33  The Kingdom and  the Gospel—part 2  The Interpretation  of the Parable  (13:18-23)

Hear then the parable of the sower. When anyone hears the word of the kingdom, and does not understand it, the evil one comes and snatches away what has been sown in his heart. This is the one on whom seed was sown beside the road. And the one on whom seed was sown on the rocky places, this is the man who hears the word, and immediately receives it with joy; yet he has no firm root in himself, but is only temporary, and when affliction or persecution arises because of the word, immediately he falls away. And the one on whom seed was sown among the thorns, this is the man who hears the word, and the worry of the world, and the deceitfulness of riches choke the word, and it becomes unfruitful. And the one on whom seed was sown on the good soil, this is the man who hears the word and understands it; who indeed bears fruit, and brings forth, some a hundredfold, some sixty, and some thirty.” (13:18-23)

Privately to the twelve and a few other genuine followers (v. 10; Mark 4:10), Jesus began to explain the meaning of the parable of the sower. For them, to hear was to understand, because, as the Lord had just told them, their faith allowed their eyes to see and their ears to hear what unbelievers could not (Matt. 13:11-12,16-17).

Jesus does not here identify the sower, but in the parable of the wheat and tares He says, “The one who sows the good seed is the Son of Man” (v. 37). In the present passage He takes for granted that the disciples understand the identity of the seed, which is made explicit in Luke’s account: “The seed is the word of God” (8:11; cf. Mark 4:14). In particular, the sower sows the word of the kingdom, the good news of entrance into the kingdom by grace through faith.

In a broader sense, of course, any believer who preaches or testifies to the gospel is a sower who sows Christ’s word in his Lord’s behalf. The parable therefore applies to any true presentation of the gospel.

The nineteenth-century commentator William Arnot wrote of sowers: “As every leaf of the forest and every ripple on the lake, which itself receives a sunbeam on its breast, may throw the sunbeam off again, and so spread the light around; in like manner, everyone, old or young, who receives Christ into his heart may and will publish with his life and lips that blessed name.”

The most faithful and dedicated Christian cannot create the word of the kingdom any more than a farmer or a scientist can create the simplest seed. Just as only God creates seeds that reproduce themselves, only God creates the word of the gospel that brings the life of His Son to a believer. The work of Christ’s witnesses is not to manufacture a message to create a synthetic seed, or to modify the seed given to them, but to sow God’s revelation by proclaiming it exactly as He has given it. The power of new spiritual life is in the word, just as the power of plant life is in the seed. The seeds in the parable are all of the same nature, sown from the same bag by the same sower. The only variables are in what happens to those seeds when they are sown on the different types of soil.

The Bible is the written word, but Jesus Christ is the living word who gives it life. The Bible, as it were, is the husk and Jesus is the kernel. “You search the Scriptures, because you think that in them you have eternal life,” Jesus told a group of unbelieving Jewish leaders in Jerusalem; “and it is these that bear witness of Me” (John 5:39).

The parable of the sower revolves around proclaiming the saving gospel, heralding the word about the King and His kingdom. But the main teaching has to do with the heart soils on which the truth of that word falls as it is preached. Jesus mentions four different soils onto which the seed falls as it is sown, representing four kinds of hearts that hear the gospel.

The soils themselves are basically the same—dirt that, given the right conditions, could support the growth of crops. Although every human heart is naturally sinful and hostile toward God (Rom. 8:7; Eph. 2:15-16), every human heart is also capable of being redeemed. There is no such thing as a naturally unredeemable heart. If a person is not saved it is because he does not want to be saved. “The one who comes to Me,” Jesus says categorically, “I will certainly not cast out” (John 6:37). Every person could receive the seed of the gospel and participate in its life if he believed. The differences in the soils, and in the hearts to which they correspond, are not in their composition but their condition.

Jesus was preparing the apostles, and every other proclaimer of the gospel, to understand the four basic kinds of hearers they could expect to encounter: the unresponsive, the superficial, the worldly, and the receptive.

