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Hearing the Kingdom: The Parable of the Sower and the Test of True Reception (Matthew 13:1–9) · Reformed Thinking

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  Welcome to Reformed Thinking. I am your host, and today we are
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  opening up a file that is absolutely central to
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  understanding the Bible, the church, and honestly, the state
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  of our own souls. It's good to be here.
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  And you're right, this isn't some abstract theological
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  debate. This topic, it acts like a
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  mirror. You look into it and you really
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  see what's going on inside. We're doing a deep dive into the
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  Parable of the Sower from Matthew chapter 13.
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  Now I know what some of you might be thinking.
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  You're thinking, Oh, I know this one.
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  Learned it in Sunday school. Yeah, the birds, the rocks, the
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  seeds. Got it.
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  Exactly. But I want to stop you right
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  there, because looking at the stack of research, commentaries
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  and sermons we have in front of us, this is not a children's
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  story. Far from it.
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  It's not simple at all. It's a diagnostic, it's a
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  spiritual EKG of the human heart, and frankly, if you read
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  it with your eyes open, it's a terrifying text.
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  It's terrifying because it shatters the assumption that
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  simply being in the room or hearing the audio waves of a
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  sermon means you're OK with God. It forces a question that you
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  know we often try to avoid. Am I actually hearing or am I
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  just listening? Is it going in?
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  We are going to be diving deep into Matthew 13, and just so
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  everyone knows where we're coming from, we're approaching
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  this from a confessional standpoint.
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  We're Protestant Christians holding to the Westminster
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  Confession of Faith. That's our.
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  Framework. So we're going to see God's
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  sovereignty, human depravity, and the absolute necessity of
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  grace all over this passage. That's the lens, and really it's
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  the only lens that makes sense of what Jesus is doing here.
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  Because this is not just a story about agriculture.
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  He's explaining what theologians call the mystery Kingdom.
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  OK, let's unpack that term right away, because Mystery Kingdom
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  sounds a bit like a novel. It does, yeah.
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  But before we even get to the sowing and the farming, we have
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  to look at the context. The notes emphasize this massive
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  shift between Matthew 12 and Matthew 13.
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  It's not just a page turn. It's a a dispensational crisis.
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  What is going on there? The context is everything.
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  I mean, if you try to read The Sower in chapter 13 without
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  understanding the disaster of chapter 12, you will completely
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  miss the point. So what's the disaster?
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  In chapter 12, the religious leaders of Israel, the
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  Pharisees, they commit what's known as the unpardonable sin.
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  This is the blasphemy of the Holy Spirit.
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  Correct. They see Jesus perform an
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  undeniable miracle. He casts out a demon.
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  It is clearly the power of God. The Kingdom of God has come upon
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  them in power. And their reaction isn't awe or
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  worship. No, instead of bowing the knee,
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  instead of worshipping, they look at the very work of the
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  Holy Spirit and they attribute it to Satan.
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  They say he casts out demons by Beelzebel.
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  That is a staggering accusation. I mean to look at pure light and
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  call it darkness. They're calling the spirit of
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  holiness the spirit of evil. It's a formal, national
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  rejection of their Messiah. It's a line they've crossed and
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  there's no coming back from it. So that's the backdrop this this
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  ultimate act of rebellion. Exactly.
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  And because of that, look at the very first verse of chapter 13.
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  It says Jesus went out of the house and sat beside the seat
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  now. Matthew is a very careful
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  writer. He doesn't include details like
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  that just to fill space. That's not just a travel log.
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  No, it's heavy with symbolism. The house in Scripture often
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  symbolizes Israel, the covenant nation, the place where God had
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  been working exclusively for centuries.
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  So Jesus leaves the house. He walks out.
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  That is a judicial act. He's turning his back on the
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  institution that just formally rejected him.
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  And where does he go? He goes to the sea.
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  And in biblical imagery, the sea usually represents the nation's
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  right. The Gentiles, yes.
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  In Daniel in Revelation, the sea is the Gentile nations or the
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  turbulent, chaotic world that exists outside the covenant
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  community of Israel. So geographically, Jesus is
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  acting out of judgement. He is.
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  He's turning from a singular focus on Israel to a broader
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  global, global scope. He's taking the message to the
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  world. That's a huge shift.
