Luke
8:9-10 - And
when his disciples asked him what this parable meant, he said, “To you it has
been given to know the secrets of the kingdom of God…”
Jesus was
known for using stories to teach important truths. We know these stories as
parables, and the Parable of the Soils takes center stage in three of the four
Gospels: Matthew, Mark, and Luke. It
opens a series of parables and contains more of an explanation from Jesus than
all of the others. This is obviously an important parable, but I think we have
missed its point too often.
You may be
familiar with the story. A sower (planter) drops seed (representing spreading
the word) on four types of soil: road, rocky, thorny, and good. Only the good
soil bears fruit.
Most sermons
and teaching on this parable have been directed to the listeners as different
types of the soils. The message is usually, “Work hard to become good soil!”
Yet, when has a soil ever changed itself?
Note Jesus' words above. Only the disciples get the real meaning of the parable. Who was
the parable for - the people as soils or the disciples as those who sow the
seed? Rather than attempting to motivate soils to change, I believe Jesus’
objective is to let his seed-sowing disciples know what to expect as they share
the good news. He wanted them to understand why not all of their efforts would
bear fruit.
We should
not be surprised when some people reject our message or others receive it
gladly for a time then fall away. It should not shock us when some who start on
the journey of faith get distracted by cares and concerns. There have been
times I have wanted to quit because of a lack of response by some or even many,
yet Jesus tells us there is good soil. It will yield a harvest a hundred times
what we put in. Maybe only one in four bears good fruit, but at a hundred-fold
yield, that is a 2,500% return on investment. Any wise investor will take that
any day of the year. So, do not get discouraged when not everyone responds.
Keep spreading that seed.
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