The Parable of the Sower – A Sermon Preached at Hendersonville Presbyterian Church, August 28, 2022
Read Matthew 13: 1 – 23
The Parable of the Sower is the first of Jesus’ 50-some revelational parables. It is breathtaking in its scope, including themes from Genesis to Revelation.
This summer we went on a 10-day tour of National Parks in Utah: Zion, Bryce, Canyon Lands, Arches, and the Grand Canyon. All great. I remember my first view of the Grand Canyon on the South Rim. I walked up to the railing and, “Wow!!” The view was magnificent, breath taking, amazing. 30-miles wide from rim to rim, 1 mile deep with a river flowing at the bottom. Wide and Deep with living water. Too much to take in. Words cannot describe the vastness, the beauty. This is how I feel about this parable. If the parable of the Prodigal Son is Zion National Park, this parable is the Grand Canyon.
Like all of Jesus’ parables, it is about the Kingdom of God. In fact, all that Jesus did, said, and taught was focused on the Kingdom of God, because that is why He was sent (Like 4: 43).
It could just as accurately be called the Parable of the Seed, the Parable of New Life, or the Parable of the Kingdom.
It is found in Matthew, Mark 4, and Luke 8. It is not in John, because John does not contain parables. The three versions of the parable are almost identical, but there are some minor differences that are important to understand the overall meaning of the parable, so I will mention Mark and Luke occasionally.
Here is what I mean by ‘revelational’ parable:
The parables of Jesus can be described as metaphors of similes that use earthly things to point to spiritual or heavenly realities.
For example: Build your house on the rock, not on sand. Earthly things like a house, rock, and sand pointing to the reality that a life lived in the kingdom of the world is unstable, while a life built on the Kingdom of God will be secure.
Or
Don’t store you treasure on earth where moths and rust can consume it. Store your treasure in heaven where it will eternally secure. Treasure, moths, and rust point to the fact that finding your value in the things of the world will always be disappointing. Finding your ultimate value in Jesus will never let you down.
These parables are Kingdom sayings of Jesus. They are instructional parables – they tell us how to live in the Kingdom of God.
Then there are parables like this one. They are carefully crafted, brilliant stories filled with deep meaning that use earthly things (like soil, seeds, sower) to reveal what the Kingdom of God is like. They are revelations into the heart of the Kingdom and into the Heart of God. They are revelational parables.
They make some simple points, but they are also intended to challenge the listener to go deeper to fully understand what Jesus is teaching. “It is the glory of God to conceal a thing; but the honor of Kings is to search out a matter” (Proverbs 25: 2 KJV).
Other revelational parables include: the Good Samaritan, the 10 Virgins and their oil lamps, the Vineyard, the Kind Master and Wicked Servant, the Prodigal Son, and Abraham and Lazarus. Each of these parables reveal some aspect of the Kingdom of God.
The Parable of the Sower is Important for Three Reasons
The Parable of the Sower is the first of these revelational parables. This is important for three reasons:
1) This parable reveals the heart of the Father for the first time in a new way.
2) In Mark, Jesus tells the disciples, “Don’t you understand this parable? Then how will you understand any parable?” (Mark 4: 13). This parable is foundational for understanding every other revelational parable. This sets it apart and makes it doubly significant.
3) By speaking this parable, Jesus is using His words to plant “the message of the Kingdom” (Matthew, NIV), “the Word of the Kingdom” (Matthew NIV), “the Word of God” (Luke NIV) into the hearts of the listeners that have “noble and good soil” (Luke 8). I’ll come back to this later if I have time, but here, on the shore of the Sea of Galilee Jesus is using words in the same way He used words to create the Universe, except in this place and at this time He is bringing an entirely new reality into existence – the Kingdom of God. The Kingdom of God is, “The rule and reign of Christ in your heart”. The Word of God is using His words to create a new reality, a new spiritual universe on earth.
For sure Jesus is the Kingdom in the same way He is the way, the truth, and the life. Jesus does not just show us the way, He is the way. He does not just speak truth, He is truth. He does not just give life, He is life. In the same way, He does not just release the Kingdom, He is the Kingdom. That is what He means when He tells the Pharisees, “If I drive out demons by the Spirit of God, then the Kingdom of God has come upon you” (Matthew 12: 28 NIV). He is referring to Himself as the Kingdom.
