Matthew 13:1-9
Jesus taught many things during his time of ministry in this world. The scripture says or the gospel writers say that he taught them in parables. Parables are little stories that Jesus used to teach spiritual things. Things that are not easy to understand he used small little stories that simple stories that people can understand and relate that to the spiritual truth and other deep truths that he wants to bring out. So that is what Parable is. A parable is not to be taken in itself and give an interpretation other than what Jesus explained it there. And a lot of times people get confused with Parables and fables also with proverbs. Parables are just simple stories and that's what they are. There's nothing more nothing less We can relate to spiritual truths from the ordinary life stories.
In this parable we read today, a sower, a farmer went to sow his seeds. The seeds fell among many different soils and he talks about that in this story. And then from Verse 18 to 23. He describes what the meaning of this Parable is so that they can understand the meaning of this Parable. So if you go down and read the rest of the chapter and I will read also as we go along. I will read that but he said that whoever has ears let them hear. People didn't have ears who some people don't know how to hear with ears in that crowd. I believe everybody had ears who gathered them because they wanted to hear Jesus anyway, but Jesus said let them have let them have who has ears.
even though we have ears and eyes, we may not hear and see what exactly is via hearing or what we are seeing. As we drive through the highways you see the speed limit and the highway signs. Don't mix them up. To 85 is highway sign and 65 is the speed limit if you mix them up you'll be in big trouble. So what you read? You need to understand what it means. Right highway sign is certainly for a reason because you want to know where you are. And the speed limits are written on another location and that's also for a reason because you don't want to exceed the speed limit. So you have to be careful with that and all so many times. We are selective when we come to our hearing or our seeing we want to see what we want to see and we hear what we want to hear right? That's what Jesus will say. There was a reporter that I read and rip who went to different courtrooms.
To report about
people's responses when they attend jury trials and how people react when you
are in the jury. So in a jury selection process and was in a courtroom and and
he watched she watched people trying to persuade the judge to get out of the
jury to accept them from jury. Trial people come up with various excuses that
they don't know. Nobody wants to be there for longer than many times. We think
so one man explained that he had a severe hearing problem. He could not hear right and he wouldn't be
able to follow the proceedings. That was the excuse that he told the judge. And
in that said you are excused. And and
then the man said, what did you say? And
the judge said it louder so that you are excused and you can leave. And then
while she was leaving the door that said to the clerk during a number nine is
leaving and he's excused but he will still get paid for his time for being here
today. Then at the door he turned around and said, thank you guys. That was the kind of fearing that we are
talking about selective here what we want to hear. And we don't hear what we don't want to hear
even if it is set the same way.
So Jesus said this parable about this over who went out. So so he seed and spread his sea. And he encountered various different soils. When he talked about the meaning of this Parable, he said the seed is the word of God. And he said that in the other gospel also. The seed that he is talking about is inspired word of God and the soils are you and me, preachers of the word and the Ministers of the word and believers who go out there and preach the word to other people or witness to other people about Jesus hrist. And when you witness to other people, you don't have a choice to select the kind of people. I'm only going to sow my seed in the good ground or I can only sow in a soil that I like. Jesus teaches that you should not choose. The final command of Jesus was to “Go preach to all the nations.” We are giving a vast variety of fields the world in front of us. That's what John Wesley is to say, “the world is my Parish.” And we cannot we don't have a choice. We have to spread the seed wherever we have the opportunity to do it.
The seed is full of life. That's what we need to learn first of all from this parable. A seed will germinate in the right conditions if it has life in it. Evidence of life of a seed is in its growing. If you take a seed in your hand, you don't know if it's live or dead. You cannot look at it and say this is a good seed I can plant. You cannot find out if the seed has life, by looking, smeeling or touching. You cannot find out unless you plant it and wait for it to see if it grows up or not. If it grows up, you know for sure that it is a living seed that you have. So that is what the power of a seed the life in it. That's exactly the Living Word of God is it is full of life. And it brings life to whoever receives it. If you remember the creation that God did. He spoke with his word and the life came into being. He spoke and the creation came up. So the Word of God is full of life.
You and I are witnesses because we are here in this world in this living body is because of the word of God. He gave us this life with His breath in us and that's the inspired word of God that Peter talks about. “All scripture is inspired by God.” (2 Timothy 3:16). Jesus taught a parable about the mustard seed. it is a very tiny seed but when it grows up, it becomes a big tree. They become big and birds find homes in there that they build their nest on them and the animals find shutter in their shadows and they become big. They multiply by bearing more fruits and more seeds for the next generation and it goes on and on.That is the the power of small seed that has life. It multiplies to generations until the end of the world. Jesus said the power of word the life of the scripture the word itself can multiply 100 times 60 times and 30 times bringing more returns to the farmer.
