Steven Furtick - Death by Distraction (03/07/2017)
In Matthew 13's Parable of the Sower, the preacher warns that distractions snatch, scorch, choke, and sabotage the good seed God plants in our hearts, stealing focus from our mission just like Jesus stayed laser-focused despite constant pulls—calling us to guard our hearts so the Word bears real fruit instead of dying by distraction.
Welcome and the Focus of Jesus
Well, welcome to church today. I'm so grateful you could make it. It would be really different to preach if you weren't here. And I'm thankful for the opportunity to study God's Word together. Are you excited to study the Bible today? Your posture says a lot. Your posture says a lot. And when you come before God with an expectant heart and leaned in and listening, I just believe that He's able to do so much more in your life.
So I invite you now to give your attention to the Gospel of Matthew today. My text comes from the 13th chapter of the Gospel of Matthew. If I wanted to be really official, I would say the Gospel according to St. Matthew, the 13th chapter.
One of the most underappreciated attributes of Jesus, from my perspective, is His sense of focus. Because when we talk about Jesus, we're usually quick to run to the fact that He was merciful, and certainly He is. And thank God for it. And that He's loving and compassionate. But I think we often miss just how focused Jesus is and was, especially as recorded in His earthly life, how focused He is and was on His mission, and how determined He was.
Jesus' Unwavering Mission Focus
If you ever study the Gospels, and I would advise you to do it, don't take my word for it. Just go through and notice all of the times that people tried to get Jesus off of His mission. Not just His enemies, they certainly attempted that, but it's His disciples even. One time, Peter came to Him and said, Hey, Lord, you don't need to die. This should never happen to you. You're a king. Come on. Kill all the bad guys. Don't die yourself. And Jesus responded to that, Get behind me, Satan. So, Peter is now somehow associated with Satan, because he said, Jesus said, You don't have in mind the things of God, but the things of men.
And so, any time that Jesus saw someone more mindful of the things of men than the things of God, He would put that behind Him and move forward in His mission. When they were trying to get Him to come down off the cross and save Himself, it was the one thing He could not do. Technically, He could have, the Scripture says, He could have called legions of angels to come and stand at His side and obliterate darkness. But He couldn't save Himself because He was saving us in the act of giving Himself. And He never lost His focus.
When they tried to get Him to defend Himself, it says that He was silent as a sheep before the shearers, as a lamb going to the slaughter. He didn't say a word. He was focused. I admire this about Jesus. And I seek to emulate it.
I consider myself a pretty focused person in some areas. I would say when it comes to leading this church, when it comes to our mission, what we're called to do, I have a pretty good sense of focus. I have to. I mean, if I weren't focused, I would have quit by now, or certainly toned things down quite a bit, because everybody has an opinion about how you ought to do everything.
I don't know if you've seen this bumper sticker, but God loves you, and everybody else has a wonderful plan for your life. So you better learn to focus if you're going to get anything done in this world. Amen, somebody? Amen. Amen.
The Historical Meaning of Distraction
In my studies this week concerning this passage I'm about to read to you, I came across something. It may seem bizarre, but stay with me. The Europeans... This has already started kind of weird. This is a hard transition. They had some pretty ingenious forms of torture that they invented and implemented in the Middle Ages. It's not just soccer that they torture us with now.
In the Middle Ages, they had many forms of torture, barbaric and sadistic, yes, but brilliant. In one of them, they would take the victim and tie each of their limbs to a different horse. So there would be four different horses that would pull the victim. In different directions. Now, this practice, as barbaric as it is and as uncomfortable as it may be for you to look at this artist rendering, had a particular name that the French would call it. And you're not going to believe what the French used to call this form of torture, where they would drag the victim to death in four different directions. The French called it distraction.
I'm not making this up. And when I read about that and studied about that in conjunction with the text that I want to share with you today, I decided to preach a sermon to you. The title of this sermon is Death by Distraction. Death by Distraction.
And I want to preach to you a little bit about the things that pull our attention and our focus from the things that matter most. Are you easily distracted? I'm not. I'm somebody who can just stay on one thing for a long time. But I do notice that we live in a world where so much of our attention span is being murdered by multitasking.