The Kingdom of God is not a worldly Kingdom. It is spiritual from beginning to end. It is not a government, a country, a political movement or party, a set of rules or good works, or a denomination. It is not the organization we call the Church. It is the rule and reign of Christ in the hearts of those who believe and trust Him. These hearts are linked together as the Christ in one heart meets the Christ in another – the Body of Christ. It manifests itself into the world through the Fruits of the Spirit – especially love; and spiritual gifts like prophesy, healing, miracles, word of knowledge, increased faith, etc.
Even John the Baptist didn’t fully get this. He sent his disciples to Jesus to ask, “Are you the one who was to come, or should we expect someone else?” Why did he ask this? Jesus wasn’t doing what the Messiah was supposed to do. Where was the insurrection, the revolution to kick out Rome and make Israel a great nation again? Where was the judgment, the manifestation of power, the vengeance Isaiah predicted. Where was the ax that John predicted Jesus would use, chopping down the tree of religion. Jesus is less messianic and less cataclysmic than John had preached.
But the power is there. The ax is already laid against the root. Just not in the way John, or anyone else, expected. By speaking this parable, which is the first, Jesus is creating and releasing the Kingdom of God into the world for the first time. The revolution has begun. Jesus is the Kingdom. But now the Kingdom lives in the hearts represented by noble and good soil. And these believers become the new sowers, sowing this new life into the world around them. Through this sowing, the kingdom of the world, which is the kingdom of satan, will be systematically dismantled and destroyed.
The darkness will be pushed back, the territory that satan claims in human hearts will be reclaimed for Christ, and the power of evil will be obliterated and consumed by fire. But this work is first done in the spiritual realm, the unseen real, where all spiritual warfare takes place. Only then will the results be manifested in the world around us. Our God is a consuming fire.
So, this parable is not just a story of the Kingdom of God. It is the way the Kingdom of God is created, brought into existence here on earth – through the spoken words of Jesus, who is the Word of God. It is this reality that Jesus is referring to when He prays, “On Earth as it is in Heaven”.
Why Do You Speak in Parables?
Before I dive into the meaning of the parable, we need to look at how Jesus answered the disciples important question: “Why do you speak to the people in parables?” Good question. Jesus’ answer has been interpreted in many different ways over the Millenia.
I believe the answer is found in Matthew 12. Up to then, the Pharisees had been waiting, watching Jesus. They asked question and talked among themselves about Jesus. But in chapter 12 they come out swinging. They claim Jesus is casting out demons in the power of satan. When they can’t knock Him out, they decide to kill Him. “Jesus knew their thoughts”.
Jesus had spent weeks, maybe even months of mostly public, almost non-stop healing illnesses and diseases, curing the blind and lame, healing the deaf and mute, calming the storm on the lake, casting out demons, and even raising a little girl from the dead. What more do they need to understand that Jesus is the long-awaited Messiah that their Scriptures and prophets pointed to?
But in their resentment, fear, jealousy, pride, coupled with a spirit of religion, they were blinded. Even though they saw, they could not see; hearing they could not hear. In their spiritual blindness and deafness they could not understand or perceive.
If He were the Messiah, they would have to give up their stature in the community, surrender and give up control of their lives to Jesus, and step out of their religious box. In their pride, they could not do this. NO WAY.
Jesus was not yet at a place in His ministry where He could afford the distraction of the Pharisees. If they weren’t going to accept Jesus as Messiah after all He had done, they never would. He could not afford to lose focus, so He began to teach in parables so they would not understand – “They will be ever hearing but never understanding”(Matthew 13: 24).
He would not give them any more ammunition to attack Him. And even though the common people might not understand everything He was saying, at least they were interested enough to ask for more explanation. The Pharisees did not care. They had made up their minds – Jesus must die.
In this way, He marginalized them for now, and kept His focus on His primary (really, only) objective – releasing and advancing the Kingdom of God. He would come back to the Pharisees later.
It is interesting to me that this resentment of and resistance to healing, deliverance, and other supernatural signs and wonders is widespread in the western Church today. Truly, there in nothing new under the sun.
The Parable
On to the parable. As you will see, this parable is also about the human heart. It is about the Kingdom of God being placed in the human heart as a seed, and that seed growing in the good soil into a bush, plant, or tree which bears fruit in time. This fruit is released into the world and is, of course, the fruit of the Spirit – love joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, and self-control. These fruits come from the heart of Jesus in us and then through us into the world. They are spiritual fruit that have an earthly impact. The work of the parable is also released into the world through the Spiritual Gifts that flow out of the Kingdom heart.