So that is the word that Jesus is talking about then the soil that I told you there are several different soils that Jesus talked about in this the first soil that he talked about was the Wayside or side walk soil. It represents our response to the good news. Our response is to God's word when some of the seeds go into the Wayside and the birds will come and pick it up they eat it. Then There goes and the seeds don't have a chance to germinate or take root in the on the Wayside. The sidewalks are hardened and packed because of bieng compacted by walking or driving on those areas and the seeds have no way to take root in such hard places if our hearts are hard and there is no way the scripture of the word of God can take root in our lives. If you open our hearts and our hearts and receive the word with humility and obedience. That's the only way God's word can take the root in us and take life in us many times. We just don't respond to the word just like on the sidewalks that the devil comes and takes it up because we don't open up our hearts and receive it with obedience and humility that there will come and snatch it away from us and we don't have even chance to respond to it.
Then the second soil that Jesus was talking about is the rocky soil. The rocky soil is similar to the sidewalks, but it may take a little bit soil. There might be a little bit soil on the Rock but it starts growing up since it doesn't have enough depth for the soil. It does not take root deep enough for the plant to grow up the rocky places where it not have soil. Sometimes they spring up because the soil is shallow when the sun comes the plants will die off. Such plants wither away quickly in the heat of the sun. So when we have a shallow faith, if we don't get rooted in the in the depth of the scripture, then the sun comes up the real heat of trials in our life comes up. It will dry up. It will dry off. That's what happens with our faith. trials of life, the cares of life and the burden of life will come us and hear us hardly like a fire will get burned up like in the plant burning up in the in the sun. It's also our busy life schedules can also become a problem and then it will not so dry out as we don't have rooted Faith deep faith in us the third soil is the soil whether it's full of thorns and we
You know what happens some of those thorns and weeds come up they plant also will come up but they will choke it and talk to you up our cares of Life can talk a Word of Life from springing up and growing into plants and become fruitful. They Thorns are maybe our cares or burdens or health issues our worries our fears or family problems or any anything like that that takes over our life and then we don't go pay attention to the word of God. It can also be the schedule of our life our business our job our family our vacations. These are all coming and taking up springing up along with the word and we don't give priority to the word for happens. It goes on the face side and the word of God will not take root in us. That's the soil full of thorns.
And then Jesus talks about the good soil. The good soil is about the soil that we received with. The proper response and also with humility and obedience that we want to receive the word have a hunger and thirst for the word of God and then we will receive it but that proper attitude it will spring up and it will have roots in us and you'll become fruitful word in our life just like a tree that produces more fruits. We will produce fruits of the Holy Spirit in our life as the word of God takes root in us.
There is good news and bad news in the story. The good news is that God has given us opportunities to receive the Word. The Word is getting spread everywhere and there is no shortage of the Word. He is expecting a return from it. Now we have the scripture available in iPhone and smart devices and all kinds of electronic media. We can hear preaching everywhere. We can hear in radio, TV, and online resources and in any language, in any form of fashion you want. The Word of God is readily and universally available. The seed is available in plenty and more than enough and the farmer is a lavish farmer. So as Farmer spreads it lavishly everywhere and free. We don't have to do anything. That's the great news. The other good news is that we have still time to respond to that news.
When we respond to the good news properly, it will become a blessing in our life and also it will be a blessing to this world through our lives. We still have time but the bad news is that there is a harvest time.
The bad news is that the time is limited. The farmer is looking for his return. We have been given a certain amount of time to live in this world. We don't know if tomorrow will be ours. Because our life can be taken away any moment. There's no guarantee. But God is the only guarantee that we have and he has given us today and now to use the opportunity to receive the word and and make use of that time together. We read in the book of Hebrews that “if you hear your voice today, do not harden on your hearts.” We have a very short time. So the best we can do is to make use of our opportunities that God gives us and respond to it properly and and share the good news to others before time runs out. We all read in our side view mirrors of our cars, a message that says that ‘the objects look smaller than it looks.’ It is true of our calendars. We can look at the calendars and say that “the days in the calendar are closer than they appear.” Time flies, and it flies so fast.
The writer of Psalm 90 talks about counting the days of our lives. “Teach us to number of days in our lives.” We have very limited number of days in our life. And if you count the number is not too many. One year is just 365 days, and if you multiply that with then years, it is only 3650 days, and you can calculate your estimate of your own, how many days are left for you.
So let's keep the count the days of our life and make it so precious and make it valuable and receive the word and share the word as long as we have life in this world. May the good Lord bless us these words of these go from this place to be his witnesses for his Living Word in this world, Amen.
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