Modern Life and the Cost of Distraction
Death by Distraction. I thought this might be a helpful topic. Since we live in an age where all of the information in the universe fits into our pocket. I thought it might be helpful to just preach a sermon about death by distraction.
Do you have any idea how many things in your life have died that you never even knew came into your life because you were too distracted to see them coming? How many moments you and I missed this month because we were too distracted to see them? And often we spend our time in church asking God to give us blessings. And I think a lot of what needs to happen sometimes when we come here is that we would actually get our eyes fixed on the blessings that are already before us and get our focus off of the distractions that have come to rob us from those blessings.
You know, Jesus says something really interesting in John chapter 10 verse 10. It's one of the most famous verses in the Bible. He said, the thief comes only to steal and kill and destroy. He comes to destroy. He comes to destroy your life. And yet he doesn't destroy your life at gunpoint. He doesn't destroy your life in a way that you can see. He destroys by distraction.
Tell somebody next to you, say, the distractions are killing you. The distractions are killing you. Come on. It's killing your focus. It's killing your mind. It's killing your peace. It's killing your opportunities. It's killing your joy. It's killing your relationships. It's killing your career. It's killing what could have been. It's killing what might be. It's killing you. It's death by distraction.
Feeling Pulled in Multiple Directions
Is it just me, or do you ever feel pulled apart? Sometimes, even while I'm preaching, I'll feel distraction. I'll be looking around the room, and I'll actually get distracted by the expressions on different people's faces. Some people look so bored while I'm preaching. Speaking of distraction, how am I supposed to preach over that?
Now, what you need to know is that I staged for that phone to ring while I was preaching struggling. I want you to have an illustration of what it's like trying to live in the world, trying to parent in a world of distractions, trying to be pure in a world of distractions, trying to be focused and praying, serve God, and just get by… In a world, I'm pulled apart, and I'm going this way and that way.
It's one thing to be distracted by the bad things. I get that, but sometimes I'm being pulled apart by four different things that are all really good. I want to interact with my kids, but I also have to get this sermon ready, and there is a phone call that needs to be returned. I want to pray and seek God, but I also have to handle some business every once in a while. I'm distracted. I'm pulled apart, and this person wants something, and that person wants something, and they expect something.
And I'm distracted, and I feel like maybe I could be good at one thing if I could only do that one thing, if I could have my day in blocks and hours, if life came with a do-not-disturb button like the iPhone, if my kids had a button on their forehead just so I could slide it and do not disturb, I just need 90 minutes and no one not watching Frozen again, because Daddy needs to focus. I don't care if you want to build a snowman. I need to prepare a sermon destroyed by distraction.
The Parable of the Sower Begins
Fortunately for us, Jesus has some things to say about distraction. I pick up in verse 1, Matthew chapter 13. Scripture says, That same day, Jesus went out of the house and sat by the lake. Now, I'm kind of ADD, so I'm distracted by that phrase. That same day, I want to see what happened earlier that day.
So I went back to Matthew chapter 12, and I looked at verse 46, and it says, This is what happened that same day. While Jesus was still talking to the crowd, his mother and brothers stood outside wanting to speak to him. This seems important. Your family wants to talk to you.
And someone told him, Hey, your mother and brothers are standing outside wanting to speak to you. And he replied to him, Who is my mother and who are my brothers? Pointing to his disciples, he said, Here are my mother and my brothers. For whoever does the will of my Father in heaven is my brother and sister and mother.
It's fascinating. Not only was Jesus unwilling to be distracted by his enemies, he wouldn't even be distracted by the people closest to him from the mission. Now, if you're sitting next to a teenager, tell them, Please, for me, don't try this at home. Your mom wants to see you. I must do the will of my... No, you must go to your mom. Okay? Who is my mother? The one who pays your light bill. The one who wiped your butt. That's who your mom is. Amen.
Jesus Teaching in Parables
But I'm pointing out that before we get into this passage where Jesus is going to teach us about a distracted heart, we see the master dealing with his own distractions, good distractions. But his focus is exemplary for our lives.
So, that same day, he went out, he sat by the lake, and there was a large crowd. Verse 2 says, Such large crowds gathered around him that he got into a boat and sat in it while the people stood on the shore. And then he told them many things in parables. In parables.