This parable has no meaning, truth, of application apart from the Holy Spirit, also called the Spirit of Christ. It is spiritual from beginning to end.
The parable has 3 parts: The Sower, the Soil, and the Seed. Lets look at each.
Sower
This one is easy, sort of. Jesus is the sower. But as we will see, when the seed is planted in us, we are also called to be sowers of the seed.
Soils
There are 4 soils. Each soil represents a human heart. “But the seed sown on good soil stands for those with a noble and good heart” (Luke 8: 15 NIV) and “When any one heareth the word of the Kingdom, and understandeth it not, then cometh the wicked one, and catcheth away the which was sown in his heart” (Matthew 13: 19 KJV).
Jesus sows over all 4 soils, even though He knows the seed will only thrive in one of the types of soils. Jesus loves the world, not just those He knows will have a good heart. Who knows, maybe one of the other soils will receive the seed and repent, becoming good soil!
Lets look at each soil. Dale Bruner points out that each of these soil types can be found in the Church. If you are like me, as I was reading the parable I found myself asking, “Which one of the soil types am I”. Maybe a combination of a couple.
Path: The first ‘soil’ is the path, although it has been so compacted over the years it cannot really be called a soil. Each field was separated by a path that the farmers and their animals used to move from one field to another. The bedrock in Israel is limestone. With constant traffic on the path over generations, with wetting and drying, the path can become like concrete. There is no soil on this path for the seeds to germinate in. The heart with this condition might hear the word, but pays little or no attention to it. They are not necessarily atheists. They just have no interest in what Jesus is saying. Perhaps they:
· Have not surrendered their life to Jesus
· Have not repented
· Have not accepted Jesus as the only way to salvation. He is a good teacher, maybe a prophet, but not Messiah
· Believe they can save themselves, and therefore they can remain in control of their lives. They believe their works are enough (these can be works in and around the church)
· Perhaps they are ‘religious’. They know about Jesus, are very learned about Scripture (so is satan), but do not have the Holy Spirit and therefore do not know Jesus
· Maybe they are under the control of a religious spirit and “cannot see”
For whatever reason, Matthew says “they hear the message about the Kingdom and do not understand”. The words of Jesus do not penetrate their heart. His words are quickly “snatched away’ by satan and his lies: “You can be like God”, “You can save yourself”, “You are better than these weak, impractical people who call themselves Christians”, “Pay no attention to the spiritual, that is from a long-dead and best-forgotten age of superstition”.
Jesus has no spiritual impact on them.
This is a heart that does not believe Jesus is Messiah, the Son or God; and does not trust (or have faith in) Jesus.
Rocky Soil: There is actual soil in this heart, but it is a thin layer of soil over bedrock (limestone). Deep enough for the seed to get covered, but not deep enough for roots to form. But still, they believe. They have “confessed with their mouth that Jesus is Lord”.
At first, they have a joyful conversion experience proclaiming Jesus is Lord. Real belief. But no follow up, no thought day-to-day about how to live in-Christ, with Christ, or for Christ. Little or no prayer life, no time spent in Scripture. They attend church, maybe even are active in church, but other than that focused on the many things of life.
Bruner writes, “Enthusiastic converts should beware lest they consider conversion an “open sesame” to eternal life or even a happy life, or lest they think that “a conversion experience” is the equivalent of faith or trusting in Jesus” (Bruner, v. 2, pg. 21).
There is another aspect of this soil or human heart. It is a heart separated from Jesus by a veil woven around their heart. This veil is made up of long-held negative emotions like anger, hatred, resentment, hurt, and disappointment; fears; unrepented sins, occult practices or participation; and abuse/trauma/and curses. They might medicate the trauma and hurt in their lives with addictions. In my experience, these things prevent Christians from growing deep in the Lord. They believe, but their roots are shallow because they have never really experienced the Father’s love and they believe the lies of satan “that they are not good enough”.
This soil supports life, but it is the type of life described in Jeremiah 17: 5 – 7:
“Cursed is the one who trusts in man, who depends on flesh for his strength and whose heart turns away from the Lord. He will be like a bush in the wastelands, he will not see prosperity when it comes. He will dwell in the parched places of the desert, in a salt land where no one lives”.
