4 Soils, and 4 Tips for Evangelism (Mark 4:1-20) | 8/11/19
Mark 4:1-20 8/11/19 | Will DuVal
This morning, we continue our study through the Gospel of Mark. We’re starting a 3 week mini-series on the PARABLES, and today we’ll be in Mark ch.4, vv1-20, if you have a Bible and want to turn there with me, and would you also stand with me as you’re able, out of respect for the reading of God’s word:
from MARK 4:1-20
Again he began to teach beside the sea. And a very large crowd gathered about him, so that he got into a boat and sat in it on the sea, and the whole crowd was beside the sea on the land. 2 And he was teaching them many things in parables, and in his teaching he said to them: 3 “Listen! Behold, a sower went out to sow. 4 And as he sowed, some seed fell along the path, and the birds came and devoured it. 5 Other seed fell on rocky ground, where it did not have much soil, and immediately it sprang up, since it had no depth of soil. 6 And when the sun rose, it was scorched, and since it had no root, it withered away. 7 Other seed fell among thorns, and the thorns grew up and choked it, and it yielded no grain.8 And other seeds fell into good soil and produced grain, growing up and increasing and yielding thirtyfold and sixtyfold and a hundredfold.” 9 And he said, “He who has ears to hear, let him hear.”
10 And when he was alone, those around him with the twelve asked him about the parables. 11 And he said to them, “To you has been given the secret of the kingdom of God, but for those outside everything is in parables, 12 so that
“‘they may indeed see but not perceive,
and may indeed hear but not understand,
lest they should turn and be forgiven.’”
13 And he said to them, “Do you not understand this parable? How then will you understand all the parables? 14 The sower sows the word. 15 And these are the ones along the path, where the word is sown: when they hear, Satan immediately comes and takes away the word that is sown in them. 16 And these are the ones sown on rocky ground: the ones who, when they hear the word, immediately receive it with joy. 17 And they have no root in themselves, but endure for a while; then, when tribulation or persecution arises on account of the word, immediately they fall away.[a] 18 And others are the ones sown among thorns. They are those who hear the word, 19 but the cares of the world and the deceitfulness of riches and the desires for other things enter in and choke the word, and it proves unfruitful. 20 But those that were sown on the good soil are the ones who hear the word and accept it and bear fruit, thirtyfold and sixtyfold and a hundredfold.”” This is the word of God... (Prayer: grant us ears to hear!)
OVERVIEW:
THREE PARTS to this sermon. In Part 1, NOT in your bulletins, I want to introduce the whole IDEA of parables – the who, what, and why of parables. In Part 2, I hope to EXPLAIN for you this parable from Mark 4, the parable of the 4 soils – it’s sometimes called the parable of the sower, but it really has less to do with the sower than it does the SOIL; and then in Part 3, I want to try and help us APPLY this parable, particularly, when it comes to our OWN sowing, our evangelism. Got that? Introduction, explanation, application. Let’s do it!
Part 1: Introduction – the “What, Why, and Who” of parables
For starters, WHAT is a parable?
a parable is “a simple story used to illustrate a spiritual lesson” (Oxford)
Jesus often tells them as SIMILES, or metaphors that compare one thing to something else LIKE it, in order to shed additional light; so – “the kingdom of God is LIKE... a pearl, a coin, a mustard seed”...
Jesus’ parables have been described as “earthly stories with heavenly meanings”
The Synoptic Gospels – Matt, Mark, Luke – record 35 of them!
In fact, just a few verses down from today’s passage, we hear in Mark 4:34 that Jesus “did not say anything to them without using a parable.” Which brings us to our next question:
WHY? Why did Jesus use parables? Why use analogies and metaphors and sometimes even cryptic stories? And the answer is two-fold:
On the one hand, Jesus DOES want to illuminate things for his followers. The Kingdom of Heaven can seem SO HEAVENLY, so other-worldly, that it is best described in indirect, metaphorical ways. Jesus has to use things we DO comprehend, to give us GLIMPSES of things we CAN’T fully grasp, this side of eternity. And in doing so, he enhances our understanding. So if you ask me what my daughter Ellery is like, I can describe her for you: she’s full of energy, she’s spunky, she loves to be the center of attention; or I can simply say: “She’s a FIRECRACKER!” And that paints a whole PICTURE for you.
