The Good Seed

While a large crowd was gathering and people were coming to Jesus from town after town, he told this parable: "A farmer went out to sow his seed. As he was scattering the seed, some fell along the path; it was trampled on, and the birds of the air ate it up. Some fell on rock, and when it came up, the plants withered because they had no moisture. Other seed fell among thorns, which grew up with it and choked the plants. Still other seed fell on good soil. It came up and yielded a crop, a hundred times more than was sown." Luke 8:4-8 A parable is a story intended to reveal something about the world by using an extended metaphor. Jesus used parables to both reveal and conceal what He was trying to day. Parables reveal truth in a palatable form. This parable was unique in that it was the first to be used. It is found in Mark 4, Luke 8,and Matthew 13. The way this parable was presented is interesting. Jesus just told the story without explanation and without introduction. This was confusing to many people who heard Jesus. Even His disciples were bewildered by it. Why did He do it? He tells us in the next passage--Luke 8:10 "The knowledge of the secrets of the kingdom of God has been given to you, but to others I speak in parables, so that, "'though seeing, they may not see; though hearing, they may not understand.' ? Jesus told parables to deliberately confuse His hearers! It is amazing to think that Jesus would do this, but He did. There is a pattern to the spread of Cod’s Word that is repeated over and over. First there is expansion. The Word goes out, and people respond. Next, there is consolidation. The disciples have to be trained to be sent out. Third, there is opposition. People will not like what he says. This leads to crucifixion, martyrdom, and rebirth. The same pattern is found in Paul. Paul carried the Gospel all over the known world. At every city he consolidated his victories by training disciples while the opposition mounted. Following this, there came a widespread persecution (read murder) of Christians, led by Satan himself. But whenever persecution came, the church not only survived, but thrived. “The blood of the martyrs is the seed of the church.” The pattern goes on today. God blesses and brings His word and power. Resistance builds even as leaders are being trained. Then comes persecution. Many are lost, but some disciples remain to take the gospel forward. The story of the sower is the story of the Kingdom. The pattern of the sower is the pattern of the Kingdom—the same pattern we see until this day. First, there is going. Who is “the sower? He is never identified. He is simply a man who spreads the Word of God. The sower is any of us. The sower is all of us. It is whoever spreads the Word of God across the earth. At the time when Jesus is giving the parable, it is uncertain who the sowers will be. The people who were called by God to spread his word have not yet been identified beyond the twelve disciples. Contained in the crowds who listened to Jesus are dozens, perhaps hundreds or thousands of people who will become sowers of the Word. This parable is calling them out. Who has ears to hear it? Who has even the curiosity to come and hear what it means? One thing is for sure—the number of sowers is not equal to the size of the field. Jesus said in Matthew 9 “The harvest is plentiful, the laborers are few. Pray to the Lord of the Harvest top send forth laborers into the harvest.” God makes the sowers. We don’t. We’ve all known churches that constantly pushed people to win converts. They are trying to call forth the sowers. But Jesus said pray and God will bring forth the sowers. In this parable, the message is hidden, so those who can be sowers will come forth. We don’t become sowers because we try. God just puts the seed in our hands and tells us to spread. Jesus shows infinite patience in allowing sowers to come forth. Churches were put here to sow—to be part of the process of sowing and growing that produces the fruit of the Gospel. We were put here to preach and be persecuted, to die as martyrs only to have the truth reborn. If there is no resistance, there is no Gospel. If there is no difficulty there is no fruit. We must pray for sowers to come. Then there is the sowing. When the sower goes with his bag of seed, where does he go? He goes as far and as wide as we can. Modern agriculture is very different from ancient agriculture. A farmer does not broadcast his seed. Instead, he narrowcasts it. He knows what produces and what does not. But the ancient had to try everything. He went at first wherever he could, he ought to have the good sense not to spread the seed just everywhere. The rule is this--spread it where it will grow. When it comes to the Word of God, most churches do just the opposite of this We find the places where the seed has already gone down and heap more seed upon it. When a familiar plot of ground is found to be resistant to the Word, we just keep throwing seed on it. Our county is one of the most churches areas in the country. 28% are in church on any given Sunday. 