READ: Matthew 13:1
CHALLENGE: Open Your Heart to God’s Truth
Matthew 13:1-9 – That same day Jesus went out of the house and sat by the lake. 2 Such large crowds gathered around him that he got into a boat and sat in it, while all the people stood on the shore. 3 Then he told them many things in parables, saying: “A farmer went out to sow his seed. 4 As he was scattering the seed, some fell along the path, and the birds came and ate it up. 5 Some fell on rocky places, where it did not have much soil. It sprang up quickly, because the soil was shallow. 6 But when the sun came up, the plants were scorched, and they withered because they had no root. 7 Other seed fell among thorns, which grew up and choked the plants. 8 Still other seed fell on good soil, where it produced a crop—a hundred, sixty or thirty times what was sown. 9 Whoever has ears, let them hear.”
Whoever has ears let them hear. Not everyone wants to know the truth or listens to it. This is the crux of this passage. If you have ears … hear. Listen. Part of listening is the heart of the listener as we will see.
(trans) What can we learn about truth from this passage?
- KEEP IT SIMPLE
Jesus is by a lake and crowds of people come looking for him. So much so, that he has to get on a boat and teach from there. Everyone was listening but not everyone was responding and that’s what this story is about. It’s about our response to truth.
He taught them a “parable” A parable would be a story from life that communicated a spiritual truth to the people. There’s a deeper point than the story itself. He tells a story about a farmer who went out to plant his seed. But it’s about the message of God and our response to it. It’s so every day and so relatable and that’s where we want to get as we communicate about Jesus.
Like the blind man – I once was blind but now I see! That’s powerful in and of itself. So simple. I couldn’t see before and now I can. Everyone can get that.
God’s truth leads to change. There’s no point in hearing the truth from God if it doesn’t impact our lives, help our lives, encourage us, steady us, strengthen us, direct us, and help us to live for God. Jesus was looking for change. He wanted the seed of truth to bring a harvest in their lives.
Matthew 4:17 – From that time on Jesus began to preach, “Repent, for the kingdom of heaven has come near.”
The stories of Jesus are not just to entertain. He’s not just trying to be famous or popular. He’s not just trying to make you feel good. He’s communicating for change. Jesus wants us crossing over from death to life and having the best life possible. He’s looking for results.
Jesus communicated in everyday layman’s terms. In this story, he’s going to talk about a farmer planting seeds. That’s one hundred percent relatable! Spiritual truth is not quantum physics or e+mc2 or things that only an Einstein can wrap his head around. You don’t need a degree for it to impact your life.
Truth should be like an apple you eat from a tree! It just does you good! It’s readily accessible. You don’t have to understand everything about the apple even. Jesus pointed out the birds of the air to flowers to a mustard seed to water and bread to shepherding and sheep. Simple truth in simple terms.
Sometimes people want to make God’s simple words and make them unrelatable except to someone with a spiritual black belt in theology. The religious leaders in Jesus’ day readily over complicated things by adding man-made rules to faith. Jesus did NOT care for the legalism.
I have always resisted when Christians try to complicate our faith with add-ons that are not clearly laid out. If you really want to be spiritual, do this! If you really want to pray successfully, you need to do this. Why can’t we just pray in our native tongue to our Heavenly Father who hears us? Some add these long and confusing corridors in the name of spirituality. It gets weird at times. Keep it simple. Jesus. In a boat. In a fishing community. Talking about planting a crop!
If we want to impact people for change, we need to be in the normal places they are. Could be the gym or coaching a sport or in a hobby. Jesus was in the trenches with everyone else and finding that common ground. Don’t we all want love and acceptance. Don’t we all love our family, our children, and grandchildren? Don’t we all have the same issues with higher costs at the grocery store? Don’t we all appreciate fall weather? All of us love food. When the northern lights were out, Walnut Beach had a lot of cars in the parking lot. Many of us love sports and struggle understanding the Browns as an organization. Common ground abounds!
We also all need forgiveness and strength and wisdom and direction. Truth is simple and I love keeping it simple. Jesus is the way, the truth, and the life. We are to love God and love others. Be happy and do good in Ecclesiastes 3:12. We have eternal life through faith in Jesus. Ask and you will receive. Does it need to get more complicated than that?
Every day, the heavens declare the glory of God. We can look around and see what God is doing. We should be able to detect the invisible attributes of God from nature. His reality is part of it. I appreciate that we have truth in nature in our daily world! Awesome!!
- STICK WITH IT (vv3-8)
When you have truth, stick with it. Revelation said, don’t add to it and don’t take away from it. I have no authority to change the Word of God for you. The truth remains the same.
