Last year by backyard garden became a backyard jungle. The rows of tomatoes, squash, beans, zucchini, eggplant, peppers, okra, watermelon, and cucumbers were planted so close together it became a real chore to gather the crop and keep it cultivated and weeded that I finally just surrendered to its growth. And grow it did. The garden continued to bear fruit and it’s shameful for me to remember that a lot of it was wasted. Some things continued to grow even after I pulled up the plants…their fruit had fallen to the ground and died…and we all know what can happen there! I should have been a better gardener. But I learned some valuable lessons that I resolve to apply this year. Here are some principles worth remembering:
Every good garden needs a good gardener…
Every plant that bears fruit is living out its purpose…
And fruit-bearing plants continue to bear fruit even after they die!
When it comes to growing things, experience can be a good teacher, but the Lord Jesus is the Ultimate Teacher. Mark 4 is a familiar passage in the Word of God. Here we find that Jesus is teaching a masterful lesson to the multitudes. In the passage we can find at least two guiding principles of planting that can inform our lives as fruit-bearing disciples:
1. The right seed planted in the wrong soil bears no fruit until the nature of the soil is changed.
2. The right seed planted in the wrong place is better than no seed planted at all.
Let’s all begin to focus our minds on our text this morning and ask that God manifest His presence among us as we learn more about becoming fruit-bearing disciples in a Kingdom Culture. Hear now the Word of the Lord:
He began to teach again by the sea. And such a very large crowd gathered to Him that He got into a boat in the sea and sat down; and the whole crowd was by the sea on the land.
And He was teaching them many things in parables, and was saying to them in His teaching, “Listen to this! Behold, the sower went out to sow; as he was sowing, some seed fell beside the road, and the birds came and ate it up. Other seed fell on the rocky ground where it did not have much soil; and immediately it sprang up because it had no depth of soil. And after the sun had risen, it was scorched; and because it had no root, it withered away. Other seed fell among the thorns, and the thorns came up and choked it, and it yielded no crop. Other seeds fell into the good soil, and as they grew up and increased, they yielded a crop and produced thirty, sixty, and a hundredfold.”
And He was saying, “He who has ears to hear, let him hear.” (Mark 4:1-9)
After we hear this story, perhaps you are pondering the same question that His followers had in that day. What does this story mean? And why is He telling it to us? The mystery and miracle of growth in the natural realm is indicative of what takes place in the spiritual realm as well. Our growth as godly people can be just as mysterious and miraculous. I often wonder why people do not read, reflect upon, and study the Word of God more. Then it becomes apparent to me when it becomes more personal. Can one of the reasons I don’t engage the Word of God more because it brings me to self-examination?
Jesus said…He who has ears to hear, let him hear… What happens when people hear the Word of God determines whether they will ever become fruit-bearing disciples in the Kingdom of God. The followers of Jesus in the day He told this story had similar struggles…let’s listen:
As soon as He was alone, His followers, along with the twelve, began asking Him about the parables.
And He was saying to them, “To you has been given the mystery of the kingdom of God, but those who are outside get everything in parables, so that WHILE SEEING, THEY MAY SEE AND NOT PERCEIVE, AND WHILE HEARING, THEY MAY HEAR AND NOT UNDERSTAND, OTHERWISE THEY MIGHT RETURN AND BE FORGIVEN.”
