Take your Bible and turn to Mark 4, Mark 4. We’re in a series on the Parables of Jesus: Famous Short Stories, and we have about two more to go and then we’ll be done. But this morning we’re come to look at what’s been called the parable of the parables or the mega parable or the mother of all parables, the parable of the sower and the seed and the soil. We’re going to look at the 20 verses of Mark 4, and we’re going to take time to read the text, familiarize ourself with what Jesus says. The name will explain it. That the message is entitled, I’m All Ears, because that’s what this parable demands of you and me, we be all ears when it comes to God’s Word.
Mark 4:1, “And again, he began to teach by the sea. And a great multitude was gathered to him so that he got into a boat and sat in it on the sea, and the whole multitude was on the land facing the sea. Then he taught them many things by parables, and he said to them in his teaching, ‘Listen, Behold, a sower went out to sow. And it happened as he sowed that some seed fell by the wayside and the birds of the earth came and devoured it. Some fell on stony ground where it did not have much earth, and immediately it sprang up because it had no depth of earth. But when the sun was up, it was scorched. And because it had no root, it weathered away. And some seed fell among thorns and the thorns grew up and choked it and it yielded no crop. But other seed fell on good ground and yielded a crop that sprang up, increased and produced some thirty-fold, some 60 and some 100.’. And he said to them, ‘He who has ears to hear, let him hear.’
“But when he was alone, those around him with the 12 asked him about the parable and he said to them, ‘To you it has been given to know the mystery of the kingdom of God, but to those who are outside, all things come in Parables so that seen, they see and not perceive. And hearing, they hear and not understand. This they should turn and their sins be forgiven them.’ And he said to them, ‘Do you not understand this parable? How then will you understand all the parables?’.
“The sewer sows the Word. These are the ones by the wayside where the Word is sown. When they hear, Satan comes immediately and takes away the Word that was sown in their hearts. These likewise are the ones sown on stony ground who when they hear the Word immediately receive it with gladness and they have no root in themselves and so endure only for a time. Afterward when tribulation or persecution arises for the Word’s sake, immediately they stumble. Now these are the ones sown among the thorns. They are the ones who hear the Word. And the cares of this world, the deceitfulness of riches and the desires for other things entering in choke the Word, then it becomes unfruitful. But these are the ones sown on good ground. Those who hear the Word accept it and bear fruit, some thirty-fold, some 60 and some 100.” So reads God’s Word.
I was reading the story of a lawyer and a doctor and a pastor who were out hunting deer. And after some time, this beautiful big buck appeared out in the open, and they all lifted their weapons and simultaneously they shot. And the buck went down and each one of them claimed that they fired the shot that bagged the buck. They were heavy in this debate and dispute as to who actually shot the buck when the game warden happened to come by and they invited him to be part of the conversation and say, “Look, I don’t know if you can help us here, but this buck appeared out in the open. We all lifted our rifles and shot a round about the same time and we’re trying to debate. We’re trying to find out who indeed shot the buck.”
And the game warden went over and after a few minutes of looking at the dead animal, he came back and he said, “I’ve determined it’s the pastor, for sure.” And the doctor and the lawyer said, “Well, how can you be so sure?” “Well,” he says, “as I examined the animal, it was clear that the bullet went in one ear and out the other, so it’s clearly the pastor.” As our story illustrates, every expositor and every exposition faces the possibility of going in one person’s ear and out the other ear.
The fact is we can hear the Word of God without hearing the Word of God. We can hear with our ears without understanding with our minds, without appropriation of the heart. Some people are hard of listening, and therefore as Jesus will teach us in this parable here in Mark 4:1 to 20, they need to keep their eyes on their ears. Because it’s an important part of the Christian life that you and I are all ears when it comes to God’s Word.
The issue of hearing without listening and listening without hearing was one that concerned the Lord Jesus Christ. We can see from Mark 1:14 and Mark 1:38, that the Lord Jesus Christ had begun his ministry preaching the kingdom of God. And Jesus wanted his audiences to listen and learn, not listen and leave unchanged by what they heard.