Elsewhere in scripture, in fact, later in this chapter, we read that he did not speak to them without a parable. So, when he would speak to the crowds, he would tell them a story, a parable, to illustrate a spiritual meaning, so that they would have to get beyond the physical story and into the spiritual depth, so that only those who listened with spiritual ears could hear what he was saying.
And he taught them in many parables, and this is one of them. He said, I love this image because it's just an image of how life is. It's just scattered. The seed is being scattered. Do you ever feel like, you know, you try to get all your seed in a row, but when life hits, it's just scattered just everywhere, no matter how many plans you make, no matter how much you try to organize it?
It says that life is like a farmer who went out, and Jesus is speaking to an agricultural society, so he's putting it in the context of their everyday life that they would understand. And he said the farmer went out and started scattering the seed. And as he did, some fell along the path, and the birds came and ate it up.
Some fell, verse 5, on rocky places where it did not have much soil, and 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, Jesus says, fell among thorns which grew up and choked the plants. Still other seed fell on good soil where it produced a crop a hundred or sixty or thirty times what was sown. Whoever has ears, he says, let them hear. Whoever's really listening and focused, let them hear.
Jesus Explains the Parable
I'll skip a few verses because Jesus is now explaining in verse 18 and following to his disciples what he had stated to the crowd. He's explaining it to them because they're a little slow, like us, and so he's having an after-class tutoring session.
He says in verse 18, listen to what the parable of the sower means. When anyone hears the message about the kingdom and does not understand it, the evil one comes and snatches away what was sown in their heart. This is the seed sown along the path.
The seed falling on rocky ground refers 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 persecution comes because of the word, they quickly fall away.
The seed falling among the thorns refers to someone who hears the word, but the worries of this life and the deceitfulness of wealth choke the word, making it unfruitful.
But the seed falling on good soil refers to someone who hears the word and understands it. This is the one who produces a crop yielding a hundred or sixty or thirty times what was sown.
Four Conditions of the Heart
The way I've always heard this parable explained is that each of the four different types of soils in this passage represent four different types of people. Some people are like that seed among the path that gets snatched up. Some people are going to hear the gospel and won't respond to it. They won't pay attention to it. It won't sink in. They'll go on with their lives.
Some people are going to be like that second type of soil. There are four different kinds. The second type of soil where they spring up quickly, they get excited, they may lift their hands in worship, they may get baptized, they may make some kind of decision, they don't follow through. It's too hard.
The third type of person, they're too consumed with the world. They're too worldly. They're just too focused on things of this world and they get choked out. And then there's the fourth kind of person who we all kind of silently want to believe that we are. That hundredfold return. Touch somebody next to you, say, I'm good ground.
Yet lately I've been wondering, is this really a description of four different categories of people or does this describe four different conditions of all of our hearts at any given time? Like, is it possible that at 9 A.M. I might be the one who is good soil, but by noon I might be kind of rocky and by three o'clock the thorns might be choking me to death? Is it possible that in the course of any given day I might be all four types of soil?
Well, Jesus is describing the condition of our hearts. What I'd like to do in the spirit of the four horsemen of European torture, I'd like to talk about these four different distracted states of heart. And I'd like you to prayerfully consider with me today how your own heart might be distracted from the great things that God wants to do for you.
First Distraction: Snatched by the Path
In this parable, we see several different results. And the first one Jesus says is that a certain type of seed falls along the path and what happens to it? Write this down if you're taking notes. Number one, it gets snatched. Everybody say snatched.
It gets snatched. Like before you can even get home from church, snatched. Before you can even write the notes, just snatched. Just snatched. Have you ever had something snatched out of your life by distraction?
I know I'm a young man, but I'm starting to understand that every year I live, it gets a little more difficult to carry a thought from the time it hits my brain to the time I need to act upon it. In fact, I found it difficult to even carry a thought from the time it hits my mind to the time I can put it in Evernote on my phone, because it gets snatched.
Because I'm writing down to study about Moses, but then autocorrect changes it to milk, and then I remember that we have none. So it gets snatched. It's just snatched. Jesus says along the path as you're living your life, there is a function of the enemy where he wants to snatch the good stuff before it has the opportunity to bear fruit in your life.