And He said to them, “Do you not understand this parable? How will you understand all the parables? The sower sows the word. These are the ones who are beside the road where the word is sown; and when they hear, immediately Satan comes and takes away the word which has been sown in them. In a similar way these are the ones on whom seed was sown on the rocky places, who, when they hear the word, immediately receive it with joy; and they have no firm root in themselves, but are only temporary; then, when affliction or persecution arises because of the word, immediately they fall away. And others are the ones on whom seed was sown among the thorns; these are the ones who have heard the word, but the worries of the world, and the deceitfulness of riches, and the desires for other things enter in and choke the word, and it becomes unfruitful. And those are the ones on whom seed was sown on the good soil; and they hear the word and accept it and bear fruit, thirty, sixty, and a hundredfold.” (Mark 4:10-20)
It is instructive for a follower of Jesus to ask about the meaning of what Jesus is saying. We learn much by seeking answers when we questions about the Word of God. But we can learn more by focusing on answering questions that the Word of God asks of us. This passage brings many questions to us today and all through ages, as long as there have been Christ-followers and fruit-bearing disciples. It examines us. It brings us to question ourselves and where we are in the process of spiritual growth and becoming fruit-bearing followers of Jesus. Consider the question that Jesus presents: How will you understand all the parables without understanding this parable?
Understanding of this parable unlocks the mysterious and magnificent story of God. It’s about a kingdom…growing because of seed being planted…something growing because of seed bearing fruit…Behold, the sower went out to sow…
I. THE SOWER SOWS THE WORD.
The Planter is a Planner. He plants according to His plan. The Word of God is The Seed of the Kingdom. It is the Gospel, the Good News in Christ Jesus. When Jesus explains the parable, it is evident to His hearers that He is not talking about life in a farming culture. A King is planting the seed of His kingdom. His Word is sown in the world. And the Planter has a plan for kingdom growth. He is sowing His word. This is His purpose and His plan. When Jesus told this story, centuries of salvation history had converged on this moment in time. To His followers, His students, they were living out the working out of the plan of God, the will of God revealed through the Word of God.
The phrase the Word of God came or the Word of the Lord came is repeated over 150 times in the Bible. The Word of the Lord came to Abram as God revealed Himself as a shield to His people before Abram’s seed was ever realized in Isaac, before God’s people ever was the nation of Israel. The Word of the Lord came to men like Samuel and kings like Solomon. The Word of God came to prophets like Jeremiah, Ezekiel, Hosea, and Haggai, just to mention a few. The Word of the Lord came to unnamed prophets and men of God through the ages and it continues to come in our age and this is how I know: …in the high priesthood of Annas and Caiaphas, the word of God came to John, the son of Zacharias, in the wilderness. (Luke 3:2)
John proclaimed the gospel of God to the people of God and the message was clear. Repent…for the kingdom of heaven is at hand…It is the same message that I preach to you today…two thousand years after Jesus declared…Behold the sower went out to sow. This is the Word of God. This is the Will of God. It is not some irrelevant teaching or only some cute story. It is the very heartbeat of a Kingdom Culture Disciple. The message is still the same. Repent, turn from your way to God’s way…surrender your will to God’s will…die to self and live for God. God is about growing His people.
The Sower is a Grower. As the parable is explained, Jesus says that His followers…a more accurate term today than Christians I might add…have been granted a great privilege…they can understand the word of God, they can understand this mystery because God will help them understand. The understanding has been given to them by God. This moment in this place there will be those who hear the Word of God. But as the story unfolds, we can learn that everyone who hears the word of God will not bear fruit. They will not grow in godliness. They will not become more Christlike. They will only become more like men. And men without the word of God wither away and die. The Lord gives us some reasons that His Word does not grow in the heart of humans. And it is not because it hasn’t been sown.
II. THE WORD WILL NOT GROW WHEN THE WORD IS STOLEN.
This one hears the word and immediately it is stolen. Who is this thief? Jesus says it is Satan and Satan is doing what his nature does. He steals. He comes to kill, steal, and destroy. We may ask the question, What in the world is the devil doing there??? When the Sower sows the word in the world we can understand that this fallen world is his domain…to plunder…to pillage…to ransack. God is steadily growing His kingdom in a hostile environment.
