INTRODUCTION
You saw the announcement on the television. There's going to be a competition for people your age. Hundreds of prizes. It's supposed to be really easy - hardly a competition at all - but you can't quite decide what to do. Is it worth joining in?
After tea, a couple of your friends come round and you have a talk about it, trying to come to a decision together. The TV programme you heard it on is one you often watch, so the offer should be OK. It seems you've just got to gather some information together, send it in and then you should be able to win one of the prizes. One of your friends says it's just a trick. It can't be worth it. After all, who's going to give you something for nothing? He decides to have nothing to do with it. Another is a bit more positive. He says he'll think about it later on and maybe send something in. After all, if you don't join in, you can't win, can you? Well, that hasn't helped you much. What are you going to do? You leave things for a while and all do something else for the rest of the evening.
In fact you think about things a lot for the next 24 hours. You don't think it's a trick, or a useless prize - after all, you know it's a good TV programme and you trust the presenters. In the end you decide to get the information together and send it off. It doesn't take you long.
A while later, when you've almost forgotten about it all, a parcel arrives - it's the prize! You're a winner! You ring your friends. Obviously the one who didn't do anything won't have won, but the other one...? You know he did some work on it... Oops. Turns out he never sent the reply in... Wonder what they'll do next time?
KEY VIDEO CLIP
Episode 3b: Catacomb Rescue
PRAYER
The world around us is full of opportunities for things to grow. It's not just in the fields and gardens: even in the smallest flat in the centre of the busiest town there is room for a flower pot where, if we care for them, seeds can push their way to life and eventually burst into leaf. Thank you for the opportunities we have to make things grow in our fields, gardens, parks and flowerpots. Thank you, too, for the opportunities we have to grow in ourselves, to respond to the good things around us. Help us to be able to see them and accept them.
Amen.
MUSIC
'I planted a seed' No.134 in The Complete Come and Praise
BBC, 1990 ISBN 0 563 345810
NOTES
In Storykeepers, the Parable of the Sower is told by Helena just after Ephraim, the travelling storyteller, has left to carry his story to other Christians. The two episodes combine to give a strong sense of how the gospel message is spread and its possibilities sown to bear fruit where the ground is receptive. The episode has the general theme of 'Neighbours and Friends' so contains a further underlying message about how loving friendship is also a way of sowing seeds that can produce a harvest of kindness and good relationships even in bad situations. For another example of this, see the unit on the parable of the Unmerciful Servant.
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