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  And this is where his teaching method changes, too.
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  I mean, up until now, he's been speaking pretty plainly.
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  The Sermon on the Mount was full of clear commands.
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  Very. Direct you have heard it said,
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  but I say to you. But now suddenly he starts using
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  parables, and the disciples themselves are confused.
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  They come to him and ask why are you speaking in parables?
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  It's a great question, and Jesus's answer is shocking to
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  our modern years. We tend to think parables are
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  just illustrations to make things easier to understand.
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  Yeah, like a little story to help the simple folks get it.
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  We think, oh, he's using a story to make it simple for the common
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  man, but Jesus says the exact opposite.
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  He says he uses parables to reveal truth to the remnant,
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  those to whom it has been given, to know the mysteries, but to
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  conceal truth from the hardened majority.
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  So it's a judgement he is hiding the truth in plain sight it.
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  Is an act of judgement on the leaders who committed that sin
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  in chapter 12 because they rejected the light.
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  Now the light becomes darkness to them.
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  They hear a story about a farmer and they think, huh, nice
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  farming advice. And they miss the entire
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  spiritual reality. They miss the Kingdom reality
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  entirely. So when we read the Parable of
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  the Sower, we are seeing the primary method of how God works
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  in this mystery Kingdom, this age between his first coming and
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  its second coming. OK, so let's set the stage then.
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  We're at the sea. Jesus is there and the text says
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  he gets into a boat and sits down and the whole crowd is
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  standing on the beach. Visualizing this is so helpful.
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  You have this massive crowd. They're pressing in on him.
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  So he gets into a boat, probably a fishing boat, and pushes out
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  just a little way from the shore.
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  OK, Now, on a practical level, that's a floating pulpit.
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  The water acts as a natural amplifier for acoustics.
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  It carries the voice beautifully.
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  Sure, that makes sense. But symbolically, think about
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  the separation. There's a gap, there's water
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  between. Them there's a water barrier and
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  you have the one teacher sitting, which by the way was
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  the ancient posture of authority.
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  King sit, judges sit, Rabbi sit to teach.
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  Everyone else stands. So he's taking his seat as the
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  judge and king. He is, but that gap of water
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  signifies that physical proximity to Jesus.
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  Standing on the beach hearing His voice does not guarantee you
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  are actually with Him. That is a scary thought.
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  You can be close enough to hear his voice, close enough to see
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  his face, and still be separated by an ocean of unbelief.
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  And that sets up the whole theme of this deep dive.
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  It's about hearing, but not just acoustic hearing.
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  It's about spiritual hearing. You can be in church in the Pew,
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  5 feet from the pulpit and still be on the beach while the Word
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  is being preached from the boat. Wow.
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  OK, so Jesus starts the story. Behold, A sower went out to sow
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  and right. There, in that simple start, is
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  the theological implication. The Kingdom of God in this age
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  does not advance by the sword. It doesn't advance by political
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  takeover or force it. Advances by sowing.
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  By the ordinary proclamation of a message, just scattering seed
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  it. Seems so weak though, doesn't
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  it? Just scattering seed.
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  Especially when you compare it to how the Roman Empire advanced
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  or how modern political movements try to advance it.
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  Looks incredibly weak to the world, but this is the mystery
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  Kingdom. The King is physically absent.
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  He's ascended. He's at the right hand of the
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  father. So how does he rule?
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  Through his word, he. Rules through the Word.
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  He conquers hearts, not borders. He builds a spiritual Kingdom,
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  not a geopolitical one, through this simple act of sewing.
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  All right, let's talk about the two key elements then, the sower
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  and the seed. In the story, the sower is
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  primarily Jesus. Yes, Christ is the great sower.
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  He's the originator of the message, but by extension, it's
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  anyone who faithfully proclaims the gospel.
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  It's the apostles. It's your pastor on Sunday.
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  It's you when you share the gospel with a neighbor.
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  OK, and what about his method? The sower scatters
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  indiscriminately. Yes, look at that.
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  He's just throwing it everywhere.
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  He isn't testing the soil first. He's not doing a pH balance test
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  on a little patch of dirt before he decides to throw a seed
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  there. He's.
