The Parable Of The Sower Series

Everybody, including me, thinks they know exactly who they are. People believe they have themselves all figured out. But, every once in a while, something happens revealing a side of yourself that you did not know existed before.

This helps keep psychologists in business.

The other side is, we think we have everybody else figured out. Our best friend, we think we know them pretty well. Then, they do something that is “out of character,” at least the character we know.

Wives think they know their husbands.

Husbands know they do not know their wives and so they do not even try.

Parents believe they know their children, after all, they knew them since they were born. But there are parts and sides of kids that parents do not know. The child gets in trouble and the first thing a parent says is, “My child would never do that.”

Of course, there is plenty of evidence to the contrary.

The more you think you know yourself or somebody else the more vulnerable you will be to deception.

If I am really to know myself, I need to have a Kingdom view. That is, how God views me. If I understand this, it will open up a door of understanding my relationship with God.

This Parable of the Sower is fundamental in understanding the kingdom view of people. Now the key to this is in verse 10.

“To you it has been given to know the secrets of the kingdom of God, but for others they are in parables, so that seeing they may not see, and hearing they may not understand.”

First what this is not saying.

It is not saying that God speaks in riddles so that people will not understand what He is saying. This would be out of character with God who “is not willing that any should perish.”

This is spiritual truth and can only be understood from a spiritual point of view. The natural man cannot perceive nor understand spiritual things. Jesus is laying down truth that can only be understood from a spiritual perspective. When anybody tries to understand spiritual truth from a natural viewpoint, there is nothing but confusion. “God is not the author of confusion.”

This is the tactic of the enemy.

There are two things that I want to lay before you now.

1. The kingdom purpose of God’s Word.

2. The kingdom effect of God’s Word.

These two things are important if we are going to understand the kingdom perspective for us. What does God think of us and how does He view us?

This will go a long way in understanding the total scheme of God’s will and way for us.

I. The Kingdom Purpose of God’s Word.

This is where we must begin.

Jesus explains it in verse 11. “Now the parable is this: The seed is the word of God.”

What is being stressed here is the significance of God’s Word. This is emphasized throughout the Scripture.

“In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God” (John 1:1).

“That which was from the beginning, which we have heard, which we have seen with our eyes, which we have looked upon, and our hands have handled, of the word of life” (1 John 1:1).

“God, who at sundry times and in diverse manners spake in time past unto the fathers by the prophets, hath in these last days spoken unto us by his son, whom he has appointed heir of all things, by whom also he made the worlds” (Hebrews 1:1).

Of course, this is only a small sampling of what the Bible has to say about the Word.

The thing that Jesus uses in this parable is that the “seed” is the Word of God. Now, why does He use this?

He uses this to show the purpose of the Word of God. Unless we understand the purpose here, we will not be able to understand what this whole parable is about. Nor will we understand the ultimate purpose of God in our life. And what we want to pursue is the kingdom purpose of our life.

A. The purpose of the Word of God is to replicate in me Christ.

The apostle Paul said it well when he said, “To whom God would make known what is the riches of the glory of this mystery among the Gentiles; which is Christ in you, the hope of glory: whom we preach, warning every man, and teaching every man in all wisdom; that we may present every man perfect in Christ Jesus” (Colossians 1:27-28).

There is something in the seed that responds to something in the soil. There is something in Christ that responds to something in us.

The purpose of the seed going into the soil is to replicate the seed through the soil. The purpose of Christ’s Word coming into my heart and life is to replicate Jesus Christ in my life.