A farmer went forth and sowed seed, and the seed was scattered, and some of it got snatched. Now, all up in your life last week, seed was scattered. Opportunities were given. Responsibilities were assigned. Moments were created. There were times where you could have engaged with somebody. There were times where you could have blessed somebody. There were times where you could have helped somebody. There were times where you could have grown in some way. There were times where you could have dug down deep in something and really made a difference. But before you could do it, here came the birds, and it got snatched.
Does anybody know what I'm talking about? You're all looking at me with blank faces like you're zen masters. But I know what it's like for something to get snatched. And the crazy thing about a seed getting snatched is you never even know what it could have been because you only saw it as a seed, and then it got snatched, snatched, snatched.
In everyday life, Jesus said… As a matter of fact, I find this very modern. He said, There are these birds of the air that, if you let them, they'll snatch the moments of your life that matter with things that are ultimately insignificant. Snatched. Just snatched.
Instead of engaging around the table with people you love, your family, you're checking with your thumb on people you don't even know on social media. What happened? Dinner just got snatched.
Some you are supposed to talk about with your teenager who is struggling and trying to figure out how to make sense of all of this. It just got snatched. It got snatched. I'm convicted while I'm preaching this to you because I'm thinking about all the birds that fly around in my mind. Some visible. Some invisible. Just snatching stuff. Just snatching opportunities. Just snatching potential. Just snatching.
You know this will happen when you leave church today. You're going to hear this word. The seed gets sown, and you won't even make it out of the parking lot before this thing gets snatched. Somebody is going to make you mad and cut you off, and the seed gets snatched.
You know what the devil would hate is for you to leave church and actually have a conversation about the sermon. He wouldn't know what to do because you've never done it before. Okay, so now we're solving problems. This is why I come to church and I hear stuff, and it doesn't work. Not because the seed wasn't good. The word was good. But you let it get snatched. You let the bird come and take it. You let the next crisis come and take it. The next responsibility. The next obligation.
Here, try this when you leave church for just four weeks. Do it for four weeks. When you leave church, ask the people you came with, if you came with someone, So what did you feel like God was speaking to you today? Just try that. Instead of, where do you want to go to eat? I mean, go eat. You don't have to fast. You don't have to check into a monastery. But just have just a little conversation.
I feel like I'm playing duck hunt in here just trying to shoot some birds out of the sky in your life today. Because I know as soon as I get done preaching, here they come to snatch it, to snatch it, to snatch it. Here comes encouragement. But no, you can't get it. You snatch it, and snatch it, and snatch it.
How many times has something been snatched out of your life in seed form before it ever even had a chance to make a difference and bring a harvest? It's a distraction. Distractions. Distractions. Technology. I praise God for it. It makes our lives insignificantly efficient. More productively distracted than ever before. We are now officially distracted with the highest quality content in the history of humanity. Congratulations to us.
I'm so burdened by this for us because there's so much good stuff going out over your life. And if you don't hear what I'm saying, you'll think there's something wrong with the seed. There's nothing wrong with the seed. It's the birds that are coming to snatch it that are keeping your life from bearing much fruit. Distracted. Distracted.
He said, the seed gets snatched. Touch somebody and say, don't let that bird snatch your seed. He'll do it. He'll do it. You will. You'll sit there. You know what? It's even in little ways too. You'll sit there on Netflix and instead of watching a movie, spend two hours looking for a movie to watch. Now you don't have time to watch a movie anymore. What happened? Your date night just got snatched.
That's why at the beginning of this year, I took all social media off my devices. I'm not saying you have to do it, but you know what's fruitful about this? Holly told me, I like you better this year. To me, that's a worthwhile trade. My wife likes me better. That means she hugs me more, kisses me more. We have more time for other, more fruitful things. Prayer and Bible study and devotion. Come on.
I'm talking about going from just good to best and refusing to let the stuff that is significant get snatched by stuff that seems urgent that really doesn't matter. Don't let... I've got to hurry. I've got to hurry. I've got to hurry.
Second Distraction: Scorched by Shallow Roots
Number two, he says that there's some seed that gets scorched. It gets scorched. The sun comes up. The problem with this seed is it's tricky. It looks good. Look. Verse five. It fell on rocky places where it didn't 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.
