The Parable of the Sower • Matthew 13:1-9

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Hey, well, good morning.

Hey, whether you're here with us on campus at our church, whether you're joining us online,

we're so grateful that each and every one of you are here as we dive into God's Word

this morning.

So let's just go ahead and get there.

If you've got your Bibles, open up to Matthew chapter 13.

Matthew 13 · chapter mention

As we continue on in week two of our series on the parables, in this series, looking at

the stories that Jesus told, it's the series that we're going to be working ourselves through

over the course of this summer.

Last week was week one, and we talked about the parable of the talents.

And it's an important, for me, it was an important foundation one for us to begin with as Jesus

goes and he tells the story about a man who is over a kingdom.

And what this began to lay in our hearts and in our minds was this basic understanding that

claiming to be a part of the kingdom wasn't enough.

That there's an aspect that what you and I, once we receive the gospel, what we do with

our lives, it matters.

It counts.

It means something.

And so what we saw was the understanding of the importance of the full embracement of

the gospel.

So it's not just the gospel that saves us, but it's the gospel that drives every single

aspect of our living.

It's where we found our life, our hope, and our eternity all in that.

And so this morning, what I want us to look at, as we talk about the parable of the sower,

is we're going to talk about believing.

But we're going to try to dive in a little bit deeper than just believing.

And what I want us all to understand this morning, what I want us to be able to draw from the

heart of Jesus as he tells this story, is what is faithful believing?

What does faithful believing look like?

Now, over the course of the last several months, if things have gone crazy, one of the things

that has happened is a lot of TV programs, especially through the streaming networks, have

released TV shows and documentaries for people to watch earlier than they planned.

Like Disney's even done this with several movies that they've put out.

And one of the ones that's been released that there's been a lot of chatter about that a

lot of people from a lot of different backgrounds, a lot of different passions, a lot of different

life experience has watched is this documentary called The Last Dance.

How many of y'all have watched The Last Dance already?

So we've got a handful of us that have watched it.

I just got a woo from Ben Wood.

He has definitely watched this.

Natalie watched it as well.

Good job.

I haven't watched it yet.

I'm looking forward to sitting down and watching it.

But if you're not familiar with the documentary, The Last Dance, it's about the basketball player,

Michael Jordan.

And here's what's kind of been profound about this documentary, is you would expect people

who like basketball to watch it, but there's been where so many people, whether you like

basketball or not, have tuned in to watch this as they begin to understand a lot about the

background of this man, Michael Jordan, who's a basketball player.

Whether that's your passion or not, it's consumed so many people.

What I find interesting about Michael Jordan is this.

My 94-year-old grandmother, who's watching right now at her home in North Augusta, she knows who

Michael Jordan is.

My dad knows who Michael Jordan is.

I grew up watching Michael Jordan and honestly pulling for whatever team was playing Jordan and

his Bulls, right?

That's who I wanted to win.

But my son, who has never seen Michael Jordan, who never watched Michael Jordan play a single

game, knows who Michael Jordan is.

But what in the world are you talking about?

The whole world believes in the fact that Michael Jordan was a real person.

The whole world believes in the accomplishments that Michael Jordan accomplished as they're documented,

whether you saw them or you didn't.

The whole world knows the work of Michael Jordan.

But just being honest with you, I don't know of a single person in my life who woke up this

morning, and their belief in the existence of the person of Michael Jordan changed anything about

their life.

Short of owning some shoes or a jersey or watching a game, the simple belief in him as a man has

done nothing to change us.

And here's where we're going with this.

What I've found exists in so many people's lives is this.

Yeah, I believe in Jesus.

But when you begin to dig in what that statement means for them, is the simple belief in Jesus

Christ has changed nothing about their lives.

And what we're going to see in the parable of the sower, what we're really going to wrestle

with is this, there is a difference in believing in Jesus and faithfully believing in Jesus.

Because to faithfully believe in Jesus means that not only do we acknowledge who he is, that

we acknowledge what he's done, that we acknowledge the sacrifice in which he's made, but believing

in Jesus causes us to be different as a result of that, of what we faithfully believe in Jesus.

So James, in James chapter 2, into speaking to what a faithful life that has been saved by God

James 2 · chapter mention

looks like, he says this.

He says in James 2 verse 19, you believe that God is one, you do well.

James 2:19

Even the demons believe and shudder.

Heard a pastor at a youth camp say one time to us, and this resonated in my head and has stuck

with me ever since, do you have the faith of a demon or do you have more?