And we see this concern expressed in the passage before us as Jesus calls us to keep an eye on our ears, chapter 4:9. And he said to them, “He who has ears to hear, let them ‘truly hear’.” The central theme of this parable is the need to hear the gospel of the kingdom. You have this theme in verse 3 of chapter 4. “Listen, behold the sower went out to sow.” Verse 9, “He who has ears to hear, let him hear.” Look at verse 15, 16, 18 and 20 which all referred to those who hear the Word.
Jesus was very much aware that just because someone has a set of ears, it doesn’t mean they’re using them profitably or properly. And so this parable is given to us by the Lord Jesus to challenge us to better listening, better appreciation, better assimilation and appropriation of that which we hear.
Now, let’s put the text in its context, both the wide context and the narrow context. Wide context is this, Jesus wants to remind Israel of the importance of hearing and heeding the Word of God. Jeremiah 5:21, he’s underscoring the fact that obedience to God’s word is the mark of the true believer. Doesn’t he say in John 10, “My sheep, hear my voice and follow me.”
The mark of a true believer is the hearing and heeding of the Word of God, and we see that in the very context of our parable. If you go back to chapter 3:35, we read, “For whoever does the will of God is my brother and my sister and my mother. The Word of God is the will of God, and those who heed the Word of God do the will of God which plans them firmly in the family of God.” Those who obey the Word belong to the family of God. That’s the wider context.
The immediate context is Jesus is still around Capernaum on the shores of Galilee, the size and press of the crowd forces Jesus to use a boat as a pulpit. He teaches them in parables, which was common technique among Jewish teachers. Go back to what we said in our very first exposition on the parables. A parable is a story or an illustration or a metaphor where two things are set side by side by way of analogy. In fact, the word parable in the Greek means to lay alongside. So Jesus in a parable usually takes something that people can readily identify with, an object, an event, something that goes on in their life. And he sets that on the one side, and then he sets a spiritual truth on the other side and he connects those two, the physical reality points to a spiritual reality.
That’s why we get that old statement, a parable is an earthly story with a heavenly meaning. So Jesus here is teaching. He’s come preaching the kingdom of God and one of the means by which he teaches is by parable. Now, I’m not going to get into a little, not a parenthesis, but an explanation in the middle of our passage where Jesus talks about the fact that parables were used, on the one hand, to reveal the truth of God to those who were hungry and attentive to it and it was used to conceal the Word of God to those who were hard of hearing and who were closing their heart to the appeals of God in the Gospel.
If you remember back to our opening study, the parables appeal, conceal, and reveal. If I was to even put that down to two ideas, the parables can be a window or a wall. It’ll be a window now to some and a wall to others. And in our context, the parable of the sower is a wall to the Jewish leadership. It’s implicitly condemning them for not hearing the Word. And it’s a window to the disciples and those who follow the disciples in discipleship. Jesus uses parables as a kind of filter, sifting the wheat from the chaff. So three things, the sower, the seed, the soils.
Let’s move quickly. Here’s a lot to cover in 20 verses, but I want you to see the sower. Jesus draws a picture very familiar to his listeners. It’s an agrarian culture. It’s not beyond the realm of possibility that as Jesus says, “A sower went forth to sower,” that that was happening nearby. Or he’s drawing upon just everyday life and is drawing upon the fact that maybe many in the crowd witnessed a farmer doing his work on their way to hear Jesus. But the point is this, with this familiar picture, Jesus tries to catch their imagination. Jesus tries to hook their attention.
And I find that interesting as a preacher, as a teacher. And if you have any avenue by which you teach the Word of God or preach the Word of God, hey, it can get done. Just when you share the gospel with your children, do it as Jesus did it. Do it imaginatively. Do it illustratively. Try to catch their imagination, try to hook their attention by drawing on things that are familiar to them where you put these ideas side by side, moving from the earthly to the heavenly, from the temporary to the eternal.
Remember, the mind is more a photo gallery than it is a filing cabinet. Great teachers turn ears into eyes so that people can see the truth. Some preachers and expositors have this idea that illustrations or pictures are a concession to weak minds. I don’t believe that. Because as I study the preachers of the Old and New Testament, as I study the teacher of all teachers, the Lord Jesus Christ, as I study church history, illustrations are not a concession to weak minds. They have been used by the best of minds to teach the Word of God effectively.
