I recently had the opportunity to speak on one of my favourite parables - The parable of the sower.

Here is the recording, or a rough transcript of the talk is below for those who would prefer to read…

You might be wondering why I’m dressed like this.  Well, if you’ve heard me speak before, you would know that I often use props or objects when I speak.  Something concrete, something more than just words. Admittedly, much of that comes from speaking on camps and in a youth ministry setting.  But it’s similar to what Jesus did with parables.  Taking something ordinary, something his audience would understand, and attaching to it deep significance.

Light, salt, water, vines, branches. And today… seeds.

I don’t have a prop today, because today I am the prop. Because what I need us to do, is to put on our farmer’s hats, and not just read this parable as a group of people sitting in a church in suburban Melbourne.  But to really listen to it through the ears of its original audience.  Remembering that this parable was told on the road, in the open, surrounded by fields. To an audience who understood farming.

The parable of the sower is found in Matthew, Mark and Luke, and one of the things that sets it apart for me is that it is one of only three parables that Jesus told, for which he also gave an explanation.

You may not realise this, but the vast majority of parables that Jesus told, were not told in this way.  In fact, many parables that we probably think Jesus explained, is because we’re remembering a sermon about them, not the actual words of Jesus.

But this is a parable for which we have the parable itself, as well as Jesus explaining it. Which should make my job today pretty simple.

Let’s have a look.  I’m reading today from Luke, for the highly spiritual reason that it is the shortest version of the parable so it fits on the slide better.

Luke 8:5-8

“A farmer went out to sow his seed. As he was scattering the seed, some fell along the path; it was trampled on, and the birds ate it up. 6 Some fell on rocky ground, and when it came up, the plants withered because they had no moisture. 7 Other seed fell among thorns, which grew up with it and choked the plants. 8 Still other seed fell on good soil. It came up and yielded a crop, a hundred times more than was sown.”

Now, to be honest, if that was all I had to go on, this could be an interesting talk, so it’s probably good that we also have the explanation.

Reading down a bit further, Luke 8:11-16

“This is the meaning of the parable: The seed is the word of God. 12 Those along the path are the ones who hear, and then the devil comes and takes away the word from their hearts, so that they may not believe and be saved. 13 Those on the rocky ground are the ones who receive the word with joy when they hear it, but they have no root. They believe for a while, but in the time of testing they fall away. 14 The seed that fell among thorns stands for those who hear, but as they go on their way they are choked by life’s worries, riches and pleasures, and they do not mature. 15 But the seed on good soil stands for those with a noble and good heart, who hear the word, retain it, and by persevering produce a crop.

You know, I think the first version I heard of this parable was not the version in Luke, or Matthew or Mark, it was the Jennie Flack version.  For those of you who don’t know what I’m talking about, let’s just say that I might have had a kid’s song slightly stuck in my head the past few weeks.

As a child, whenever this parable was presented, there was always one simple takeaway.  The question that was sometimes inferred, sometimes directly asked - Which type of soil do you want to be?

And the answer was obvious - The good soil.

But I think I can see how this parable has changed for me over the years.

Ash was a fourteen year old boy on camp.  He had a pretty difficult background.  He had been removed from his family and bounced around from one foster home to the next.  He was the kid who was always looking for a fight, as if he’d punch you in the face for looking at him the wrong way.

As is often the case, across the week of camp, some of that hardness started to soften.  In some areas.  But when it came to anything to do with God, that door was closed.  At one point I was almost pleading with him, because I had this burden on my heart for him to know God. But he did not want to hear it and said as much.

As a child, it was easy for me to want to be the good soil.  Why would I choose to be the path? It was kids like Ash that made me realise, nobody chooses to be the path.  But sometimes hearts are hardened.

We had a speaker come in one time to camp, the night before the campers arrived. The idea was that he was going to give an encouragement talk to the Camp Leaders.  He got up on stage and told everybody to look around the room, and if you were there, you would have seen a bunch of mainly sixteen to twenty year olds.  All excited and passionate and pumped for camp.

And then he said, “In ten years time, most of the people in this room will no longer be following God.”  You could have heard a pin drop.  He went on to give one of perhaps the best pre-camp encouragement talks I’ve heard, because he touched on a truth I had not realised until then. That the good soil and the rocky soil look the same - It’s just a question of depth.

