The Parable of the Sower
Everyone has an opinion. But you must decide in your heart what you truly believe about Jesus. Join Pastor Andrew as we take a look at the parable of the Sower in Matthew 13.
Matthew 13:3-9, 18-23
Series Overview: The parables of the gospels answer the question “what does Jesus teach?” – v. 1-3
The reality of Jesus’ teaching is…
Everyone has an opinion – v. 4-8, 18
Some are victims of evil – v. 19
Some are victims of experience – v. 20-21
Some are victims of excitement – v. 22
Many are beneficiaries of grace – v. 23
Parabolic Wisdom: “You must decide in your heart what you truly believe about Jesus” – v. 9
Transcript
· And the first time following Jesus actually costs them something. Maybe a friend mocks them.
· Maybe life gets harder. That at the workplace it's more uncomfortable. All of a sudden social
· media someone disagrees with you because that's the worst thing in the world, right?
· And all of a sudden when life pushes back because we say we're going to follow Jesus,
· all of a sudden the feelings start to fade and they're gone.
· But hey, if you have a Bible, go ahead and grab it and turn to Matthew chapter 13. Matthew chapter 13
· is where we're going to be laying down our roots this morning. And if you were here last week,
· we launched this brand new series called Parables. And I was gone. I was out of town
· and Kyle preached for us. And when I love to give guys preaching opportunities to kind of
· raise up more preachers and do a good job. But usually when I do that,
· I want them to preach worse than me so I sound better the following week. So thanks a lot,
· Kyle. Where'd he go? He was supposed to lower the bar and he heightened it. He did a great
· job. But he did a phenomenal job. And you can give Kyle a hand for that. That's right.
· But he did a great job just launching us into this new series, Parables. And we're
· doing this on the back end of eight weeks going through the miracles of Jesus.
· And in the miracles of Jesus, we said over and over again, the question that came out
· of those passages is who is this man? Who is Jesus? What does he about? And we saw
· throughout this pieces of his authority that ultimately pointed to him as God and our Savior.
· And as we turn the page to the parables, the question shifts from the identity of Christ
· and it answers a different question. In this overview, as we see the parables of the
· Gospels answer the question of what does Jesus teach? This God who came down to earth
· to be with us, to die on a cross and raise for our sins. We must ask the question of,
· okay, if Jesus is God, what does he say for us to do and how do we actually follow it?
· And you see, as you go through the Gospels, we're going to see very clearly
· that Jesus was the greatest teacher who ever lived. And his favorite way to teach was the
· parable. Jesus often taught in stories. Actually, if you go through the Gospels,
· 35% of everything Jesus says in the Gospels comes to us in the form of a story.
· He talks about farmers and seeds, lost coins and prodigal sons, wedding feasts and buried
· treasures. And every story attempts to crack open heavenly truth that brings it down to
· our earthly domain. And today, as we jump into Matthew chapter 13, starting in verse one,
· here's how we see that we just plummet into this text. And it says here on that day,
· Jesus went out of the house and was sitting by the sea. Such large crowds gathered around
· him that he got into a boat and he sat down while the whole crowd stood on the shore.
· Then he told them many things and parables saying, we're going to stop right there and
· pick that up in just a second. But as we launch into this text, I just want you to picture
· this scene for a second, that there's this massive crowd that was following Jesus wherever
· he went. Now, how annoying would that be? Like you can't escape, right? I have four kids,
· I can't escape them, but I can't imagine a crowd following you wherever you go.
· Wherever Jesus goes, this crowd is just behind him and he comes out and they're just pushing
· in, they're pushing in, they're yearning for more. So Jesus steps into a boat,
· it gets pushed out a few feet into the water. And this is before big old church buildings like
· this, this is before microphones and AV equipment. This is 2000 years ago. And as Jesus
· pushes out, because he is God, he's pretty smart, he uses the water as an amplifier for
· his voice. And as they're sitting on the shoreline, Jesus is using this and speaking
· like a microphone to the crowd around him, like an amplifier. And in this amphitheater
· type setting, in the very first story out of his mouth that we see today,
· is this foundational one that he sets as he says, you must understand if you're going
· to understand any of the others is about a farmer casting seed. Now, if you look at me,
· you probably could assert that I don't know much about growing anything. I'm a city boy.
· When I came to Surprise and I was at Phoenix, Crossroads Phoenix for about
· eight and a half years, someone said, if you're going to go to Surprise,
· you need to wear boots. And I said, you'll never see me in boots because if I wore boots,
· I'd be a fraud. So I wear books instead of boots. Some of you get that, some of you don't.
· But it's like, I will never wear boots because I'm not a cowboy. I'm not a farmer.
· I've been watching Yellowstone to catch up. But let me see, as I watch that,
· I'd be like, I ain't doing that, right? Like I ain't killing someone at a farm and
· burying them. A different story I think I'm getting from that.
· But here's what I love about this parable. As we dive in here, Jesus is going to tell
· this parable twice. First, he tells it to the crowd as his voice reverberates through the water
· to all those onlookers. But he's going to tell it a second time in the privacy of him and his
· disciples as he explains it and as he walks them through it. And I love this because
· sometimes when we read scripture, we feel like we have to guess, we have to read a lot of
· commentaries, we have to see who said this and what does it mean. But we don't have to
· too hard what it means when Jesus tells us exactly what it means. But it picks up in our story in the
· second half of verse three. And I want to read this in full and then take some time breaking
· it down and going through how this applies for us. But it starts here in the second half.
· He says, consider the sower who went out to sow. As he sowed, some seed fell along the
· path and the birds came and devoured them. Other seed fell on rocky ground,
· where it didn't have much soil and it grew up quickly since the soil wasn't deep. But when the
· sun came up, it was scorched. And since it had no root, it withered away. Other seed
· fell among thorns and the thorns came up and they choked it. Still other seed fell on good
· fruit. Some 100, some 60, some 30 times what was sown. Let anyone who has ears listen.
· Let's pray over our text this morning. Dear God, I thank you this morning.
· Lord, I thank you how glorious you are, how great you are, Lord, as we just dive into this
· parable. And God, we ask of how you cause us to move, what you cause us to do as a result,
· how the seed falls and what we must do in response. Lord, I just ask that you guide our time,
· that you guide our hearts. And Lord, that we leave this place changed knowing what we must do.
· God, thank you for your presence that dwells with us here this morning.
· And we lift all this up in Jesus name. Amen. We've always called this the parable of the
· sower. And actually, we call it the parable of the sower because Jesus actually names it
· the parable of the sower in just a second. But what's funny about this is I think when
· we apply it to us, it almost, the sower in the story never changes. The sower,
· the seed that the sower is throwing out, it never changes. The same farmer scatters
· the same seed across the whole field. The only variable, the only thing that changes
· in the story is actually the soil. So for our sake, I almost think a better name,
· if I were to tell Jesus what a better name for the story he tells is, you're shaking your head,
· you're like, are you going to be a heretical right now? This is like the parable of the
· soils because he's going to walk through four different soils and how it impacts us and how
· we respond and how us as the soil are supposed to respond to this text. And in his explanation,
· Jesus tells us which each of these elements stand for. The sower is the son of man, Jesus
· himself and anyone who carries out his gospel. The seed is the word of God, the good news of
· the kingdom and the soil is the human heart. So as we engage in this text, here is the reality
· that is being taught through here. And the reality of Jesus teaching is I believe that we
· see five things that come from this text. And the first thing we see is that everyone has an
· opinion. You see the first thing about this parable that it forces us to admit is that when
· the seed is scattered, something happens every time. The seed never just like hangs and floats
· in the air. Like that would define gravity, right? Like that would make no sense. Like the
· hits the ground in every single setting, in every single way. When it lands somewhere,
· wherever it lands, the soil responds to it. And I think this is important because that's the
· picture of Jesus' ministry. He scatters the word everywhere, the way a first century farmer
· walked his field, flinging seed in every direction. I remember my first house that I
· bought my first house, I had a lawn, a front and a back lawn. That was a bad idea because I had to
· mow and overseed both of those. The longer we lived there, what I decided to do is I would
· only do winter lawn in the front yard and not the backyard because I had to make it look nice
· on the outside when my backyard really was terrible and dying. But I remember the first
· time I went to overseed my lawn, I got one of those things you push and you put the seed
· in and it sprays it on nicely. Yeah, I found out year two that takes too long. So instead,
· as a farmer does, I took a bag and just threw it, right? That's the way you know you're
· winning. And now, as I've moved to Surprise, Arizona in North Surprise, my grass is awesome.
