Sowing In Good Soil

SOWING THE SEED OF THE WORD OF GOD IN GOOD GROUND

Today lord willing I’ll try & talk a little about the parable we find in matt. 13: to do with sowing seed, the word of God.

Matthew 13:1- 9 Listen as I read the 1st 9 verses;

1 The same day went Jesus out of the house, and sat by the seaside. 2And great multitudes were gathered together unto him, so that he went into a ship, and sat; and the whole multitude stood on the shore. 3And he spake many things unto them in parables, saying, Behold, a sower went forth to sow; 4And when he sowed, some seeds fell by the way side, and the fowls came and devoured them up: 5Some fell upon stony places, where they had not much earth: and forthwith[soon] they sprung up, because they had no deepness of earth: 6And when the sun was up, they were scorched; and because they had no root, they withered away.

7And some fell among thorns; and the thorns sprung up, and choked them:

8But other fell into good ground, and brought forth fruit, some an hundredfold, some sixtyfold, some thirtyfold. 9Who hath ears to hear, let him hear

Lets try to visualize what took place there at that time; Jesus was teaching on a hill beside the Sea of Galilee, and the multitude become so great that He went on board a boat and sat down to address the entire crowd that would then be in front of Him. And then He sees a farmer yonder at a distance and the farmer is working in his field scattering seed on the ground, were sure of that because Jesus says in verse 3; “Behold,”**[look] As He is looking at the farmer in the distance.

Well The farmer is sowing seed in his field. As they watched the farmer at work, Jesus used the scene to teach a lesson about life. As Jesus taught, the farmer acted out his message.

The sower had a bag of seed and, after reaching in and getting a handful, he broadcast,[as the old farmers in our day might call it] he broadcast the seed onto the ground. As he did so, some of the seed would naturally fall on ground that was not suitable, along with other seed that fell on good soil.

Fields in biblical times were not like our fields today which have been prepared by modern machinery with the crops planted in neat rows. In those days, the farmer would broadcast the seed all over the ground and then plow it under.

The fields were in long strips with paths between them so that people could pass through.

That was important in a culture where everyone walked. Sometimes the Romans built their roads next to a farmer’s field. Sometimes the land next to the field was allowed to grow wild and it was full of thorns and weeds.

Because of the way they would scatter the seed back then it was impossible not to have some of the seed fall, or be blown by the wind, onto these unfit areas.

Let me remind us that a parable is an earthly story to illustrate a heavenly truth.

We need to understand some of the symbolism of what Jesus is saying.

First of all, there is the farmer or sower.

Jesus explains: in (Matthew 13:37). 37He answered and said unto them, He that soweth the good seed is the Son of man; Jesus is the one, who sows the seed, [the word of God]

38 The field is the world; the seed is the Word of God, and the various soils represent the different responses that people have to the Word, which Jesus sows.

Lets notice that there are three things to look at in this wonderful parable of Jesus.

The first is this: The seed falls onto every type of soil, which is typical of every kind of hearer, lets notice that it is sown on the soil, which is nothing but packed dry earth, the wayside

It is sown on soil, which is full of rocks, and soil, which is full of thorns, as well as on good soil.

4 different types of soil, pointing to 4 different types of people who hear the word. But rememember, the seed fell on all the soil. Good and bad.

Acts 10:34 Peter says God is no respecter of persons: Even when God knows that the Word will not take root in a person’s life he still gives an opportunity to hear and respond.

2 Peter 3:9 9The Lord is not slack concerning his promise, as some men count slackness; but is longsuffering to us-ward, not willing that any should perish, but that all should come to repentance

Every person alive is given an opportunity to respond to God in all dispensations of time.