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  Not he throws it on the path, on the rocks, in the thorns and on
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  the good soil. And this connects directly to
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  what we call the free offer of the gospel.
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  As Reformed Christians, we believe in election, that God
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  has chosen the people for himself from before the
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  foundation of the world. But we also believe that we do
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  not know who those people are. We don't have a copy of The
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  Lamb's Book of Life in our back pocket.
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  So our job isn't to be soil testers, our job is to be
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  sowers. Exactly.
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  We call all men everywhere to repent and believe.
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  We don't look at someone and say oh, they look like a rocky soil
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  person. I'm not going to waste the seed
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  on them. No, we scatter, we proclaim
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  that's. Actually a real relief.
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  It takes the pressure off me to try and determine who is ready
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  or worthy. I just I share the message it.
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  Liberates you from the burden of the results.
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  You're responsible for the output, not the outcome.
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  You're responsible for the faithfulness of the sowing.
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  God is responsible for the harvest.
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  OK, now about the seed. The text identifies the seed as
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  the word of the Kingdom. This is a.
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  Crucial point of bibliology. The doctrine of Scripture.
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  The seed is immutable. It does not change.
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  Notice in the parable, the seed is the same in every single
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  scenario. A good point.
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  When it falls on the path, it's good seed.
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  When it falls on the rocks, it's the same good seed.
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  The seed itself is never the problem.
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  So if the crop fails, you can't blame the seed.
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  Exactly, and this is a massive critique of pragmatism in the
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  modern church. When we see that people aren't
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  responding when the soil is hard, the modern tendency is to
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  blame the seed. We think, oh, the message is too
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  harsh, it's too old fashioned, it's not culturally relevant.
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  Let's. Genetically modify the gospel.
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  Let's soften the edges. Take out the talk about sin and
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  hell and wrath. Make it all about living your
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  best life now. But if you change the seed, you
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  destroy the life principle that's inside it.
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  Right. A modified gospel cannot produce
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  life. It might produce a crowd, it
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  might produce enthusiasm, but it won't produce genuine
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  Christians. Jesus is making it crystal
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  clear. If the harvest fails, it is
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  always a soil problem, never a seed problem.
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  The Word of God is perfect. The human heart is what is
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  defective. That's a heavy thought.
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  It puts the responsibility squarely on the hearer.
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  It means we can't blame the preacher or the music or the
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  building or. The style of the seed?
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  No. The issue is the soil so.
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  Let's walk through these soils. This is the diagnostic part.
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  The first soil is the wayside or the path.
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  Some fell along the path. OK, we need to understand the
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  agriculture here. In 1st century Galilee, fields
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  weren't fenced off like we see today.
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  They were separated by these narrow strips of unplowed earth.
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  And people would just walk on those to get from field to
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  field. Constantly.
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  So that soil is beaten down, it's impacted, it's as hard as
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  concrete, just compressed by constant foot traffic.
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  So in the seed falls on it. What?
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  Happens. It just sits there.
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  It sits on top, it never gets in.
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  It makes no penetration at all. And this is a picture of what?
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  This is the picture of the natural man.
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  Cole talks about this in First Corinthians 2.13.
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  The natural man does not receive the things of the Spirit of God.
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  They are foolishness to him. It's like trying to plant a
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  garden on a highway. There's just no way for it to
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  take root. The source material brought up a
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  really interesting point about how this hardness happens.
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  We usually think of the hard heart as the angry atheist or
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  the person who openly hates God. Right, the militant skeptic.
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  But it can be religious familiarity.
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  Oh. Absolutely.
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  That is the great danger of what you could call judgement through
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  familiarity. You can sit in a Pew for 30
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  years. You can hear the doctrines of
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  grace. You can hear about justification
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  and sanctification every single Sunday.
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  And you can even nod along. You can nod along.
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  You can take notes, but if you hear it without faith, if you
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  hear it without repentance, that constant traffic of truth over
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  your heart actually packs it down harder and harder.
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  You become hardened by the very gospel that's meant to save you.
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  That's a frightening idea. You can be inoculated against
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  the truth by getting small non lethal doses of it that you
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  never actually ingest. You become a professional sermon
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  listener. You critique the homiletics.