· It is fake. So I don't ever overseed it anymore. Yeah. Hallelujah for that.
· Every winter it looks fantastic. Every summer it looks fantastic. You can't beat it.
· But the picture we get here of Jesus is he's spreading seed. And the important thing we
· need to see is everyone has to do something with it. Nobody walks away from hearing the
· message of Jesus Christ neutral. Everyone has an opinion about Jesus whether they realize it
· or not. Look at verse 18 where Jesus begins his explanation. This is in Matthew 13.
· Skip down to verse 18 when he begins to explain this to his disciples,
· he says, so listen to the parable of the sower. He's like, listen to the message
· that I'm giving you. Listen to this story. And I'm going to explain upon it to the
· disciples. He said, what this means for you. And he starts here is listen because all of
· you are going to have a response to this. There is no neutral ground when it comes
· to Jesus. I think about in Arizona and we're going to get a little bit further once we pass
· this summer that is really just beginning if we're honest. But as we get later in the year
· and usually as you get into October and you get into election season, I love to just drive
· around Surprise and see all the bright election signs that are so fun to look at. And you
· see none of them stay like neutral on everything. Vote for me. Everyone has a
· position. Everyone aligns red or blue or something else. Like everyone says we believe
· this. We're standing for this. This school board vote on this prop vote on this. There
· is no neutrality when it comes to that. And even more so when we talk about our
· spiritual life. Sometimes we think me and Jesus, we can just be bros and we can
· just be neutral and don't have to talk that much. But here Jesus establishes that
· everyone has an opinion. Everyone has to make up their mind on what they believe
· about Christ. And the four soils are going to represent this four responses to
· Christ. And here's the sobering reality as we get into this is three of them are
· negative and one of them is positive, which is not a fun way to start out. But
· as we dive into this first, the first thing we see and I think the three negative
· I think are all ways that we can become victims to the world and to the sin around
· us. And the first response we see is that some people are victims of evil. Keep
· going. In this passage, when Jesus says in verse 18, listen to the parable of
· the sewer, he starts hearing, he says, when anyone hears the word about the
· kingdom, he is talking about the kingdom of God. When anyone hears the
· kingdom and they don't understand it, the evil one comes and snatches away what
· was sown in his heart. This is the one sown along the path. You see, this is
· the first soil that we see. The first soil is what is referred to as the
· path, the hard ground. Think of a dirt road packed by years of foot traffic
· and horses and wagon wheels. The seed hits that surface and it just lies on
· top. Now, here, if you think back 2,000 years ago, they did not have
· sidewalks, okay? They had gravel packed dirt in Rome. They didn't quite, they
· might have had some kind of different areas where maybe you had some brick
· and stuff, but it was not the same of what we have now. And I have a
· feeling their construction moved faster than it does in Surprise Arizona.
· Can I get an amen for that? All right. Like, why are we doing construction
· on what we just did construction on six months ago? What were we talking
· about? Anyway, but here's what happens. This hard packed dirt, when the seed
· hits it, it can't penetrate. It just lays on top of that dirt until some
· birds come and eat it, snatch it away, and take it off. And you see,
· Jesus tells us exactly what this means. He says the birds are the evil
· one, Satan himself. And he says, this is the heart that hears the
· gospel, and before it can ever take root, the enemy steals it away. Now,
· we've all seen this soil. Maybe you've even been this soil. It's the person
· at the funeral who hears the gospel clearly, feels something stir for 90
· seconds, and by the parking lot, it's gone, and they're back to their
· old way of life. It's the skeptic who decided before you ever opened
· your mouth to talk about Jesus that what you're saying is nonsense,
· and they will not hear it. Commentators call this gospel deafness,
· where the book closes before it is ever open to hear the good news of
· Christ, and so do their ears. It kind of reminds me about what
· happens here in monsoon season, which maybe is going to kick off
· today. That would be great, right? But here's what's funny. When
· monsoons happen, we think our desert, like, we desperately want it.
· We're like, hey, as soon as rain hits that water or hits that dirt,
· it's just going to soak it all up, right? We think it's just going
· to go straight there. You know why we have flash floods in the middle
· of monsoon season? It's because the ground is so hard that when
· that water hits it, it just keeps rushing on by, and it just
· floods and floods until it gets into the washes, and then the
· washes become full of weeds, and then it gets hot, and then
· there's fires in there later, and it's the cycle of the deserts,
· right? But it becomes the ground is so hard-packed that even
· when life in water itself comes to nourish it, it has become so
· hardened that it cannot take it in. And I think if we're honest,
· a hard heart is the same way the word pours down, but it just
· runs right off because it cannot receive it. But notice I call
· this person, this soil, a victim. And here's the deal is they
· are in a sense because the evil one, Satan, is real, and he is
· actively at work to rip the word out of human hearts. There
· is a thief that roams around us. But don't miss what Jesus says
· at the front in verse 19. He says, this is the one who
· hears and doesn't understand it. There's still responsibility
· there. Satan can only snatch away what was never allowed to
· sink in. You see some are victims of evil, but some are also,
· as our next point here, that we see are victims of experience.
· Check out verse 20 and 21, after we've seen how some,
· they hear God's word, and they won't respond to it. This
· next, our victim of evils, check it out, verse 20, it
· says, and the one sown on rocky grounds, this is the
· one who hears the word and immediately receives it with
· joy. This sounds great right now. They're receiving God's
· word with joy, but verse 21, but he has no roots, and it
· is short lived. When distress or persecution comes because
· of the word, immediately he falls away. Some are victims
· of experience. This is the one that looks promising at
· first. Rocky ground here doesn't mean that it is
· covered in stones. It means that there's a thin layer
· of topsoil sitting on top of a limestone bedrock. That's
· what was very common at this time in Rome, and this was
· all over Galilee at this time, and the seed would land,
· but because the soil was so shallow, it would warm up
· really fast. It would get water really fast, and all
· of a sudden, it would sprout up. It was the quickest,
· greenest growth in the entire field, but the problem
· was is there was no depth. There was no roots. There's a
· slab of rock that's underneath, so the moment the
· sun comes up and it heats, and the heat just hits
· like we know heat can hit, right? The plant has nothing
· to draw from. It has no water underneath that it can get
· to keep going, and it withers as fast as it sprouts.
· One commentator put it perfectly that this soil is
· quickly green and quickly gone, and Jesus names exactly
· what the sun is in the story. It is not heat in
· general, but he said it is distress or persecution
· because of the word. Now, what does this mean for us?
· How do we have a rocky heart that impacts us? Well,
· I think this is the person whose faith was all
· experience, all emotion. They responded with real tearful
· joy at the retreat or at the concert in the high moment
· at the camp, but it never went below the surface.
· In the first time, following Jesus actually costs them
· something. Maybe a friend mocks them. Maybe life gets
· harder that at the workplace, it's more uncomfortable.
· All of a sudden, social media, someone disagrees
· with you because that's the worst thing in the world,
· right? And all of a sudden, when life pushes back because
· we say we're going to follow Jesus, all of a sudden,
· the feelings start to fade and they're gone. It's almost
· like what we see every January with New Year's
· resolutions. People make resolutions. I'm going to go
· to the gym. I told you was my goal this year is
· like, I don't want to be like those people who start
· the gym and quit the gym, so I'm not going to start
· the gym, so I can't quit the gym. But I was like,
· actually what I'll do is I'll start in February because
· it'll be cleared out. No one will be there. In February,
· I actually turned into May when my wife signed us up
· for a membership. She didn't really ask. She just
· signed us up. She's like, I'm starting this plan.
