Jesus very commonly used parables in his teaching. I suspect that most teachers see a value in using stories as teaching procedures, because stories can convey ideas vividly and imaginatively in ways that stay with the hearers and may effectively stir responsive thoughts in the minds of the hearers. Many of the memorable parables of Jesus are quite simple stories or comparisons, drawing on scenes and activities that would be very familiar to his hearers.
One of those memorable parables is often called the Parable of the Sower, found in Matthew 13:1-9. Many of Jesus's hearers were people of the land, very accustomed to cultivating fields and gardens as means of feeding their families and having grain or produce to sell in the market. In Jesus's parable, one visualizes a farmer, sowing grain, in the days long before mechanized farming. The farmer first prepares the field, tilling the soil, then he takes seed grain in a sack, hangs the sack about his shoulder in a way that allows him to dip his hand into the bag for handfuls of grain, and scatters the seed as he walks by swinging his arm in a wide arc, coordinating his steps with the swinging of his arm so that his seed is distributed evenly over the land. I remember my own Dad sowing oats this way, when I was a very small boy. We later had a broadcast seeder which was cranked by hand as we walked across the field scattering the seed grain.
In Jesus's story, we quickly notice that he is describing not so much the manner of the farmer's sowing, but the soils on which the seed falls. Because of this, some people prefer to describe the parable as the Parable of the Soils. The sower is consistently broadcasting good seed, but the ground conditions where the seed falls is at times good and at times bad. He describes some seed as falling on the path, quickly to be eaten by the birds. Some seed falls in rocky patches where the soil is dry and thin, and though the seed sprouts quickly it has little root and soon is scorched by the hot sun and withers away. Some seed falls among thorns, and is overwhelmed and crowded out by them. But some seed falls into good soil, and certain patches produce a hundredfold, some 60, and some 30.
What is Jesus trying to convey to us in telling this story? The story is followed by an interchange with his disciples in which they quiz him about why he teaches in parables like this. That interchange, described in verses 10 through 17, is followed by Jesus's own commentary on the meaning of each ground condition of which he spoke. We often focus on that commentary, found in verses 18 through 23, and we find much there to contemplate for the good of our responses to the word of the Lord.
At this point, however, I want to key in on the comment with which Jesus ends his initial story. See verse 9 of our Chapter 13 of Matthew's Gospel. Jesus draws the parable to a close by saying, "He who has ears to hear, let him hear." I see this as a major clue as to what Jesus would have us gain from his story. It is about how we hear, how we understand, how we take his word to heart, and how we respond to allow his teaching to bear fruit and to accomplish useful things in life.
Sometimes when we hear the word of the Lord, we hear, but not really. The words enter our ears, but nothing sticks. Often we are not really listening. We are like the person who sleeps through the sermon at church. Our receptors are turned off. Then there are times when we can't hear because we are too busy talking. Some conversations are very one-sided. Even when the other person says something, it is ignored as one continues the stream of his own words. Sometimes a person is attentive for entertaining tidbits of life, but is tuned out when it comes to words of wisdom, or to notions which call for reflection and depth of understanding.
Some of us, Jesus points out, may initially think the life of faith is a great thing, and exciting thing, but we fall away when the going is tough, when we are spoken against, when friends criticize us for our interests, or when we endure hardships. Jesus also speaks of those of us who can not hear and understand because we are so busy with the lesser things in life, with materialistic notions of success, with having the right car, the right clothes, the right phone, the right Internet service, the right social media, the right circle of friends.
As we have opportunity to learn and understand God's will for us, let our hearing of his word, and our taking it to heart, be like good seed falling on good soil, and producing real abundance of life.
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Editor's note: Jerry Nichols, a native of Pea Ridge, is an award-winning columnist and a retired Methodist minister with a passion for history. He can be contacted by e-mail at [email protected], or call 621-1621.
Religion on 07/16/2014