New life begins in the spring.
Spring is by far my favorite season of the year. Everything starts coming to life, neighbors begin working outdoors, the tulips begin blooming, and bugs start taking flight. The other night, about 1:00 a.m., I let our dogs outside. The second I opened the door, I saw this big garden snake coiled on the sidewalk. Before I could react, our new puppy Rudy jumped right over his head. (If you want to know what happened next, read Genesis 3:15.)
Now if that had been Lara, she would have let out a bloodcurdling scream, and our neighbors would have been dialing 911, thinking that the preacher next door turned into an axe murderer.
In our backyard, we have this enormous maple tree. Every spring, the little maple twirlers will begin falling by the thousands! Some of the twirlers fall on our back patio and sidewalk where our dogs come along and eat them up. Some fall on our lava landscape rocks where they shoot up quickly, then wither and die in the summer’s heat. The twirlers that fall in our gutters are a different story. Theycan grow for several months. It all depends on how long it is before Lara chases me up on the roof to clean out the gutters.
Some of the twirlers fall on the grass, where they get choked out by the grass or decapitated by the lawn mower.A few twirlers though, fall in our flower beds and take deep root.
Isn’t it tragic that a tree would cast out thousands of twirlers, perhaps tens of thousands, and only so few survive?
The parable of the sower.
In Mark 4:1-9 (NIV) Jesus shares a parable that is familiar to us all. "Again Jesus began to teach by the lake. The crowd that gathered around him was so large that he got into a boat and sat in it out on the lake, while all the people were along the shore at the water’s edge. He taught them many things by parables, and in his teaching said:'Listen! A farmer went out to sow his seed. As he was scattering the seed, some fell along the path, and the birds came and ate it up. Some fell on rocky places, where it did not have much soil. It sprang up quickly, because the soil was shallow. But when the sun came up, the plants were scorched, and they withered because they had no root. Other seed fell among thorns, which grew up and choked the plants, so that they did not bear grain. Still other seed fell on good soil. It came up, grew and produced a crop, multiplying thirty, sixty, or even a hundred times.' Then Jesus said, 'He who has ears to hear, let him hear.' " In this story, there are two constants and several variables.
The first constant is the farmer’s faithfulness in sowing his seed.
The farmer sows seeds indiscriminately to all soil types. It doesn’t matter whether it's hardened soil, rocky, crowded, good, or bad. The farmer provides a picture of Jesus' ministry. Jesus preached the gospel far and wide, to the religious and irreligious, to the rich and the poor, to the elite and the marginalized, to the receptive and unreceptive, to Jews and Gentiles, and to friends and enemies.
A second constant is the power of the seed.
The same seed is thrown to all soil types. It isn’t genetically altered, or repackaged, or rebranded for this soil type or that soil type. There is nothing deficient about the seed at all. The seed is a picture of the living, enduring word of God.
1 Peter 1:23-25 (NIV) says, "For you have been born again, not of perishable seed, but of imperishable, through the living and enduring word of God. For, 'All men are like grass, and all their glory is like the flowers of the field; the grass withers and the flowers fall,but the word of the Lord stands forever.' And this is the word that was preached to you."
Or as God says in Isaiah 55:11 (NIV), "so is my word that goes out from my mouth: It will not return to me empty, but will accomplish what I desire and achieve the purpose for which I sent it."
This word, this Bible, is sufficient for the salvation of all men. Read it, share it, sprinkle its wisdomin conversations, sow it widely, and sow it indiscriminately. Have confidence that wherever the seed falls, it will be faithful to accomplish the purpose for which it was sent. Seeds are funny things. Sometimes they germinate right away. Sometimes they’ll germinate years later. But if they're never sown, they will never germinate or grow.
A few weeks ago a man showed up after church on Easter Sunday, wanting gas money. We have many situations like this at our church. A lot of times these individuals are referred by the gas stations across the interstate. I was busy greeting guests, so I grabbed Mark Gannar. Mark took the man into the conference room, listened to his story, shared the word of God with him, and the man accepted Christ. You never know what God has in mind! How many of us would have been faithful to sow the word in that circumstance? Most of us would give him gas to get to the next town, but refuse him the gospel to get him to heaven.
There are also variables in thisparable.