· We're doing it. She's going five days a week.
· I'm going one and a half-ish in hiking some.
· But as we're going to the gym, it's like those
· people. You get super excited about it. The
· feeling is there, but as soon as it gets hard,
· it's like, I think I'm going to quit this. I think
· I'm done. I'm all jazzed up about Jesus in the
· moment, but as soon as life punches me in the face,
· I'm going to fall out. I've seen this over the
· course of 10 years of pastoring. I've seen this
· all the time, and I'm going to say it's the
· addict behavior of Christianity, and sometimes
· all people come to me. They're like, dude,
· I'm jazzed up for Jesus. I want to do
· everything. Tell me what can I do at the
· church tomorrow and Tuesday and Wednesday and
· Thursday and Friday, and I'll be here every
· moment I can, and I say, hey, can you come
· back next Sunday? They're like, yeah, but what
· can I do Monday through Saturday? I want to
· do more, and I'm like, just keep coming on
· Sunday for about a month. And if you can do
· that, I'll find out what we can do next.
· And here's what's often happened is they
· wanted to be all in, but as soon as they
· couldn't be all in in that moment, they
· would not commit to making this a lifestyle
· rather than just an experience that's a high
· for a little bit, but comes scorching down
· as soon as life gets hard. And you see,
· this is why here at Cross Church we talk
· about we don't want just an experiential
· Christianity. We don't want just a
· Christianity that's charismatic on the
· outside but is not rooted in Scripture
· on the inside. Every time we gather for
· a service, here's our goal, and you've
· probably heard these words, and we're
· gonna say them more and more as time
· goes, is we want to take a piece of
· Scripture. We want to pray through it.
· We want to praise through it. We want
· to preach through it so that you can
· practice it during the week. And here's
· the difference with that is when we are
· rooting in Scripture and in God's Word,
· we are not gonna have this shallow
· little root that hits the rock that
· as soon as the sun comes out, the
· distress, the persecution were ripped
· right out. We wither away and our
· Christianity is gone. You see, this is
· a sobering soil church because it
· warns us that an emotional response
· is not the same as a converted heart.
· Jesus tells us throughout Scripture
· that those who continue
· in his Word are truly his disciples.
· Sprouting fast is easy. Putting down
· roots is hard.
· You see, some are victims of evil. Some
· are victims of experience, but we also
· see some are victims of excitement.
· This seems very similar to the last
· one, but let's break this down a
· little bit more because it's a
· continues in verse 22. It says,
· now the one sown among the thorns,
· this is the one who hears the Word,
· but the worries of this age, the
· deceitfulness of wealth choke the
· Word and it becomes unfruitful.
· This in some ways is the most
· dangerous soil of all and I believe
· is the most dangerous soil for the
· church in America today because
· nothing dramatic happens.
· No birds swoop down. No scorching
· sun comes out. The seed actually
· takes root and it starts to grow.
· This plant looks like it might
· make it, but the problem is it's
· not growing alone.
· There are thorns that are coming
· up right alongside it, growing
· slower, but growing with it.
· And slowly, quietly, they
· choke the life out of it.
· And Jesus identifies the thorns in
· the story as two things. Number one,
· he says the worries of this age.
· Does anyone have worries in this
· room? Does anyone have worries in
· this room?
· There are so many worries we have
· in this age and this isn't even a
· new thing. This isn't like all of
· a sudden we got worries in 2026.
· Jesus was telling them they had
· worries in 1 AD. That's probably
· about 30 AD, but in that time they
· had worries of this age. But number
· two, he says it's the deceitfulness
· of wealth. Oh, that's a whole
· nother sermon I don't have time
· for, but we'll get some cliff
· notes on it. But think about
· this worry and wealth, the
· anxious grind of life and the
· seductive pull of stuff. Now I
· called this the soil victim of
· excitement and here's what I mean
· is this person is genuinely excited
· about 100 other things. Their
· calendar is full, their cart is
· full, they're chasing the
· promotion, the bigger house, the
· next vacation, the kids travel
· ball every weekend and none of
· that is bad. None of it is
· necessarily evil, but that's
· what makes it deceptive because
· all of it when it comes
· together, it slowly crowds out
· Jesus of your life and there's
· no room left for him to grow.
· And here's what's scary about
· this. It's like when you don't
· watch your front lawn and here's
· what I've learned is that I
· moved into our house, our new
· house about almost two years ago
· in North Surprise and we did a
· new build out there and they
· put all the plants in your
· front yard and they're all
· native desert plants and as they
· grow and get a little messy,
· you don't even notice because
· they look like they're
· supposed to be there in the
· desert. But then weeds start
· growing too and I don't really
· unless you're in right by
· the plants, you don't even see
· the little weeds sprouting and
· then all of a sudden one day
· you pull into your garage and
· there's weed this tall and
· you're like, what happened to
· that weed? And then you're
· going to pull it and you
· realize there's thorns all over
· it and it hurts your hand and
· it's killing you and then
· you realize it's killing the
· plant that was supposed to be
· there. And the same happens
· in our lives. These little
· weeds sprout out without us
· noticing. All of a sudden
· they start crowding the
· things that are most important
· and there's a warning here
· that the thorns do not
· announce themselves. The
· thorns don't say, hey, this
· is going to steal from your
· relationship from Jesus. This
· is going to get you sidetracked.
· This is going to harden and
· this is going to ruin your
· path. This is going to destroy
· the foundation of your family
· for the generations to come of
· following Christ. They don't
· announce themselves like that.
· They say, hey, this is a good
· thing. Follow this. And we
· start busily filling our
· calendars with stuff that all
· of a sudden we forsake the
· most important thing, which is
· right in front of us. And
· here's the scariest part
· about this church is I don't
· care who you are, is you don't
· mature past these things. Just
· this past couple months I have
· had this struggle in my heart
· where sometimes I scroll
· social media and I get annoyed
· because I see people I know
· when I grew up with and I'm
· like, oh, they're going on
· that vacation. They bought
· that house. They have that
· car. I'm smarter than that
· person. Like I should be
· making more money than them.
· I should be doing this. And
· I'm like, and God has to
· like stop me in my tracks
· and be like, dude, why do
· you care about that stuff? Why
· care about the worries in
· this age? Why do you care
· about the deceitfulness of
· wealth? It is here today,
· but it is gone tomorrow. He
· says focus on the main
· thing. Focus on the purpose,
· on the path, on what I have
· provided for you because
· what matters more than all
· of it is the person of
· Jesus Christ that our
· world is trying to choke
· out in these deceitful
· thorns. They are so hard
· because they are creeping
· up in us, trying to crowd
· out Jesus of our life.
· So that's three soils,
· three failures, the heart
· that is robbed by the
· evil one, the shallow
· heart that couldn't
· survive the heat, the
· crowded heart that is
· choked out by worry
· and wealth. If Jesus
· stopped here, this would
· be such a depressing
· parable, but he doesn't.
· There is evil. There's
· there is excitement, but
· church, here is the good
· news is that many are
· beneficiaries of grace.
· Many are beneficiaries
· of grace. Keep going as
· we go through this
· passage and we see as
· Jesus ends his commentary
· on this in verse 23,
· it says, but the one
· sown on the good ground,
· I love that phrase, on
· the good ground, this
· is the one who hears
· and understands the
· word who does produce
· fruits and yields some
· 100, some 60, some 30
· times what was sown.
· Here's what this
· parable has been
· billing to. He's gone
· through the bad soil
· and he leads to the
· good soil. This is the
· fourth heart that we
· are embracing and
· notice what makes it
· different is this heart
· as she describes, it
· hears and it
· understands. It doesn't
· just hear, but it
· also receives. It
· takes root. It produces
· a harvest and not even
· a small one. It says
· a hundredfold, 60 fold,
· 30 fold in the ancient
· world. A seven fold
· return was considered
· a great harvest. So
· this was like a
· mind blowing harvest.