But on the OTHER hand, Jesus himself tells us, that he ALSO spoke in parables to OBSCURE things from most of the crowd. “for those outside everything is in parables, 12 so that “‘they may indeed see but not perceive,
and may indeed hear but not understand,
lest they should turn and be forgiven.’” 13 And he said to them, His DISCIPLES, “Do you not understand this parable? How then will you understand all the parables?” Note two things there:1) He WANTS his disciples to understand! He says, “Don’t you get it?! This is my EASIEST parable. If you don’t get THIS one, how are you gonna understand the fig tree, the leaven, the unjust judge – I want you all, my disciples, to understand these things. That’s why in v34, Jesus took them aside and “privately to his own disciples he explained everything.”
2) But v12: “for those outside everything is in parables, 12 so that “‘they may indeed see but not perceive...’” And Jesus quotes here Isaiah 6:9. Which is TELLING. Because what does God call Isaiah to do, in the OT, when the nation of Israel whores after other gods? God commanded him: “Make the heart of this people dull,[e] and their ears heavy,
and blind their eyes;
lest they see with their eyes,
and hear with their ears,
and understand with their hearts,
and turn and be healed.”
11 Then I said, “How long, O Lord?”
And he said: “Until cities lie waste
without inhabitant.” (6:10-11)God warns Isaiah: “they’re not going to listen to you! I’m going to stop up their ears, and they will not repent and turn back to me, but that’s between me and them; YOUR job, is simply to PREACH!”. It’s the SAME calling God gives the prophet Jeremiah, in Jer. 7:27... and the prophet Ezekiel: in Ezek. 3:4-7... And it’s the same calling God gives JESUS here in Mark 4: speak to them in parables, in order to REVEAL truth to those who earnestly desire to know it, and yet to CONCEAL truth from those who are indifferent.
Jesus isn’t going to cast HIS pearls before swine – if you don’t even care enough about Heaven to sit and reflect on it a little bit, it’s not for you. I fear that some in the church today have cheapened and dumbed down the gospel in an attempt to make it more INCLUSIVE for EVERYONE – “just pray this magic prayer and you’ll be saved”; friends – if entering the Kingdom was a matter of simply praying a prayer, don’t you think God would have included that prayer in the BIBLE? No, JESUS said, “wide is the gate, and easy is the way that leads to destruction, and those who enter by it are many. 14 But the gate is narrow and the way is hard that leads to life, and those who find it are few.”
Which leads us to our third and most important introductory question: WHO? If that’s WHAT a parable is, and WHY Jesus tells them, then WHO ARE they for? If they’re not for EVERYONE, how do I even know if this parable is for me?
Hear this: if you are already a follower of Jesus, this parable is for you. “To you has been given the mystery of the kingdom of God”. You’ve already trusted in the mystery of all mysteries, the good news that Jesus is your King. This sermon is for you.
If you are NOT yet a follower of Jesus, this parable may well be for you; you might feel today like Jesus is speaking DIRECTLY to you; perhaps the soil of your heart is finally ready for the seed of the gospel.
And yet, for others, it’s possible you will leave here today with the soil of your heart even HARDER than when you arrived. And frankly, friends, that is probably the hardest part of my job. After 4 months on the job, I can tell you – being a lead pastor isn’t easy. But perhaps the hardest part is KNOWING, when I walk up into the pulpit on Sunday morning, that there will in all likelihood be someone here in this room who is NOT saved, whose spiritual eyes and ears are stopped up and who will LEAVE here even more NUMB to the gospel, even more DE-SENSITIZED to the good news of Christ crucified and resurrected than when you walked in. And Friends: if you have ears to hear, LISTEN to me – don’t LET it be you! Wake UP! WAKE UP this morning! Unstop your ears, PRAY that the Holy Spirit who ALONE can reveal these truths to us would cause the scales on YOUR eyes to fall off this morning, and WAKE UP!
