The High Cost #4 - Seed
We're looking something Jesus said in Holy Week, but it's important to recognise what happens BEFORE and AFTER He says these words.BEFORE
- He'd been anointed by Mary with oil and perfume (Symbolic of burial preparation)
- The Triumphal Entry
- The arrival of the Gentile Believers seeking Jesus
AFTER
- He commits Himself to fulfilling the words He speaks by going to the cross
- He asks that God would be glorified (Through the Son's submission to the Father's will)
- God speaks for the third time from Heaven saying: "I have glorified it and I will glorify it."
| Very truly I tell you, unless a kernel of wheat falls to the ground and dies, it remains only a single seed. But if it dies, it produces many seeds. Anyone who loves their life will lose it, while anyone who hates their life in this world will keep it for eternal life. Whoever serves Me must follow Me; and where I am, My servant also will be. My Father will honor the one who serves Me. (John12:24-26) |
And so the high call to discipleship continues.
A wheat kernel (a small tiny seed with a hard shell) goes into the ground and dies.
There in the ground the hard kernel cracks open and a full wheat plant (locked up in the dna of the seed) begins to grow and many seeds will be made by the one seed.
Then Jesus says it another way...
Anyone who loves their own life (too much) will lose it.
Anyone who hates their life will keep it...
The word for "hate" is "miseo" and is almost always used in the context of priorities.
When you chose option A as your priority, you are effectively "hating" (miseo-ing) option B.
Why does Jesus place such a high call before us?
Why such a high cost? Why is such a radical departure from an old life needed?
The clue lies in Jesus' analogy.
A wheat kernel is small, hard and insignificant. But it has the DNA of a full wheat plant in it.
In a broken sinful world, we are also small, hardened by sin and irrelevant because we follow our own agendas BUT we are created in the image of God. We are created for more.
Our old lives need to die.
Stone hearts need to become flesh.
The old clothes of worldly ways need to be taken off and a new self put on (See Col.3)
When the old dies, the new can come.
The context of these important words about discipleship is vital: Jesus uses this analogy in Holy week with Gentiles believers present, making the gospel universal and with the full delight and approval of God the Father. He's heading for the cross to die for the world.
By ourselves we can't die to old self and arise as a new self.
But Jesus' death and resurrection has made germination/regeneration/transformation possible, because the power of the Holy Spirit now works in you and me...
