Jeremiah 13, verses 12 through 17. Listen to this. This is the very word of God. You shall speak to them this word. Thus says the Lord, the God of Israel, every jar shall be filled with wine. And they will say to you, do we not indeed know that every jar will be filled with wine? Then you shall say to them, thus says the Lord, behold, I will fill with drunkenness all the inhabitants of this land, the kings who sit on David’s throne, the priests, the prophets, and all the inhabitants of Jerusalem. And I will dash them one against another, fathers and sons together, declares the Lord.
I will not pity or spare or have compassion that I should not destroy them. Hear and give ear. Be not proud, for the Lord has spoken. Give glory to the Lord your God before he brings darkness, before your feet stumble on the twilight mountains. And while you look for light, he turns it to gloom and makes it deep darkness. But if you will not listen, My soul will weep in secret for your pride. My eyes will weep bitterly and run down with tears because the Lord’s flock has been taken captive. And then for our New Testament reading and the text for this morning’s sermon, turn to the gospel according to Luke chapter eight, We’ll begin the reading at verse four and read through verse 15. Luke 8, four through 15.
And when a great crowd was gathering and people from town after town came to him, he said in a parable, a sower went out to sow his seed. And as he sowed, some fell along the path and was trampled underfoot. and the birds of the air devoured it. And some fell on the rock, and as it grew up, it withered away because it had no moisture. And some fell among thorns, and the thorns grew up with it and choked it. And some fell into good soil and grew and yielded a hundredfold.
As he said these things, he called out, he who has ears to hear, let him hear. And when the disciples asked him what this parable meant, he said, to you, it has been given to know the secrets of the kingdom of God, but for others, they are in parables, so that seeing, they may not see, and hearing, they may not understand. Now, the parable is this. The seed is the word of God.
The ones along the path are those who have heard, then the devil comes and takes away the word from their hearts so that they may not believe and be saved. And the ones on the rock are those who, when they hear the word, receive it with joy, but these have no root. They believe for a while, and in time of testing, fall away. And as for what fell among the thorns, they are those who hear, but as they go on their way, they are choked by the cares and riches and pleasures of life, and their fruit does not mature. As for that in the good soil, they are those who, hearing the word, hold it fast in an honest and good heart and bear fruit with patience.
That’s the reading of God’s Word. Let’s pray for His blessing upon it now. Father, we come now to the parable of the sower, a passage that’s very familiar to most of us as we come to consider it together now. We pray once again for the ministry of your Holy Spirit, that he would be our teacher and that you would explain the parable to us through him for the honor and glory of the one who spoke it, our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ. We pray it in his name. Amen.
Pretty much every time I have the privilege of standing in this pulpit and reading God’s Word to you. I precede the reading with something like, listen to this. I might vary my wording just a little bit from one occasion to the next, but it’s always something along the lines of, listen to this. This is God’s Word. And I’m not the only one, I’m sure.
Most of the time when someone comes and preaches in this pulpit, they will say something similar. Our Constitution even encourages us to do that. before we open and read God’s Holy Word. It’s fitting for everyone to be reminded that what you’re about to hear is the Word of God. And it’s fitting that we encourage each other to listen with attentiveness, because this isn’t just any word.
This is the Word of God. It’s living and it’s active. It’s always necessary, then, that we listen carefully, that we listen intently when God’s Word is read, when it’s taught, when it’s preached. And that’s really what this parable is all about, isn’t it? Jesus himself calls us to listen. He calls us to hear well, because the Scripture is His Word, and this Word The contents of our Bibles are the very words of life.
Now, you know that Jesus taught in parables, and there are four major parables that all three of the synoptic gospel writers recount for us in each of their gospels. When I say synoptic gospels, if you’re not familiar with that term, you have four gospels, Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John. Matthew, Mark, and Luke basically follow a common flow. They record many of the same events and teachings of Jesus. So they have basically the overall they have the same view, a similar view. And so they’re called the Synoptic Gospels.
And so when you hear that word, that term, That’s what’s being referred to the first three of the four Gospels in our Bibles, and Matthew, Mark, and Luke all record four parables. Similarly, I mean, some of them have other parables that aren’t in every, all three of those gospels. But so in other words, there are going to be some parables we’ll see in Luke later on that Matthew doesn’t record, or that Mark doesn’t record. But there are four that all three of these writers do record in their gospels. And those are the parable of the mustard seed, the parable of the tenants, the parable of the fig tree, and then this one right here that we’re looking at this morning. By this time in Jesus’ ministry, where we find him in Luke’s gospel at this point, chapter 8, Jesus was probably more popular than ever. This may be the height of his popularity during his earthly ministry. And that’s a good thing.