24% of those are in Baptist churches, where the Gospel is really preached. There are few people who have lived long in this county who have not been to church or been told the Gospel. The citizens who have lived long in this county have for the most part either believed in Jesus, or turned hard against him. So where do we spread out seed? You guessed it—among people just like ourselves. One church imitates another, until we have managed to turn off half the people in the county. We unthinkingly act just like everyone we ever knew in church, and keep inviting those same hardened, resistant people to church, even though who have rejected the Gospel long ago. Meanwhile, there are new people, young people, strange people, minority people all around us who may not be so hardened to hearing the Gospel. Those we ignore, so that the church can look and act like it always did. But the sower in the parable casts his seed far and wide. His only criteria for spreading the word is that there be a willing audience. Many will not like it. He expects this like a salesman knows that not every flyer he sends out will bring a customer. He only cares that everyone be given an opportunity. Next comes the growing. When he seed begin to take root, then what? It is still a struggle to bring the seed to fruition. Jesus lists three reasons the seed does not make it. .1. The ground was too hard to receive the Gospel. My yard has a good covering of grass. But there are some places, especially in the shade, where nothing grows. When I look at those patches, I see that the ground is like stone. I put grass seed on it, but it washed away with the first rain. There are two reasons a person becomes hard to the Gospel. They may have reason to believe a lie. People who are devoted followers of other religions are hard to reach, because it puts them against their family and culture. So are the greedy, the lustful, and the gluttonous. That doesn’t mean we should not witness to them, but we must realize that they will probably not respond. There is no room in their life for God’s truth. They are firmly and completely given over to a lie. The other reason is because he has a reason for rejecting the truth.. Once they believed, but they have seen so much hypocrisy and abuse in the name of the Lord that they want nothing to do with any of it. These people can only be reached by much prayer, fasting, and of course a great deal of loving patience. 2. The ground was too shallow for roots to grow. In college I worked for four years with Icthus, a Christian rock festival which attracted tens of thousands of young people. My job was to witness through the crowd. Once I came across a group of young people all from the same church. They were very hard to the Gospel. They wanted nothing to do with it personally, yet whenever the bands came on, they would cheer an carry on with the rest of the crowd. They even wore Christian jewelry . I shared the Gospel with them, but I could get nowhere. Finally I asked them if they had ever received Christ before. They all had. “They told me that at first, they were very excited. But then it faded. No one told htem what to do next. So instead of sharing with them about how to be saved. I shared how they could continue to walk with Him with prayer, Bible reading, etc. What I thought was hard soil turned very tender. They were believer, they just did not know how to grow deeper. What kind of gardener will spread his seed one day and come back in three months, expecting a harvest. He knows that seed must be weeded and cultivated. We do this in small group discipleship and through training in prayer and Christian living. We must get close enough to the soil to find the rocks and pull them out. 3. There are too many other things in the soil. Even if we have good soil, the weeds often choke it out. On my lawn, along with the bare patches, are weedy patches, where clover or dandelions replace good grass. I don’t care much, of course. As long as it’s green, it looks the same. Unfortunately, many have the same idea about the Gospel in the Bible Belt. As long as people look like Christians and act like Christians, they are okay. In time, we see the worldly things outgrowing heavenly things in our lives. But Jesus assures us that in every place, there will be some who will grow, in spite of these obstacles. Finally comes the reaping phase. When there is growth, is is abundant—thirty, sixty, a hundredfold. The successes wind up outwaying the failures. When the persecution time comes, and much of what we have built is wiped out, then there will be those few who have been left behind who will survive. A flu bug is a very vulnerable thing. It cannot survive long outside the human body. If you put it in a liquid even a few degrees hotter or colder than it is used to, it will die. If you put it in the sun, it will die. Even so, the flu bug is a great danger to us. Why? Because there are so many of them. This is what Jesus said about the Word of God. those who believe it are many, when the Gospel has been spread. Eventually, the Gospel will overrun the earth. So let’s not waste our time on bad soil, weedy soil or rocky soil. Let’s go out and find the fertile fields. Then let’s make disciples and grow them into spiritual maturity, so they, too can join the harvest.