The seed grows into a bush, but there is no fruit. When persecution, trouble, or loss comes, the bush withers and he falls away.
This is the heart that believes Jesus is the Messiah, the Son of God; but does not trust (or have faith) in Jesus.
Soil Choked with Thorns: This heart also has soil. But the soil is already choked with thorns. This heart hears the word and receives it. The seed sprouts and even grows a little bit, but its life is strangled by the care and worries of this life and by the deceitfulness of wealth.
This is the Christian who seeks to find their ultimate value in the things of the world – money or wealth, work or their business, possessions, position in the community or church, accomplishments, their country; even in family, education, their knowledge and experiences, etc. In other words, they are looking to idols for their fulfillment and ultimate value as human beings.
They believe the lie that “they can make themselves good enough”.
Their anxiety comes when the things that give them their ultimate value are attacked by the kingdom of the world. Their business might be failing, their wealth might be wiped out by a depression, their accomplishments might be challenged, their country is under attack. Fear and anxiety comes from the thought that they might lose these things, even if they are not being attacked..
They believe Jesus is Messiah, but want to find salvation in the gods of their own choosing. The seed grows but is quickly choked out. The plant is alive, but produces no fruit.
This is the heart that believes, but trusts in the wrong things.
Noble and Good Soil: This is the soil in which the seed finds a true home, where it can germinate, sprout, and thrive. Over time this seed will grow into a plant, a bush, or a mighty tree like ‘The Tree of Life’ or the tree Isaiah describes, “An oak of righteousness, a planting for the display of His glory”.
This is the seed that bears fruit – the fruit of the Spirit: “love, joy, peace, patience kindness, goodness, faithfulness, and self-control”.
This is the person who grasps, receives, and comprehends the message of the Kingdom. This is the heart that has repented and is completely surrendered to Jesus, the heart of the one who says, “Not my way, but yours”. A humble and obedient heart. The heart of the one who has, “Denied themselves, picked up their cross, and follows Jesus”; who has given up the right to themselves, who can begin to live their lives with an unoffendable heart.
This life does not immediately manifest itself in the heart with good soil. It takes time for the tree to grow. And it requires nurturing – prayer, study of Scripture, service, worship, Christian fellowship, healing, and repentance. But the bush grows and fruit begins to appear. At first a little, but more and more over time as this person stays connected to Jesus and grows in their relationship with Him.
This is also the heart that begins to operate in one or more spiritual gifts.
This is the Jeremiah 17: 7, 8 person (Also Psalm 1):
“But blessed is the man who trusts in the Lord, whose confidence is in Him. He will be like a tree planted by the water that sends out its roots by the stream. It does not fear when heat comes, its leaves are always green. It has no worries in a year of drought and never fails to bear fruit”.
This heart bears fruit 100, 60, or 30 times. This is a Kingdom principle, the principle of the seed – the principle of multiplication.
How can you tell is your heart is made up of this soil? Do you see fruit, even a little bit; and is this fruit growing over time? If you said, “Yes”, then you have good soil.
This is the heart that believes and trusts Jesus.
Summary of the Soils: Can thin soil or a soil choked with weeds be converted into a good soil that bears fruit? Yes. Through confession and repentance, love, trust, and through surrender and crying out to Jesus. But only through the power of the Holy Spirit.
Not all who receive the Word of God hold it. Only 1 in 4 stands under the Word, surrenders to its authority, obeys it, and trusts Jesus. As the saying goes, “Not all who attend church pray”. Not all who swim in the water are fish. And as my pastor says, “putting your head in the oven does not make you a biscuit”. (Although I am not sure equating going to church to putting your head in an oven is a good simile).
One more point (if I have the time): How Can Any Heart Contain ‘Good’ Soil?
Paul writes:
“There is no one righteous, not even one . . . All have turned away, they have together become worthless, there is no one who does good, not even one (Romans 3: 10 – 12 NIV).
Scripture tells us that we all come into this world with fallen natures – hearts that are “deceitful above all things and beyond cure” (Jeremiah 17: 9).
So how do we go from a wicked and evil heart with ‘bad soil’ to a heart of “noble and good soil” that can receive and nourish “the seed”? Why do any hearts contain good soil? Note in the parable that the good soil is present before the seed is sown. The growth of the seed, that is, the growth of the Kingdom, depends on good soil being first available.
