ and do not belong to the Church is constantly on the increase.” He stated: “When we consider this immense portion of humanity which is loved by the Father and for whom He sent His Son, the urgency of the Church’s mission is obvious” (RM 3).

The Holy Father tells us: “God is opening before the Church the horizons of a humanity more fully prepared for the sowing of the Gospel. I sense that the moment has come to commit all of the Church’s energies to a new evangelization and to the mission ad gentes [“to the nations”]. No believer in Christ, no institution of the Church can avoid this supreme duty: to proclaim Christ to all peoples.”

That is the mission of the Church. It’s the mission of each and every single one of us as Christian followers of Jesus. It is a non-negotiable. We must do it. BUT, we can’t accomplish that task if we have not first been transformed by the Lord ourselves. If we have not encountered His presence in our hearts, if we have not been changed by His Word, if our hearts have not yet been touched by His love, then we have no experience of the Gospel to share.

In our readings for Mass today, we hear about the transforming power of the Word of God when it is not just read and preached, but most importantly when it is integrated and lived. The Parable of the Sower, which we’ve just heard in the Gospel, is meant to challenge us to listen intently to God’s Word, to read it with attention, to be receptive to its instruction, and to allow our lives to be shaped by its power. But how we receive and integrate the seed that is the Word of God is determined by the condition of the soil of our hearts and minds.

Through the parable, Jesus is explaining to us as His disciples some of the obstacles to the Word of God bearing good fruit. He’s inviting us to see the difference between simply hearing the Word and listening to it. Just as farmers till the soil, we have to be active in letting the Word of God bear fruit in our lives by cultivating the soil of our hearts. Think about it, in order for a farmer to reap a bountiful harvest, he has to prepare the soil properly, to give it nutrients, to make sure it is being watered, to ensure that its pH levels are in their proper balance. For us, the same applies with our hearts. If we want to enjoy a good spiritual yield in life, it depends on how fully and willingly we accept and respond to God’s Word. We can’t experience that if our hearts have anything in them that is preventing us from receiving God’s Word in its fullness.

In the parable, Jesus is the Sower who is coming into our lives trying to plant the seeds of Truth, Goodness, and Beauty, the seeds of faith and trust, the seeds of relationship and communion with God. Jesus uses four different soil-types to represent four separate responses we can give to His saving word. Most of us have all four different types of soil within us – we kind of bounce back and forth between them at times. While we certainly desire to have good soil, we know that there are occasions when we are shallow, like the depth of the soil along the path. There are areas of rock in our hearts where God’s Word has not yet been able to fully take root. There are areas within that are overrun with weeds, where God’s Word is being choked and strangled, not being allowed to reach its full potential. But we also have good soil, where our hearts have accepted God’s Word, where it is being brought to harvest.

The Lord knows this about us. He knows our hearts better than anyone else because He created them; He fashioned them; He shaped them; He holds them in the palms of His hands. He is the One who cares for them. He is the One who can water the soil, to fill it with nutrients, to add fertilizer if we need it. He knows how to adjust the pH levels of sin, of woundedness, of pain, of grief. He comes to us and brings His love and care to those areas, safely pulling out the weeds, giving the good seed space to grow and take root. But we have to cooperate with that grace. The Lord cannot till the soil of our hearts if we’re preventing Him from coming into the garden.

We shouldn’t be afraid of welcoming and nourishing the seed of God’s Word because God has sown it for a good purpose and He will continue to watch over the soil and cultivate it. He may ask for something demanding, but he’ll be with us every step of the way. Tilling and cultivating the soil, removing some of those rocks, might be painful; it might sting. But the Lord never does anything to hurt us. He only has plans for our good, for something beautiful to grow out of our generosity and sacrifice.

The Parables the Jesus so often shared in His public ministry and in His preaching are meant to give us insights into aspects of our daily lives. They’re supposed to help us understand how God meets us in those moments and walks with us on our journeys of faith, journeys that are meant to lead us into deeper relationship with Him. When we look at them in that light, the parables are also supposed to offer us spiritual and divine insights about who God is for us; they provide us with “knowledge of the mysteries of the Kingdom of heaven.” We cannot sit on the sidelines, though. It is not enough to simply look at the door: it must be opened to discover what lies beyond. We have to let Jesus penetrate the depths of our hearts in order for us to be changed.

How do we do that? How do we allow the Lord to come into our hearts? Prayer. Spending time with Him each and every day. If we’re not making Him a priority, if we’re not giving Him the time and the space that He deserves, there is no way that He can till the soil of our hearts; there is no way that He can plant those seeds of faith and trust; there is no way that He can lead us to conversion.

How we respond to the Word of God is the key to how fruitful the Gospel is going to be in our lives. The beautiful thing about our hearts is that the Lord can change the kind of soil that is present within us – if we let Him. God allows the seed to land on the hard paths, on the rocky ground, and in the thickets of our lives in the hopes that in those places it will find a place to mature and bear fruit, that those things which normally hinder growth will be removed, and that the soil may be just a little deeper than it was at first.

Why is this so important for us, though? This isn’t just about our own relationship with the Lord; it isn’t about our own knowledge of who God is and how He is working in our lives. There is much more at stake here. This is so important because of what our faith, what our relationship with Jesus requires of us. Throughout the Gospels we are told, as disciples of the Lord, we must go out and share how the Lord has changed us. We are called to go out to all the nations of the world and to spread the Good News, to bring others to an encounter with the love and heart of Jesus. That’s the mission that Pope St. John Paul II was speaking of in his encyclical. It has always been the mission of the Church. But that mission has never been more important.

We cannot go out and share with others how the Lord has changed our lives and bring others into a relationship with Jesus if we have not allowed Him to change our lives, if we are not in relationship with Him. So, we have to foster that – each and every day.

I want to give us all a homework assignment for this week – myself included. Each day this week, spend 10, 20, or 30 minutes just with the Lord. Share your heart with Him. Listen to what He is speaking to you. Ask for His help in turning away from vices and to embrace virtue. Ask Him to till the soil of your heart. You might just be amazed at how different you are when you come to Mass next weekend.

Here’s the thing – we cannot change the world if we are not good soil, if the seeds of faith are not growing within our hearts and bearing fruit. The Lord needs us to help be little sowers in the world, planting those seeds in the hearts of others. We are called to participate in that. But He has to change us first. Let’s begin to allow Him to do that within us this week so that, in the future, we can share in His saving mission.

Photo: Sprout by Jametlene Reskp. Used under Unsplash license.