I saw a neighbor working in his front yard wearing a funny T-Shirt that said, “Sorry I Can't My Plants Need Me.”
In today’s parable from Matthew, chapter 13, the seed is the Word of God (verse 20), and the ground is our hearts (verse 19). It all depends on what kind of soil a person is because God sows lavishly for all, but we often listen to only what we want to hear.
The seed that fell on the path, which the birds ate up, is the evil once snatching away the word of the kingdom before one can understand it. The classic example of the hard ground is hard hearts hardened by sin and foolish and hurtful desires, so the message of salvation makes no impression or is dismissed because the person says that they are an unbeliever, agnostic or an atheist.
St. John Chrysostom is careful to point out that God neither imposes his will nor his gifts on those unwilling to receive them… Chrysostom makes an important observation by insisting that the inability to receive and comprehend has no link to the power of hearing and sight. Indeed, as Chrysostom points out, if the deficiency in comprehending rested in impeded hearing and sight, then God would be obliged to correct the malady. But since the disability was voluntary and of one's own choosing, Jesus "does not simply say 'they do not see,' but 'seeing they do not see,' so that the disability (i.e., the blindness and deafness) is of their own wickedness."1
I have a sticker in my Bible that has a picture of a holy water bottle with the caption, “Not today, Satan!”
We do not fight for victory, we fight from victory, but it’s still a fight.
Say this prayer written by seminarians: “Jesus, come into my life. Reveal yourself to me. Free me from my sins and lead me to the truth. Reveal to me your mercy in the power of your resurrection. Lord Jesus Christ, prove to me your love and lead me to everlasting life.” 2
Jesus explicitly says this class of persons are without understanding. Head knowledge is important, but it is only when we have the proper understanding that we can make the proper application to our lives. That is why devotional Bible reading in private is so important or at least praying over the Readings before Sunday Mass like the Missioneros de Jesús do in the church hall each Saturday afternoon at 5 PM.
We can all benefit from asking God for a softer heart to protect his word in us- He promises he will give it in Ezekiel 36:26:
I will give you a new heart, and a new spirit I will put within you. And I will remove the heart of stone from your flesh and give you a heart of flesh.
Regarding the rocky ground-- in professional baseball, coaches talk about the “morning-glory” syndrome. Morning-glories are called morning-glories because they unfold into full bloom in the early morning. Then they start to fade. So, this name, morning-glory, is given to young recruits in professional baseball who perform marvelously in spring practice in Florida or Arizona but then as they travel north and experience the lengthy baseball season, they begin to wilt like a morning-glory flower. By June their batting average drops to an unacceptable level. And by July they are released from their team.3
Seed that falls on rocky soil is like that. It may take root initially but because it doesn’t get the nutrition it needs it eventually wilts and dies. Morning-glory is a name that could be applied to many Christian believers who make an initial commitment to Christ but then fall away. A few will be sincere, but when they get out in the world, they waver, then wither. We are called to experience the joy, the new meaning and purpose that only Christ can give.
e.g.
Once considered a hopeless alcoholic, Matt Talbot abstained from drinking the last 40 years of his life, finding strength in prayer, religious books and daily Mass. Talbot took great efforts to repay all his debts, even searching for a street musician he stole a fiddle from in order to sell the instrument and pay for drinks. Unable to find the fiddler, Talbot gave the money to the church to have a Mass said for him. Talbot became a Third Order Franciscan in 1890.
Lastly, the thorns represent one hearing the word, but then worldly anxiety and the lure of riches choke it and it bears no fruit.
The catechism tells us of the moral neutrality of our feelings. Yet we don’t worship our feelings. They are guided by moral truth and our will so we can direct our feelings to good when they are unruly.
To stop chronic worry, our Gospel is telling us to start daily Scripture readings and to give Scripture authority in our lives. As Dr. Wayne Dyer says, “When you change the way you look at things, the things you look at change.”
Many recovery programs say, typically, when we come into this program, all kinds of personal problems are uppermost in our minds: pending separation, problems of romance; of occupation, health, legal or money problems. Most of us felt that if only the problems would go away, we would be okay. What we did not realize was that it is because of and within these very problems that the program works! The program does not work in a vacuum; it only works in the day-to-day ebb and flow our lives. Trial, tribulation, and pain are the soil in which the Steps can germinate. Thus, every problem, no matter how small or great can be turned into good.
The harvest bore fruit in staggering proportions. One-hundred-fold or sixty or thirty percent increase is huge. "The average yield for grain sown in Palestine seems to have been between seven- and fifteen-fold ... , but Genesis 26:12 has a yield figure of one-hundred," which represents the blessing of God.4
This also indicates clearly that even in the fruit-bearing hearers of the word there are gradations. Amen.
1. Robert M. Arida, Hearing, Receiving and Entering TO MYSTE¯RION/ TA MYSTE¯RIA: Patristic Insights Unveiling the Crux Interpretum (Isaiah 6:9-10) of the Sower Parable, St. Vladimir's Theological Quarterly, 38 no 2 1994, p.230
2.Rev. Thomas Cavanaugh and John D. Love, “How to win friends for Christ one conversation at a time,” on Amazon.
3. Dr. Daniel Lioy, Tarbell’s Lesson Commentary, September 2004- August 2005 (Colorado Springs: Cook Communications).
4. Ruth Ann Foster, William D. Shiell, The Parable of the Sower and the Seed in Luke 8:1-10: Jesus' Parable of Parables, Review & Expositor, 94 no 2 Spr 1997, p.263