Satan has a long history of stealing the word of God planted in man’s surroundings.In the Garden of Eden, the Word of God was sown in the creature that was created in God’s image. Man is the only creature created with the desire and capacity to worship. God’s desire was that man be content and satisfied with Him and live in obedience to His word. But Satan had access to the Garden…and man had access to the Word. The Word of God had created the perfect place for man to exist. But it required that man live according to the Will of God rather than the will of man. Which would it be? The will of man apart from the will of God never results the glory of God and the benefit of man. The will of man divorced from the will of God keeps the man spiritually separated from God and His word. A key to understanding here is the word immediately. Satan is there and able to immediately respond because he has access there. He is still influential in this person’s life.
The one who hears the word and it never captures him or changes him has not forsaken his ungodly influences. God’s word calls man toward something and away from something. Toward holiness and away from sin. Many of God’s people never realize that God’s word is not changing them…they think they’re OK with God but know little about His word. But others around them easily recognize the disconnect. For those who hear the word of God and are still keeping the things of their sinful life close by, here’s a word from the Lord:
The devil is still in your garden.
III. THE WORD WILL NOT GROW WHEN THE ROOT DOESN’T GROW.
This one hears the word…and the heart doesn’t have room for the root. When a seed is planted, the growth begins in the root. The root grows into the ground as the plant grows outward toward the light. Here the teaching is given that joy comes immediately in a person at the realization that something has radically changed in their condition. I see in this the joy that comes in the salvation experience. If you have been born again think back to the joy that you immediately knew when the Holy Spirit confirmed to you that your sin was forgiven and you could in fact live forever with God. This emotional experience is real at the time of conversion. Sometimes we are quite overwhelmed. But there is more to salvation than just the realization that we are set free from hell and the righteous judgment of a holy God.
For growth to come we must grow from the inside out…the Word at work. The root must grow deep in the life of the disciple. But often the Word is neglected. And the trials of life kick in. Without the foundation being built, without the root of God’s word working deeper in our hearts, we are unstable when the trials of life bear down, when we are persecuted because of the Word and the Word is neglected in our lives. God allows testing to come because He is testing the faith of the one who says they believe, or trust, God’s word. This one does not become a fruit-bearing disciple. Not because he hasn’t heard the Word…but because of what happens after he does.
The one who hears the Word and falls away from the testing of the Word has not trusted God in his trial. The heart is still hardened towards God. It has not been broken before Him. There is no room for the root to grow there because of rocky ground. The hard shell around a hard heart is an inherently human condition. If you remember the joy of your salvation, but there is no godward fruit coming out of your heart, here is a word from the Lord.
Bedrock still surrounds your heart.
IV. THE WORD WILL NOT GROW WHEN IT IS OVERGROWN.
This one hears the Word and the world outgrows the Word. No one ever says, I think I need some weeds in my garden and I need to go plant some. Why is it that this kind of growth needs no help to grow? No one has to plant the thorns and thistles in a garden. They just naturally grow there. My personal philosophy is that the Kingdom of God, when realized in all its fullness and glory, will be a place that roses will not have thorns. But this is the way of our fallen world. In the judgment upon Adam’s sin, the ground would begin to grow thorns and thistles instead of good fruit. The curse of sin brought the curse of thorns. Here Jesus uses an excellent metaphor as a reminder of where we are…and the times in which we live.
The distractions of our times helps strangle the life out of a fruit bearing disciple.It is a mistake to assume that it has ever been easy to follow Christ. Without the distractions of our age, one may think that it was not as hard to bear Kingdom fruit. But disciples of all ages have learned that time is the constant and consistent thing shared with all humanity, no matter what the cultural experience. The worries of the world is rightly interpreted the cares or concerns of the age. God’s Word growing in the lives of His people is constantly opposed by the world’s systems. There is a world order, despite the chaos. And chaos is the order. The devil is opposed to God’s Kingdom in every age.