You know, it says right here, demons believe.

Demons believe.

So is there a difference between us and our belief in the demons?

So Jesus talks about this.

Matthew 13, let's start reading in verse 1.

It says,

That same day Jesus went out of the house and sat beside the sea, and the great crowds

gathered about him, so that he got into a boat and sat down.

And the whole crowd stood on the beach, and he told them many things and parables, saying,

A sower went to sow, and as he sowed, some seeds fell along the path, and the birds came

and devoured them.

Other seeds fell on rocky ground where they did not have much soil, and immediately they

sprang up since they had no depth of soil.

But when the sun rose, they were scorched, and since they had no root, they withered away.

Other seeds fell among thorns, and the thorns grew up and choked them.

Other seeds fell on good soil and produced grain, some a hundredfold, some sixty, some thirty.

He who has ears, let him hear.

So here's the setting of what happens and what takes place, is that Jesus on his day-to-day

journey with the disciples, and they're moving through on their journey.

And sometimes, as in the case in the life of Christ, people would hear about the things

that he would do.

They would hear about the teachings that he would give, and they would begin to migrate

themselves toward Jesus.

And so Jesus looks around, and he sees that there's a crowd.

And so he gets into a boat, and everyone's there on the beach, and he creates this beautiful

amphitheater effect to where they will be able to hear the words that he says.

And then, in so many cases, he goes into these great teachings of Scripture, of understanding.

But in this moment, Jesus begins to tell a story.

And here's what's significant about this story.

Jesus gets done, and the crowds were there, and everybody's kind of confused.

What did that mean?

I don't understand the point of the story of what you just said.

In fact, the Bible even tells us that the disciples, those who had heard more teachings

of Christ than anyone else, they come back to him and say, Jesus, you have to explain to

us what this parable is talking about.

And so Jesus, not to the masses, but to the few, he gathers them up, and he begins to explain

why he began to tell a story about a farmer, why it's important to know the details of what

seems to be a day-by-day, routine, mundane task that is happening.

And he begins to tell about the work that a farmer is doing, that a seed that is common

to all, but where it begins to fall, and what that means.

He talks about four soils, but what we want to look at this morning is not four soils, but

four hearts.

And as we look through this, there's going to be the opportunity for us to see where's

our heart in this.

Where's the heart of those that we care for and that we love, and what does this tell us

about the character and nature of God as we go through?

The first heart that Jesus speaks about is the hardened heart.

You know, when it comes to matters of faith, there are people in this world who do not care.

That's a hard truth.

But when it comes to faith, when it comes to spiritual matters, when it comes to dealing

with talking about Christ or any other religion, there are people whose hearts are hardened and

they simply don't care.

Jesus describes in the parable of the sower that as the seeds are cast, that some of them

actually fall onto the path, the path that many people would have walked on, a path that

would have been beaten down, would have become hard as concrete.

And as the seed that would penetrate in other areas would fall on there, that seed wouldn't

even begin to penetrate the soil that it was under.

And so when Jesus explains, he says this.

He says,

This is what was sown along the path.

As we go out into this world, as we interact with the people that we interact with, some

of them that we deeply, we know, we love, and we care about, we have to begin with understanding

the harsh words of what Christ says.

There's simply people in this world who do not know, nor do they care to talk about the

things that matter to us.

And you've been with them and you've seen them.

And the more we talk, the more they reject.

The more we plead with them to understand, the more they're unwilling to do so.

This isn't all those who are lost, but it is definitely some.

And when we think about the people that God puts in our life, we find that so many times

it's people that we dearly love and that we care about.

This is probably the group of people that I've had more conversations with Christians

about.

The people that they battle with, whether it be one of their children, that even though

they were raised a certain way, have run from that and their hearts appear to be hardened.

I've dealt with spouses who are dealing with this with their own spouse or people who are dealing

with this with their friends that they love that God has brought them to.

And it brings them to a point of frustration of, I've done it all.

I've gone through with them all.

And it's like everything that I say never penetrates the hardness of their heart.

And so then in desperation, men and women of faith say, God, what do I do?

How can I change them?

How can I soften their heart to hear the gospel?

And here's the harshness of this scripture, but the truth of the scripture, these people

exist and the gospel still has to be scattered.

So what do we do?

How do we penetrate?

How do we move forward from that?

I think two simple ways that we see in dealing with a matter of the spirit, we have to understand

that salvation and the sharing of the gospel in and of itself is spiritual.