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  You notice that the pastor stumbled over a word, but you
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  never tremble at the word. The truth walks over your heart,
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  but it never ever enters your heart.
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  And then while the seed is just sitting there exposed, then come
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  the birds. The birds.
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  Jesus is explicit about this. The birds aren't just random
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  nature, he says. This represents the wicked one.
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  This is Satan. So this is active spiritual
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  warfare. Yes, and notice when it happens.
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  It happens during the sewing. Satan is in church, he is active
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  while the word of God is being preached, and his goal is
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  immediate removal. He.
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  Snatches it away. He snatches it.
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  And how does he do that distraction?
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  Did I leave the oven on? I wonder where we're going for
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  lunch. I need to check my phone for
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  that notification. Or cynicism.
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  All the pastor always says that part, right?
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  Or mockery. The seat is exposed on the
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  surface and the enemy swoops in and just takes it.
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  The person leaves the service and 5 minutes later it is as if
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  they never heard a single word of the sermon it.
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  Creates a sort of spiritual amnesia.
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  That's a great way to put it. And the scary part is the person
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  doesn't even realize they've been robbed.
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  They think, well, I went to church, but spiritually nothing
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  happened. The transaction was intercepted.
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  So what's the? Remedy for the hard path because
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  you can't just push a seed into concrete.
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  It doesn't work that way the. Heart cannot plow itself.
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  If you're a hard path, you need a divine plow.
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  You need the law of God to come and crush that hardness.
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  You need God too. As the Prophet say, break up
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  your fallow ground. It's a violent act.
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  It's a violent act of grace. God has to shatter your
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  self-sufficiency, your pride, your religious complacency so
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  the seed can finally find a place to lodge.
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  OK, that's the first soil. Let's move to the second.
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  This one is tricky because it looks like a success story, at
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  least at first. The Stony ground.
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  This is the deception of the shallow heart.
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  And again, the geography of the Holy Land matters here in that
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  region. Stony ground doesn't mean dirt
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  with some loose rocks in it. A farmer would just pick those
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  up and throw them to the side. So.
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  What does it mean? This refers to a thin layer of
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  topsoil, maybe an inch or two deep, that's resting on top of a
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  solid shelf of limestone bedrock.
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  So there's nowhere for roots to go.
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  Exactly. So when the seed falls, it sinks
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  into that little bit of soil. It finds purchase, but
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  underneath is impenetrable rock. Now that rock shelf acts like a
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  like a heating pan. It catches the sun's heat and
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  radiates it up into that thin layer of soil.
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  It's just. Like a greenhouse effect, it
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  gets really warm. Exactly.
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  And because that warmth, the text says, immediately it sprang
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  up. There's that word again,
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  immediately. It's rapid, it's sudden, and in
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  the parable, that speed is actually a bad sign.
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  It's a warning light. It springs up so fast because it
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  can't go down. It has no room for roots, so all
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  the energy is forced upward into the stock.
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  This sounds like a direct critique of a certain kind of
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  emotionalism. It's a direct critique of what
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  we might call decisionism or revivalism.
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  You know, the emotional high, the tears at the altar call, the
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  immediate joy without any deep underlying conviction of sin.
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  This is the person who gets really excited about Jesus for
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  about 3 weeks. They buy the T-shirt, they
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  download all the worship music, they're posting about it.
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  They are enthusiastic. Yes, they love the idea of
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  Jesus, they love the community, they love the feeling of relief
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  from guilt. But there's no root.
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  There has been no ontological change in their nature.
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  What do you mean by that The? Hardest stone that Ezekiel
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  talked about is still there, right beneath that thin soil of
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  religious excitement. They've bypassed the poverty of
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  spirit. They haven't truly mourned over
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  their sin. They just want the happiness and
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  the benefits of the Christian life.
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  And then the sun rises. The Sun.
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  Jesus identifies the sun as tribulation or persecution
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  because of the word. Now here's the thing, the sun is
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  necessary for true wheat. Wheat needs the sun to grow and
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  ripen. So it's the same sun that hits
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  all the plants the. Same sun, but that very same sun
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  that matures and strengthens the deep rooted plant absolutely
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  scorches and kills the rootless 1.
