I Know Whom I Have Believed

 Thoughts on the 6^th Sunday after Trinity 2026

Isaiah 55.10–13; Psalm 65; Romans 8.1–11; Matthew 13.1–9, 18–23

There are some remarkable promises in today’s readings, and promises from God are always something you can take to the bank.

God is a God who makes, and keeps promises.

The first one is from our Old Testament reading in the Book of the Prophet Isaiah and it’s a striking one: For as the rain and the snow come down from heaven, and do not return there until they have watered the earth, making it bring forth and sprout, giving seed to the sower and bread to the eater, so shall my word be that goes out from my mouth; it shall not return to me empty, but it shall accomplish that which I purpose, and succeed in the thing for which I sent it (55:10-11).

There’s a guarantee in these words: if we expose ourselves to the Word of God, as we are doing this morning, it will do a work on us, whether we are aware of it or not.

In the Letter to the Hebrews it says something very similar:  For the word of God is alive and active. Sharper than any double-edged sword, it penetrates even to dividing soul and spirit, joints and marrow; it judges the thoughts and attitudes of the heart (Hebrews 4:12).

The words of scripture have a way of searching us out and entering deep into our hearts and minds and bringing about the transformation that is described in the very next verses from Isaiah:  For you shall go out in joy, and be led back in peace; the mountains and the hills before you shall burst into song, and all the trees of the field shall clap their hands. Instead of the thorn shall come up the cypress; instead of the brier shall come up the myrtle; and it shall be to the Lord for a memorial, for an everlasting sign that shall not be cut off (55:12-13).

Soaking ourselves in the scriptures is transformative. I wonder if that’s your experience?

The second promise is in our second reading from St Paul: There is therefore now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus. For the law of the Spirit of life in Christ Jesus has set you free from the law of sin and of death (Romans 8:1).

Now there’s a promise. We are not condemned. Because of Jesus, and what he did, there is NO condemnation for us who are baptised into Christ and partakers of his promises.

We might be judged from time to time when we have gone astray and need to confess our sins and repent of them, but that’s very different to condemnation, from which there is no way back. For us, there is always a way back, no matter what we have done.

Believe it! There’s nothing you can do to take away the FACT of God’s love for you. Nothing.

A little later in his Letter to the Romans Paul labours the point: For I am convinced that neither death nor life, neither angels nor demons, neither the present nor the future, nor any powers, neither height nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God that is in Christ Jesus our Lord (8:38-39).

And finally there’s the promise contained in the Parable of the Sower, from our Gospel reading. Here Jesus describe the Word of God as a seed being sowed on different types of ground and so we get a similar promise but the imagery is different.

In Isaiah the Word is the rain that waters the earth and in the Gospel the Word is the Seed sent by God into the soil of our hearts and minds, where it can take root and fill our whole being, and bring about an abundance of life that Jesus claims will be thirty, sixty or even a hundred times what we have now.

In some way all the promises offer us something abundant; a kind of flourishing. Something that can’t be contained in our limited imaginations.

So St Paul also says that no eye has seen, no ear has heard, and no human mind has conceived the things God has prepared for those who love him (1 Corinthians 2:9).

There’s an old and quite clichéd rhetorical tool that preachers sometimes us and it goes something like this.

Imagine that someone wrote to you and told you that you had come into an inheritance and that they had deposited a huge sum of money into a bank account for you.

They gave you the details: the sort code and the account number and even sent you a debit card (a cheque book for you oldies) so that you can access the treasure that is now legally yours.

Well something’s got to be done in response hasn’t it?

The gift is yours for the taking but you are the one with the wherewithal to access it. You’ve got to take steps and go to the bank or go online. You’ve got to set up a pin and validate the debit card. You’re the one with the keys, so to speak, and unless you use them that treasure will sit in the bank waiting to be put to use by you.

You’ve got a decision to make here. Are you going to believe the good news that you’re now wealthy, or are you going to listen to the voices that tell you that none of it makes sense; that that kind of thing only happens in fairy tales; and that nothing good like that could possibly ever happen to little-old-unworthy you?

Are you going to believe the secular materialist voice that has delivered widespread depression, anxiety and a profound crisis of identity to our generation and our youngsters, or are you going to believe the voice of the Church, and all our forefathers and mothers in the faith, who promise us hope and peace and an identity as the beloved sons and daughters of God?

Are you going to believe that there’s nothing in this meaningless universe but randomness? Or are you going to believe all the saints who teach us that the whole thing is enchanted and full of the presence of God; that there is unspeakable joy available to those of us who do believe it, and that the best way to describe this joy is to say that it’s as if the mountains and the hills have burst into song, and all the trees of the field are clapping their hands.

We are promised, in no uncertain terms, that if we practice our faith, if we  refuse to walk according to the flesh and set our minds on the things of the Spirit that our hearts will overflow with love; our minds with wisdom; our relationships with peace and that justice will reestablish everything in our lives and set it all right.

I believe it. I’m with St Paul, who says: I know whom I have believed, and am convinced that he is able to guard what I have entrusted to him until that day (2 Timothy 1.12).

Let us pray.