In his famous book, Lectures to My Students, Spurgeon said this, “God helping me, I will teach the people by parables, by similes, by illustrations, by anything that will be helpful to them, and I will seek to be as thoroughly interesting a preacher of the Word of God.” Seek to be a thoroughly interesting gospel preacher, evangelist, teacher, discipler of children, the sower.
A couple of things about the sower, just this picture in verse 3, “Listen, behold a sower went out to sow.” There’s the picture, it’s the sower with a bag of seed slung over his shoulder, profusely, promiscuously scattering the seed everywhere and anywhere. Unlike modern farming, the farmer of the Middle East didn’t plow first and then sow the seed. They sowed the seed and then they plowed. And so they just profusely, promiscuously scattered the seed. And the seed falls on the path, among rocks, under brush, and on good soil.
The sower, in the context, would have to be the Lord Jesus, wouldn’t it? Because he comes preaching the kingdom of God, chapter 1:14 telling people to repent because the kingdom is at hand. But we can extend that. We can amplify that. The sower is the Lord Jesus and anyone who preaches his gospel after him, that’s you and me. Or we can put it this way, the sower is God through his servants. Christ being the true and ultimate servant. Remember the analogy that we are God’s field. 1 Corinthians 3:5 to 9, “And it is God who gives the increases we plant and we sow gospel seed.”
Now there’s two things just by way of implication, not explicit but implicit. The sower went forth to sow, and given that it falls on different ground and yields different responses, he is just sowing faithfully and far, as faithfully as he can and as far as he can. And I think there’s two implications there. You and I must sow God’s Word. We must share the Gospel faithfully. As we’ll see, the farmer is faithful in sowing the seed. It’s his job to scatter the seed even though the results will vary. That’s helpful.
We can’t control the outcome of our sowing the seed, but we can control our faithfulness and the fulfillment of the necessary call to share the gospel with others. We are to faithfully preach the gospel regardless of the response. We cannot control and we must not manipulate people’s responses or reactions. Our assignment is simply be true and faithful to the proclamation of the gospel and remember that God is responsible for the harvest.
Amen.
1 Corinthians 3:5 to 9, which I just quoted a moment ago, which by the way is a reminder that evangelism must not be confused with fruit. Evangelism must not be confused with fruit. Evangelism must be defined in terms of faithfully sharing the gospel with someone in need of it. Evangelism doesn’t always bear fruit. You don’t have to have a string of conversion stories as part of your biography to be a faithful evangelist or a faithful communicator of the gospel or a man who fulfills the great commission. John Stott said this, “To evangelize does not mean to win converts but simply to announce the Good News irrespective of the results.”
We’ve got to sow the seed faithfully. We’ve got to sow the seed far. There’s an indiscriminate sowing of the seed. The Bible talks about sowing the seed bountifully. 1 Corinthians 9:6, “The sower will fling the seed as far and wide as possible, as generously as he can.” And I love that picture. We can’t go around asking people are they the elect. Spurgeon talks about the fact that we don’t know who the elect are. You can’t lift the shirttail of someone and find the letter E embroidered there. We don’t know who the elect are. It’s our job to scatter the seed and share the gospel indiscriminately to every man everywhere just as God commands them to repent. God is the one who produces the fruit.
Amen.
So we’re to sow faithfully and sow far. We’re we’re not to limit the proclamation of the Gospel. We’re not to profile people in evangelism either, you know? We just share the gospel with whoever God sets in front of us. We’re to touch as many people as possible in any legitimate way possible.
Isn’t that Paul’s heart in 1 Corinthians 9:19 to 23? Where in that section he says, “I have become all things to all men that I might see of some.” I hope you’re all things to all men. I love what John Wesley said, who preached the gospel thousands and thousands of times across Britain and Europe and America. He said this, I like this spirit, it’s the spirit of the sower who went forth to sow faithfully and far. “Do all the good you can, by all the means you can, in all the ways you can, in all the places you can, at all the times you can, to all the people you can as long as ever you can.” I like it. That’s the sower.