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  So suffering isn't an accident in the Christian life, it's a
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  revealer. Suffering is the great
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  diagnostic. It's God's MRI for the soul.
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  It reveals what's really underneath the surface when the
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  faith becomes costly, when your friends make fun of you at work,
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  when you lose a promotion because of your Christian
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  ethics, or when a real tragedy strikes and God doesn't seem to
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  answer your prayer the way you wanted.
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  That's when the heat gets turned up.
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  That's when the sun comes out and the Stony ground here
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  Withers. They get offended, they fall
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  away. They say things like I tried
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  Jesus and it didn't work for me. Precisely because their faith
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  was transactional, it was about what Jesus could do for them.
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  Give them peace, fix their marriage, make them happy.
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  It wasn't about who Jesus is in his own right.
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  This defines temporary faith. It looks like life for a season,
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  but it's dead at the root. That brings us to the third
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  soil, and I feel like if the first soil is the hardened cynic
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  and the second is the emotional but shallow convert, this third
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  soil is the one that fills a lot of our churches, the thorny
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  ground. This is the divided heart, and
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  you are absolutely right. This is the most subtle and I
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  think the most common danger for the person who has been in the
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  church for a long time. This plant doesn't die
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  immediately. It grows.
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  It looks. Healthy for a while, yeah.
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  So tell us about the thorns. The Greek word is a canthus.
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  We have to remember Genesis 3. Thorns are part of the curse on
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  the ground. They are native to the soil of
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  this fallen world, the wheat. The word is the foreigner.
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  So the thorns don't need any help growing they.
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  Don't need cultivation. They grow naturally because the
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  fallen soil loves them. The soil is fallen, just like
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  the unregenerate parts of our own hearts.
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  And the text says they choked the word the.
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  Word is a pep Nixon. It means to strangle.
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  It's a violent image. It's a competition for
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  resources. The soil only has so much
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  nutrition, so much moisture, so much access to sunlight.
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  So the thorns and the wheat are fighting for the same space
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  they. Are they're growing up together?
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  But because the thorns are native, because they're more
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  aggressive, if you leave them alone, they will always win.
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  They will strangle the life out of the good plant.
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  Jesus gives us 2 specific names for these thorns, the cares of
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  the world and the deceitfulness of riches.
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  Let's break those down. OK, first the cares of the
• 18:14
  world. This is anxiety.
• 18:16
  This is the tyranny of the urgent.
• 18:18
  It's being so consumed with your career, your mortgage, your kids
• 18:22
  soccer schedule, the political news cycle that you have no
• 18:25
  mental, emotional or spiritual energy left for the Kingdom of
• 18:29
  God. So it's not even necessarily bad
• 18:31
  things, it's the good crowding out the best.
• 18:34
  Precisely. It's not always about committing
• 18:36
  some gross, scandalous sin. It's just life, but it's life
• 18:40
  where God is relegated to the margins.
• 18:42
  He gets the leftovers of your time, your energy, your
• 18:45
  attention. And the second thorn, the
• 18:47
  deceitfulness of riches. This is a direct shot at the
• 18:50
  materialism of every age, but especially our own.
• 18:54
  It's a critique of consumerism and the prosperity gospel.
• 18:57
  Why are riches deceitful? What's the lie they tell?
• 19:00
  They tell 2 primary lies. Lie #1 If you have enough of me,
• 19:04
  you will be secure. That's a lie.
• 19:07
  Your health can fail, the market can crash, your positions can be
• 19:10
  stolen. True security is only in Christ.
• 19:13
  And the second lie. Lie #2 If you buy this, if you
• 19:17
  attain this, you will be satisfied.
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  That's a lie. Solomon had it all and called it
• 19:22
  vanity. Our hearts were made for God and
• 19:25
  they will be restless until they find their rest in Him.
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  We pursue wealth thinking it will solve our problems and all
• 19:31
  the while it's a thorn Bush growing up and choking out our
• 19:33
  spiritual life. The scary part about the thorny
• 19:36
  soil, as you said, is that the plant actually grows.
• 19:39
  It doesn't die off immediately like the plant in the Stony
• 19:41
  ground. It looks promising for a long,
• 19:43
  long time. It has a stalk.