THE UNRESPONSIVE HEARER

When anyone hears the word of the kingdom, and does not understand it, the evil one comes and snatches away what has been sown in his heart. This is the one on whom seed was sown beside the road. (13:19)

The hard-packed soil beside the road (v. 4) represents the person who hears the word of the kingdom, and does not understand it. The reason he does not understand is not due to any deficiency in the message but to his own hardheartedness. He is the person often referred to in the Old Testament as stiff-necked. He is unconcerned with the things of God, completely indifferent to anything spiritual. The word makes no penetration into his mind or heart. He does not give the gospel the least consideration, thinking it to be total foolishness. He has so continually and consistently resisted anything that smacks of spirituality, that the soil of his heart has become pounded down until it is impervious and insensitive.

Because it makes no penetration, the seed of God’s word is fully exposed to the enemy of the soul, and the evil one comes and snatches away what has been sown in the person’s heart. His lack of repentance or of any sense of guilt and shame insulates him from God’s help and leaves him utterly exposed to Satan’s attack. His heart has never been softened by remorse, never broken up by conviction of sin, never cultivated by the smallest desire for anything good, pure, and holy.

That person is the fool who hates wisdom and instruction (Prov. 1:7) and who says there is no God (Ps. 14:1). He is self-sufficient, self-satisfied, and often self-righteous. On such a person the gospel has no effect, because it is veiled to determined unbelievers, “in whose case the god of this world has blinded the minds of the unbelieving, that they might not see the light of the gospel of the glory of Christ, who is the image of God” (2 Cor. 4:4).

The evil one uses many means as he snatches away what has been sown.

Luke adds that some seed was trampled under the feet of those who walk the hard path (8:5; cf. Heb. 10:29). Satan uses false teachers, who promote spiritual lies and contradict God’s truth. He uses fear of what other people might think about a person’s becoming a Christian. Satan constantly uses pride to blind people to their sinful condition and need of salvation. He makes them believe they are not really so bad, or that, if they do need improvement, they can improve themselves. He uses doubt, prejudice, stubbornness, procrastination, love of the world, love of sin, and every combination of those ploys.

THE SUPERFICIAL HEARER

And the one on whom seed was sown on the rocky places, this is the man who hears the word, and immediately receives it with joy; yet he has no firm root in himself, but is only temporary, and when affliction or persecution arises because of the word, immediately he falls away. (13:20-21)

The second patch of soil covers unseen rocky places and has no depth. This soil represents the man who hears the word, and immediately receives it with joy. By his quick response to the gospel it seems as if he has been waiting eagerly to hear it and cannot embrace it soon enough. In contrast to the person with the hardened, unresponsive heart, this man offers no resistance at all, but rather manifests emotional excitement in his response to the message.

Sometimes shallow acceptance of the gospel is encouraged by shallow evangelism that holds out the blessings of salvation but hides the costs—such as repenting from sin, dying to self, and turning from the old life. When people are encouraged to walk down the aisle, raise their hand, or sign a card without coming to grips with the full claims of Christ, they are in great danger of becoming further from Christ than they were before they heard the message. They may become insulated from true salvation by a false profession of faith.

In any case, the superficial convert accepts the message of salvation with open arms and is overcome with joy and enthusiasm. He cannot say enough good about the gospel, the preacher, the church, and the Lord. He is on an emotional high, in a state of grand euphoria. He is certain he has found the answer to his felt needs. He has been accepted with those who believe and cannot wait to tell everyone of the new meaning, purpose, and happiness in his life.

Because his emotional response to the gospel is so immediate and positive, this sort of convert stands out above most others. He is often more vocal in talking about his experience and may even be zealous in church attendance, Bible study, and prayer for a while.