The older I’ve got, the more I’ve realised that this parable is not like a multiple choice quiz.  It’s not a simple, “Choose which soil you want to be”.  But it would be a pretty fair assumption that there’s a lot of good soil in this room.  You would hope that sitting here on a Sunday morning, there would be an over-representation of good soil.

And if that’s the case, what do we make of this parable?  What does this parable have to say to those who fall into that good soil category? Well, I think it’s time to put those farmer hats on again.

Now, this is not recorded in the Bible, but go with me. It could have happened.

Let’s say there were a farmer in the audience when Jesus was telling this parable.  Jesus finished talking, people start to leave, the disciples are chatting amongst themselves - You ask him what he meant, no you ask him what he meant.  Jesus gives them the explanation.

As they’re digesting this, the farmer approaches Jesus.

“Hey Jesus, great teaching, love your talks. Um, I don’t meant to criticise, you’re a great teacher and all, but I just thought I should let you know… that’s not really how farming works.”

Jesus just stands there and he’s like, “Oh?”

“Well yeah, and once again, like great parable, and I see what you’re trying to do. But perhaps I could offer some pointers?”

Jesus once again, “Oh?”

“Okay, well you see, that’s not how a farmer would sow seeds. And it’s okay, I understand, you’re not a farmer, you weren’t to know. But any farmer who knows what he’s doing only sows seeds in the good soil.  We’re not out there throwing seeds on the path, we plow our fields to get rid of the rocks, we tend our fields to get rid of the weeds.  I’ll tell you what, if God is the farmer in this parable Jesus, he certainly does things differently.”

At this point, I think Jesus just smiles.

The true significance of this parable is not what it says about us, but what it says about God.

That when I am hard-hearted, when my passion and commitment is fickle, when my faith is shallow, when I get weighed down by the worries of the world and caught up in my own plans - That God still sees me as worthy to receive His word.

Of course I want to be the good soil, I want to have an open and receptive heart, I want to produce that thirty, sixty, a hundred fold increase on what is invested Into me.

But the state of my heart does not determine God’s abundant generosity.

No matter which type of soil best describes your heart, God is sowing regardless.

I think that one of the great traps that we can fall into is reading this parable and thinking, “Yeah, that makes sense”. What we actually need to do is look at it with our farmer’s hats on and say, “Hang on, that makes no sense.”

Why is this one of only three parables that Jesus explains?  The answer to that is found in a different question.  To whom was the explanation given?

Luke 8:9
His disciples asked him what this parable meant

This explanation was given to his disciples.  To those who had dedicated their lives most to imitating Jesus.  To live like him. To those he was entrusting to go out in the world and share the Good News of the Kingdom of Heaven.

And he tells this parable about a farmer who doesn’t do things the way the world works.

And you know what… They got it. They understood.

And they went out, and they shared Jesus to the hard-hearted, to the shallow of faith, to the depressed and downtrodden, to the rich and powerful, to the imprisoned and the prison keepers. To those who accepted the Word and those who rejected the Word.  Because that may not be the way the world works, but that’s the way God works.

To a disciple of Jesus, this parable is just as much about how we share the word as how we receive it.

So, on one level, I hope just as I heard when I was a child, that you can read this parable and say, “God, I want my heart to be represented by the good soil”.

But on a deeper level, I hope you can be comforted that God is abundantly generous.  That He’s there, sowing that seed without discrimination - on the path, the rocky soil, amongst the thorns and in the well-cultivated field.  That is the amazing grace of God - not that we are good soil, but that he sows the seed regardless.

And most of all, I hope you are challenged.  Because if you prayed that first prayer, that your heart would be the good soil. That’s not where the story ends.

You see, Jesus tells us what happens when the seed takes root in the good soil.  They grow to produce thirty, sixty, a hundred fold of what was planted.

And when God’s word is shared with us and it takes root in our heart, and we pray, “God, how do I share this?”

Jesus replies with a parable, “A farmer went out to sow his seed.”

May your heart be good soil, that the Word of God takes root and grows to maturity in your life.  May you know that wherever your heart is at, God is still sowing seeds. And may you live your life in a way that shares Jesus abundantly like the farmer in this parable. Amen.