· How much return came
· from this. He's
· describing a yield that
· is off the charts, but
· it begs the question
· here and understand
· what we're saying here
· and understand the
· gospel, the gospel,
· the good news of
· Jesus Christ, that
· Jesus lived, that
· Jesus died, that
· Jesus paid the price
· for our sins, that
· Jesus rose from the
· grave and Jesus is
· the ultimate God, the
· one and only who can
· change our life now
· and for all of
· eternity. When we hear
· and we receive that
· truth that scripture
· proclaims, but as
· we go in this point,
· I want us to be
· careful and there's
· a little warning here
· because it would be
· easy to read this
· and walk out thinking
· the whole point of
· this is be better
· soil. Try harder.
· I guess you try to
· receive it a little
· bit more, but church
· soil doesn't make
· itself good. A path
· doesn't decide to
· become farmland. Rocky
· ground can't dig out
· its own bedrock. A
· thorny field can't
· pull its own weeds.
· Good soil is cultivated.
· It is worked. It is
· graced by God above.
· You see the good
· soil heart isn't the
· heart that was
· naturally better than
· the others. It's the
· heart that grace got
· ahold of. God
· softens the hard ground.
· God breaks up the
· rock. God clears out
· the thorns. Ezekiel
· 36 tells us about
· this. It says that
· he takes our heart
· of stone and he
· gives us a heart of
· flesh. You can't
· manufacture good soil
· on your own. You
· receive it when you
· humble yourself before
· God. And then a
· heart that truly has
· received grace. Here's
· what it tells us. It
· will always produce
· fruit. A fruitless
· Christian, many
· commentators say, is
· an oxymoron. When
· the word truly takes
· root, a harvest is
· guaranteed. In the
· late 1700s, William
· Carey, he was a
· missionary. He left
· England for India for
· a missionary journey.
· And when he was
· there in India, he
· labored for seven
· years before his
· very first convert
· to Jesus. Seven
· years of scattering
· seed that seemed to
· land on nothing but
· hard paths and rocky
· ground. People told him
· to quit. People said
· you are wasting your
· life. You are wasting
· your talents. But he
· kept sowing in his
· seed. And his motto
· became this, expect
· great things from God.
· Attempt great things
· from God. He said,
· expect great things
· from God. Attempt
· great things for God.
· He trusted the
· Lord of the Harvest
· would in his time
· produce the good
· soil. And he did.
· And he is one of
· the most renowned
· missionaries to this
· day. You see, that's
· our encouragement here
· today. Cross Church
· that if you're a
· believer, your job
· is not to manufacture
· the harvest. Your
· job is to keep
· sowing the seed.
· Generously, everywhere,
· even recklessly. Don't
· use that stupid little
· thing that you push
· and it spreads the
· seed evenly. Just
· take a handful of
· seed and chuck it
· wherever you can get
· it to. That's what
· this calls us to do
· in trust that wherever
· that seed lands, God
· knows the soil that
· it's hitting. Keep
· praying that the
· hard-hearted spouse
· that soil will soften
· and that seed will
· seek in. Keep
· loving the rebellious
· kid which you know
· he has rocky soil
· in his life. And
· keep hoping that God
· will till that soil
· so that it can receive
· the word. Keep
· sharing with the
· apathetic co-worker
· that is so caught
· up in the stuff
· of the world that
· all of a sudden,
· God will create this
· soil in their heart
· that it changes
· everything. Church,
· you sow and God
· grows. That is the
· message of Scripture.
· We just scatter
· and scatter
· and scatter.
· But now how look at how
· this story ends
· in the first half of
· this to the crowd
· in verse 9.
· I just love this
· how Jesus has
· he's been building
· this parable
· and he's saying
· and he walks through
· these different soils
· in verse 9.
· He says to end
· this to the crowd.
· Let anyone who has
· ears listen.
· That's not like
· a throwaway line.
· Jesus doesn't do
· throwaway lines.
· This is a challenge.
· One paraphrase renders it.
· Are you listening to this?
· Are you really listening?
· And here is where all
· this builds to us today.
· The wisdom,
· the parabolic wisdom
· we see in this story
· is today you must
· decide in your heart
· what you truly
· believe about Jesus.
· Nobody can decide
· that for you.
· You must decide
· what you truly believe
· about Jesus
· in your heart
· not in someone else's.
· You see it's the same seed
· the same sower.
· The only variable
· in this story
· is the soil
· which means the real
· question this morning
· is not is the gospel true?
· The gospel is true.
· The Bible that we have
· was written over
· thousands of years
· by dozens of authors
· all pointing to
· the same message
· that Jesus is God
· and Jesus saves
· the question is not
· is this true?
· This is true.
· The real question
· that you must answer
· is what kind of soil are you?
· What heart will you receive
· the truth of the gospel in?
· You have to decide
· you have to decide
· in your own heart
· what you truly believe
· about Jesus Christ.
· Nobody can decide it for you
· and notice every one
· of these soils
· heard the same word.
· Hearing is not the issue
· although it is
· for some of us maybe sometimes
· especially when my wife
· asked me to do things
· but hearing isn't the issue
· here is the true issue
· within the church
· receiving God's word is
· and you can sit
· in this room
· in rooms alike it
· across our country
· and across our world
· every single Sunday
· with ears that work perfectly
· and you can still
· let the birds of the air
· steal the seed away
· the sun scorch it
· the storms choke it out
· you can sit here
· and not receive it
· but let me ask you plainly
· this morning
· which soil are you?
· Are you the hard soil
· that every time you hear
· the word of God
· it's just sitting on the surface
· ready for Satan to snatch it away
· you're not even
· making it hard for him
· you're leaving that seed out there
· knowing that it's not going to go anywhere
· are you the rocky ground
· and there is a moment once
· maybe you cried at a youth camp
· maybe you broke down
· at a men's retreat
· maybe you even cried in church
· and God was gripping your heart
· but you let that experience
· just be an experience
· and never take root
· in the word of God
· are you the thorns
· you believe
· you really do
· but your schedule is so full of other stuff
· that you are pushing out
· you are choking Jesus out of your life
· or are you the good soil
· who has received the word of God
· who it has changed everything in your life
· and now your role
· is a pick up a bag of seed
· and keep throwing it to the world around us
· you see in this beautiful story
· we also have a warning
· and our warning plays out
· in such a vivid picture
· in the Old Testament
· in Exodus chapter 10
· if you've grown up in church
· you know the story of Moses
· standing up to the Pharaoh of Egypt of that day
· who probably used aliens to build his pyramids
· but that's a different story right
· at least demon technology
· we can agree on that
· I'm just kidding
· but as he confronted Pharaoh
· and he said let my people go
· Pharaoh had time and time again
· to respond to the God of the universe
· but we see for the last time
· the commentary on his heart comes in Exodus chapter 10 verse 20
· it says but the Lord hardened Pharaoh's heart
· and he did not let the Israelites go
· now sometimes in the church we read that passage
· like that's pretty messed up
· like why did God harden Pharaoh's heart
· why did he make his soil hard
· why did he not let him receive the truth of the gospel
· here's the thing God did not say
· I am choosing Pharaoh to condemn
· Pharaoh made his own choice
· here's what precedes that in Exodus chapter 9 verse 34
· it says when Pharaoh saw that the rain,
· hail, and thunder had ceased
· listen to what this guy did
· when he's like I might win my battle
· I might win my war
· I might still be the victor in this
· he said he sinned again
· and he being Pharaoh hardened his heart
· he and his officials
· Pharaoh had a chance
· to recognize the God of the universe
· let's say I gotta change my ways
· but he kept on sinning
· he kept on hardening his heart
· he kept on pushing down his path
· and God sent him in his way
· and said you want a hard heart
· you got it man keep going down your path
· and for us today
· as we examine the soil of our life
· God will let you go in the direction you choose
· if you're choosing the hard path
· you're choosing the rocky
· you're choosing the thorns
· God will let you go down there
· he will let you make your decisions
· he will let you harden your heart
· and wreck your life
· but he does not desire that for you
· instead when you fall humbly before him
· when you pray God open up my heart
· God's gonna break out that tiller
· and start breaking apart
· everything that's holding that soil back
· so that when you hear the gospel truth
· of what he has
· when you hear the message of what he's done
· that everything changes
· and we get to see exactly what we're gonna witness
· in just a second in baptism
· how God changes lives
· how we can say yes to Christ
· and our life is different now
· and for all of eternity
· church that is great news
· can I get an amen
Part of Series
Parables
View all episodesTranscript
· And the first time following Jesus actually costs them something. Maybe a friend mocks them.