But Jesus wasn’t interested primarily in popularity. Jesus certainly wasn’t interested in numbers just for numbers sake. He certainly wasn’t interested in having superficial hearers. But as the crowds multiplied, and as people came out from town after town to hear him, it’s inevitable that there were some superficial hearers among those who were following him.
And knowing that, Jesus begins to speak in parables. He begins to teach in parables. There was a point in his ministry where there was a shift, and his teaching took on a strongly parable-laced quality to it. And we’re at that point in Luke. Parables take the forefront in his teaching here. Leon Morris, commenting on this, wrote, parables demand thought. and spiritual earnestness. They separate the sincere seeker from the casual hearer. So, that’s part of the reason Jesus used parables. That’s why parables become prominent in his ministry at this point.
And in our Old Testament reading, I hope you captured some of the flavor of that where The people weren’t listening to the Word of God when it was being proclaimed. And what was the attitude of the prophet? What was the attitude of the Holy Spirit who inspired the prophet? It was an attitude of great grief. He said he’d weep tears for these people who would not listen to God’s Word. And that’s the attitude of our Savior.
Jesus wants us to listen to His Word. He wants us to listen intently and attentively So you’ve heard teaching on this parable many times, I’m sure. What I want us to take from the passage this time is that the Lord Jesus Christ earnestly entreats us to listen diligently to the Word of God. That’s what the parables are all about. That’s especially what this parable is all about. The Lord Jesus Christ, our Lord, earnestly entreats us to listen diligently to the Word of God.
And we’ll consider three things, three points this morning. First of all, we’re going to consider the purpose of parables, the purpose of parables in general. Secondly, this parable and the exchange between Jesus and his disciples that we see in this passage shows us about the sovereignty of grace in salvation, the sovereign grace of God. And then finally, we’ll consider the parable itself, this specific parable. And we’ll talk about the significance of the soils. So there’s the three points, the purpose of parables, the sovereign grace of God, and the significance of soils.
So we saw at the beginning of this text, the great crowds were gathering to Jesus. Now, of all these people in the crowds that were coming to him, which ones were sincere? Who were the true disciples, as opposed to the merely curious? Who are the people that really wanted to latch on to what Jesus was saying, as opposed to people that had kind of what we might describe as a Mars Hill attitude? You remember what Luke wrote in the book of Acts about the people in Athens who would gather at Mars Hill.
He said they’d spend their time in doing nothing but hearing something new. And along comes Jesus, and he’s got this powerful teaching. So it’s something new to listen to. How many among the crowd were just interested because it was something different, something new?
Well, parables, to a certain extent, separate out the true disciples from the merely curious. To some extent, parables could be used by our Lord to separate the sheep from the goats. And at this point, the use of parables begins to predominate in Christ’s teaching. In fact, in one of the other gospel writers, it says he taught them with parables and he didn’t say anything to the people without a parable. That was his practice.
But Jesus repeatedly emphasized the importance of giving careful attention to God’s word. If we were to look at Mark’s gospel, when he introduces Jesus’ parable of the soils, the parable of the sower, Jesus cries out before he proclaims the parable. He says, listen, behold, both words together. It’s like, listen, look, he’s trying to draw people’s attention. to what he’s about to say. And we must listen diligently to his word. We must listen carefully, and parables make us do that. They help to make us do that. And then even after he gives the parable, what does Jesus say? He says, he who has ears to hear, let him hear. He stresses this again and again. Keep your place right there in our text, but well, just jump ahead to verse 21.
Jesus is surrounded by a crowd and his mother and brother, mother and brothers had come to see him. And they, people told him, your mother and your brothers are standing outside desiring to see you. And he said, my mother and my brothers are those who hear the word of God and do it. If you keep your finger in Luke 8 and flip ahead to Luke 11, verse 28.
Woman had cried out in the crowd, blessed is the womb that bore you. Jesus said, blessed rather are those who hear the word of God and keep it. Flip ahead to chapter 14. Look at verse 35. Talking about salt, if it loses its saltiness. He says there’s no use if it loses its saltiness. It’s no use either for the soil or for the manure pile. It’s thrown away. He who has ears to hear, let him hear. Just for good measure. Let’s look at another one. 16, chapter 16, verse 29.