But because the soil of his heart is shallow, he has no firm root in himself. The gospel prompts an immediate positive reaction, but it is temporary, and all the change is on the surface, rather than in the depths of his heart. His feelings were changed but not his soul. God’s life-giving word cannot take root because just below the surface of his heart is a rocky base that is even harder to penetrate than the soil beside the road. There is no repentance, no remorse over sin, no recognition of lostness, no contrition, no brokenness. And there is no humility, which is the first mark of true conversion (Matt. 5:3).

When this person hears the gospel it brings a religious experience but it does not bring salvation—evidenced by the fact that when affliction or persecution arises because of the word, immediately he falls away. The gospel truth has not penetrated his heart but only the edge of his mind, and it is therefore as immediately renounced as it was immediately received. He has come to Christ for what he thought he would get in the way of personal benefit, but when confronted with the high cost of salvation, he will not pay the price. He has built his religious house on the sand of emotional experience, and when the storms of affliction or persecution beat on his house, it crumbles and washes away (Matt. 7:26-27). He has the foliage of a religious experience, but he has no root in spiritual reality and therefore cannot produce spiritual fruit, which, as Jesus goes on to say (13:22-23), is the only reliable evidence of true conversion.

The falling away comes immediately after the affliction and persecution because of the word, but it may be many years before that severe testing comes. The superficial believer may be baptized, serve in the church, and apparently function as a model member for a long time. But testing will eventually come that will expose his lifelessness.

The affliction and persecution Jesus is talking about does not have to do with the ordinary hardships and troubles of life, but specifically with problems that result because of the word. When the cost of discipleship becomes too high, this person falls away and becomes lost to the visible church just as he was always lost to the spiritual.

Falls away is from skandaliz, which means to cause to stumble or fall and is the term from which we get scandalize. It is sometimes translated with the idea of causing offense—as in the Authorized Version of this verse. All of those meanings are appropriate here, because the superficial Christian is scandalized, offended, stumbles, and falls away when his faith is put to the test (cf. John 8:31; 1 John 2:19).

When friends, family, fellow students, co-workers, or employers begin to criticize him for his faith or pressure him to compromise or even renounce it, he cannot resist. He becomes ashamed of the gospel and of the One he had so joyously proclaimed as Lord. Because his profession had no conviction or sincerity, he never experienced the new birth and the new life that Christ gives—and his sham faith soon withers.

William Arnot again has a helpful comment: “If the law of God has never rent the ‘stony heart’ and made it ‘contrite,’ that is, bruised it small, you may, by receiving the Gospel on some temporary, superficial softness of nature, obtain your religion more easily and quickly than others who have been more deeply exercised; but you may perhaps not be able to hold it so fast or retain it so long.... He that endureth to the end shall be saved; but he that falls away in the middle shall not.”

If a person’s profession of Christ does not involve a deep conviction of sin, a genuine sense of lostness, a strong desire for the Lord to cleanse and purify, a hungering and thirsting for righteousness and a love of His Word, along with a genuine willingness to suffer for His sake, there is no root to his spiritual life and it will be only a matter of time before his religious house falls.

It is encouraging, however, that the same persecution that makes the false believer wither will make the true believer stronger. “All who desire to live godly in Christ Jesus will be persecuted” (2 Tim. 3:12); but “after you have suffered for a little while,” Peter assures us, “the God of all grace, who called you to His eternal glory in Christ, will Himself perfect, confirm, strengthen and establish you” (1 Pet. 5:10).

THE WORLDLY HEARER

And the one on whom seed was sown among the thorns, this is the man who hears the word, and the worry of the world, and the deceitfulness of riches choke the word, and it becomes unfruitful. (13:22)

The third patch of soil is infested with thorns and represents the man who hears the word but who is too worldly for it to take root and grow in his heart. This person hears the word of the gospel and may make a token profession of faith. But his first love is for the things of the world, and his worry about or preoccupation with those things blinds him to the importance of the gospel or anything else spiritual and eternal. He loves riches and lives as if they are the answer to all his needs and desires. He is oblivious to their deceitfulness, to their utter inability to satisfy the heart or bring lasting happiness. He does not notice his deceiving worldliness chokes the word, because his attention is on his riches, possessions, prestige, position, and other things of the world. He is not even aware that he has lost what knowledge of the word he once had or that his spiritual life is totally unfruitful—because he has no real interest in such things.