This is for all of us who are living life at a superficial and shallow level. And so, we're very busy, but we're barren. I said we're busy, but we're barren. Busy, but barren. I should do a whole sermon called busy, but barren. I'm not going to today, but in the future, watch for it. You can remember. I remember when he came up with that on the spot. Busy, but barren.
You returned all your text messages. Didn't say nothing. LOL emoticon. Didn't say nothing. You found out what the person you went to high school with that you didn't even talk to in high school. You found out what they ate for lunch. Don't even know who your kids are hanging out with.
Oh, I'm sorry. I shouldn't say these things. It's just that I preach out of the overflow of what I'm dealing with. And lately, I've been seeing that so much of what I focus on is stuff planted in shallow soil. And this is problematic because it has the appearance of life, but it isn't life. It has the appearance of productivity, but it's not productive. It has the appearance of life, but it has no root.
Root represents commitment. Root represents what you're really anchored to, tethered to, tied to, and tenacious about. So many of us are so unrooted. And that's why we're so easily distracted. Because we have no guiding sense of principles or priorities to make our decisions by. And it shows up in all kinds of ways in our lives.
Some of you have been saying for five years, ten years, how I'm going to get a little healthier. I really need to do something about my health. I really need to get it under control. But you have no root. What I'm saying is you haven't ever really committed to doing what it's going to take to make the steps toward that goal being a reality.
Anybody has a birthday in the office and you eat a cupcake. Anybody. Joe in finance. Never met him. Give me a cupcake. It's his birthday. I'll start the diet Tuesday. This makes no sense. There's no root, see? There's no root.
The first time that your toe is hurt because you stuffed it on the coffee table, you're on the DL for seven weeks. You don't come back to the gym. Your season is over. What happened? You never got rooted.
I'm using fitness as an example because we can all relate to it, but I could just as easily talk about uncommitted church members. Now, if you're here today, I'm not talking about you because you're here. This is for all the people that are watching online later in the week because you didn't come because Johnny might have had a fever. His forehead wasn't hot, but he was sweating a little bit. Or he looked like he might.
You would be surprised how little it takes for some people to just miss church. No root. No root. No root. No, I don't understand it. If you're here, you can enjoy this. You can clap. Nobody will know you missed last week. This is your first time here in seven weeks. Just pretend like you come every week. Just act like you sit in that same seat every week.
Because this is for somebody who you wake up on Sunday mornings and you have a conversation with your kids. Do you want to go to church today? I don't get that. What are you doing asking a 13-year-old if they want to go? Why are they occupying the corner office in your house anyway? You want to go to church today? Are we going to... That shouldn't even be a conversation.
Are we going to go to church this week? Well, you know, my boy Bobby, he's playing soccer. I can get him around. He's got a travel team. And so that's why, you know, we can't be there. Can I tell you something about Bobby's soccer future? Bobby is not turning pro in soccer. He's not. I know he had a coach one time when he was nine. The coach said he had great potential. He's not turning... Bobby is mediocre at soccer. He'll be lucky to play in college. He won't get a scholarship.
And you've run him around all over three different states, teaching him that soccer is more important than the house of God. You better get that boy rooted in the house of God. You better teach him there's some priorities. There's some stuff that matters in this life more than soccer, more than... Oh, my God, I'm preaching about root systems. What's so wrong with soccer? That's twice you've cracked on soccer in the same sermon. What's your deal?
I'm not talking about soccer. I'm talking about seeds that get scorched, because we didn't plant them deep enough. No priorities. No sense of values. This is what we do in this family. This is how we don't talk about people in this family. We're rooted. This is how we respect others in this family. This is how we put God first. This is how we give. This is how we do. This is how we show up and fulfill our commitments. This is how we do what we say we're going to do.
Then you wonder why when Bobby's 30 years old, he's not in church and been through two marriages. You taught him that everything else was more important than God. What did you expect? The sun came out. This is a nice little holiday weekend message just to make everybody feel better. And the sun comes out. And the heat comes on. And the seed gets scorched. Because it had no root. Scorched. Snatched. Scorched. Scorched.
Third Distraction: Choked by Thorns
What's the third thing? The seed that gets choked. The seed that gets choked. He says that the seed falling, verse 22, among the thorns refers to someone who hears the word, but the worries of this life and the deceitfulness of wealth choke the word, making it unfruitful.