The one who hears the word and realizes that the word no longer informs and instructs his life is living the reality that he is a slave to the world’s operating system. I don’t have to tell you what robs you of meaningful time with the Word of God. You already know. The fast-paced, sound bite, image driven Word from the Lord is fashionable but not fruitful. Time with the Lord is never wasted. It will always bear fruit. I commend to you that a drive by devotional thought for the day is not sufficient for our age. The deceitfulness of riches and the desires for created things are no substitute for right worship with the Lord. The implication is that this one who hears the word used to bear fruit. The Lord says the seed planted within them became unfruitful. Maybe that’s you today. There was a time when you saw God bringing the fruit of His word to bear in your life in a powerful way and you long to get back to that time in your life, but you seem to be trapped in the hustle and bustle of a world that is busted. If this is you, here is a word from the Lord:
The thorny curse still holds your life captive.
V. THE WORD WILL BEAR FRUIT WHEN IT IS ACCEPTED.
Hearing the Word and Accepting the Word is much more defined than our common terminology of Accepting Jesus. It is much deeper than a mere intellectual assent that the story of God’s redemption through the death of Christ on the cross to atone for the sin of humanity. To understand what it took to change the nature of man, to change the way we hear and understand His word is to understand that Christ on the cross is the central event in all of human history. To accept the word…means to acknowledge the word of God as the will of God and do it. It means to recognize that this universe is ordered to operate as God determines and that the Word of God has authority in our life to effect change. It means to follow Christ into the Kingdom of God in an attitude of reverent worship and gratitude that our life has been totally transformed and we can now become sowers of this seed as well. Everywhere we are, we are to bear fruit.
The sower sows the word received. The liberating principle in being a fruit-bearing disciple is that the fruit of godliness bears fruit in me when I begin to sow the seed of the gospel of God. And the freedom comes when I learn that I don’t have to make up the story…I just need to let the story grow out of me…I can sow the Word I have received.
I spend far too much of my time analyzing the hearts of humans who need to hear the gospel. I cannot know this. God does. And He commissions me to be a sower. And He calls you to hear and accept this word today. You are to go and bear fruit…You are to be the good soil. And good soil brings about much fruit. Much fruit glorifies God.
Good soil receives the seed and grows…what changes the condition? What can we humanly do to change our lives, our heart condition, into one that can be seen as good soil, fertile soil, fruit-bearing soil? Nothing. Only the authoritative power found in the transformative word of God. A major theme in the Gospel of Mark seems to be that Jesus has the Authority of God manifested in His life because He is God. So I pondered upon why the writer of Mark placed this parable here in the arrangement. Could it be that bearing the fruit of God in the life of disciples involves something more than just praying the sinner’s prayer or occasionally attending a church service? Could it be that the writer of Mark wanted us to see plainly what Jesus was talking about Chapter 3:34-35?
And looking about on those who were sitting around Him, He said, “Behold, My mother and My Brothers. For whoever does the will of God, he is My brother and sister and mother.” We are joined to God by the will of God and the word of God growing in us.
Look at the example of a fruit-bearing disciple given to us in the story of Legion in Chapter 5. I would not have targeted Legion as one of the Good Soil people. He certainly was influenced by the devil and had a hardened heart toward God. I probably wouldn’t have spent much time sowing the word into his life. But this story tells us that Jesus purposely went there. And what happened there demonstrated the authority of the Word of God in the spiritual realm. In the eternal realm, the Word of God matters much. I love how the story ends…or does it? Legion’s life is still bearing fruit. We read that this demon-possessed man was radically transformed…clothed and not naked, no longer deranged but in his right mind, no longer uncontrollable but sitting down. That made an eternal impact in God’s kingdom to the disciples of Jesus. But this is what bore the most fruit when the Lord commissioned Legion:
Go home to your people and report to them what great things the Lord has done for you, and how He had mercy on you. (Mark 5:20) Hear Legion’s response: And he went away mad began to proclaim in Decapolis what great things Jesus had done for him; and everyone marveled. (Mark 5:21)
Legion became a sower…Behold the sower went out to sow.
It is the will of God for Disciples of Jesus to become sowers of the gospel, living by the Word of God, and bear much fruit. Kingdom Growth begins with the Word of God growing from the inside out.
Is God’s Word growing in you today? Sow the seed that has been sown in you.
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