There are few barriers to the gospel greater than love of riches and of the world in general. Paul warns that “the love of money is a root of all sorts of evil, and some by longing for it have wandered away from the faith, and pierced themselves with many a pang” (1 Tim. 6:10). And John warns, “Do not love the world, nor the things in the world. If anyone loves the world, the love of the Father is not in him. For all that is in the world, the lust of the flesh and the lust of the eyes and the boastful pride of life, is not from the Father, but is from the world” (1 John 2:15-16).

Some years ago the U. S. Department of Agriculture developed a soil treatment that contains 6 percent ethyl alcohol. When the solution is applied to a field in the proper amount, it reportedly causes all the weeds to sprout and grow vigorously. Once they are grown, the weeds can then be mechanically removed before they have a chance to develop seeds. The field becomes virtually free of weeds for up to five years.

That is something of a picture of true conversion. Christ’s cleansing is complete and thorough. The preaching of the law of God makes sin flourish (cf. Rom. 7:7-12), and in salvation He removes all the weeds of sin in order to cleanse the field of the heart and prepare it for the pure seed of His Word. Subsequent sin requires subsequent cleansing; and that sin, too, when confessed, Christ is also “faithful and righteous to forgive” (1 John 1:9). The Lord’s desire is to keep His people free from all sin at all times.

A professing believer who is unconcerned about sin in his life and does not hate evil and love righteousness gives strong evidence that the soil of his heart is weedy. He will eventually discover that his love of the world and his identification with Christ’s word cannot coexist. If his faith is genuine, he will forsake the world; if it is not, his sin will choke out what knowledge of the word he has.

A person who comes to church but never becomes committed to serving, who is continually preoccupied with money, career, fashions, sports, and everything but the Lord’s work is a person with a weed-infested heart. A person who claims to love Christ but who cannot remain faithful in marriage has a weedy heart. The person who refuses to let go of his worldliness is a person in whom the seed of God’s saving gospel has not found root and is in danger of being choked out altogether.

THE RECEPTIVE HEARER

And the one on whom seed was sown on the good soil, this is the man who hears the word and understands it; who indeed bears fruit, and brings forth, some a hundredfold, some sixty, and some thirty.” (13:23)

The fourth patch of ground on whom seed was sown is good soil. It is good not because it has a different basic composition than the other kinds of soil, but because it is rightly prepared. Because his heart is prepared by the Spirit and receptive to God (cf. John 16:8-11), the person this soil represents hears the word and understands it. Before salvation, the person who receives Christ had the same basic nature as those who reject Him. He is not necessarily any less sinful or more perceptive than they. A person who is saved may have lived a life of debauchery and utter wickedness, whereas many who do not believe are humanly moral and respectable. A person who is saved may have little education and a low IQ, whereas many who do not believe are highly intelligent and trained.

The only barrier to salvation is unbelief, and anyone who is willing to accept Jesus Christ on His terms is good soil. He hears the word of the gospel because God honors his humility and opens his spiritual ears; and he understands the gospel because God honors his faith and opens his spiritual mind and heart.

Jesus told of this kind of hearer in order to encourage His disciples and all other believers who witness in His name. Despite the hardness, shallowness, and worldliness of most human hearts, there are always those who are good soil, in which the gospel can take root and flourish. There will always be people whom the Spirit has prepared to receive the word with sincere, surrendered hearts.

The ultimate mark of the genuine believer, the good soil, is fruitbearing. He not only hears and understands but also indeed bears fruit. Spiritual fruit is the inevitable product of spiritual life.