The seed. In Mark we see that the seed, as we’ve said already numerous times, is the preaching of the gospel of the kingdom, which was in a state of coming. Mark 1:14, “The seed is the proclamation of God’s Word.” And when Jesus explains this parable, he says in verse 14:4 of Mark, “The sower sows the Word.” So the sower is God through his servants sowing the Word far and near. The seed is the Word of God. People are brought into God’s kingdom. The harvest takes place through the hearing and the preaching of the Word of God. How shall they hear without a preacher? “Faith comes by hearing and hearing by the Word of God,” Romans 10:14 to 17.
Now, here’s the thing that strikes me to keep moving here. There’s nothing wrong with the seed. That the seed in this case doesn’t always bear fruit. In fact, just in preparation for this message, I was listening to an eight-minute video by Greg Laurie, who you know well in the Harvest Crusades that he does all across the country, one famously here in our own backyard at the Angels Stadium. But in that message on the parable of the sower, Greg admits what he has seen. Thousands and thousands of people make a response, not all stick with it, not all are true conversions. In fact, he says if you go in the percentages in this passage, only one in four responses may stick. There’s nothing wrong with the seed. The issue is the soil, which we’ll get to before we’re done. But the thing that strikes me is, here, there’s nothing wrong with the seed. It’s the same seed that’s sown, but the response is different, and that response is occasioned by the condition of the soil, or as it is translated and interpreted, the condition of the human heart that is reached by the gospel preached.
There’s nothing wrong with the seed and everything wrong with the soil. We need to note that, and I’ll tell you why we need to note that. Because there are those today in the church, in the face of our cultural context of spiritual barrenness, diminishing interest in the gospel who want to question the place and power of preaching. But such thinking is inverted because in this parable, guys, Jesus teaches that man will not believe the Word and man will not receive the Gospel because their hearts are calloused, casual, crowded. According to Jesus, there’s nothing wrong with the Gospel, so preach it faithfully and share it far with the confidence that God will not all allow his Word to return void. It’s the soil, not the seed.
Yet many today in the contemporary evangelical church want to say that people are ready to hear the Word if we’d only preach the parts that address their felt needs. And if we’re going to preach, we need to preach in a way that’s more conversational and positive. Out with the pulpit and in with the stool. Out with teaching and in with talk. But guys, that’s upside down. That’s back to front, that’s inverted.
Listen to H B Charles, who’s preached here at Kindred and I count a friend, he said this, “We are not to manufacture seed, and we’re not to modify the seed. We’re to take the seed as it is and sow it. The power is in the seed, not in our wisdom, resources, programs, talents or effort. We’re not spiritual scientists who have been commissioned to go into the laboratory and find a way to create better seed. We are just farmers who have been commissioned to take the God-given seed and plant it in the hearts of people. The seed will do the rest.”
That’s a good word. It’s a reminder, isn’t it, of what Martin Luther, the Protestant reformer said in answer to the question, “What do you put the success of the Reformation down to?” He gave a longer answer, but I’m going to give you the shorter answer. He said this, “Take myself as an example. I opposed indulgences and all the papists, but never with force. I simply taught, preached and wrote God’s Word. Otherwise, I did nothing. And while I slept,” which is a reference to another parable of Jesus later in Mark 4:26 to 29, “and while I slept or drank Wittenberg beer with my friends, Philip and Amsdorf, the Word so greatly weakened the papacy that no prince or emperor ever inflicted such losses upon it. I did nothing. The Word of God did everything.”
The sower, the seed, the soils, the soils. This is how the parable explained in verses 13 through 20, although the explanation begins with a mild rebuke from Christ regarding the disciples’ spiritual dullness. This is the parable of all parables, the mother of all parables. We believe there’s some 60 parables in the Gospels, and this one needs to be understood if the others to be understood.
Look at verse 13. “Do you not understand this parable, how then will you understand all the parables?” Everything begins and ends with our response to the Gospel revealed in Scripture and taught by the living Word Himself. Again, I like what Danny Eakin says concerning this, “If you cannot add and subtract, you will not be able to multiply and divide. If you can’t understand this parable and its significance, the other ones will be a challenge.”