This is that parable where the rich man died, and he was suffering torment in Hades. Meanwhile, Lazarus, the poor beggar, had gone into paradise. He was being comforted in the bosom of Abraham, and the rich man pleaded with Abraham to send Lazarus back to his brothers to warn them so that they wouldn’t come to that place of torment. And Abraham’s response was, they have Moses and the prophets. Let them hear them. So you see how Christ is really in earnest when he urges us to listen carefully to the Word of God. Listening is crucial. Hearing is crucial. Faith comes from hearing, and hearing through the Word of Christ.
So what does all that teach us about the purpose of parables? If someone asked you, what’s a parable for? What might you say? It would be logical. It would be understandable if you were to say, well, parables are something Jesus used to teach. Parables are a way that Jesus would illustrate spiritual truths. He would explain things. He would reveal truth through parables. And all of that is certainly true. There’s no doubt about that.
Jesus also used parables for something else. He also used parables, in a sense, to do the opposite of all that. He used parables to conceal, to hide. Go back to our text and look at verse 10. He used parables because to some it hadn’t been given to know the secrets of the kingdom. And he used parables so that seeing they may not see and so that hearing they may not understand. That was his answer to the disciples when they asked him to explain the parable. So it’s given to you to know, but not to them.
And that’s why I’m teaching in parables, he says. Matthew’s gospel puts it even more strikingly Because in Matthew’s gospel, they come, they ask Jesus to explain the parable. They ask him, why are you teaching in parables? Why are you using these mysterious sayings?
And Jesus says, as Matthew reports it, he says, to you, it has been given to know the secrets of the kingdom of heaven, but to them, it has not been given. Now, this is a hard thing for us to consider, but it’s right there in God’s word. We have to grapple with it. Jesus used parables not only to reveal, but also to conceal. Not only to convey knowledge, but even at the same time to withhold it. And people respond differently to God’s word. That’s what the parable of the sower, the parable of the soils teaches us. People respond differently to God’s word in the same way.
You’ve probably heard this illustration. Think of the sun and the light and the heat that comes from the sun, and how that light and heat, the heat in particular, can melt wax. But the same exact light, the same exact heat, can harden clay. The parable of the sower teaches us that some people’s hearts are like wax, and the light and the warmth of the word of God will melt their hearts. But the same word will have a different effect on different kinds of hearts. Parables are the same way. Parables do exactly that. They enlighten and they warm and teach the hearts of some, but others go away unaffected or perhaps even hardened.
Well, what’s the root cause of the difference? What’s the root cause? That brings us to our second point, because the root cause is the sovereignty of God. God’s grace is sovereign. And we pick up on the sovereignty of God, at least the outworkings of it, the way God manifests his sovereignty, when the disciples come to Jesus after he told the parable.
Verse 9, the disciples asked him what this parable meant. That’s key. Very important. They heard the parable, and they wanted to know more. So they went to Jesus and they asked. Have you ever liked a song, enjoyed the melody, enjoyed maybe the quality of the voice of the singer, enjoyed the beat, the rhythm, whatever, liked the song, but weren’t quite sure what the words meant? there ever been a song like that for you? I’ve had many of those.
And if it’s a good song, if it’s a popular song, there’s no doubt lots of people who like the music, enjoy listening to it, get stuck in their head, maybe, but they don’t know what the words mean. And they don’t really care. They just enjoy the music, which is fine. Sometimes it’s better that way. But Responses to parables can be similar to that. People can respond to parables in that way.
Jesus, the master teacher, no one ever spoke like this man spoke. He would have been enjoyable to listen to, pleasant to hear. He would have been an engaging speaker and teacher. And when he taught in parables, there were no doubt countless people who would hear those parables and say, that’s nice.
Oh, that’s really rich. I like that. And they go away. Whereas Christ’s true disciples would say, explain this to me. People respond to God’s Word in just this way. We see it throughout Scripture, but there’s some very poignant examples of this very thing. Hearing the Word of God, maybe even enjoying the intake, but not benefiting from it, not acting upon it.
And you know who witnessed this firsthand, maybe more clearly than anybody else in the Old Testament, would be Ezekiel. Ezekiel had been preaching to the people of God who were in exile. He’d been calling upon them to repent. He’d been drawing to their attention the fact that the very reason they were in exile was because of their disobedience to God. He was pleading them to repent and turn back to the Lord. And he preached, and he preached, and he preached, and the people didn’t listen.