· Maybe life gets harder. That at the workplace it's more uncomfortable. All of a sudden social
· media someone disagrees with you because that's the worst thing in the world, right?
· And all of a sudden when life pushes back because we say we're going to follow Jesus,
· all of a sudden the feelings start to fade and they're gone.
· But hey, if you have a Bible, go ahead and grab it and turn to Matthew chapter 13. Matthew chapter 13
· is where we're going to be laying down our roots this morning. And if you were here last week,
· we launched this brand new series called Parables. And I was gone. I was out of town
· and Kyle preached for us. And when I love to give guys preaching opportunities to kind of
· raise up more preachers and do a good job. But usually when I do that,
· I want them to preach worse than me so I sound better the following week. So thanks a lot,
· Kyle. Where'd he go? He was supposed to lower the bar and he heightened it. He did a great
· job. But he did a phenomenal job. And you can give Kyle a hand for that. That's right.
· But he did a great job just launching us into this new series, Parables. And we're
· doing this on the back end of eight weeks going through the miracles of Jesus.
· And in the miracles of Jesus, we said over and over again, the question that came out
· of those passages is who is this man? Who is Jesus? What does he about? And we saw
· throughout this pieces of his authority that ultimately pointed to him as God and our Savior.
· And as we turn the page to the parables, the question shifts from the identity of Christ
· and it answers a different question. In this overview, as we see the parables of the
· Gospels answer the question of what does Jesus teach? This God who came down to earth
· to be with us, to die on a cross and raise for our sins. We must ask the question of,
· okay, if Jesus is God, what does he say for us to do and how do we actually follow it?
· And you see, as you go through the Gospels, we're going to see very clearly
· that Jesus was the greatest teacher who ever lived. And his favorite way to teach was the
· parable. Jesus often taught in stories. Actually, if you go through the Gospels,
· 35% of everything Jesus says in the Gospels comes to us in the form of a story.
· He talks about farmers and seeds, lost coins and prodigal sons, wedding feasts and buried
· treasures. And every story attempts to crack open heavenly truth that brings it down to
· our earthly domain. And today, as we jump into Matthew chapter 13, starting in verse one,
· here's how we see that we just plummet into this text. And it says here on that day,
· Jesus went out of the house and was sitting by the sea. Such large crowds gathered around
· him that he got into a boat and he sat down while the whole crowd stood on the shore.
· Then he told them many things and parables saying, we're going to stop right there and
· pick that up in just a second. But as we launch into this text, I just want you to picture
· this scene for a second, that there's this massive crowd that was following Jesus wherever
· he went. Now, how annoying would that be? Like you can't escape, right? I have four kids,
· I can't escape them, but I can't imagine a crowd following you wherever you go.
· Wherever Jesus goes, this crowd is just behind him and he comes out and they're just pushing
· in, they're pushing in, they're yearning for more. So Jesus steps into a boat,
· it gets pushed out a few feet into the water. And this is before big old church buildings like
· this, this is before microphones and AV equipment. This is 2000 years ago. And as Jesus
· pushes out, because he is God, he's pretty smart, he uses the water as an amplifier for
· his voice. And as they're sitting on the shoreline, Jesus is using this and speaking
· like a microphone to the crowd around him, like an amplifier. And in this amphitheater
· type setting, in the very first story out of his mouth that we see today,
· is this foundational one that he sets as he says, you must understand if you're going
· to understand any of the others is about a farmer casting seed. Now, if you look at me,
· you probably could assert that I don't know much about growing anything. I'm a city boy.
· When I came to Surprise and I was at Phoenix, Crossroads Phoenix for about
· eight and a half years, someone said, if you're going to go to Surprise,
· you need to wear boots. And I said, you'll never see me in boots because if I wore boots,
· I'd be a fraud. So I wear books instead of boots. Some of you get that, some of you don't.
· But it's like, I will never wear boots because I'm not a cowboy. I'm not a farmer.
· I've been watching Yellowstone to catch up. But let me see, as I watch that,
· I'd be like, I ain't doing that, right? Like I ain't killing someone at a farm and
· burying them. A different story I think I'm getting from that.
· But here's what I love about this parable. As we dive in here, Jesus is going to tell
· this parable twice. First, he tells it to the crowd as his voice reverberates through the water
· to all those onlookers. But he's going to tell it a second time in the privacy of him and his
· disciples as he explains it and as he walks them through it. And I love this because
· sometimes when we read scripture, we feel like we have to guess, we have to read a lot of
· commentaries, we have to see who said this and what does it mean. But we don't have to
· too hard what it means when Jesus tells us exactly what it means. But it picks up in our story in the
· second half of verse three. And I want to read this in full and then take some time breaking
· it down and going through how this applies for us. But it starts here in the second half.
· He says, consider the sower who went out to sow. As he sowed, some seed fell along the
· path and the birds came and devoured them. Other seed fell on rocky ground,
· where it didn't have much soil and it grew up quickly since the soil wasn't deep. But when the
· sun came up, it was scorched. And since it had no root, it withered away. Other seed
· fell among thorns and the thorns came up and they choked it. Still other seed fell on good
· fruit. Some 100, some 60, some 30 times what was sown. Let anyone who has ears listen.
· Let's pray over our text this morning. Dear God, I thank you this morning.
· Lord, I thank you how glorious you are, how great you are, Lord, as we just dive into this
· parable. And God, we ask of how you cause us to move, what you cause us to do as a result,
· how the seed falls and what we must do in response. Lord, I just ask that you guide our time,
· that you guide our hearts. And Lord, that we leave this place changed knowing what we must do.
· God, thank you for your presence that dwells with us here this morning.
· And we lift all this up in Jesus name. Amen. We've always called this the parable of the
· sower. And actually, we call it the parable of the sower because Jesus actually names it
· the parable of the sower in just a second. But what's funny about this is I think when
· we apply it to us, it almost, the sower in the story never changes. The sower,
· the seed that the sower is throwing out, it never changes. The same farmer scatters
· the same seed across the whole field. The only variable, the only thing that changes
· in the story is actually the soil. So for our sake, I almost think a better name,
· if I were to tell Jesus what a better name for the story he tells is, you're shaking your head,
· you're like, are you going to be a heretical right now? This is like the parable of the
· soils because he's going to walk through four different soils and how it impacts us and how
· we respond and how us as the soil are supposed to respond to this text. And in his explanation,
· Jesus tells us which each of these elements stand for. The sower is the son of man, Jesus
· himself and anyone who carries out his gospel. The seed is the word of God, the good news of
· the kingdom and the soil is the human heart. So as we engage in this text, here is the reality
· that is being taught through here. And the reality of Jesus teaching is I believe that we
· see five things that come from this text. And the first thing we see is that everyone has an
· opinion. You see the first thing about this parable that it forces us to admit is that when
· the seed is scattered, something happens every time. The seed never just like hangs and floats
· in the air. Like that would define gravity, right? Like that would make no sense. Like the
· hits the ground in every single setting, in every single way. When it lands somewhere,
· wherever it lands, the soil responds to it. And I think this is important because that's the
· picture of Jesus' ministry. He scatters the word everywhere, the way a first century farmer
· walked his field, flinging seed in every direction. I remember my first house that I
· bought my first house, I had a lawn, a front and a back lawn. That was a bad idea because I had to
· mow and overseed both of those. The longer we lived there, what I decided to do is I would
· only do winter lawn in the front yard and not the backyard because I had to make it look nice
· on the outside when my backyard really was terrible and dying. But I remember the first
· time I went to overseed my lawn, I got one of those things you push and you put the seed
· in and it sprays it on nicely. Yeah, I found out year two that takes too long. So instead,
· as a farmer does, I took a bag and just threw it, right? That's the way you know you're
· winning. And now, as I've moved to Surprise, Arizona in North Surprise, my grass is awesome.