• 19:45
  It has leaves. From a distance, it might even
• 19:47
  look just like the fruitful wheat next to it, but it
• 19:50
  produces no grain. It's sterile.
• 19:52
  It takes up space in the field but contributes nothing to the
• 19:55
  harvest. This.
• 19:56
  Really corrects a bad theological idea I've heard
• 19:59
  called the carnal Christian theory, yes.
• 20:01
  It absolutely refutes it, the idea that you can have Jesus as
• 20:04
  your savior but not your Lord. That you can be saved and on
• 20:08
  your way to heaven, but be completely dominated by the
• 20:11
  world and bears 0 spiritual fruit.
• 20:14
  This parable destroys that idea. It does.
• 20:17
  The thorny soil does not produce a harvest.
• 20:19
  In the end, it's worthless. It's gathered and burned, just
• 20:22
  like the tares in the next parable.
• 20:23
  If the thorns win, the soul is lost.
• 20:26
  There is no such thing in the long run as a featless
• 20:28
  Christian. Wow.
• 20:29
  So we have three kinds of failure, the heart heart, the
• 20:32
  shallow heart, and the divided heart.
• 20:34
  Now we finally get to this success story.
• 20:36
  Soil #4 the good ground. Finally, a harvest.
• 20:40
  Other seeds fell on good soil and produce grain.
• 20:43
  OK, so I have to ask the big question.
• 20:45
  What makes the soil good? Is it just that some people are
• 20:47
  naturally better or smarter or more spiritually inclined than
• 20:50
  others? Absolutely not, that would be
• 20:53
  Pelagianism, the heresy that we contribute to our own salvation.
• 20:57
  Remember all the ground starts as cursed ground from Genesis 3.
• 21:01
  Good soil is not naturally good, it is made good.
• 21:04
  It requires A gardener, a farmer, it.
• 21:06
  Requires A husbandman. Someone had to come into that
• 21:08
  plot of land and do the hard work.
• 21:10
  Someone had to break up the path.
• 21:12
  Someone had to come in and dig out the limestone shelf.
• 21:15
  Someone had to RIP out the thorn bushes by the root and burn
• 21:18
  them. This is sovereign grace.
• 21:19
  This is effectual calling. This is the Holy Spirit doing
• 21:23
  what we cannot do for ourselves. God takes away the heart of
• 21:26
  stone and gives a heart of flesh, as Ezekiel promised.
• 21:30
  The soil didn't decide to be good.
• 21:32
  The plowman prepared it. That is the Reformed doctrine of
• 21:35
  regeneration. We believe that before we can
• 21:37
  truly hear or believe, God has to give us new ears and a new
• 21:41
  heart. Exactly.
• 21:42
  We receive the seed because God has opened our hearts to receive
• 21:45
  it. It's just like the story of
• 21:47
  Lydia in the book of Acts. The Lord opened her heart to pay
• 21:50
  attention to what was said by Paul.
• 21:53
  The preparation of the soil is God's work from start to finish.
• 21:56
  And the proof that the soil has been made good is in the fruit,
• 21:59
  the. Fruit.
• 22:00
  That's the evidence. Not just the decision, not just
• 22:02
  the raised hand or the prayer that was prayed, but the ongoing
• 22:06
  fruit of a changed life, character, repentance,
• 22:10
  obedience, Lovejoy, peace, the fruit of the Spirit.
• 22:15
  But Jesus adds this detail here that is so pastorally helpful,
• 22:19
  He says some produced one hundredfold, some 60 and some
• 22:22
  30I. Love this detail, it's so
• 22:24
  gracious. It guards US against two very
• 22:26
  common errors. First, it guards against
• 22:29
  elitism. What do you mean by?
• 22:30
  That. Well, you have the hundredfold
• 22:32
  Christians, the Spurgeons, the Calvins, the martyrs, the
• 22:34
  missionaries who seem to have endless zeal and produce
• 22:37
  incredible results. It's easy to look at them and
• 22:39
  say that's the only valid standard.
• 22:41
  If I'm not that, I must not be real.
• 22:43
  And. You can get discouraged.
• 22:44
  But Jesus says no. The 30 sold is also good soil.
• 22:48
  Don't despise the thirtyfold Christian.
• 22:50
  Not everyone has the same gifts or the same calling.