There are many consistencies in the story. The same farmer doing the planting so there’s no inconsistency there. The same seed being planted. The same process of broadcast planting is used. The same weather impacting all the seed no matter what the soil. All those things are the same even though the results vary.
- Speak the Truth Consistently
The seed doesn’t get planted without a farmer! Food doesn’t get raised without a farmer. We don’t survive without farmers. If you didn’t have the farmer, that would be terrible. Right? Someone has to produce all the food we eat. They plant and produce.
The same is true with spiritual truth, it needs to be communicated. We have preachers and individuals. We have small groups, youth group, Celebrate Recovery, Adventure Club, Junior Church, Sunday mornings, livestreams, and conversations where we can communicate the truth. We have the Word of God readily accessible.
As Paul said, how will anyone hear if they’re not told? The interesting thing about revelation is that it needs to be communicated. God gave us the universe and that speaks. God gave us the Word. God gave us Jesus. God gave us the Spirit. God gave us the church. There’s all kinds of communication that happens.
Romans 10:14 – How, then, can they call on the one they have not believed in? And how can they believe in the one of whom they have not heard? And how can they hear without someone preaching to them?
How can you believe if you haven’t heard. We need to plant the seeds! Our world desperately needs a revival and I’m sure people have questions. Let’s be a light!
The farmer in the story reaches his hand in a bag and he spreads that seed and it lands all over the place. A great reminder that you cannot predict the response to the truth, we just need to consistently give it. The gospel is so important.
I appreciate that God makes sure that truth is available to us. Like Moses said – it’s near. Deuteronomy 30:11-14 – Now what I am commanding you today is not too difficult for you or beyond your reach. 12 It is not up in heaven, so that you have to ask, “Who will ascend into heaven to get it and proclaim it to us so we may obey it?” 13 Nor is it beyond the sea, so that you have to ask, “Who will cross the sea to get it and proclaim it to us so we may obey it?” 14 No, the word is very near you; it is in your mouth and in your heart so you may obey it.
I love the fact that God will always make sure it’s communicated. As Jesus said, the seed is the teaching of the kingdom. It’s God’s truth and that doesn’t change! Let’s teach it!
- Do the Right Thing Consistently
You have to believe that if you keep doing the right thing consistently, good things are going to happen. Not saying that every positive action will have the same positive result. It does’t for the farmer. Some seed bears fruit while others won’t.
But that doesn’t stop the farmer from consistently planting. You’ve got to plant something to get something. You’re not going to get what you don’t plant. You have to put forth some effort. You want good relationships – invest into making them. You want answers to prayer, pray. You want to learn things, study. You want to get into better shape, work out. You’ll have a tough time getting love when you plant hatred.
You may not always get the exact same response to all good actions, however, good comes from good so keep at it.
There’s a principle that you reap what you sow. As I’ve been learning from the book of Job, life is more complicated than that. For instance, a farmer could have planted fields and had them destroyed in the hurricanes we recently had. However, as a general rule of thumb, you get what you plant.
Galatians 6:9 – Let us not become weary in doing good, for at the proper time we will reap a harvest if we do not give up.
Not everything that I’ve bought turns into a profit. But I’ve learned this. The same type of thinking that generally leads to success doesn’t always and I’ll have some losers. But I hold to my patterns because more often than not, it works. You have to be consistent and consistency pays off in so many areas of life.
Where are you discouraged by response? Stick with it. We learn that the farm plants consistently, he cannot worry only about results. Just keep at it. Keep at praying. Keep at teaching. Keep at serving. Keep at being a good parent. It will pay off and that’s what the farmer learns.
- Remember You Don’t Control Results
It’s consistently true that I don’t control what happens with God’s word. He says that it doesn’t return to him empty although I don’t always see the good.
The variable in the story is the soil types. Same farmer. Same seed. Same system. Same weather. Different results. Not everyone gets it or accepts it or even understands it. As Jesus will soon point out, the soil represents the human heart of the person. And some hearts are hard.
The disciples asked Jesus why he talked in parables. They were given the secrets of the kingdom. The kingdom of God is his rule in the world. They were told the truth. The rest of the people were not. Doesn’t seem fair, does it?
Vv14-15 – In them is fulfilled the prophecy of Isaiah: “‘You will be ever hearing but never understanding; you will be ever seeing but never perceiving. 15 For this people’s heart has become calloused; they hardly hear with their ears, and they have closed their eyes. Otherwise they might see with their eyes, hear with their ears, understand with their heart and turn, and I would heal them.’
I’ve noticed before that when it says that God hardened a person’s heart, He didn’t take them anywhere they didn’t want to go. These people dulled their ears and closed their eyes. If they understood, they’d repent. The word should create change but it didn’t because they were closed off to it and thus responsible.