· It is fake. So I don't ever overseed it anymore. Yeah. Hallelujah for that.
· Every winter it looks fantastic. Every summer it looks fantastic. You can't beat it.
· But the picture we get here of Jesus is he's spreading seed. And the important thing we
· need to see is everyone has to do something with it. Nobody walks away from hearing the
· message of Jesus Christ neutral. Everyone has an opinion about Jesus whether they realize it
· or not. Look at verse 18 where Jesus begins his explanation. This is in Matthew 13.
· Skip down to verse 18 when he begins to explain this to his disciples,
· he says, so listen to the parable of the sower. He's like, listen to the message
· that I'm giving you. Listen to this story. And I'm going to explain upon it to the
· disciples. He said, what this means for you. And he starts here is listen because all of
· you are going to have a response to this. There is no neutral ground when it comes
· to Jesus. I think about in Arizona and we're going to get a little bit further once we pass
· this summer that is really just beginning if we're honest. But as we get later in the year
· and usually as you get into October and you get into election season, I love to just drive
· around Surprise and see all the bright election signs that are so fun to look at. And you
· see none of them stay like neutral on everything. Vote for me. Everyone has a
· position. Everyone aligns red or blue or something else. Like everyone says we believe
· this. We're standing for this. This school board vote on this prop vote on this. There
· is no neutrality when it comes to that. And even more so when we talk about our
· spiritual life. Sometimes we think me and Jesus, we can just be bros and we can
· just be neutral and don't have to talk that much. But here Jesus establishes that
· everyone has an opinion. Everyone has to make up their mind on what they believe
· about Christ. And the four soils are going to represent this four responses to
· Christ. And here's the sobering reality as we get into this is three of them are
· negative and one of them is positive, which is not a fun way to start out. But
· as we dive into this first, the first thing we see and I think the three negative
· I think are all ways that we can become victims to the world and to the sin around
· us. And the first response we see is that some people are victims of evil. Keep
· going. In this passage, when Jesus says in verse 18, listen to the parable of
· the sewer, he starts hearing, he says, when anyone hears the word about the
· kingdom, he is talking about the kingdom of God. When anyone hears the
· kingdom and they don't understand it, the evil one comes and snatches away what
· was sown in his heart. This is the one sown along the path. You see, this is
· the first soil that we see. The first soil is what is referred to as the
· path, the hard ground. Think of a dirt road packed by years of foot traffic
· and horses and wagon wheels. The seed hits that surface and it just lies on
· top. Now, here, if you think back 2,000 years ago, they did not have
· sidewalks, okay? They had gravel packed dirt in Rome. They didn't quite, they
· might have had some kind of different areas where maybe you had some brick
· and stuff, but it was not the same of what we have now. And I have a
· feeling their construction moved faster than it does in Surprise Arizona.
· Can I get an amen for that? All right. Like, why are we doing construction
· on what we just did construction on six months ago? What were we talking
· about? Anyway, but here's what happens. This hard packed dirt, when the seed
· hits it, it can't penetrate. It just lays on top of that dirt until some
· birds come and eat it, snatch it away, and take it off. And you see,
· Jesus tells us exactly what this means. He says the birds are the evil
· one, Satan himself. And he says, this is the heart that hears the
· gospel, and before it can ever take root, the enemy steals it away. Now,
· we've all seen this soil. Maybe you've even been this soil. It's the person
· at the funeral who hears the gospel clearly, feels something stir for 90
· seconds, and by the parking lot, it's gone, and they're back to their
· old way of life. It's the skeptic who decided before you ever opened
· your mouth to talk about Jesus that what you're saying is nonsense,
· and they will not hear it. Commentators call this gospel deafness,
· where the book closes before it is ever open to hear the good news of
· Christ, and so do their ears. It kind of reminds me about what
· happens here in monsoon season, which maybe is going to kick off
· today. That would be great, right? But here's what's funny. When
· monsoons happen, we think our desert, like, we desperately want it.
· We're like, hey, as soon as rain hits that water or hits that dirt,
· it's just going to soak it all up, right? We think it's just going
· to go straight there. You know why we have flash floods in the middle
· of monsoon season? It's because the ground is so hard that when
· that water hits it, it just keeps rushing on by, and it just
· floods and floods until it gets into the washes, and then the
· washes become full of weeds, and then it gets hot, and then
· there's fires in there later, and it's the cycle of the deserts,
· right? But it becomes the ground is so hard-packed that even
· when life in water itself comes to nourish it, it has become so
· hardened that it cannot take it in. And I think if we're honest,
· a hard heart is the same way the word pours down, but it just
· runs right off because it cannot receive it. But notice I call
· this person, this soil, a victim. And here's the deal is they
· are in a sense because the evil one, Satan, is real, and he is
· actively at work to rip the word out of human hearts. There
· is a thief that roams around us. But don't miss what Jesus says
· at the front in verse 19. He says, this is the one who
· hears and doesn't understand it. There's still responsibility
· there. Satan can only snatch away what was never allowed to
· sink in. You see some are victims of evil, but some are also,
· as our next point here, that we see are victims of experience.
· Check out verse 20 and 21, after we've seen how some,
· they hear God's word, and they won't respond to it. This
· next, our victim of evils, check it out, verse 20, it
· says, and the one sown on rocky grounds, this is the
· one who hears the word and immediately receives it with
· joy. This sounds great right now. They're receiving God's
· word with joy, but verse 21, but he has no roots, and it
· is short lived. When distress or persecution comes because
· of the word, immediately he falls away. Some are victims
· of experience. This is the one that looks promising at
· first. Rocky ground here doesn't mean that it is
· covered in stones. It means that there's a thin layer
· of topsoil sitting on top of a limestone bedrock. That's
· what was very common at this time in Rome, and this was
· all over Galilee at this time, and the seed would land,
· but because the soil was so shallow, it would warm up
· really fast. It would get water really fast, and all
· of a sudden, it would sprout up. It was the quickest,
· greenest growth in the entire field, but the problem
· was is there was no depth. There was no roots. There's a
· slab of rock that's underneath, so the moment the
· sun comes up and it heats, and the heat just hits
· like we know heat can hit, right? The plant has nothing
· to draw from. It has no water underneath that it can get
· to keep going, and it withers as fast as it sprouts.
· One commentator put it perfectly that this soil is
· quickly green and quickly gone, and Jesus names exactly
· what the sun is in the story. It is not heat in
· general, but he said it is distress or persecution
· because of the word. Now, what does this mean for us?
· How do we have a rocky heart that impacts us? Well,
· I think this is the person whose faith was all
· experience, all emotion. They responded with real tearful
· joy at the retreat or at the concert in the high moment
· at the camp, but it never went below the surface.
· In the first time, following Jesus actually costs them
· something. Maybe a friend mocks them. Maybe life gets
· harder that at the workplace, it's more uncomfortable.
· All of a sudden, social media, someone disagrees
· with you because that's the worst thing in the world,
· right? And all of a sudden, when life pushes back because
· we say we're going to follow Jesus, all of a sudden,
· the feelings start to fade and they're gone. It's almost
· like what we see every January with New Year's
· resolutions. People make resolutions. I'm going to go
· to the gym. I told you was my goal this year is
· like, I don't want to be like those people who start
· the gym and quit the gym, so I'm not going to start
· the gym, so I can't quit the gym. But I was like,
· actually what I'll do is I'll start in February because
· it'll be cleared out. No one will be there. In February,
· I actually turned into May when my wife signed us up
· for a membership. She didn't really ask. She just
· signed us up. She's like, I'm starting this plan.
· We're doing it. She's going five days a week.
· I'm going one and a half-ish in hiking some.