And so we've got to begin by praying.

We've got to begin by getting on our knees and pleading before the Lord that only he can

soften the heart that has been hardened.

And then the second thing, the thing that is oftentimes so difficult, but we see time and

time again in scripture, we wait.

We wait.

We wait for our moment.

We wait for the opportunity.

We wait and we plead for the plan of God to be made known to us to deal with a hardened

heart.

The next heart that we see in the scripture is what we'll call a shallow heart.

Scripture tells us that some seeds fell here on the shallow ground that was rocky, but had

a thin layer of soil.

And so what began to happen is the seed landed in a shallow layer of soil and it grew quickly.

But because there was no root system, it died when the sun rose.

Jesus tells us this in verse 20.

As for what was sown on the rocky ground, this is the one who hears the word and immediately,

I want you to notice that word, immediately receives it with joy.

Yet he has no root in himself, but endures for a while.

And when tribulation or persecution arises on account of the word, notice it again, immediately

he falls away.

Jesus talks about a person that hears the gospel.

They don't count the cost.

They don't walk through, they don't process within them, and immediately they respond.

And that's something for us to praise and be excited about.

But as quickly as they come, as quickly as they fall away, and what begins to happen in

these moments is the heart is exposed because there's no root of what exists to ground them

in the gospel.

And it's a devastating moment of what so many churches are going through.

And I believe is one of the greatest problems in those who claim to be believers in America.

That there is no counting the cost.

There is no perseverance through.

There is no willingness to dig down in.

And what we see is that what I want from Jesus is the promise that I'm always going to get with

what's good because that's what I deserve.

And that's what is owed to me.

And in that, Jesus is not our Savior, but he's a genie in the bottle that we try to control

to just give me what I want.

You see, the shallow heart lives a life that God owes them something based off of their merit

and not that they receive things because of God's.

And so our establishment before him is, well, God, I'm a good person.

Well, God, I go to church.

Well, God, I give some money.

Well, God, I do some stuff.

Well, God, I'm better than most.

So you should just give me what I want.

And the moment that we begin to not live in the good things that we feel like we deserve

is immediately when we begin to fade away.

And the trouble with this is that when we approach Scripture,

that we as Christians should never be surprised by persecution or difficulty.

I mean, when we see, when we look through the Bible,

there's very few cases of men and women of faith

whose testimonies are recorded in Scripture.

And then as they go through their life,

they walk in faith with God.

Everything goes wonderful.

They die in their sleep at a ripe old age.

We don't see that.

That's not the narrative of the story of what we find in Scripture.

But for so many men and women of faith,

it is their perseverance through their persecution.

It is the perseverance through their difficulty that tells the wonderful character and nature of God.

And so we see Moses.

Moses obeyed God.

Moses went back and ended up wandering in the desert for 40 years

with a bunch of people who complained,

and then he didn't even get to enter the promised land.

We see Jeremiah, God's prophet,

who was obedient to God's call on his life to call God's people to repentance.

He did exactly what God told him to do and told them,

this is what would happen if you don't.

He did what he was called to do.

And as the people refused to repent and entered into exile,

so did Jeremiah.

John the Baptist,

who Jesus talked about the greatness of John the Baptist, right?

That's a big deal.

His life of faithfulness caused him to be beheaded.

And Paul, when he got saved,

the words of Jesus about Paul would be this,

that Jesus would show Paul how much he would suffer for the sake of the gospel.

And we could keep going and keep going and we keep going.

The Bible says,

not that we as Christians are set free from it,

not that we as Christians won't walk through this,

but the Bible says,

don't be surprised when persecution comes.

Don't be surprised when difficulty comes.

I heard a pastor this week,

and here's what he said about suffering and difficulty.

Let it shake you,

but don't let it rob you.

Let it shake you,

but don't let it rob you.

And here's what he was getting to,

and I love the picture of this.

Church,

when persecution and difficulty come,

and we've been through it,

let it shake you.

Let it make you better.

Because think about it.

If your foundation,

if where you're standing,

if you feel like it begins to wobble back and forth,

what do you do?

You plant down even more.

And that this is where we're going to be.

And this is who we are.

That you can shake all that I have,

but my foundation remains true.

But if we're shallow,

if we're shallow,

when it comes,

we just burn away with it.

The next that Jesus speaks to is the distracted heart.

So there was another seed that came and it grew,

but what grew around it consumed it.