Part 2: EXPLANATION. This IS, in fact, the easiest parable to interpret, because Jesus himself interprets it FOR us, in the second half of the passage. That’s why I assigned myself this parable, and I gave CORDELL the parables of the lamp, the harvest, and the mustard seed all THREE for next Sunday’s sermon when I’m gone relaxing on vacation in Michigan.
Jesus explains that “the seed is the word of God” (Luke 8:11). So let’s flesh this out: as a pastor, what you pay me for, is to try and get the WORD of God... [THIS]... into the PEOPLE of God... [YOU]. Here’s the WORD of God... and here’s YOU... I’m trying to get THIS... deeper into your hearts.
And as an EVANGELIST, a PROCLAIMER of the good news, YOU and I have BOTH been called, everyone who is a believer, you don’t get paid for this one; this is FREE, with the cost of admission into the Kingdom; when you surrendered your life to Jesus, he gave you a new purpose: Now you are called to get the Word of God... into others. To get THIS... into THEM. Either by evangelism – Mark 16 “go and preach the gospel in all creation”, OR if the person is already a believer, by discipleship, – Matthew 28 “go and make disciples of all nations”; help them grow THEIR roots deeper and stronger.
Got it? So [Bible] SEED... [Heart] SOIL... we’re ALL called to be SOWERS, and then to PRAY that the Lord of the HARVEST would give the growth. Here’s PAUL, in 1 Corinthians 3: “What then is Apollos? What is Paul? Servants through whom you believed, as the Lord assigned to each. 6 I planted, Apollos watered, but God gave the growth.7 So neither he who plants nor he who waters is anything, but only God who gives the growth. 8 He who plants and he who waters are one, and each will receive his wages according to his labor. 9 For we are God's fellow workers. You are God's field.”
So we are workers, called to plant, called to water, but then we PRAY, because GOD must give the growth. And yet, it’s helpful for us to recognize that there are FOUR distinct types of soil. And each soil requires a different kind of LABOR, if the seed of God’s word is EVER going to have a shot to take root, and not JUST take root, but actually grow up into a fruit-bearing plant. Notice: that is the goal of the sower here: FRUIT-bearing plants.
But that’s impossible, Soil #1, if the ground is still HARD. HARD ground must be JACK-HAMMERED. (vv4,15)
In our 21st c. context, we might read v4 as: “he sowed, and some seed fell along the pavement”... the ASPHALT. Where God desires an orchard; there’s currently an interstate. So what do you do? Borrow one of these bulldozers next door from Promise, and start the DEMOLITION!
Notice: the ground isn’t just randomly hard; it’s a PATH. A PATH is ground that is actively being used for a DIFFERENT purpose. Friends: there is no neutral ground in this life. When it comes to God’s plan for your life, everyone is actively being used for one of two purposes: for GOD’S purpose, to bring Him glory and spread His Kingdom on earth as it is in Heaven, or for SATAN’S. Those are your options. If you’re COASTING, like “Maybe I’m not ON FIRE for the Lord, but I’m not like actively performing Satanic séances...”; if you are not a fruit-bearing tree, you’re just wasting soil and space, you’re leaching vital nutrients out of the orchard. Jesus said, “Every tree that does not bear good fruit is cut down and thrown into the fire.” (Matthew 7:19) He says “because you are lukewarm, and neither hot nor cold, I will spit you out of my mouth.” (Revelation 3:16) Friends: your heart IS being used for one purpose or the other; don’t BE hard-hearted. Don’t HARDEN your heart, this morning, to the good news of Jesus, OR to His good calling on your life, to bear fruit, and spread the gospel seed to others.
