Rain Fall

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Lessons, Proper 10A: Genesis 25:19-34; Psalm 119:105-112; Romans 8:1-11; Matthew 13:1-9,18-23

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The Irish poet, Dora Sigerson Shorter, has a poem titled “Rain after Drought”:

All night the small feet of the rain / Within the garden ran, And gentle fingers tapped the pane / Until the dawn began. The rill-like voices called and sung / The slanting roof beside; The children of the clouds have come;  / Awake! awake! they cried. Weep no more the drooping rose  / Nor mourn the thirsting tree, The little children of the storm  / Have gained their liberty. All night the small feet of the rain  / About my garden ran, Their rill-like voices called and cried  / Until the dawn began.

It was a historically dry winter and spring. The drought that struck Florida beginning in 2025 didn’t arrive suddenly — it carved itself slowly into the land over nine relentless months. It left the soil brittle, reservoirs shrinking, and ecosystems strained. By February 2026, the crisis had peaked—cracked earth, stressed crops, and communities living under tightening restrictions. Late May finally brought widespread, somewhat persistent rain. It didn’t erase the drought, but it changed the story. The soil drank deeply, lakes lifted, and long‑silent wetlands stirred again. Even now, with about 63% of Florida still under drought conditions, that rainfall remains a turning point—an early sign that renewal is possible, even after months of scarcity.

THE PROPHET SPEAKS

The prophet Isaiah spoke a promise as concrete as rain falling on drought‑stricken soil:

"God’s word will accomplish what God intends; it will not return empty."

That assurance was spoken to a people who had nearly forgotten how to hope. Judah had endured decades of Babylonian domination—Jerusalem razed, the temple burned, leaders deported, families scattered. Life in exile was not only geographic displacement but spiritual disorientation. Babylon wanted Judah to believe that empire was the only possible world, that coercion and consumption were the only imaginable future. Into that despair, Isaiah announced a different future—God’s future, which included Israel’s emancipation from Babylon! Israel’s emancipation from Empire! Such was not merely a political reversal; it was a signpost that pointed also toward cosmic emancipation, an unveiling of a world freed from every empire that crushes and coerces.

“You shall go out in joy and be led back in peace.”

The prophet imagines creation itself erupting in celebration—mountains singing, trees clapping—as if the land recognizes that human liberation and cosmic renewal belong together.

FAITH AS RADICAL ACCEPTANCE OF NEW LIFE

"The Sower at Sunset" by Vincent van Gogh, 1888 (Public Domain)

This is where Isaiah meets Jesus. Matthew’s parable of the sower stands in that same field of hope. Jesus scatters the word of the kingdom with extravagant generosity, trusting that even in a world shaped by empire, some seed will find good soil. Both Isaiah and Jesus insist that God’s word is not fragile. It is like rain—quiet, persistent, unstoppable—soaking into the cracked places of human history until new life breaks forth.

In Matthew 13, Jesus tells a story about a sower who scatters seed with reckless generosity. Some seed falls on the path, some on rocky ground, some among thorns, and some in good soil. The seed is the word of the kingdom—the same word Isaiah says will not return empty.

But Jesus presses the question: Will we receive it? Faith, in this parable (indeed, in all of Matthew’s presentation of that concept), is not merely some intellectual assent. It is not “believing” that God exists or that Jesus teaches wisely – as if God needs that from us. No, faith is the acceptance of a radical promise—the willingness to stake one’s being on God’s alternative. It is saying, with Isaiah’s exiles, “We will trust the God who leads us out in joy.” It is saying, with the good soil, “Let this word take root in me, even if it disrupts everything.”

It is a clear choice that we have to make! Empire offers only one kind of life: competition, fear, exploitation, coercion. Babylon offered it. Rome offered it. Nazi Germany offered it. Empires ancient and modern have offered it. Our own world offers it – maybe in subtler ways, but those ways are equally as destructive.

God, in Jesus, offers another kind of life: freedom, covenant fidelity, love of neighbor, justice, belonging in community. Isaiah calls it joy and peace. Jesus calls it the kingdom. For Matthew, faith means choosing this life – the life that God offers. Faith is letting the seed fall deep enough to change us. Faith is saying yes to the summons into God’s alternative world.

Understanding the Word and Bearing FruitJesus says the fruitful hearer is the one who “understands” the word. But in Scripture, understanding is never merely cognitive. It is relational, embodied, lived. To “understand” the word is to let it reshape our desires, our loyalties, our habits, our imagination.

Isaiah describes what that fruit looks like: joy, peace, singing mountains, clapping trees. Creation flourishing because humanity flourishes. A community where the hungry are fed, the thirsty are satisfied, and the poor are welcomed to the feast without price. Matthew describes the fruit as thirty, sixty, a hundredfold—an extravagant harvest of lives transformed by God’s alternative world. Both texts insist that fruitfulness is not accidental. It comes from receiving the word deeply enough that it becomes the organizing center of our  lives. It comes from trusting the promise deeply enough that we begin to live as though God’s future is already arriving.

THE WORD THAT FREES US

Isaiah’s exiles could have stayed in Babylon. They could have accepted the empire’s story as the only story. Many did. But some heard the word, trusted the promise, and walked into freedom. The crowds around Jesus could have dismissed the sower’s seed as unrealistic. Many did. But some heard the word, trusted the kingdom, and became disciples. And now the word is spoken to us.

God is still sowing. God is still speaking. God is still calling us out of the empire of this world and into the kingdom of God. The question is not whether the seed is powerful—it is. The question is not whether the promise is trustworthy—it is. The question is not whether God’s word will accomplish its purpose—it will. The question is whether we will receive it.

Will we let God’s word root itself in us deeply enough to free us from the habits of empire—fear, scarcity, competition, self-protection? Will we let it grow into the fruit of covenant fidelity—love of neighbor, generosity, justice, belonging? Isaiah imagines mountains singing. Jesus imagines fields bursting with grain. Both imagine a world transformed by the word of God. And both imagine that transformation beginning in the hearts of those who dare to trust the promise.

May we let God’s word make us signs of cosmic emancipation—people whose lives hint at the world God is bringing into being. May we be good soil. May we bear fruit. May our lives become small but unmistakable signs that the God who freed Israel from Babylon is still freeing the world even today.