So we’ve got four soils, and we’ve got four responses. Now this could certainly be speaking to, more than likely, the unbeliever, the person who hears the Gospel for the first time, the second time, the third time, and what their response possibly can be to hearing the Gospel. But I don’t rule out that implicit in this is also the idea how do you and I as disciples of Jesus Christ respond to his Gospel and the amplification of it in theology and doctrine?
Four soils, four responses, quickly. Number one, the first response, the first heart is the stubborn heart. Look at verse 4, “And it happened as he sowed that some seed fell by the wayside and the birds there came and devoured it.” Verse 15 is the explanation, “And these are the ones by the wayside where the Word is sown. When they hear, Satan comes immediately and takes away the Word that was sown in their hearts.”
The stubborn heart is represented by the wayside soil. There are no fences between the farmer’s fields in that time, just well-worn hard-packed paths that are then sun-baked and become as hard as concrete. And so the seed would get trampled underfoot or it would be picked off by the birds as it lay on the top of that hard surface. And Jesus is saying that’s like the hard heart. That’s like the stubborn heart, the impenetrable heart that opposes the Gospel.
Now in the context, it may well speak of the Pharisees and the scribes, who in the chapter before in the time leading up to the teaching on this parable were in danger of, what, committing the unpardonable sin, of hardening their heart against the gospel, attributing the work of God to the work of Satan. We’re talking about people whose hearts have become hard against God and that which he reveals of himself.
And along the way, as with Pharaoh and as with Herod, God confirms their choice by abandoning them. Could well be the context here. In our context, if we’re to apply it a little bit more broadly, I think it speaks of atheists, secularists, humanists who oppose the thought of God, who foolishly say in their heart, there is no God. It speaks of those who have been habitually exposed to the gospel and have now become calloused and numb to its glory. What a danger, where your gospel privileges will come back to curse you on the day of judgment. As you began to turn the volume down on your conscience and the voice of the spirit of God and the preaching of the Word of God.
It speaks of those who have become bitter and angry and resistant because of some harrowing experience that they’ve gone through that leaves them questioning the goodness of God, questioning the character of God or his professed love for mankind. I can’t love a God like that who allows my child to die, who allows such wickedness and injustice to take place on the earth. Along with life and its losses, their hearts become hard towards the gospel, encased in a distrust of God, his ways and his worth and his glory.
In a message that Warren Wiersbe preached many years ago at the Moody Founders week, he tells the story of one of our presidents many years ago, Franklin Pierce, who was elected president. He wasn’t yet inaugurated. In the days leading up to his inauguration, he was on a train ride along with his wife and his son up to Concord in New Hampshire. An accident took place. The carriage that they were in was derailed and they tumbled down the side of a hill. President Pierce came away untouched, his wife survived, but his child, his little boy was killed in the accident. And according to Wiersbe, President Pierce was so bothered by that, became embittered by that, that on his inauguration day he refused to have a Bible as part of the ceremony. It speaks of atheists, secularists, humanists who oppose the thought of God, those who are habitually exposed to the gospel and become calloused or those who become embittered.
But it also could be a simpler interpretation. Because remember the image here is of the wayside, just a place in the middle of the fields that people have walked that’s become packed down. It’s become hardened by the sun, and so it speaks of people on the go. People are just busy about life, and so could it speak of those who are disinterested in the gospel. Not because of a theological proclivity, not because they have willfully rejected the gospel upon hearing it clearly, not because they’re just embittered by life, they’re just too busy to stop and listen, to think seriously about the historicity of the Gospels and the presentation of the person and work of Jesus Christ who claimed to be God’s son and the Savior of all men. Just too busy for that. They don’t give serious thought to spiritual things. Isn’t that where most of our fellow Americans are at today? They’re just too busy to give thought to spiritual things. So the seed of the gospel never takes root, it just lies there on the surface to be picked off.
A couple of years back I was at Shepherds and had some Irish friends over for the conference, two of my dear friends, Pastor Clifford Morrison, Pastor Freddie McLaughlin, who’s been at Kindred and who was my mentor. It was the years, actually several years ago. Steve Lawson had just preached on Galatians 1:6 to 9 about the danger of other Gospels and the call to be committed to the one true Gospel. It was a powerful message.