When a heart BECOMES hardened to the gospel, like my own was, for most of my life, layers and layers of asphalt; the only solution is a jack-hammer. And let me tell you, a jack hammer can be PAINFUL. But I don’t regret for a SECOND the people who God sent into MY life, to speak truth, sometimes DIFFICULT truth... JACK-HAMMER truth, in LOVE to me, to destroy my pride, demolish my hatred of God and others, to point out my hope-LESS-ness without Jesus. I praise GOD for them. And I have friends and family TODAY, and I’m sure you do too, who I look at and think: I’M not getting through to them! If THIS person’s heart is EVER going to be softened, it HAS to be because the Holy Spirit supernaturally broke through the layers of spiritual CONCRETE. And you may be right. Maybe God has HARDENED that person’s heart specifically to demonstrate HIS power to transform them in a way that only GOD could have. But He may STILL want to use YOU to operate the jack-hammer. That can feel daunting. ABRASIVE. And it might be painful for the hard-hearted person, in the moment, but they just might be eternally grateful to you one day, for confronting them in love.
The second kind of ground is rocky and SHALLOW. And shallow soil must be TILLED. (vv5-6,16-17) PLOWED. CULTIVATED.
The difference here is that there is actually some good soil this time. v5, the seed takes ROOT... for a season. But there’s no DEPTH of soil. No depth of ROOT system. And notice what kills the seed in this type of soil, v17: tribulation. Hardship. v6 uses the metaphor of “the scorching sun”. It’s interesting, isn’t it, that the very same thing that is most NECESSARY for the plant’s growth – the SUN – is the thing that, without the right roots in place, will KILL the plant. We’ve reiterated this in recent sermons: suffering is God’s greatest TOOL, his primary INSTRUMENT for growing us in our faith. For strengthening our roots. But if we aren’t careful, the very thing God designed to help us grow most in Him, can become the thing that shakes a shallow faith to its core, and causes our shallow roots to shrivel up and die.
Friends, we will ALL go through difficulty in this life. The question isn’t if, but when. And HOW. How you will handle it? Will suffering make you bitter or better? Do you have the ROOTS to weather that kind of storm. That kind of SCORCHING from the sun. If you wait til you’re in the MIDDLE of the storm, the HEAT of the summer, you may be too late. Take heed NOW, brother, sister, to TILL the soil of your heart. Under the power and direction of the Holy Spirit, to LOCATE the rocks, the weak spots in your faith, and systematically begin REMOVING them. Strengthening your faith, deepening your roots, Ephesians 6:13, “so that you may be able to withstand in the evil day”.
Soil #3 is thorny and DIVIDED. (vv7,18-19) It is DIVIDED, trying to grow both good seed ALONGSIDE thorns, but v7: the weeds and thorns eventually CHOKE OUT the good seed. So DIVIDED ground must be WEEDED. De-thorned.
Consider the unique THREAT with each type of soil:
The threat with the HARD ground was SATAN. He “immediately” comes and destroys the seed; This is a direct attack, because the person’s heart is so HARDENED to the truth.
The threat with the SHALLOW ground was HARDSHIP. This is the route Satan attempted with JOB. Test his roots. Satan still uses that scheme on many believers today.
But he saves his most devious, deceptive tactic for this THIRD type of soil, the divided soil. What’s the threat here? v.19: “the cares of the world and the deceitfulness of riches and the desires for other things”. Busyness, money, and worldly pleasure. This is the hardest kind of soil to work with. Have you ever tried to tend soil filled with thorns!? When the youth group was serving in Wheaton this summer at a homeless shelter there, they had us doing some landscaping, and I’m just getting after it, but I hear some of the students laughing at the other end of the building, so I walk over to check it out, and Troy Johnson is shaking his head in defeat, and the others are giving him a hard time because he can’t pull this weed... and I look down at it - this thing is not big, so I start piling on him too – “Troy, why don’t you take a break and relax in your high chair...” And he’s like “No! YOU try it...” So I bend down and look closer at this sucker, and it is COVERED in thorns. I’m talking every square inch of this thing. Like, cut straight through your WORK GLOVE thorns. Truth be told: I couldn’t pull the thing either. I think one of the middle school girls finally got it out. Thorny ground is the TOUGHEST to deal with, but friends, in most of our cases, this is the #1 soil that you and I fight against personally, and that we face in our evangelism with OTHERS, every single day.