John the Baptist gives us the answer. “Repent, for the Kingdom of heaven is near”. He is referring both to Jesus and to the creation and release of the Kingdom that will happen when Jesus uses words to speak out the message of the Kingdom in this parable.
John is preparing the way for Jesus. “Prepare the way for the Lord, make straight paths for Him”. I think John is preparing hearts to receive the Word of God, the message of the Kingdom, the Seed
Confess (“Confessing their sins, they were baptized by him in the Jordan River”), repenting (and being repentant) so that “they produce fruit in keeping with repentance
Jesus Himself tells us how to prepare our hearts to received the seed, “Repent for the Kingdom of Heaven is near” (Matthew 4: 17) and “Now after John was put in prison, Jesus came to Galilee, preaching the gospel of the Kingdom of God, and saying, “the time is fulfilled and the Kingdom of God is at hand. Repent and believe in the gospel” (Mark 1: 14, 15 NKJV).
The Passion Translation says it this way, “Keep turning away from your sins and come back to God (repent) for heaven’s Kingdom realm is accessible” (Matthew 4: 17 TPT).
The first word of the Gospel is “Kingdom”; the first command of the Gospel is “Repent”
Peter gives the Gentiles this advice in the days of the Early Church, “Repent and be baptized every one of you, in the name of Jesus Christ for the forgiveness of you sins. And you will receive the gift of the Holy Spirit” (Acts 2: 38).
The work of John is to prepare hearts to receive Jesus. Some ignore John; some are excited about what he is doing, but quickly forget; some receive his baptism, but get caught up in their own gods. But some receive the baptism, confess, repent, and expectantly wait for what God will do next.
Their heart is being made “noble and good” through repentance.
All of this involves the Holy Spirit, but I must participate. How do I receive the Holy Spirit? Repent!
Note Jesus and John both say, “The Kingdom of God is near” of “Is at hand”. I always wondered about this. Why didn’t Jesus or John say, “The Kingdom of God is here”? It was here in the sense that Jesus was there. But it did not yet exist outside of Him – His Kingdom purpose was not yet fulfilled. He had not yet released or created it in the hearts of people. But as He told the Parable of the Sower, He sowed, created, released the Kingdom into their hearts. From that time on He always referred to the Kingdom as “here”; never as “near”.
Seed
Now we come to the crux of the parable – the seed. What or who is the seed.? Everything depends on this; it is why Mark tells the disciples, “If you don’t understand this, you won’t understand any parable”.
Matthew tells us Jesus is sowing the “Message of the Kingdom” (NIV) and the “Word of the Kingdom” (KJV) . Mark writes “The farmer sows the word”. Luke is the most direct, “The seed is the Word of God”.
So we have two parts to understand. What does Jesus mean by the seed, and what does He mean by “the Word of God. First, the seed.
Throughout the Scriptures, Jesus is called “the Seed”.
Speaking to the serpent, God said, “I will put enmity between you and the woman, between your seed and her Seed. He shall bruise (crush) your head, and you shall bruise His heal” (Genesis 3: 15 NKJV).
Speaking to Abraham, God said, “In your Seed all the nations of the earth shall be blessed, because you have obeyed my voice” (Genesis 22: 18 NKJV).
Speaking to David, God said, “When your days are fulfilled and you rest with your fathers, I will set up your Seed after you, who will come from your body, and I will establish his kingdom . . . and your house and your kingdom shall be established forever before you” (2 Samuel 7: 12, 16 NKJV). The “Son of David” is a messianic term.
Isaiah wrote, “But as the tenebinth and oak leave stumps when they are cut down, so the holy Seed will be the stump in the land” (Isaiah 6: 13 NIV). The “Stump of Jesse” refers to Jesus.
Zechariah writes, “The seed (also called the Seed of peace in the ASV) will grow well, the vine will yield its fruit, the ground will produce its crops, and heavens will drop their dew. I will give all these things as an inheritance to the remnant of this people . . . I will save you, and you will be a blessing” (Zechariah 8: 12, 13 NIV).
Peter writes, “For you have been born again, not of perishable seed, but of imperishable, through the living and enduring Word of God” (1 Peter 1: 23). The “Living and Enduring Word of God” is Jesus. Peter is telling us that we are born again when our heart of noble and good soil receives the Seed.
Paul, commenting on Abraham and the seed writes, “Now to Abraham and his Seed were the promises made. He does not say, “And to seeds”, as many, but as one. “And to your seed”, who is Christ” (Galatians 3: 16 NKJV).