Can I work on that phrase for a moment? He said the worries of this life, the worries of this life. Put it up on the screen. He does not say the responsibilities of this life. That's not what's killing you. It's the worries of this life that's choking you out.
Some of us are not distracted by things that are actually happening in our lives. We're distracted by our interpretation of the things that are happening in our lives. So we're not actually... And this is brilliant. If I were the devil, I would play this hand all day long. He can destroy you by distracting you and not even have to do anything to you, just make you think it might happen. That's right.
He doesn't even have to deploy any demons. All he has to do is to get you... He said the worries of this life have the effect of suffocating or choking your soul. Now you're so distracted by what happened Friday that you can't let go of that you can't focus on what you got to do Monday. Choke. Choking. You're choking. Choking on the worries of this life. Choking on the decisions that your kids might make that they haven't even made. Choke, choke, choke, choke.
The enemy is so brilliant about this. By the power of auto-suggestion, he'll get you thinking about stuff. And once he gets your mind going that way, it's impossible for you to... Get a breath... Choking. The worries of this life is choking you out. And you've got a distracted mind. You've got a distracted mind.
I came to a conclusion a couple of... I guess two or three years ago. I was thinking about all of the things that had worried me up until that point in the history of the church. And I realized, after I listed them all out, that 95% of the things that had worried me the most had never even happened.
And I decided to begin the process of trying to buy back my bandwidth so I can focus on reality as it is, rather than my paranoia and schizophrenia about the future as it may be. The worries of this life. Some of you, it's not what's happening to you that's choking you. It's how you're thinking about what's happening to you that's choking you. You could change your mind and it would change your life even if your circumstances didn't change at all. You need to come up for air. You're choking. You're being destroyed by distraction.
It's not people that are distracting you. It's not things that are distracting you. It's not appointments that are distracting you. It's all up here. You're choking up here. You're choking on the thoughts. The worries of this life.
And there's another thing. The deceitfulness of wealth. When we read this, it says, It says, The deceitfulness of wealth will choke the word, making it unfruitful. And I know what I think, and you may think it too. Yeah, that's for Mark Cuban, and yeah, that's for Donald Trump, and yeah, that's for magnets and serial entrepreneurs and people with billions.
But you know what I found out? I have a lot of stuff too. I found out that a lot of people will sit right there in their seats and say, that's right, money is the root of all evil. The Scripture doesn't say that money is the root of all evil. It says that the love of money is the root of all evil.
I've met people who don't have any money who are way more obsessed with money than people who do. Haven't you? So here's how it works. Wealth is a gift from God. Every good and perfect gift comes from him. If you have it, he gave it. Without him, it wouldn't be possible.
But it's when it tricks you and you begin to think that the stuff can satisfy that you begin to choke. Because now I need more stuff for more satisfaction. And now I'm living in a place where if I could just get more... You know, I've seen a lot of parents who ran all around this world trying to make more money to give their kids more stuff and never gave them what they needed most themselves. Choking. Choking. Choking.
Thinking that more stuff will satisfy. I've used this example before in the church, but I want to use it again. You know, I get a lot of speaking invitations to go outside of this church and preach. Sometimes I go, but usually not. Usually the automatic answer is no. And I'm going to tell you why. Because I don't want to be a shell up here because I gave too much out there. This is a priority for me.
Secondly, there are three children by the name, Elijah B., Graham T., and Abby Faith. Okay? One of them is eight. One of them is six. One of them is three. When I get invited to go preach somewhere, it's an opportunity that would make me more popular. It would actually probably be a great blessing to go, and I know God could use me. But it's deceitful, see? It's deceitful.
Because there's a sense in which I could get so caught up in going out to share the seed of the Word of God with the world and my own family be starving at home because daddy's not there. It's a trick, see? I found this out because I'd be in a hotel room somewhere, and my kids would be back home playing baseball, and Holly would be sending me a video clip of them playing baseball, and I'd realize it's not the same watching it on the iPhone.
If I'm watching it on the phone, I can't scream, Come on, boy. Get that ball. I can't scream. Come on, boy. Get your head up. I can't scream. Come on, boy. Quit swatting the gnats and focus on the ball. I can't scream. Come on, boy. Don't sling your bat. I got to be there.