And what makes it so Tough is that oftentimes the “cares of this world” aren’t inherently BAD things. In fact, they’re usually GOOD THINGS: family, work, money. But they are DANGEROUS things, b/c as Tim Keller says, an idol is when a good thing becomes the MAIN thing. When these GOOD things replace God as the PRIMARY aim and passion of our hearts, they become DEADLY.
So what do you have to do with divided ground, with thorns growing alongside the good seed? You have to weed them out, cut them out, destroy them. But notice here: the thorn ISN’T “money” itself. It isn’t “family”. It isn’t “work”. What Jesus condemns here is the “CARES of the world”, the DECEITFULNESS of riches... and the DESIRE for other things, ABOVE our desire for Him. It’s not the thing in and of itself that is condemned as evil – money, family, work – but rather, the “Love OF it, above our love for Jesus”.
Friends – if we find something, ANYTHING, in our hearts, that upon an honest self-assessment we conclude that we love more than Jesus, we need to ROOT OUT that other love. Weed it. Pull it up. That is what Jesus called His would-be followers to do time and time again throughout the Gospel accounts:
the rich young ruler in Mark 10: the problem wasn’t his STUFF; it’s that he LOVES his stuff more than he loves Jesus. So Jesus calls Him to go and SELL all his stuff.
the “family man” in Luke 9:61: who wants to follow Jesus, but first, he needs to go say goodbye to his family; the problem wasn’t his family; it’s that he LOVED his family more than he loved JESUS. So Jesus says if you’re not willing to leave them behind without so much as a goodbye for MY sake, you’re not worthy to follow me.
I told you - these are not the sermons of a guy who’s trying to pack out the sanctuary and lead America’s fastest growing megachurch. John 6:66 - People were walking AWAY from Jesus’ sermons in DROVES.
Jesus said in our text from last week: a house divided against itself cannot stand. He says in Matthew 6:24 – “No one can serve two masters. You cannot serve both God and money.” Take your pick. Luke 14:26 – “If anyone comes to me and does not hate his own father and mother and wife and children and brothers and sisters, yes, and even his own life, he cannot be my disciple.” If your feelings for those closest to you don’t look like HATRED in comparison to your love for ME, then I don’t want you as a follower. Divided hearts need not apply.
This is a HARD saying, friends. Who can measure up? Matthew 19:26 ““With man this is impossible, but with God all things are possible.”” But it WILL NOT COME without cost to you. Jesus isn’t peddling cheap grace here. This is COSTLY. It cost Him his LIFE. And it will cost you yours too. But He is worth it. Worth upending your life, uprooting your other worldly desires, and trading it ALL, for Jesus.
Fourth, even the GOOD ground must be TENDED. (vv8,20) Paul still had to PLANT, Apollos still had to WATER. And right now, brothers and sisters, there are people out there whose hearts are READY. They are WAITING to hear the good news. You think, “Come on, this is America! Everyone knows the gospel; if they don’t believe yet, it’s not because they haven’t heard.” And you are WRONG. Oh, they may have LISTENED for years, but they have never HEARD. I listened to the gospel for 27 ½ YEARS before I ever heard it. And right now, there’s someone in YOUR life who has listened for a LONG time, but they’ve never HEARD. Because the ground used to be hard, but God took a jack-hammer to it. And then the leftover rocks still kept the soil shallow and tough for a long time. But God’s been TILLING that too. And now he’s been working to remove the WEEDS and THORNS, to show them the vanity and futility and hopelessness of their worldly STUFF, and their soil is FINALLY ready. 27, 47, 87 years later. It’s finally good. They can finally HEAR now. But “how are they to hear without someone preaching?”
So I want to leave you with four quick, practical takeaway points, four TIPS, specifically, for your personal evangelism. For your OWN sowing of the gospel seed with which you have been entrusted, if you are a follower of Jesus.