There was a holy hush descended over that service. And after Steve had prayed and sat down, the person that got up should have either ended the meeting right there and then, or he should have called us to get on our knees and respond. It was that kind of moment, but he didn’t do any of that. He immediately told us who had won the raffle on the MacArthur commentaries. And I was sitting there going, wow, we just missed a moment. And I looked down to Freddie McLaughlin who was three or four men down the aisle from me. He looked at me and you know what he said? “The birds just took it.” Now initially I didn’t get, birds just took it. What’s he talking about? And then it dawned on me. Here, the birds just took it. We became distracted with lesser things, mundane things. It’s always a danger. Satan’s happy to distract you, to make you busy. If you can’t make your body, he’ll make you busy. Busy for the most important things in life.
The shallow heart, the shallow heart. In chapter 4:5 and 6, “Some fell on stony ground where it did not have much earth and immediately it sprang up because it had no depth of earth. But when the sun was up, it was scorched because it had no root. It withered away.” And the explanation of that, 16 and 17, “Likewise are the ones sown on stony ground who they hear the Word immediately receive it with gladness, then they have no root in themselves and so endure only for a time and afterward when tribulation or persecution arises for the Word’s sake, immediately they stumble.”
So the stony ground represents the shallow heart. The stubborn heart, the shallow heart, this is rocky ground. Most likely a thin layer of topsoil and some bedrock. And so the seed quickly germinates, but because of the bedrock, the roots don’t go down deep and the plant or the seed withers without moisture as the sun comes up. Now, who are we speaking about? In the context, it’s probably the crowds that would thin over time. What is the context of this parable? That the crowd is so big and the interest in Jesus is so large that he’s literally pushed into a boat, and he has to take the boat out a little bit from the shore. And Jesus addresses the people on the shore, and they look at him in the boat out towards the sea.
But as we know throughout the Gospels, those crowds began to thin. John 6:66 tells us that many stopped following him. When Jesus became less beneficial, less interesting, more demanding, the crowds thinned. They didn’t want to pay the price of true discipleship. Now, in our context, and in theirs, it speaks of a superficial faith, a faith based on emotions, not intellect, not well. It’s faith tied to a prosperity Gospel, a feel-good Gospel, the kind of Gospel that withers when persecution comes and costs pile up and demands on discipleship are made. See, people often respond to the Gospel for selfish reasons. They see it as a path to prosperity. They see it as an exit door out of a bad marriage, a failing business or health issues. In other cases it’s tied to family. It’s a hand-me-down with no real root, no real personal substance.
And in all cases, faith in Jesus is emotional, circumstantial, superficial, immediately abandoned in the face of pressure, pain or persecution, verse 17. The Word stumble there at the end of verse 17 means to be scandalized or offended. It’s what one old preacher calls Soda-Pop Christians, all fizz and then they go flat. Those who have a brush with Christianity, but it never really takes root in their lives.
Again, I was prepping for this message when I was away, and I was out walking and I downloaded and listened to a great sermon by R.C. Sproul. In this passage, and in it he tells a little biographical sketch of his conversion of Christ. And in it, he talks about the night he got saved. Him and his best friend made a profession of faith at a gospel meeting. And they went back to their dorm, I think it was, or their room, and both of them jotted off notes to their girlfriends to tell them of what had happened.
But he said by the morning, his friend repudiated everything he had done the night before, and R.C Sproul said, “That haunted me for the rest of my life.” They looked to see him, their response was enthusiastic and joyful. They sat down and wrote notes to their girlfriends, but by the morning, the other guys’ emotional response had worn off. There was no substance, no root. Emotions are fine. When you get truly converted, it’ll be accompanied by emotion, weeping, repentance, sorrow. But as our Adrian Norger says, “God doesn’t do his deepest work in the shallowest end of life, which is our emotions. Many people make emotional responses to Jesus, but it’s superficial, without root, without repentance, without change.”
George Whitfield, the passionate and powerful preacher of The First Great Awakening used to preach the massive crowds numbering in the thousands and people were greatly affected or emotionally moved by his evangelistic messages. He was a very emotional man himself. And when Whitfield was asked how many people were saved, he would always say, “We’ll see in a few years,” and so we will.