And you know what? If I don't go preach, somebody else will. But if I don't stand on the third baseline, no other dad can. I'm not bragging to you. I'm just saying to you that I could have been anywhere in the world I wanted to be last week preaching. Anywhere in the world. We get invitations from all over the world. Switzerland, Cape Town, anywhere in the world preaching. But I'm so glad that I wasn't, because I was at the Mint Hill playoffs, coach pitch.
I got to see Elijah hit one right over the shortstop's head and round first base and make it to second. I got to see Graham, the catcher. You know, usually the catcher in coach pitch doesn't do much, but Graham decided he wanted to catch him a foul ball. And I got to see my six-year-old pop up like a major league player and stretch his glove out and catch the third out. And I got to pick him up and swing him around that field and say, you go ahead with your bad self, Evan Gattis. Come on, somebody.
And I'm glad I didn't miss that. And God wanted me to come and say to some parent today, you're missing that. You're missing that. Don't miss that. You can get more money, but you can't get eight years old back. You can't get that back. Graham's only going to be six once. Abby's only going to be three once. Please, Lord Jesus, let her only be three once. I can't take it twice. I only got this once, and I won't miss it.
I refuse to miss it. I'm not going to let the cares of this life make me miss it. The deceitfulness of popularity make me miss it. I'm focused on something. I want something. My faith is pointing towards something. I'm seeking for something. I got my eyes on something. There's something that matters to me, something worth sacrificing for. I'm not going to choke.
Touch somebody. Say, I'm not going to choke. I'm not going to choke. I'm not going to choke. Come on, give somebody next to you the Heimlich and say, don't choke, don't choke.
So it's the seed that gets snatched. It's the distractions along the path. It's the seed that gets scorched. It's the persecution, the beating down of the hot sun. It's the seed that gets choked. It's the thorns. It's the cares. It's the seed. That's three.
Fourth Distraction: Sabotaged by Weeds
I said there would be four. But the fourth soil is the one that bears the good fruit. You know, a hundredfold, sixty, thirty-fold bears the good fruit. That's what we want to be. So that can't be the fourth distraction.
So let's look. Let's look at Matthew 13, 24. You know, Jesus tells this parable and he finishes that parable and he transitions into another one. It's very short. And it's a different parable, but he's making the same point.
And he says, the kingdom of heaven is like a man who sowed good seed in his field. The seed was good. What kind of seed? What kind of seed? Quit complaining about the opportunities and start paying attention to the soil. God is giving you good seed.
In your Bible, this is called... the parable before this is called the parable of the sower. I don't really think it's the parable of the sower. The sower sowed the same kind of seed. It's the parable of the soil. Soil. The person sitting next to you may have way more stuff distracting them, but may be doing a much better job managing it because their heart is good soil. Good soil.
And he said that the man came and sowed good seed. And listen to this phrase. He says, verse 25, but while everyone was sleeping, his enemy came and sowed weeds among the wheat and went away. And when the weeds sprouted and formed heads, then the weeds also appeared.
This is the seed that gets sabotaged. You have a destiny. I don't know if anyone's ever explained this to you before. I don't know if you had a dad who explained this to you or a mom who explained this to you or a teacher who saw it in you or a coach who put it in you. Or if life has beaten it out of you, but you have a great destiny.
Things that you are supposed to do. The scripture says that we are born again by incorruptible seed of the word of God. The seed of God is in you. Let us make man in our own image and according to our likeness. He reproduced after his own kind. God put his seed in you. You have a great destiny.
But Matthew 13 says you also have an enemy. And your enemy loves to catch you sleeping and plant weeds among the wheat. It is a sabotage. Distractions in the midst of destiny. While they were sleeping, an enemy came and sowed weeds among the wheat.
So the enemy can't take away your destiny. He can only plant something next to it that will keep you from recognizing it. Weeds among the wheat. This is why pornography is such an epidemic in our young people today. Because our enemy sees their destiny. And so he says, maybe if I can get them looking at stuff while they are too young to know what it is doing to them, later in life, it will choke out the harvest before it ever has an opportunity to arrive. Weeds among the wheat.