Tip #1: PURSUE good soil. Personally. In your OWN heart. Before you sow elsewhere, check your OWN heart. Matthew 7, Jesus said “You will know a tree by its fruit. Are grapes gathered from thornbushes, or figs from thistles?” In other words, if you’ve got serious thorns growing in your OWN divided heart, you’re at risk, like the Pharisees in Matthew 23:15, of turning those who you mentor and disciple into TWICE the sons of Hell that you are! The single most important quality in a disciple-maker, in a gospel preacher, in an evangelist, in EVERY Christian following Jesus’ call to pay it forward to others, isn’t their knowledge of the Bible, the eloquence of their speech, their love for you as a person; the single most important trait is the QUALITY of their SOIL. “The good person out of the good treasure of his heart produces good, and the evil person out of his evil treasure produces evil” (Lk 6:45) How is your soil, Christian? Pursue good soil. Avoid bad soil. Phil 4:8 - “whatever is true, whatever is honorable, whatever is just, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is commendable, if there is any excellence, if there is anything worthy of praise, think about these things.”
Tip #2: IDENTIFY good soil, in others. It doesn’t do a lot of good to spread seed on the highway. You can sow as much as you want; you’re not growing a lot of fruit out here on 40. We used to do an exercise with our student leaders at Culver where I’d give them each just one apple seed. And I’d say, “your job is to do everything in YOUR power, do your very BEST, to turn that into a fruit-bearing apple tree one day.” There’s a prize. And guess what, they’d take a lot of CARE, in choosing the SOIL in which they invested that seed. Identify those with GOOD soil in your life. And then invest MOST of your time and energy in them.
But Pastor – are you saying I just give UP on those who DON’T seem to have good soil; NO: because Tip #3 is – pray and work to CULTIVATE good soil in THEM TOO. We used to do ANOTHER exercise with those leaders where I’d give them a spreadsheet with 4 columns on it: Hard, Shallow, Thorny, Good. And we’d have them think through and pray over every one of their family and friends, and then list each person’s name in one of the 4 categories. Because it is practically helpful, in your evangelism, to assess whether you’re dealing with someone who truly hard-heartedly hates God, vs. someone who just loves their party lifestyle MORE than God. Work to get better at identifying the different soils, so you can more effectively CULTIVATE each, based on the specific type of labor it requires.
But at the same time, #4 - RECOGNIZE that you DON’T just have 1 seed to plant, 1 shot at evangelism; the gospel is a renewable resource; so don’t be selective... Tip #4: DON’T WAIT FOR good soil. Tell EVERYONE!
did you notice where the sower spreads his seeds in the parable? does it say “He noticed the ground was hard along the path, so he didn’t bother sowing there”... or “He noticed the thorns, so he didn’t waste any more seed there”...? NO! He sows EVERYWHERE!
Brothers and sisters – we are called to sow LIBERALLY!
I’ve got grass seed growing in the cracks between my sidewalk (and yet, NOT in the middle of the yard where I ACTUALLY sowed it!)
You never know what God is doing in a person’s heart. They might seem like the most hard-hearted, worst-soiled person you’ve ever MET... and that might be EXACTLY where God wants them, in order to reveal their need for Him. Keep sowing! Never stop cultivating, but never stop sowing either. [Dory: Just keep sowing...]
God’s job is to give the growth; your job is to sow. Yes, pursue good soil personally. Yes, look especially for good soil in others’ hearts. And yes, look for opportunities to strategically TILL the soil when necessary. But at the end of the day, let’s don’t over-strategize and over-insert ourselves in the process. Evangelism in Mark 4 isn’t a science. The sower isn’t calculative in his seed-spreading. He is LIBERAL. Because he understands that God desires that NONE should perish, but that ALL should reach repentance (2 Pet 3:9) but that means they MUST hear the good news! Romans 10:17 - “So faith comes from hearing, and hearing through the word of Christ.” “He who has ears to hear, let him hear.” Let’s pray...