And so in chapter 20, verse 49, Ezekiel is praying to God and he’s complaining. He’s saying, oh Lord, they’re saying of me, is he not a maker of parables? Ezekiel was saying, repent. Your sins have reached up to God. And the people are saying, oh, you know, he’s just telling a story. It’s an allegory. Don’t worry about it.
And another point in Ezekiel’s prophecy, God is speaking to Ezekiel. Because maybe Ezekiel was perplexed and brokenhearted that the people weren’t listening, weren’t acting upon his message from God. And God says to Ezekiel, behold, you are to them like one who sings lustful songs with a beautiful voice and plays well on an instrument, for they hear what you say, but they will not do it. So Ezekiel knew what that was all about.
And that’s the way people could respond to parables too. They could listen. They could even be impressed, but not be affected in a saving way. So Jesus’ answer to his disciples when they came and asked him to explain the parable, that’s where we really see the sovereignty of God shining through. To you, he told them, to you it has been given to know the secrets of the kingdom of God.
And I like the fact that in the English Standard Version, they put those words to you at the beginning of the sentence, because that’s how it appears in Greek. And the reason that’s significant is because in the Greek language, it’s not like English where usually the subject has to be at the beginning of the sentence or at the beginning of the phrase. In Greek, you could put the subject anywhere in the sentence you want. And the way you find out or the way you figure out it’s the subject is by the article. And so in Greek, if the writer or the speaker wants to emphasize something, they move it to the front of the sentence.
And that’s where those words, to you, occur in the Greek text. There are mysteries. There are secrets of the kingdom of God. And Jesus is saying, to you, it’s been granted to understand them. To you. And I used the word secrets there. The ESV uses that word. The Greek word there is mysteria, from which we get the word mystery. And you and I might use the word mystery. If we’re using it casually, we might use it to speak of something we don’t get, something we don’t understand. Calculus is a mystery to me. Never studied it. I would have failed, I’m sure, if I had. a mystery. I could say it’s a mystery. But that’s not the meaning of the word, actually.
Actually, the Greek word mystery means something closer to what we think of in connection like with a mystery novel. Some of you like to read mysteries? If you read a mystery and you read all the way to the end, you find out whodunit, right? There’s a revelation at the end of the mystery. You’re left wondering as you turn the pages and as you go through the book, but then when you get to the end, it’s revealed. That’s what a mystery is.
A mystery in the real sense of the word is something that’s hidden, but for purposes of being revealed at the appropriate time. And so Jesus is saying to you, it has been given to know the mysteries of the kingdom of God, God’s ancient plan, and it’s being revealed now. It’s from time immemorial, it’s from eternity past, but now it’s being worked out. Jesus says, it’s being worked out in me, and it’s being revealed to you. Because you’re my chosen ones.
So they weren’t given that gift. They weren’t given the gift of knowing the mysteries of the kingdom of God because they asked. Rather, they asked because it had been given to them to know. Because God sovereignly was working in their hearts, not to just say, oh, that’s nice and walk away, but to ask, teach us what this parable means. So to know the secrets or the mysteries of God’s kingdom is a gift. And there’s this set of people known as the elect. They are given the gift to know the secrets and the mysteries of the kingdom of God.
And it’s the same set, the same group of people that God gave as a gift to his son. When he said, all that the father gives to me will come to me. The ones that the father gave to the son will come to him. The ones that the father gave to the son will ask him, what does the parable mean? They’ll listen carefully. They’ll listen diligently and they’ll seek him as they seek to understand what he’s saying in his word. Now it’s fair for us to pause and consider the question that some might be very inclined to ask.
And that is, why is this gift, the gift of understanding, knowing the mysteries of the kingdom, why is it given to some and not to others? It’s a difficult question. It’s an understandable question. And we might even at times be inclined to think that that doesn’t seem fair. Why is it given to some and not others? But there’s a better question for us to ask. Let me steer you towards the better question. And the better question is, why is it given to any? Because none of us deserves to know. We are all dead in sins and trespasses. We are all rebels. Against God, we were guilty of cosmic treason against the Lord of the universe.
And in His sovereign grace and His sovereign mercy, He turned some back. He gave them the gift to know the mysteries of the kingdom. To others, He let them have what they wanted, which was not to know Him. What they wanted was to continue to shake their fist at Him, to continue to rebel and turn away. But for some, God turns back.
I’m not going to allow you to run away from me anymore. I’m going to change your heart so that you desire me and so that you seek me and so that you ask. And whoever seeks finds. Whoever asks, it will be given to them. By nature, none of us wants to listen to God. By nature, none of us seeks Him. We’ve all turned aside. But in his mercy, he turned some from darkness, that darkness that they love, that darkness that you and I, before we were in Christ, loved. He turned us from it. He changed his hearts. That’s the sovereign grace of God.