God is constantly communicating but some just won’t listen. We bring ourselves to the Word and must make sure our heart is open to the truth! Have we shut our eyes to it?
There have been many times in life where I realize that my job is to inject truth into the spiritual veins and pray for the best. I just have to stand back realizing that I need to give it time to work. I can only give the truth. One plants and another waters but only God can give the increase!
- OPEN YOUR HEART TO THE TRUTH
The crowd listened to the story. They heard the SAME truth but it would not impact people the SAME way.
- Some Hearts Are Hard
V18 – “Listen then to what the parable of the sower means: 19 When anyone hears the message about the kingdom and does not understand it, the evil one comes and snatches away what was sown in their heart. This is the seed sown along the path.
This is the path – it’s packed by continuous foot traffic. When we were kids, we played kickball in the back yard. No grass grew on our diamond path around the bases because we wore it out. There would be no point in even trying to plant anything because it would only get trampled down.
This is the path! The seed landed there but it couldn’t sink in so the birds came along and ate it. Satan is the bird eating spiritual truth. How do our hearts get hard? It’s by a consistent refusal to hear the truth. You are not open to it and won’t hear it.
Part of the issue is pride. Sometimes people will not listen because they know it all and cannot see and will not see. They are right and there’s no talking to them. That’s not your fault and it’s not my job to soften a person’s heart. That’s God’s work.
You placed the truth right there with them. However, for the hard hearted, it’s like dropping tomato seeds onto a cement patio. No good will come of it. When I know people aren’t listening, I stop talking. Like Jesus said, you don’t have to throw your pearls to pigs who don’t care about it. They don’t want to hear it and more talking doesn’t fix that!
What can you do? I give God’s advice. Today, if you hear his voice, don’t harden your heart. The time to respond to God is now!
- Some Hearts Are Uncommitted
Vv20-21 – The seed falling on rocky ground refers to someone who hears the word and at once receives it with joy. 21 But since they have no root, they last only a short time. When trouble or persecution comes because of the word, they quickly fall away.
Oh, salvation for free? Forgiveness? Help with my marriage? Great. And they embrace it. But this soil dries out because it’s only a few inches of top soil. The heat comes and the plants wither.
Every spring we buy plants in those little containers. A flat of them. What happens if you don’t plant them right away and don’t keep them watered? They quickly wither.
For the farmer, he plants the seed and it looks good at first. But trials tell the true story. Faith doesn’t just embrace, faith endures. It takes commitment to keep doing the right thing even when you get resisted for it.
We need to make sure that when we embrace Christ, we’re in it for the long haul. You cannot follow Christ base on short term down turns.
Job has to be one of the greatest examples. He was willing to take the good and the bad. He voiced his bitter laments but he never gave up on having an audience with God. He said, even if he slays me, yet I will trust him. You cannot evaluate all life based on the short term. Keep going.
- Some Hearts Are Distracted
V22 – The seed falling among the thorns refers to someone who hears the word, but the worries of this life and the deceitfulness of wealth choke the word, making it unfruitful.
Weedy soil – the weedy soil actually chokes out the good. I have planted plants to compete with the weedy crab grass and they have been great because no weeds grow there like they used too. There’s not enough room. In reverse – weeds can choke out garden plants.
We’ve all had gardens be less fruitful because it’s more weeds than anything else. About August we are starting to lose the tug of war in the garden and it’s hard to know where the plants begin and weeds end. Weeds can choke out good plants and that’s not what we want.
This heart is distracted. It’s concerned with wealth. It’s caught up in the busyness of life and deadlines and bills and a hundred other things of no eternal significance. And the heart soil becomes weedy. The applause and success and busyness gets the best of us.
It’s good to remember that every weed starts out small and it’s best to pull them sooner rather than later. When things are coming between you and God, pull the weeds. Don’t allow God to become that lesser priority.
- Some Hearts are Receptive to the Seed
We are like a garden tilled up! Good soil is where you want to be. The good soil is where the seed can germinate, root, grow unhindered and bear fruit. This is what God wants. He wants us changing and becoming who we are intended to be. We should be filled with love and kindness and righteousness and fruit of the Spirit.
What is your heart like? Are we listening to the Word or closing our eyes to the truth? I know some like to put a spotlight on a favorite part of the Bible in an effort to teach the “whole counsel” of God while simultaneously forgetting about the whole counsel of God.
Jesus said that the truth is like a solid rock and we build off that solid rock.
Some hearts are open and some are closed. How about you? How’s your heart? You have room for Jesus? You have room for the word?
John 1:12 – Yet to all who did receive him, to those who believed in his name, he gave the right to become children of God—