The spiritual fruit of attitude is described by Paul in Galatians: “love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, self-control” (5:22-23). The genuine believer also bears fruit of behavior, which Paul refers to as “the fruit of righteousness which comes through Jesus Christ, to the glory and praise of God” (Phil. 1:11). Fruit is the spiritual reality that God produces in the lives of His children. The Spirit-filled life of the believer “is constantly bearing fruit” (Col. 1:6).

The psalmist rejoiced that the believer who delights in God’s Word and meditates on it day and night is “like a tree firmly planted by streams of water, which yields its fruit in its season. And its leaf does not wither; and in whatever he does, he prospers” (Ps. 1:2-3). Jesus declared that true and false branches—those who are genuinely related to Him and those who only seem to be—are distinguished by their bearing or not bearing fruit (John 15:2-5). We are not saved by bearing fruit or by any other good work, because we cannot bear spiritual fruit or do any truly good work until after we are saved. But we are saved for fruitbearing. “We are His workmanship,” Paul says, “created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand, that we should walk in them” (Eph. 2:10).

Not only does Jesus assure us that true believers bear fruit but that they bear it in great abundance: one a hundredfold, some sixty, and some thirty. Those figures represent phenomenal yields of 10,000 percent, 6,000 percent, and 3,000 percent. Believers differ in fruitbearing because they differ in commitment to obedience, but all are profusely fruitful.

As mentioned above (under v. 8), the average yield ratio of grain crops in Palestine was less than eight to one. Therefore even the least productive thirty to one was almost four times the average. It is not that a believer produces a hundred, sixty, or thirty times the amount of fruit that an unbeliever produces—because an unbeliever can produce no spiritual fruit at all. Jesus simply used these figures to represent the great productivity He gives to the faithful proclamation of His Word. That is the point of the entire parable: true believers produce fruit.

To His witnesses Jesus is saying, “Go and preach, and realize as you go that some people will reject your message outright. Because they want nothing to do with God, Satan will not allow the gospel to have any impact on them whatsoever. Others will seem to accept it gladly but will soon fall away, because they only had a superficial religious experience and were not born again. These are the ones who live by the flesh, whose lives are controlled by emotion, feeling, and sentiment. Others will seem to accept the gospel while holding on to the old life and its ways; and their faith will also prove vain and will eventually disappear as it is choked out by the world. But others will truly believe. In humility they will confess and repent of their sins, look to Me for help, and be given new life. You will know these true believers from the others by the evidence of fruit in their lives.”

He is also saying to His witnesses that they should not lose heart. God alone can plow up the heart that is hard and resistant. In His sovereign will He gives the shallow heart depth, and the cluttered heart cleansing. The Lord guarantees that His faithful witnesses will produce fruit and will do so abundantly. It is impossible for a faithful sower of the Word to fail, because the Lord of the harvest will not permit it. So we anticipate the wrong and right responses. What marvelously helpful insight for those who sow!

The Lord is teaching His people that anyone who belongs to Him can and should be a witness for Him. The responsibility of the one who sows the gospel in His name is not to produce the seed, the soil, or the fruit. His only responsibility is to faithfully spread the seed as far and wide as he is able. When they fall on good soil, the seeds that a little child throws here and there as he follows his father through the field will produce fruitful plants just as genuine and productive as those the experienced father plants. And the untrained Christian who faithfully scatters his few seeds will produce a greater harvest than the most learned and experienced believer who never bothers to sow at all.

To those who are considering His claims or have made a perfunctory decision for Him, Jesus gives an appeal to think about the kind of soil that represents their heart. If it is hardpacked and beaten down by continual neglect of God, or perhaps even by conscious opposition, He calls that person to allow His Spirit to break up the ground and make it receptive to His Word. If the soil of his heart is shallow and superficial, He calls that person to allow the Spirit to remove the rocky resistance that lies beneath the surface of his seeming acceptance of the gospel and give him true faith. If the soil of his heart is infested with the weedy cares and concerns of the world, He asks that person to allow the Spirit to cleanse him of his worldliness and to receive Him with no reservations or competing loyalties.