Verse 22,

Jesus says,

As for what was sown among the thorns,

this is the one who hears the word,

but the cares of the world and the deceitfulness of riches choke the world,

and it proves unfruitful.

This is the more of the gradual.

The shallow was immediate,

but this one is gradually over time.

Of what begins to happen,

as more and more we say,

Jesus,

I'll take that.

But then as the cares of the world begin to grow,

what begins to happen is in the heart and faith of that individual,

what is around them consumes them more than what is in them.

And what begins to happen is not immediate,

but slowly and slowly over time,

what begins to happen is it is choked away and choked away and choked away.

And what we find is there was that initial belief,

but the faithful believing never existed.

Church,

I'm going to ask you,

what consumes you?

What fills your thoughts?

What fills your calendar?

What drives your spending?

What is the desire of your heart?

And are we sitting there trying to be the plant that is growing forth the fruit of the gospel,

but yet everything else that we allow to grow around us

is so much stronger in our mind and in our heart than the gospel is?

And then why are we surprised when one day we walk away to chase after something else?

But then the last one that Jesus gives us is he gives us the fruitful heart.

So important that we understand what the fruitful heart is.

Verse 23,

Jesus says,

As for what was sown on good soil,

this is the one who hears the word and understands it.

He indeed bears fruit and yields,

in one case a hundredfold,

in another sixty,

and in another thirty.

Jesus says,

This is the one that gets it.

This is the one that has to battle through.

This is the one that has to grow deep.

This is the one that has to persevere from what could come around it.

But that the fruitful heart will always be the one that bears fruit.

And then in very similar language as Jesus talked about last week,

with the parable of the talents,

what does it do?

It reproduces and reproduces and reproduces.

Church, when it comes to faith,

when it comes to faithful believing,

we have to understand that faith is always designed to be tangible.

It's always designed to be tangible.

It should be seen.

It should be known.

It should be experienced in the life of the believer.

And so Paul writes in Galatians 5, 22 through 23,

but the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness,

faithfulness, gentleness, self-control against such things.

There is no law.

Church, what do people see in you?

What are you known for?

This past week, one of our elders, Tim Scholl and I,

we went out for lunch.

And I love talking with Tim

because Tim and I have very similar come-to-faith stories.

And we were sitting there, we were heading out,

trying to find a restaurant that we could sit down in,

and we ran short, so we grabbed food

and brought it back here to the church.

But we were sitting there and we were talking.

And we were talking about who we were

before we were in Christ.

Who we were before we were saved.

And we talked about those moments

kind of when you bump into somebody

who knew you from those days,

but don't know you from now.

Y'all ever have that experience, right?

And we said for the people who have known us in both,

the hope is that even though you knew who I was,

now, not because I've said it,

now, not because I go to church,

now, not because I'm a pastor or I'm an elder

or I'm a small group leader or I'm whatever else,

not because what I say I am,

because of what you see in me,

you know this is who I am.

See the difference?

Our faith is tangible.

It's meant to be seen in you.

But then also,

the part before James 2.19

that we read at the beginning

is verse 18.

It says, show me your faith

apart from your works.

I love this.

And I will show you my faith

by my works.

You believe that God is one,

you do well.

Even the demons believe and shudder.

And so we come away with it,

that it's an inside transformation

that manifests itself

into who we are and what we do.

So what do people see from you?

What does your life look like?

Not, do you believe in Jesus?

But do you faithfully believe

in a way that's transformed,

in a way that's molded you

and shaped you

into being more and more like Christ?

You see, demons believe.

But is that your level of belief?

Let's pray.

Lord, I thank you so much

for this morning.

God, for this time

that we could be here together

in your word.

Lord, I thank you for those of us

that are joining online

in services before

and in services that will come after.

Lord, I ask that in this moment,

that as we're there

processing through

with your word,

Lord, that you would expose

to ourselves

the character

and the nature of our heart.

Lord, that we would examine

our belief.

Lord, are we just simply believing

in a factual,

intellectual,

religious Jesus?

Or are we faithfully

believing in Jesus

that changes who we are,

that brings us to submission,

that causes us to desire

above all things

a deep-rooted obedience

to you?

Lord, I pray

as we go from here

where that we would find

our hearts

would be the fruitful heart.

Lord, but if not,

Lord, we would be willing

to examine,

to cry out to you

where that we may find ourselves

loved, saved,

and obedient to you.

Jesus, we love you,

we praise you,

and it's in your name we pray.

Amen.

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