· But as we're going to the gym, it's like those
· people. You get super excited about it. The
· feeling is there, but as soon as it gets hard,
· it's like, I think I'm going to quit this. I think
· I'm done. I'm all jazzed up about Jesus in the
· moment, but as soon as life punches me in the face,
· I'm going to fall out. I've seen this over the
· course of 10 years of pastoring. I've seen this
· all the time, and I'm going to say it's the
· addict behavior of Christianity, and sometimes
· all people come to me. They're like, dude,
· I'm jazzed up for Jesus. I want to do
· everything. Tell me what can I do at the
· church tomorrow and Tuesday and Wednesday and
· Thursday and Friday, and I'll be here every
· moment I can, and I say, hey, can you come
· back next Sunday? They're like, yeah, but what
· can I do Monday through Saturday? I want to
· do more, and I'm like, just keep coming on
· Sunday for about a month. And if you can do
· that, I'll find out what we can do next.
· And here's what's often happened is they
· wanted to be all in, but as soon as they
· couldn't be all in in that moment, they
· would not commit to making this a lifestyle
· rather than just an experience that's a high
· for a little bit, but comes scorching down
· as soon as life gets hard. And you see,
· this is why here at Cross Church we talk
· about we don't want just an experiential
· Christianity. We don't want just a
· Christianity that's charismatic on the
· outside but is not rooted in Scripture
· on the inside. Every time we gather for
· a service, here's our goal, and you've
· probably heard these words, and we're
· gonna say them more and more as time
· goes, is we want to take a piece of
· Scripture. We want to pray through it.
· We want to praise through it. We want
· to preach through it so that you can
· practice it during the week. And here's
· the difference with that is when we are
· rooting in Scripture and in God's Word,
· we are not gonna have this shallow
· little root that hits the rock that
· as soon as the sun comes out, the
· distress, the persecution were ripped
· right out. We wither away and our
· Christianity is gone. You see, this is
· a sobering soil church because it
· warns us that an emotional response
· is not the same as a converted heart.
· Jesus tells us throughout Scripture
· that those who continue
· in his Word are truly his disciples.
· Sprouting fast is easy. Putting down
· roots is hard.
· You see, some are victims of evil. Some
· are victims of experience, but we also
· see some are victims of excitement.
· This seems very similar to the last
· one, but let's break this down a
· little bit more because it's a
· continues in verse 22. It says,
· now the one sown among the thorns,
· this is the one who hears the Word,
· but the worries of this age, the
· deceitfulness of wealth choke the
· Word and it becomes unfruitful.
· This in some ways is the most
· dangerous soil of all and I believe
· is the most dangerous soil for the
· church in America today because
· nothing dramatic happens.
· No birds swoop down. No scorching
· sun comes out. The seed actually
· takes root and it starts to grow.
· This plant looks like it might
· make it, but the problem is it's
· not growing alone.
· There are thorns that are coming
· up right alongside it, growing
· slower, but growing with it.
· And slowly, quietly, they
· choke the life out of it.
· And Jesus identifies the thorns in
· the story as two things. Number one,
· he says the worries of this age.
· Does anyone have worries in this
· room? Does anyone have worries in
· this room?
· There are so many worries we have
· in this age and this isn't even a
· new thing. This isn't like all of
· a sudden we got worries in 2026.
· Jesus was telling them they had
· worries in 1 AD. That's probably
· about 30 AD, but in that time they
· had worries of this age. But number
· two, he says it's the deceitfulness
· of wealth. Oh, that's a whole
· nother sermon I don't have time
· for, but we'll get some cliff
· notes on it. But think about
· this worry and wealth, the
· anxious grind of life and the
· seductive pull of stuff. Now I
· called this the soil victim of
· excitement and here's what I mean
· is this person is genuinely excited
· about 100 other things. Their
· calendar is full, their cart is
· full, they're chasing the
· promotion, the bigger house, the
· next vacation, the kids travel
· ball every weekend and none of
· that is bad. None of it is
· necessarily evil, but that's
· what makes it deceptive because
· all of it when it comes
· together, it slowly crowds out
· Jesus of your life and there's
· no room left for him to grow.
· And here's what's scary about
· this. It's like when you don't
· watch your front lawn and here's
· what I've learned is that I
· moved into our house, our new
· house about almost two years ago
· in North Surprise and we did a
· new build out there and they
· put all the plants in your
· front yard and they're all
· native desert plants and as they
· grow and get a little messy,
· you don't even notice because
· they look like they're
· supposed to be there in the
· desert. But then weeds start
· growing too and I don't really
· unless you're in right by
· the plants, you don't even see
· the little weeds sprouting and
· then all of a sudden one day
· you pull into your garage and
· there's weed this tall and
· you're like, what happened to
· that weed? And then you're
· going to pull it and you
· realize there's thorns all over
· it and it hurts your hand and
· it's killing you and then
· you realize it's killing the
· plant that was supposed to be
· there. And the same happens
· in our lives. These little
· weeds sprout out without us
· noticing. All of a sudden
· they start crowding the
· things that are most important
· and there's a warning here
· that the thorns do not
· announce themselves. The
· thorns don't say, hey, this
· is going to steal from your
· relationship from Jesus. This
· is going to get you sidetracked.
· This is going to harden and
· this is going to ruin your
· path. This is going to destroy
· the foundation of your family
· for the generations to come of
· following Christ. They don't
· announce themselves like that.
· They say, hey, this is a good
· thing. Follow this. And we
· start busily filling our
· calendars with stuff that all
· of a sudden we forsake the
· most important thing, which is
· right in front of us. And
· here's the scariest part
· about this church is I don't
· care who you are, is you don't
· mature past these things. Just
· this past couple months I have
· had this struggle in my heart
· where sometimes I scroll
· social media and I get annoyed
· because I see people I know
· when I grew up with and I'm
· like, oh, they're going on
· that vacation. They bought
· that house. They have that
· car. I'm smarter than that
· person. Like I should be
· making more money than them.
· I should be doing this. And
· I'm like, and God has to
· like stop me in my tracks
· and be like, dude, why do
· you care about that stuff? Why
· care about the worries in
· this age? Why do you care
· about the deceitfulness of
· wealth? It is here today,
· but it is gone tomorrow. He
· says focus on the main
· thing. Focus on the purpose,
· on the path, on what I have
· provided for you because
· what matters more than all
· of it is the person of
· Jesus Christ that our
· world is trying to choke
· out in these deceitful
· thorns. They are so hard
· because they are creeping
· up in us, trying to crowd
· out Jesus of our life.
· So that's three soils,
· three failures, the heart
· that is robbed by the
· evil one, the shallow
· heart that couldn't
· survive the heat, the
· crowded heart that is
· choked out by worry
· and wealth. If Jesus
· stopped here, this would
· be such a depressing
· parable, but he doesn't.
· There is evil. There's
· there is excitement, but
· church, here is the good
· news is that many are
· beneficiaries of grace.
· Many are beneficiaries
· of grace. Keep going as
· we go through this
· passage and we see as
· Jesus ends his commentary
· on this in verse 23,
· it says, but the one
· sown on the good ground,
· I love that phrase, on
· the good ground, this
· is the one who hears
· and understands the
· word who does produce
· fruits and yields some
· 100, some 60, some 30
· times what was sown.
· Here's what this
· parable has been
· billing to. He's gone
· through the bad soil
· and he leads to the
· good soil. This is the
· fourth heart that we
· are embracing and
· notice what makes it
· different is this heart
· as she describes, it
· hears and it
· understands. It doesn't
· just hear, but it
· also receives. It
· takes root. It produces
· a harvest and not even
· a small one. It says
· a hundredfold, 60 fold,
· 30 fold in the ancient
· world. A seven fold
· return was considered
· a great harvest. So
· this was like a
· mind blowing harvest.
· How much return came
· from this. He's
· describing a yield that
· is off the charts, but
· it begs the question
· here and understand
· what we're saying here
· and understand the
· gospel, the gospel,
· the good news of
· Jesus Christ, that
· Jesus lived, that
· Jesus died, that
· Jesus paid the price
· for our sins, that
· Jesus rose from the
· grave and Jesus is
· the ultimate God, the
· one and only who can
· change our life now
· and for all of
· eternity. When we hear
· and we receive that
· truth that scripture
· proclaims, but as
· we go in this point,
· I want us to be
· careful and there's
· a little warning here
· because it would be
· easy to read this
· and walk out thinking
· the whole point of
· this is be better
· soil. Try harder.