Quickly and moving on. The strangled heart is the third heart condition, the third response, the third kind of soil the seed falls on. The stubborn, the shallow, the strangled heart. Verse 7, “And some seed fell among thorns and the thorns grew up and choked it and it yielded no crop.” What’s the explanation? Who are we speaking about, verses 18 and 19? Now, these are the ones sown among thorns. These are the ones who hear the Word and the cares of this world, the deceitfulness of riches and the desires for other things entering in choke the Word and it becomes unfruitful.
Quickly, it’s another type of soil. Alongside the seeds sown beneath the soil is creeping, crippling weeds and thorns to strangle and choke the growing seed. It’s a real danger, isn’t it? Weeds grow bigger and faster than plants. And Jesus takes that idea, and he gives it a spiritual spin. And in the context, it speaks of the crowds that thin. Because ultimately, there was an initial expression of love for God, but it was emotional. It was not attached to the will. It was not backed up by the heart. And eventually that wanes and they go back to loving the things of the world because the love of the Father’s not in them, 1 John 2.
In our context, in today’s world, as people respond to the Word of God or you share the gospel with them, it speaks of anxiety, materialism, and worldliness getting in the way of the gospel. We’re talking about idols of the heart, not stone idols, not wooden idols, but idols of the heart. Things, desires, dreams, goals that are not God ordained or who replace God as the primary focus of one’s life. Because an idol is anything or anyone that takes the place of God in your life, and that’ll kill the gospel. John Calvin was right, wasn’t he? The human heart is a factory of idols. And in our context, Jesus talks about worry, wealth, and want. Those are the siren calls of our culture to the human heart, and men listen to it to their eternal destruction.
I love the story of the businessman and the Native American who were walking down the noisy street in the city one day and suddenly the Native American stopped and he said, “Shh, listen, can you hear the cricket?” The businessman said, “A cricket, I don’t hear anything.” But the Native American got down on the ground and within a few moments had come up with the cricket in the hollow of his hand. The businessman looked at him and said, “I can’t believe what I’ve just witnessed. Here we are downtown with all the noise of these people and passing cars and you hear a cricket, how do you do that?”
The other man said, “Well, I’ll show you.” And he took a few coins out of his pocket and he threw them on the sidewalk and as the coins clattered and rolled around, 20 people stopped to look. The Native American looked at this businessman and says, ‘You’ll always hear what your ear is tuned to hear.'” And our culture is tuning the and the hearts of men and women and young people to hear the siren call of the things of this world, and it’s making them deaf to the still small voice of the spirit of God speaking to them in the Gospel.
Finally, the fourth response, the fourth heart condition, the soft heart. We’ve kept the best for the last. Verse 8, “Another seed fell on good ground and yielded a crop that sprang up, increased and produced some thirty-fold, 60 and some a 100.” Now, who are we talking about here? Well, verse 20, “But these are the ones sown on good ground. These who hear the Word, accept it and bear fruit, some 30, 60 and 100.”
As we wrap up, you get the point. This is the good soil that yields an abundant harvest, a bumper crop. This is soil that’s rich in nutrients, deep and moist beneath the surface. And the seed grows and roots take place, and as the roots draw upon the moisture and nutrients of the soil, fruit is grown.
Now in the immediate context, I think Jesus is talking about his disciples and those who are the disciples of his disciples. In the case of his disciples, they have taken up their cross, they have left their nests, they’re now following him and their life is bearing fruit. Mark 1:16 to 20, Mark 2:13 to 14, Mark 3:13 to 14. But in a wider sense, it speaks of anyone like his disciples who embrace and then live out the gospel they heard and heeded.
Paul gives us a update on the Thessalonians and how having heard the gospel with much joy and affliction, they turn from idols to serve the true and the living God and wait for his son from heaven. Chapter 2:13, they received the Word of God not as the word of man, but as it truly is the Word of God, which is changing them.” So this soil represents people who experience the transforming power of the gospel, whose lives are now rooted in Jesus and they abide in him and that bears fruit in their life, John 15:5 and 8. A life touched by the gospel, guys, is a life marked by a harvest of good things.