Jesus is the Seed.
Jesus even calls Himself the Seed, “The hour has come for the Son of Man to be glorified. I tell you the truth, unless a kernel (Kokkos in Greek meaning “grain, seed, or kernel) falls to the ground and dies, it remains only a single seed. But if it dies, it produces many seeds” (John 12: 23, 24 NIV).
Jesus is the Seed. Jesus is sowing Himself into the soils of the human heart. In the good soil, the Seed will grow into a plant, bush, or tree that bears fruit.
We are also called the seed, “If you belong to Christ, then you are Abraham’s seed according to the promise” (Galatians 3: 25 NIV).
And here is the ‘heart’ of the parable.
If a seed grows, it grows into an exact version of the parent plant!! The seed carries the DNA of the parent plant – all the information needed to become the parent plant is encoded into the seed. If you plant a sunflower seed, it will grow into a sunflower. If you plant an acorn, it will grow into an oak tree. A sunflower seed will never grow into an oak tree.
The seed is the essence of all life. In this sense a tiny seed is powerful. It contains the ability to create life. Not only that, but the seed has within itself the capacity to multiply. One sunflower seed will grow into a sunflower plant that produces hundreds of seeds. One acorn will produce and oak tree that over its life will produce millions of acorns.
When Jesus the Seed is sown into the noble and good ‘soil’ of a human heart – a heart of humility and repentance – that seed carries the DNA of Jesus, perfectly replicating Him in that heart. “Christ in us, the hope of glory”. “On that day you will realize that I am in my Father, and you are in Me, and I am in you” (John 14: 20 NIV). Jesus grows in that heart – the real, complete, fully functional Jesus exactly like the Jesus that walked on the shore of the Sea of Galilee 2000 years ago. That Jesus!
When that heart is watered, fertilized, and weeded, Jesus will grow in that heart into an oak of righteousness and the Tree of Life. All within you!!
And it is Jesus, the real Jesus. You have the peace, joy, faith, hope, and power of Jesus in you. The fruit of the Spirit flows from Christ in you into your spirit, soul, and even body.
You don’t need to ask God for more peace or joy. You have all the peace and joy the universe can give you in your heart already – you have Jesus and all His peace and joy. You don’t need to receive more peace and joy. You need to release what you already have!
We carry Jesus is our hearts. We carry the seed, which multiplies in our heart. We are now called to be the sowers, as we sow Jesus into the hearts of others. This is the mandate for evangelism.
We have been born again by the Seed. When the Seed enters the heart with the “good” soil, the Kingdom of God is planted there – spiritual life begins to form. Christ, the Seed, then rules and reigns in our heart – the Kingdom of God. This is what is means to be born again – Jesus living in us. Just as we entered this life through a human seed, we enter the New Life of the Kingdom of God through The Spiritual Seed, Jesus. “I tell you the truth, no one can enter the Kingdom of God unless he is born of water and the Spirit. Flesh (a human seed) gives birth to flesh, but the Spirit (the Seed, Jesus) gives birth to spirit” (John 3: 5 NIV).
Jesus the Seed brings New Life, also known as Kingdom life. But only if the soil of our heart is a “good and noble soil”. This life is for today, but lasts for eternity. This life is from first to last, a spiritual life. For sure it manifests itself in acts of kindness, works of service, love and all the other fruits of the Spirit. It manifests itself in the doing of practical work – healing the sick, deliverance, and even raising the dead. But only if the Seed is growing in their heart.
May I quickly make two more points?
The Word of God
The Seed is also called the Word of God. Most people think this means the Bible. But in Scripture the Word of God refers to Jesus – the living Word of God.
The New Testament did not exist when Jesus spoke this parable. No one knew what lay ahead of Jesus and His disciples. Paul was still a Pharisee. There was no ‘Word of God’ as in the written word, outside of the Old Testament.
Jesus has always been called the Word. In John 1, “In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. He was with God in the beginning . . . the Word was made flesh and made His dwelling among us” (John 1: 1, 2 and 14 NIV).
The 1 Peter passage I mentioned about is written this way in a different translation, “For through the eternal and living Word of God you have been born again. And this ‘seed’ that He planted within you can never be destroyed but will live and grow within you forever” (1 Peter 1: 23 TPT).
Finally, in Revelation 9, Jesus is called “the Word of God”.