• 22:54
  And the second error it guards against.
• 22:55
  Despair. I think many listeners might be
• 22:58
  examining their lives right now and saying I still struggle with
• 23:01
  sin. I'm not a spiritual giant.
• 23:04
  My fruit seems so small. Maybe I'm not saved at all.
• 23:06
  Maybe I'm thorny ground. But if there's real fruit, even
• 23:09
  if it's thirtyfold, it's proof of life, yes.
• 23:12
  The standard is the reality of fruit, not the quantity of fruit
• 23:16
  relative to others. That's a huge comfort.
• 23:18
  It's about the direction of the life, not the perfection of it.
• 23:21
  It's. About the species, not the size.
• 23:24
  Is it wheat or is it a thorn? Even a small stock of wheat is
• 23:28
  still wheat, and it proves the soil is good.
• 23:30
  So we've walked through the four soils, but we can't just leave
• 23:34
  it there as a moral checklist, you know, OK, go out and be good
• 23:37
  soil because we just established we can't change our own hearts.
• 23:40
  We need to synthesize this How do we see Christ at the center
• 23:43
  of this parable? This is the most important part
• 23:46
  if we read this and the take away is just try harder to be
• 23:49
  better soil. We have missed the gospel
• 23:52
  entirely. We need to see Christ as the
• 23:55
  center of the whole story. OK, so.
• 23:57
  He is the sower. He.
• 23:58
  Is the sower who went out to sow think about what that means he
• 24:02
  came from the glory of heaven to the cursed ground of earth he
• 24:05
  entered a field that he knew would largely reject him.
• 24:08
  He's. Sowed in tears.
• 24:10
  He was rejected by the wayside Pharisees, He was abandoned by
• 24:13
  the Stony ground crowds who followed him for the miracles,
• 24:16
  He was betrayed for 30 pieces of silver, the deceitfulness of
• 24:19
  riches, but he kept sowing, even to the point of giving his own
• 24:23
  life. And he is also the seed.
• 24:25
  He. Is the seed the content of the
• 24:27
  message? Is Christ himself his life,
• 24:29
  death and resurrection. To receive the seed is to
• 24:32
  receive the person of Jesus, and just like a seed, has to go into
• 24:35
  the ground and die to bring forth life.
• 24:37
  Jesus died and was buried in the heart of the earth.
• 24:40
  So that he could bring forth a great harvest of many brothers
• 24:42
  and sisters, a harvest of good soil.
• 24:45
  And finally, he is the life that makes the fruit grow.
• 24:48
  He is the life. Fruitfulness doesn't come from
• 24:51
  our effort, it comes from union with Christ.
• 24:54
  We bear fruit because He lives in us.
• 24:56
  He's the vine. We are the branches.
• 24:58
  Apart from him, we can do nothing.
• 25:00
  There is one image from the notes that really struck me.
• 25:03
  We talked about the thorns choking the life out of us.
• 25:06
  But Christ did something specific with thorns.
• 25:09
  He did. On the cross, what did the Roman
• 25:12
  soldiers put on his head? A.
• 25:13
  Crown of thorns that. Isn't just a random, cruel form
• 25:16
  of torture, it is a profound theological symbol.
• 25:19
  He took the curse of the ground. He took the thorns that choke
• 25:22
  us, the anxiety, the love of money, and He wore them as His
• 25:26
  crown. He bore the judgement for our
• 25:28
  divided thorny hearts so that we could be made into good soil.
• 25:31
  So he clears the ground by taking the curse on himself.
• 25:34
  That is the Gospel in one beautiful, painful image.
• 25:38
  He took the thorns so we can have the harvest.
• 25:40
  So what does this all mean for the listener right now?
• 25:42
  Jesus ends the parable with this very direct command.
• 25:45
  He who has ears, let him hear. It's a summons.
• 25:48
  It's a call to urgent self examination.
• 25:51
  This is not passive listening. Jesus is pointing at every
• 25:54
  single person in the crowd and at every person listening to
• 25:57
  this and saying you are one of these soils.
• 25:59
  Which one is it? It's a mirror, like you said at
• 26:02
  the beginning. It's a mirror and we need to
• 26:03
  have the courage to look into it Honestly.
