Mark 4: 33 – 34
‘U’ See What I’m Say In
33 And with many such parables He spoke the word to them as they were able to hear it. 34 But without a parable He did not speak to them. And when they were alone, He explained all things to His disciples.
There were two other Gospels written along with Mark’s version of our Lord’s teaching. The Apostle Matthew and the disciple Luke recorded these same remarks of our Lord Jesus. So, let’s see what they say and then compare all three to gather more information.
Luke 8: 9 – 10, “9 Then His disciples asked Him, saying, “What does this parable mean?” 10 And He said, “To you it has been given to know the mysteries of the kingdom of God, but to the rest it is given in parables, that ‘Seeing they may not see, and hearing they may not understand.’
Matthew 13: 9 – 17, “9 He who has ears to hear, let him hear!” 10 And the disciples came and said to Him, “Why do You speak to them in parables?” 11 He answered and said to them, “Because it has been given to you to know the mysteries of the kingdom of heaven, but to them it has not been given. 12 For whoever has, to him more will be given, and he will have abundance; but whoever does not have, even what he has will be taken away from him. 13 Therefore I speak to them in parables, because seeing they do not see, and hearing they do not hear, nor do they understand. 14 And in them the prophecy of Isaiah is fulfilled, which says: ‘Hearing you will hear and shall not understand, and seeing you will see and not perceive; 15 For the hearts of this people have grown dull. their ears are hard of hearing, and their eyes they have closed, lest they should see with their eyes and hear with their ears, lest they should understand with their hearts and turn, so that I should heal them.’ 16 But blessed are your eyes for they see, and your ears for they hear; 17 for assuredly, I say to you that many prophets and righteous men desired to see what you see, and did not see it, and to hear what you hear, and did not hear it.
Now please remember that Matthew was probably there when our Lord gave this Parable. In addition, although Mark probably wasn’t there, his step father in the faith, Peter was there and heard our Lord Jesus. Luke wasn’t there when our Lord gave this Parable but later came and interviewed those who were. So, the winner is Matthew. He is the one who give us the most information. We will speak about his remarks shortly.
I was kind of a wild guy during my college days. In fact I was so crazy that I attended five colleges just to obtain my Bachelor’s Degree. I was more interested in partying than attending classes. I attended Mercer County Community College, Temple, Rider, East Tennessee, and finally The College of New Jersey. The Lord was gracious to help me finish my Bachelor’s in Science at the last University.
The reason I bring this up is because I really enjoyed East Tennessee. I was kind of a novelty at this college. For some reason the students got a big kick out of my accent. I was surprised by their observation of my speech. Growing up in Philly I did not realize that we have a unique way of saying things compared to other parts of the United States. For example we like to eat hoagies. Everyone else likes to refer to them as ‘subs’ or ‘hero’s’. Are you kidding me? ‘Subs’ are navy vessels. ‘Hero’s’ are our soldiers, police, and firemen - Not meat on a roll. To wash down our hoagies we drink soda, not pop. This is what I called my dad.
However, there are some sentences that we need to correct here in Philly. One is ‘you see what I’m say in?’ I have been corrected on behalf of all people from Philly. They do not see what we saying, they hear what we are speaking about.
This is how our Lord viewed sharing His truth. He spoke to the people in Parables. Some people came away amazed at the truth of His words and others didn’t have a clue of what He was ‘say in’. Oops – ‘Saying’.
33 And with many such parables He spoke the word to them as they were able to hear it. 34 But without a parable He did not speak to them. And when they were alone, He explained all things to His disciples.
The crowds flocked to our Great Lord from all over Israel. Our Lord was now teaching them in Parables so as to stir them into thought. You know that is one thing that we do not like to do. We get our English word to ‘think’ from the Latin word ‘Muse’. I find it very amazing that when you put the letter ‘A’ before a word it says ‘not to’. So if we put the letter ‘A’ before ‘Muse’ we get ‘Amuse’. Does this sound familiar? We spend billions of dollars on ‘amusement’ so we do not have to think.
I like to follow my Lord’s advice when I address people and try to get them to think. The purpose of the Parables were to get people to think about the truth in His story and ask about its significance.
How would you feel if you went to church and your Pastor had just told you a Parable and ended before explaining what it meant. This is what happened here. The people had heard the Lord’s Parable and went their way. As you can see from all the various versions the disciples came up to the Lord and wanted to know what the Parable meant.
Remember that crowds have followed our Lord. After His teaching, I am sure many of the townsfolk left. Some hung around. Perhaps even some were still hanging around when our Lord explained what He meant with the Parable.
Over and over throughout the Gospels our Precious Holy Spirit has led our Wonderful Lord and Savior into various situations where He would wind up fulfilling prophecy.
As you well know the apostle Matthew was the first one to put down on paper the words and actions of our Master. His principal target was to the Jewish people to point out how our King is God’s Anointed – The Messiah. All the miracles He performed and the events and incidents every time, when recorded was a fact that fulfilled the prophets descriptions of what the Messiah would do.
Remember, our Lord had just completed a teaching on the four soils. – hard, stony, thorny, and good ground. The seed is the word of God. We come to find out that our Precious Holy King in His Parable of the four soils is referring to ‘Salvation. The first two soils are people who are not saved. The third soil some teachers say, refer to ‘Cardinal Christians’ because the seed did take root, but never grew because the cares of this world took more precedence in their lives. Well, I am not sure if this is correct or not. I do know this though, I would not want to be in this group and bet my whole eternity of this position. I want to be sure of my eternity. I hope you do too.
Matthew records our Lord’s words to His disciples which give us more information that Mark and Luke.
‘Because it has been given to you to know the mysteries of the kingdom of heaven, but to them it has not been given. 12 For whoever has, to him more will be given, and he will have abundance; but whoever does not have, even what he has will be taken away from him. 13 Therefore I speak to them in parables, because seeing they do not see, and hearing they do not hear, nor do they understand. 14 And in them the prophecy of Isaiah is fulfilled, which says: ‘Hearing you will hear and shall not understand, and seeing you will see and not perceive; 15 For the hearts of this people have grown dull. their ears are hard of hearing, and their eyes they have closed, lest they should see with their eyes and hear with their ears, lest they should understand with their hearts and turn, so that I should heal them.’ 16 But blessed are your eyes for they see, and your ears for they hear; 17 for assuredly, I say to you that many prophets and righteous men desired to see what you see, and did not see it, and to hear what you hear, and did not hear it.’
If the people were studying their scriptures then they should have been wondering why they did not understand the Lord’s message. Did they just show up to hear Him tell a story while they really were there was to witness or have some miracle done for them? You see our Merciful Messiah would even heal the people illnesses, diseases, and cast out demons from their lives. But that would only last for a life time. He Is more interested in eternity. He Is more interested that people come to Him as the Creator God Who now walks among them.
For those few in the crowd who wanted to know This Wonderful Holy One, then they would be the ones who would gain the spiritual truths and insights. Others would only get their temporary needs met and be on their way back home.
I am not preaching to the choir. For by you seeking more of Who The Lord Jesus Christ Is and wanting to know more of His amazing wisdom, you are the seed that fell on good soil. May you obtain a rich harvest.