See, God is always scattering, planting, blessing, opportunities. But there is an enemy. It is distraction. It is lust. It is perversion. It is greed. It is offense. The enemy sees your destiny, so he says, I know what I will do. I can't take away their calling. But maybe if I can let someone offend them and they will let that root of bitterness grow down in them, maybe it will choke out the love in their heart and they won't be able to function in the world and they will isolate themselves. It is wheat. But there is a weed.
Now I am confused because I see the wheat and the weed and I don't know which one is which. An enemy did this. Did you notice the men were quick to recognize? They said, An enemy did this. It was the work of an enemy. This comes from the devil. He is the master of distraction.
He wants to get your eyes off of what matters, so he wants to put a seed in your marriage to take root. He wants to put a seed in your mind. No, he can't get you to leave your wife yet, but maybe he can make you start thinking about what it would be like if you did. And then the enemy says, He went away. because now he has planted the seed. He doesn't have to make it grow. He planted it. And now you are watering it.
You wake up in the morning and God has a plan to bless you that day and the enemy says, You know what I think I will do? Before they have the opportunity to really get a mindset for this day, I think I will frustrate them on 485.
She said, You know what I will do? When they walk in the office determined this week that it is going to be a better week, I will make sure that Sue looks at them just right. Just right. Just plant that seed. I will make sure they don't get the compliment that they needed from someone so they will feel insecure all week. And now they will overeat all week because they are burying the insecurity about the weight they needed to lose that nobody complimented them on that they lost over the weekend. and they will gain it all back plus one.
I planted the seed. I went away. My job here is done. Just a seed. They won't even see it. They are sleeping. This is why we have to wake up, church, to the distractions all around us. And don't let your enemy catch you spiritually sleeping. He will wreck your field. He will wreck your family.
He wants to get you so busy that you won't be on top of it, that you won't see it going down right under your very nose. It's happening right beneath you, and you don't see it. Here you go. When we come to church, God, the Master Gardener, he has this way of uprooting the stuff that doesn't belong there. He has this way of getting down. He gets beneath the surface of why things are wrong in your life, and he pulls it up, watch this, by the root.
He says, I'm going to take the stuff. If you'll let me, if you'll cultivate your heart, if you'll get your focus back on me. You know what Jesus said the greatest commandment was? He said, To love the Lord your God with all your heart, not with a distracted, divided, sometimes I'm in, sometimes I'm out, when the sun comes up, I get scorched by the heat, not with a noncommittal, indecisive faith.
He said, If you will love the Lord your God with all your heart and all your soul and all your mind and all your strength, he says, I want to bring back a sense of focus to your life. Paul said this one thing I do. Forgetting what is behind me, I can't help what the enemy planted in my past, but I can stand here in my present, and I will press toward the mark for the prize of the high calling.
I have a destiny. I refuse to let distractions keep me from my destiny. I refuse to let this sidetrack me from stepping into my purpose. I refuse to let this devil destroy my family while I'm sleeping. I'm awake now, devil. I see what you're doing, and it won't work this time because God's about to uproot some stuff and pluck some stuff and burn some stuff. It is... Come on.
Don't you want your mind back? Don't you want your joy back? Don't you want your peace back? Aren't you sick and tired of being so distracted that you can't see straight? It's too much. The thief comes to kill and steal and snatch and scorch and choke and sabotage.
But Jesus said, I came that you might have life. Let this seed live. Let this thing sprout. Bring forth. I put miracles inside of you. I put destiny inside of you.
It's time to come standing to your feet at all locations. A farmer went forth and sowed seed. That's what I've been doing for the last 55 minutes as I preach to you today. Sow and seed. Seed of the Word of God.
Why don't you take a moment before you rush out of here and get distracted with the next thing that won't matter. and get distracted with the next thing that will be there waiting for you when you leave anyway. Why don't you just take a moment and seal this seed of the Word of God in your heart with worship.
Would you bow your head and close your eyes at every location? Can we pause for a moment in His presence and acknowledge that we've been distracted? That in many cases we've left our first love. that we've had no root that we've run here and there. that we've run aimlessly. that we've been carried along with the wind and driven back and forth like a wave of the sea. Come on but in this moment our focus our attention turning to you Jesus come Holy Spirit. come Holy Spirit to aid he the time I'll have a in wrote we've opened.