· I guess you try to
· receive it a little
· bit more, but church
· soil doesn't make
· itself good. A path
· doesn't decide to
· become farmland. Rocky
· ground can't dig out
· its own bedrock. A
· thorny field can't
· pull its own weeds.
· Good soil is cultivated.
· It is worked. It is
· graced by God above.
· You see the good
· soil heart isn't the
· heart that was
· naturally better than
· the others. It's the
· heart that grace got
· ahold of. God
· softens the hard ground.
· God breaks up the
· rock. God clears out
· the thorns. Ezekiel
· 36 tells us about
· this. It says that
· he takes our heart
· of stone and he
· gives us a heart of
· flesh. You can't
· manufacture good soil
· on your own. You
· receive it when you
· humble yourself before
· God. And then a
· heart that truly has
· received grace. Here's
· what it tells us. It
· will always produce
· fruit. A fruitless
· Christian, many
· commentators say, is
· an oxymoron. When
· the word truly takes
· root, a harvest is
· guaranteed. In the
· late 1700s, William
· Carey, he was a
· missionary. He left
· England for India for
· a missionary journey.
· And when he was
· there in India, he
· labored for seven
· years before his
· very first convert
· to Jesus. Seven
· years of scattering
· seed that seemed to
· land on nothing but
· hard paths and rocky
· ground. People told him
· to quit. People said
· you are wasting your
· life. You are wasting
· your talents. But he
· kept sowing in his
· seed. And his motto
· became this, expect
· great things from God.
· Attempt great things
· from God. He said,
· expect great things
· from God. Attempt
· great things for God.
· He trusted the
· Lord of the Harvest
· would in his time
· produce the good
· soil. And he did.
· And he is one of
· the most renowned
· missionaries to this
· day. You see, that's
· our encouragement here
· today. Cross Church
· that if you're a
· believer, your job
· is not to manufacture
· the harvest. Your
· job is to keep
· sowing the seed.
· Generously, everywhere,
· even recklessly. Don't
· use that stupid little
· thing that you push
· and it spreads the
· seed evenly. Just
· take a handful of
· seed and chuck it
· wherever you can get
· it to. That's what
· this calls us to do
· in trust that wherever
· that seed lands, God
· knows the soil that
· it's hitting. Keep
· praying that the
· hard-hearted spouse
· that soil will soften
· and that seed will
· seek in. Keep
· loving the rebellious
· kid which you know
· he has rocky soil
· in his life. And
· keep hoping that God
· will till that soil
· so that it can receive
· the word. Keep
· sharing with the
· apathetic co-worker
· that is so caught
· up in the stuff
· of the world that
· all of a sudden,
· God will create this
· soil in their heart
· that it changes
· everything. Church,
· you sow and God
· grows. That is the
· message of Scripture.
· We just scatter
· and scatter
· and scatter.
· But now how look at how
· this story ends
· in the first half of
· this to the crowd
· in verse 9.
· I just love this
· how Jesus has
· he's been building
· this parable
· and he's saying
· and he walks through
· these different soils
· in verse 9.
· He says to end
· this to the crowd.
· Let anyone who has
· ears listen.
· That's not like
· a throwaway line.
· Jesus doesn't do
· throwaway lines.
· This is a challenge.
· One paraphrase renders it.
· Are you listening to this?
· Are you really listening?
· And here is where all
· this builds to us today.
· The wisdom,
· the parabolic wisdom
· we see in this story
· is today you must
· decide in your heart
· what you truly
· believe about Jesus.
· Nobody can decide
· that for you.
· You must decide
· what you truly believe
· about Jesus
· in your heart
· not in someone else's.
· You see it's the same seed
· the same sower.
· The only variable
· in this story
· is the soil
· which means the real
· question this morning
· is not is the gospel true?
· The gospel is true.
· The Bible that we have
· was written over
· thousands of years
· by dozens of authors
· all pointing to
· the same message
· that Jesus is God
· and Jesus saves
· the question is not
· is this true?
· This is true.
· The real question
· that you must answer
· is what kind of soil are you?
· What heart will you receive
· the truth of the gospel in?
· You have to decide
· you have to decide
· in your own heart
· what you truly believe
· about Jesus Christ.
· Nobody can decide it for you
· and notice every one
· of these soils
· heard the same word.
· Hearing is not the issue
· although it is
· for some of us maybe sometimes
· especially when my wife
· asked me to do things
· but hearing isn't the issue
· here is the true issue
· within the church
· receiving God's word is
· and you can sit
· in this room
· in rooms alike it
· across our country
· and across our world
· every single Sunday
· with ears that work perfectly
· and you can still
· let the birds of the air
· steal the seed away
· the sun scorch it
· the storms choke it out
· you can sit here
· and not receive it
· but let me ask you plainly
· this morning
· which soil are you?
· Are you the hard soil
· that every time you hear
· the word of God
· it's just sitting on the surface
· ready for Satan to snatch it away
· you're not even
· making it hard for him
· you're leaving that seed out there
· knowing that it's not going to go anywhere
· are you the rocky ground
· and there is a moment once
· maybe you cried at a youth camp
· maybe you broke down
· at a men's retreat
· maybe you even cried in church
· and God was gripping your heart
· but you let that experience
· just be an experience
· and never take root
· in the word of God
· are you the thorns
· you believe
· you really do
· but your schedule is so full of other stuff
· that you are pushing out
· you are choking Jesus out of your life
· or are you the good soil
· who has received the word of God
· who it has changed everything in your life
· and now your role
· is a pick up a bag of seed
· and keep throwing it to the world around us
· you see in this beautiful story
· we also have a warning
· and our warning plays out
· in such a vivid picture
· in the Old Testament
· in Exodus chapter 10
· if you've grown up in church
· you know the story of Moses
· standing up to the Pharaoh of Egypt of that day
· who probably used aliens to build his pyramids
· but that's a different story right
· at least demon technology
· we can agree on that
· I'm just kidding
· but as he confronted Pharaoh
· and he said let my people go
· Pharaoh had time and time again
· to respond to the God of the universe
· but we see for the last time
· the commentary on his heart comes in Exodus chapter 10 verse 20
· it says but the Lord hardened Pharaoh's heart
· and he did not let the Israelites go
· now sometimes in the church we read that passage
· like that's pretty messed up
· like why did God harden Pharaoh's heart
· why did he make his soil hard
· why did he not let him receive the truth of the gospel
· here's the thing God did not say
· I am choosing Pharaoh to condemn
· Pharaoh made his own choice
· here's what precedes that in Exodus chapter 9 verse 34
· it says when Pharaoh saw that the rain,
· hail, and thunder had ceased
· listen to what this guy did
· when he's like I might win my battle
· I might win my war
· I might still be the victor in this
· he said he sinned again
· and he being Pharaoh hardened his heart
· he and his officials
· Pharaoh had a chance
· to recognize the God of the universe
· let's say I gotta change my ways
· but he kept on sinning
· he kept on hardening his heart
· he kept on pushing down his path
· and God sent him in his way
· and said you want a hard heart
· you got it man keep going down your path
· and for us today
· as we examine the soil of our life
· God will let you go in the direction you choose
· if you're choosing the hard path
· you're choosing the rocky
· you're choosing the thorns
· God will let you go down there
· he will let you make your decisions
· he will let you harden your heart
· and wreck your life
· but he does not desire that for you
· instead when you fall humbly before him
· when you pray God open up my heart
· God's gonna break out that tiller
· and start breaking apart
· everything that's holding that soil back
· so that when you hear the gospel truth
· of what he has
· when you hear the message of what he's done
· that everything changes
· and we get to see exactly what we're gonna witness
· in just a second in baptism
· how God changes lives
· how we can say yes to Christ
· and our life is different now
· and for all of eternity
· church that is great news
· can I get an amen
More from this series
Parables