In Mark 4:10-20 (NIV) Jesus tells his disciples the meaning of this parable."When he was alone, the Twelve and the others around him asked him about the parables. He told them, 'The secret of the kingdom of God has been given to you. But to those on the outside everything is said in parablesso that, 'they may be ever seeing but never perceiving, and ever hearing but never understanding; otherwise they might turn and be forgiven!' Then Jesus said to them, 'Don’t you understand this parable? How then will you understand any parable? The farmer sows the word. Some people are like seed along the path, where the word is sown. As soon as they hear it, Satan comes and takes away the word that was sown in them. Others, like seed sown on rocky places, hear the word and at once receive it with joy. 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. Still others, like seed sown among thorns, hear the word;but the worries of this life, the deceitfulness of wealth and the desires for other things come in and choke the word, making it unfruitful. Others, like seed sown on good soil, hear the word, accept it, and produce a crop— thirty, sixty or even a hundred times what was sown."
The first variable is the activity of Satan.
1 Peter 5:8 (NIV) says, "Be self-controlled and alert. Your enemy the devil prowls around like a roaring lion looking for someone to devour."The evil one cannot destroy the word of God, though he’s tried for centuries. What the evil one does instead is that he steals the word of God. He takes it away before it has the opportunity to do its work. The evil one knows that if the seed is given enough time, and works itself into a person’s soul, that person will be saved for eternity.
A lot of you are into basketball. There are some guys who whenever they get the ball, they nail a three pointer, or slide past you for the score. Once they have the ball, they're unstoppable! So what do you do in that instance? You keep them from getting the ball in the first place. You put yourself between them and their teammates. You knock the ball away when it’s passed to them.
What is Satan’s strategy? He wants to busy us with television, the internet, e-mail, i-phones, i-pods, i-touch, work, school activities, and other interests. What is Satan'sgreatest fear? That we’d saturate ourselves with God’s word. In the past few weeks a group finished reading the Bible inninety days. Many of them shared with me that to accomplish this goal, they had to turn off thetelevision.They had to change their priorities.
The second variable in this story is the soil itself.
It’s the person who is hearing the gospel. For those who are like seed sown on the path, as soon as they hear the word of God, Satan comes along and snatches it away.
Here is my opinion on this. You cannot be passive about receiving God’s word. You need to seize it, andrip it back out of the bird's mouth. This is how it is with our dogs when I give them a treat. They don’t wait to receive it. They leap up to rip it out of my hand. There is an eagerness there, a sense of hunger and desperation. They're not going to leave things to chance. When you see an opportunity to grow in the word, seize it. Life Groups, Bible classes, and Sunday school all teach the word of God.Did you know that there are times when I come here to teach a class or lead a group, and not a single person in a church of 300-400 shows up? That's a tragedy. Seize the word. Seize those opportunities.
For those who are like seed sown on rocky places-- they hear the word and at once receive it with great emotion. But the word never really takes root. When trouble or persecution comes because of the word,they quickly fall away.
Coming to Christ can be a very exciting and emotional experience. But my advice is that you must first count the costs of following Jesus. When you choose to follow Jesus, he will forgive all your sin. But make no mistake about it. Following Jesus will change everything about your life, including your beliefs, attitudes, habits, behaviors, priorities, and relationships. Emotion isn’t enough to sustain your walk in Christ. You need to go deeper.
For those like the seed sown among thorns-- they hear the word, but the worries of this life, the deceitfulness of wealth, and the desires for other things come in and choke the word, making it unfruitful.
Jesus nails it here! Worry is all consuming. Wealth is all consuming. Our fleshly desires are all consuming. How many times do we fall asleep on our pillows at night preoccupied with this worry or that worry. How many of us are thinking aboutmaking money this way or that way, or about fulfilling this desire or that one? We meditate so little on the word of God. We mostly meditate on worry, wealth, and desire.
The only way to strengthen the authority of God’s word in your life is to meditate on it. Give it half as much energy as you do your worries and desires.
And for those who are like seed that falls on good soil-- you’ve heard the word, accepted, and have become fruitful. But not everyone will be equally fruitful. Some produce a crop thirty, sixty or even a hundred times what was sown. Our responsibility is to be faithful. The results are up to God. We can’t change a person’s heart. We can only sow the seed. Will you be faithful to keep on sowing the seed?