Be Good Dirt!
Today, Pastor Michael is back in Mark and we find Jesus avoiding the crushing crowd that His ministry has created of late. Folks around the land are flocking to hear His message and Jesus actually has to go out into a boat to preach to them, it’s gotten so bad.
Jesus is preaching one of His most famous parables, the parable of the sower. This parable is about a seeds thrown into four different kinds of soils: 1—on the road, where it becomes food for birds, 2—falling on rocky ground, where it cannot develop roots, 3—falling into thorny ground where the thorns chock out the growth and finally, 4—falling onto good soil where it yields a crop.
What we find in this message is that it’s more about the soil than the seed itself. And the parable is about how one sows the word. If on the road, the similarity is that of falling on unprepared people and Satan can snatch it away. If on rocky soil, it shows people who initially receive the word with joy but it’s received superficially and doesn’t last. If sown within thorns, it represents worries and the world, choking out spiritual development and truths. But if sown in good soil, if the word is heard in the heart, it produces fruit.
(CSB Baker Illustrated Bible Study Notes) The people who represent good soil, by contrast, attend to the gospel with earnest and ongoing engagement. The mark of a true disciple, an insider, is to “hear the word, welcome it, and produce fruit” (4:20). Those who genuinely hear and receive the mystery of the kingdom of God will, by the grace of its generative power, produce a harvest beyond belief.
Verses can be found today in Mark 4: 1-20.
Scripture quotations marked CSB have been taken from the Christian Standard Bible®, Copyright © 2017 by Holman Bible Publishers. Used by permission. Christian Standard Bible® and CSB® are federally registered trademarks of Holman Bible Publishers.