Well, with the few remaining moments, let’s look now at this parable. It was in Mark’s gospel when Jesus’ disciples asked him to explain the parable of the sowers. Jesus replied in this way. He said to them, do you not understand this parable? How then will you understand all the parables?
And then he goes on to give the explanation of the parable, which suggests to us that by giving us not only the parable of the sower, but Christ’s own explanation of the parable, he’s kind of giving us an answer key in a certain sense to parables. That’s why this parable in particular is so important. It’s the one that Christ always leads with when his ministry of parables begins, and it’s one that we have his own explanation for. William Hendrickson, speaking of the parable of the sowers, or the parable of the soils, said this was first, basic, and probably most important of all parables. And in giving us the explanation, Jesus shows us how to interpret parables. And he tells his disciples, the seed, the seed is the word of God.
The soils, represent different kinds of hearers. And more particularly, the soils describe the four basic conditions of the human heart. Four basic conditions of the human heart. And in his explanation, he clarifies that all four hear, but only one of the four bears fruit. That’s important for us to take note of.
Howard Marshall, prominent New Testament scholar and particular expert on the gospel, according to Luke, said, in some people’s hearts, the seed may never get a chance to germinate. He’s talking about the seed that fell on the path. In others, its growth is arrested because they fail to endure. So the seed that fell on the path, that’s the seed that never makes it into the soil because it fell where people normally walk and the soil is hardened. It’s pressed down and the seed can’t get down into the soil. The soil’s too hard. And so that seed gets trampled. or gets eaten up by the birds.
And in Jesus’ explanation of that particular aspect of the parable, he brings in the instrumentality of Satan. Now, the devil takes away the seed. And it reminds us and cautions us that the devil is active. He’s out there, He’s working, and He’ll do whatever He can to keep any of us from benefiting from the Word of God. He’ll do it any way He can, and He never gets tired of doing it. He’ll try to simply keep us from believing.
He doesn’t mind if you read God’s Word. He doesn’t mind if you hear it. He doesn’t mind if you sit under the preaching of it, just as long as you don’t believe. You can listen to all the preaching you want as far as Satan is concerned, just don’t believe it.
Or he’ll work to make us forget it, to make it go in one ear and out the other, or to raise doubts about it. He’ll raise up prominent scholars to write books that will shake people’s confidence in God’s word. raise objection in our minds, or just distract us, distract us from Christ. If he can do any of those things, it’s mission accomplished for the devil. And that’s what’s illustrated by the seed that falls by the wayside. Then you got the seed that falls on the rock. That’s the way the ESV puts it.
Some fell on the rock. What it means is, is it fell on soil that was very shallow in Israel. Lots of places where you can actually till the soil. The soil is not very deep and underneath it, very close to the surface in some cases, you’ve got this layer of rock.
And don’t get the idea that the sower who went out to sow his seed in this parable is just sort of willy-nilly, carelessly just throwing seed everywhere. He’s throwing his seed on soil. He doesn’t know how shallow the soil is or how deep. He doesn’t know how close to the surface the rock is. The point is he’s indiscriminately sowing seed, but in some places there’s rock close to the surface. So that seed will fall into the soil, but it can’t take root. And so it gets no moisture. So the seed gets scorched, and it withers.
One noteworthy thing about Jesus’ explanation of this kind of soil, he says this, this kind of person receives the word with joy. That’s important for us to remember. That’s important for us to take to heart. Because there are people who when they first hear of Christ, when they first hear the gospel, they respond enthusiastically. They’re happy. They rejoice for a while. But they don’t endure. And there are many like this.
Many have an impulsive response to the gospel, to the word, but it’s just an emotional one. I saw that a lot in prison ministry. You know, when a person’s behind bars, facing an uncertain future, not knowing perhaps whether they’re going to be found guilty or innocent in the court of law, or how much of a sentence they’re going to get, suddenly they’re very receptive to the things of Christ. They’re glad to hear about Jesus, and they’re glad to hear about forgiveness of sins. But after they’ve been behind bars for a while and they get acclimated and start to develop a little bit more sense of self-confidence, then they don’t have as much use for Jesus anymore.