Galatians 5:22 to 23, “The fruit of the spirit is what? Love, faithfulness, kindness, gentleness.” We don’t have time to get into this, but if you study your New Testament, “the word fruit is used of winning of souls to Christ,” Romans 1:13. “Of practical holiness,” Romans 6:22. “Sharing material things with others in need,” Romans 15:27. That’s all fruit, that’s all change of life and character produced by the Holy Spirit. “Christian character,” Galatians 5:22, “Good works,” Colossians 1:10. “Praise and witness,” Hebrews 13:15.
The Bible knows nothing about a continuing state of carnality in the life of a Christian. I don’t know if you’ve heard preachers over your years talk about there’s the natural man, there’s the carnal man, and there’s the spiritual man. No. There’s the natural man who’s not spiritual, and there’s this spiritual man who can be carnal, but it is not a state of being. It is not something you are for years and years upon years. The Bible knows nothing about a disciple who doesn’t follow, submit to the Lordship of Jesus Christ and bear fruit. Matthew 7:15 to 20, we’re not talking about perfection, we’re talking about direction.
The Christian will not be sinless, but they will most definitely love sin less, and they will most definitely commit it less. And a change will come over them that’s dramatic and lasting, measurable. In fact, in Jesus’ day, the farmer would expect nothing more than tenfold, and yet Jesus is now what the gospel produces is a life so dramatically changed, it’s beyond the normal, it’s beyond the acceptable. It’s truly breathtaking and life-changing.
One of my friends, it’s been a while since we’ve had him at Kindred, is an Ulsterman called Alan Graham. I met Alan at the aircraft factory we worked out in Belfast. His story is dramatic, wonderful, and I think exemplary of what we’re talking about. He got saved after staggering out of a club one night, partially drunk, but not far from the place he had exited was a tent meeting by Beth Shean Tabernacle from the Shankled Road in Belfast. They were reaching the people of Roskill where I lived, and where Alan was visiting with the gospel. He was so intrigued by what he heard, he went home, sobered up and came back the next night and gave his life to Christ.
This guy was a guy. He was a boozer, he was a fighter. He just had a reputation, and so when he came into the company we were working in, I only knew him as a Christian, but he told me prior to that when he got saved, he learned later the guys had a sad bet going on, let’s see how long he lasts. Because the thought was, you know what, Alan must be out of sorts with the missus or he’s trying to kick the drinking, and so they were laying bets on how long he would last, and every one of them lost. Because after several years of working with Alan, he left our company, surrendered his life to gospel missions, went into Donegal with CEF and worked there for many years, and then God called him into the Zimbabwe in Africa where he is still this day working in an orphanage for girls and young people. Fruit that remains.
Guys, as we close, don’t let this sermon go in one ear and out the other. Keep an eye on your ears because it is the hard of hearing that go to hell, and hear the Word. But because of their response, reject that word. Can be a hard heart. It can be a shallow, superficial heart. It can be a heart that allows outside forces to strangle what God is setting out to do on the inside.
As I said, we just got back into the house last night at midnight from a few days in Kauai. Loved every minute of it. Through the kindness of a friend, we stayed in a beautiful place there. And as we were checking in last Sunday night, there were two people at the front desk, girl and a guy. We were dealing with the girl. She was getting us our stuff for our room. And as I was talking, I noticed that the guy kept looking at me, young man who I’d later know as Eli. And after looking at us for a minute or two, when I eventually … I think at some point in the conversation with the girl gave my name, Mr. De Courcy. This guy just lapped up and he goes, “I know that voice.” He says, “I listen to you on the radio here in Kauai, along with my father.” He says, “I knew that voice.” But I was didn’t want to embarrass myself.
I thought about that this morning, thought that’d be a good place to finish. Eli, front desk, Timbers, Kauai. “I know that voice.” Jesus said in John 10:27, “My sheep know my voice and they follow me.” My friend, do you know Jesus’ voice? You’ll find it in the Word of God, in the gospel. The Good News of his death, burial and resurrection for you, which is the very ground of your hope for eternal life. I hope you know that voice. I hope you’re heeding it as well as hearing it and that your heart and your life is good soil that God is producing a wonderful harvest from. Amen.