The Word of God refers to Jesus, to the spoken or revelational word of God (rhema). But the spoken words of Jesus carries the seed. It is not the Seed. The Seed is Jesus, the Spirit of Christ, or even the Holy Spirit. All the same. Without the seed in our heart there is no DNA, nothing to replicate. It is possible to know the Bible, which some call the word of God, but not have the Seed planted in our heart because the soil has not been properly prepared. The knowledge of the written word without the Seed is what I call religion. Many people know the Bible well, they can recite whole paragraphs. But they do not have the Seed in their heart. They are often operating in a spirit of religion. This in one of the spirits that is killing the Church from the inside.
God knows how our minds and hearts work. If the ‘word’ of the ‘word of God’ in the parable is only the written word, if filling our heart with God’s written word is all it takes to live in the Kingdom of God and release fruit, especially the fruit of salvation, humans would be able to say, “Look what I have done. I read the Bible every day and look how much fruit I produce”. (Remember Matthew 7: 21 – 23. “I never knew you. Away from me you evil doers”). But if the Seed, who is Jesus, is required to produce the fruit, then humans can only point to Jesus and say, “look at what Jesus has done through me, all for God’s glory”. Big difference. The difference between the Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil and the Tree of Life.
Now We Are the Seed
At the end of Galatians 3 Paul writes, “If you belong to Christ, then you are Abrahams seed and heir according to the promise”.
Now we are the seed. Our purpose is to spread the seed with in us, Jesus, into the hearts of others. His seed has multiplied in our hearts, so by the fruit of the Spirit we release that seed into the world as His sowers.
Remember, a good tree produces good seed. If we are producing and releasing good seed we can be sure that the Seed is in us.
“We must be clear about why we are the seed. It is not because of the life intrinsic in ourselves (our work, intellect, experiences). It is rather due to our ability to carry the True Seed. We become ‘people of the Kingdom’ only when the King moves into our heart. His DNA, multiplication DNA is not resident in our talents, gifts, intellect, strength, skills, or sparking personalities. It is only in the True Seed”.
So What?
I’ll leave you with one last thought to ponder (as if you don’t have enough). After Jesus finished teaching three parables in Mark, He was tired and probably weary of the crowds. He tells His disciples, “Let’s go over to the other side” (Mark 4: 35). As they push the boat away from the shore, Jesus falls asleep in the stern. What happens over the next 24 hours is one of the most remarkable days in His life.
In the middle of the lake Jesus calms a ferocious storm. On the other side He casts out a legion of demons from a demon-possessed man the next morning. Then He returns back to His hometown, heals a woman of an illness she had for 12 years, heals her emotionally when He tells her to “be a peace”, and finally raises a young girl from the dead.
Jesus demonstrates power over nature, the demonic, sickness and illness, emotional illness, and death – the 5 ways satan seeks to steal, kill, and destroy the lives of the children of God.
Here is the shocking news. That same Jesus, in fact the exact same Jesus, is in us, the Body of Christ, the Church. He is in you!
You have the same power! Impossible? Not according the Scripture. Paul tells us that we have the same power God used to raise Jesus from the dead (Ephesians 1: 19), and Jesus tells us we will do even greater things, referring to miracles, than Him (John 14: 11, 12).
“All our service must be initiated by Him as the source, must be through Him as the means and the power, and must be to Him for His glory”.
None of this is possible, until the Seed is planted in our heart. It must be the heart of good soil. It must be nurtured, but in the end it is all Him. Now we are called to sow this seed into the hearts of others, using all the ‘tools’ He has made available to us, including signs, wonders, and miracles, just as Jesus and the early chuch did. (Some reading this believe signs, wonders, and miracles were for the Apostolic age and ended when all the disciples and Paul died. This is not scriptural and not in accordance with all the signs, wonders, and miracles being done in the world today).
Summary
Wow. That’s a lot. Here is a summary. Jesus is the sower and He is the seed. He sows Himself into your heart. The seed grows into the Kingdom of God, the rule and reign of Christ in you. That is new life. If you receive Him, if you surrender to Him, repent, and trust Him, the seed in you will grow into Jesus in you, into a tree of righteousness, a tree of life, bearing fruit. Christ in you, the hope of glory. You will be able to do what Jesus did, even greater things. But it is not you, it is Jesus in you. The Kingdom of God is not a matter of eating and drinking but of righteousness, peace, and joy in the Holy Spirit – planted in you by the Seed.