• 26:05
  Hearing the Word of God is never a neutral event.
• 26:08
  Every time you hear a sermon, you are either being softened or
• 26:11
  hardened. It's either a saver of life unto
• 26:13
  life or a saver of death unto death.
• 26:16
  Let's get really specific with application.
• 26:18
  If someone is listening and they identify with the wayside soil,
• 26:21
  they feel hard, cynical, unmoved by spiritual things.
• 26:25
  If. That's you.
• 26:26
  My plea would be, do not delay. The birds are swift.
• 26:30
  The enemy is quick to snatch the word away.
• 26:33
  If you feel even a twinge of conviction right now, that is
• 26:36
  God's common grace to you. Cry out to him.
• 26:39
  Pray, Lord, I have a hard heart. I cannot break it.
• 26:41
  Please, for your mercy's sake, bring the plow.
• 26:43
  Crush my pride. Give me ears to hear.
• 26:46
  Don't let the devil snatch this moment away from you.
• 26:48
  What about the Stony or thorny hearer?
• 26:50
  The person who is maybe in church, maybe even active, but
• 26:54
  they know deep down it's shallow or they know they're being
• 26:57
  choked by the world. This is a call to test your
• 27:00
  faith, to do what Paul says and examine yourself to see whether
• 27:04
  you are in the faith. Ask the hard questions.
• 27:07
  Am I prioritizing my comfort over Christ's Kingdom?
• 27:10
  Am I chasing money in possessions while my soul
• 27:12
  starves? So it's a call to active
• 27:14
  repentance. Yes, you need to repent of
• 27:16
  specific idols. You need to do some wedding.
• 27:19
  And wedding is painful. It means saying no to some good
• 27:22
  things so you can say yes to the best thing.
• 27:24
  It means killing that carnal Christian myth in your own mind
• 27:28
  and bowing to the total lordship of Jesus Christ over every area
• 27:31
  of your life and. Finally, to the good soil
• 27:33
  listener. Be encouraged, but don't be
• 27:35
  proud. Trust the sower.
• 27:37
  If you see fruit in your life, give all the glory to God.
• 27:40
  You didn't make yourself good soil, He did and rely on His
• 27:43
  strengths to endure. The sun will come up that He
• 27:45
  will come, but if you were rooted in Him, you will not
• 27:48
  wither. He will keep you to the end.
• 27:50
  There's a very practical application here for worship,
• 27:52
  too. We talked about plowing the
• 27:54
  ground. Yes, if the condition of the
• 27:56
  soil matters this much, then how we prepare to hear the Word on
• 28:01
  Sunday matters immensely. We shouldn't just roll out of
• 28:04
  bed, rush to the service, and expect to have some amazing
• 28:07
  encounter with God if we've been filling our minds with thorns
• 28:10
  and hardening our hearts all week long.
• 28:12
  So Saturday night becomes crucial.
• 28:14
  Saturday night is plowing time. Sunday morning is plowing time.
• 28:18
  Before you ever leave the house, you should be in prayer.
• 28:21
  Lord, prepare my heart. Remove the distractions.
• 28:24
  Soften the soil. Help me to hear your voice
• 28:27
  today. We need to till the soil of our
• 28:30
  hearts before the seed is sown. That completely changes the way
• 28:33
  you walk into the sanctuary. You're not just the consumer
• 28:35
  waiting to be entertained, you're an active participant in
• 28:38
  a supernatural event. Absolutely.
• 28:40
  You come expecting God to speak into work well.
• 28:42
  We've covered a lot of ground, literally from the hard path to
• 28:45
  the good soil. It's a text you can spend a
• 28:47
  lifetime in and still find more. Here's a final thought to leave
• 28:50
  you with the parable leaves no middle ground.
• 28:53
  There's no 5th soil. You can't be kind of good soil,
• 28:57
  or a hybrid of thorny and good. You are either bearing fruit for
• 29:00
  the harvest or you are not. That is the sobering reality.
• 29:04
  The variable is the condition of the human heart.
• 29:06
  But the good news is that the sower is fateful, and he is also
• 29:10
  the one who prepares the soil. The Savior is speaking till you
• 29:12
  hear him. Thanks for listening to Reformed
• 29:15
  Thinking.