It happens all the time. And they’re hearers like that. They receive the word initially with joy. It’s a good, strong response. And the text even says, they believe for a while, but then they fall away. And what causes the falling away? Testing. Trial. When the going gets tough, they give up on Jesus. Matthew Henry said, whether the temptation arises from the smiles or the frowns of the world, they’re easily overcome by it. Those are the rocky ground hearers. Then you’ve got thorny ground hearers.
With this one, you can think of it like your own gardens. You’re constantly pulling weeds out of the garden, aren’t you? And when you plant things in your garden, you can’t tell where the next weed is going to come up. You don’t know how many weeds are in there. They’re not evident at first, but they grow up with whatever you planted. And that’s what happens in the parable. The seed that the sower sowed begins to grow, but along with it grows thorns. And that’s representative of lesser things crowding out our good spiritual intentions.
These hearers had plans to walk with Christ, plans to serve him, but then things choke out those plans. the thorny, choking pleasures of life can be of two kinds. There are things that can choke out the word that are in and of themselves sinful. If someone hears the gospel, they think, you know, it would be a really good thing for me to follow Christ. But they’re too absorbed in things that are wrong and things that are sinful, whether it’s pornography or whether it’s, you name it, any kind of sensual activity. that crowds out Christ, crowds out the Word. So it can be things that are in and of themselves sinful, all kinds of infidelity. But then there are things that aren’t in and of themselves bad, but they become vices when we overindulge in them. When we spend hours and hours and hours doing something that we really shouldn’t be doing, not that the thing in itself is necessarily bad, but we waste our time, time that could be spent serving Christ, time that could be spent doing our duty, but we don’t. That’s a thorny ground here. Overindulging in other things that supplant spiritual things. So you see, brothers and sisters, even things that are indifferent or good can become idols if we give them priority, and they’ll choke the word.
But then we have the good soil. Jesus describes the one who hears the good soil here as having an honest and good heart. And you know what that has to mean is that they’ve been given a new heart, which takes us back to the sovereign grace of God. But this person hears the word with an honest and good heart, and he holds it. He holds on to the word.
We’ve been praying for John David because when he was sick, he lost weight. I’m assuming that part of the reason he lost weight is because he wasn’t able to keep food down. You can eat the most nutritious, most healthy meal, but if you then throw it up, your body won’t benefit from it. If you’re sick, you can take the best medicine, but if you can’t hold the medicine down, the medicine won’t do you any good.
And it’s that way with the Word. People can take in the Word and just spit it back out. If they don’t hold on to the Word, they won’t profit from it. Thomas Schreiner, writing about these different kinds of hearers, made this comment, initial excitement about the things of God does not necessarily mean that we are saved, nor does praying a prayer or walking forward to receive Christ or being baptized. The mark of a true believer is not merely starting the race, but finishing it.
See, it’s that good ground here who held onto the word and brought forth fruit with patience or endurance, that could be translated. So the good soil is the person who listens rightly. The word, the person who hears well, who heeds and holds the word. And this is why the manner in which we hear is of eternal importance. And that’s why Jesus, out of his love for you, is earnestly entreating you to listen diligently to the Word of God.
I also want to point out, before we close, in the parable here in Luke, we’re told that the good soil yielded a hundredfold. A hundredfold. At that point in Matthew’s gospel and in Mark’s gospels, They say that the good soil hearer brought forth fruit, some 30-fold, some 60-fold, some 100. They make that gradation. It wasn’t uniform fruitfulness, but everybody produced fruit. Every good hearer produced fruit. Luke doesn’t mention 30 and 60-fold. He just mentioned 100-fold. And I think part of the reason for that, he’s encouraging us to hearken back to the Old Testament. Back to Genesis 26.
There you’ve got Isaac. Abraham, his father, had died. He’d been buried. And now Isaac was the patriarch. Isaac had inherited the blessings of Abraham. They had conveyed to him. And the surrounding nations knew that. Other kings and leaders came to Isaac, and they said, we know that you are now the blessed of the Lord. Everyone was aware. that Isaac had inherited the blessings of Abraham.
He was now the one in covenant with God. And that year, Genesis 26, 12 says that Isaac sowed in the land and he reaped the same year a hundredfold. So when Luke says that the good ground here bore fruit, brought forth a hundredfold, he’s giving that to us as shorthand for covenant mercies of God. Those who hear and retain the word and bear fruit and persevere are the children of Abraham. You are the blessed of the Lord. And so with all of my heart, I encourage you, along with the Lord Jesus, who encourages you the same, to earnestly and diligently listen to the word of God, unto the blessing of your souls. Let’s pray.