Luke 8:1–21

0:00 When I was growing up in East Texas, my small little town of about 2,500 people had a football rivalry, and in some years it was even more a basketball rivalry with a small town that was right next door to us. It was a little town, not much bigger than ours, called Jefferson, Texas, population just about 3,000, at least when I was growing up a very, very long time ago. What was interesting about Jefferson, though, is that it had this sort of patina of history to it because back in the middle of the 19th century, it had been a steamboat port sitting right there on the big Cypress bayou.

0:39 And in the 1880s, the steamboat port of Jefferson, Texas was booming. Steamboats from all up and down the river would port in that city and the captains and the crew would get off. And so there were hotels and restaurants and taverns and all the rest of it. And they would stay in these beautiful, sometimes, hotels. It was a booming town. Well, one day in the 1880s, a wealthy New York railroad tycoon named Jay Gould came through the town and made to the church fathers a proposal. Let me run a railroad line through this town that heads west.

1:17 Well, the town fathers thought about it and they met together and they voted and all the rest. And they finally said, no, there's too much noise, there's too much smoke, it's going to be loud. And besides, they said, the future of the American economy is not these trains, it's steamboats. They were sure that that was the case. Gould was actually staying at one of these luxury hotels in town. It was called the Excelsior House, and at least when I was a kid, it still existed. You could go in and look around this hotel. And in the guest registry, they had everybody that stayed there sign it.

1:48 Jay Gould angrily wrote his name out, signed it in the guest book, and then put a gigantic X beside his name, and he wrote out beside it, it is the end of Jefferson. He was right. Three years later, the Army Corps of Engineers blew up a dam that had been keeping the big Cyprus bayou deep enough for steamboats to go through, and the bayou, along with Jefferson, Texas, and everything around it, dried up completely. Jay Gould, this railroad tycoon, took his offer of a railroad line to another small town about the same size at the time, about 3,000 people, some miles off to the west. The name of that small town?

2:35 Dallas. See, Jefferson didn't just miss an opportunity. They totally misjudged the moment. They heard Jay Gould's offer. They understood what he was offering to them. They heard it clearly, and they had every chance to respond, but they got it wrong. They said no. They turned away, and it cost them everything. Well, that's the kind of thing that we're going to be looking at today in Luke chapter 8. We're continuing our study through the gospel of Luke.

3:06 Over the last several weeks, we've been seeing as Jesus makes these increasingly more and more spectacular claims about who he is and what he's come to do. So he's healed the sick. he's raised the dead, he's forgiven sins, and he's warned that how you respond to him, this is already in chapters prior to what we're looking at today, how you respond to him is the most important decision you're ever going to make. That's the case that he's been making from the beginning of the book. And last time, if you remember, at Simon's dinner table, we saw the difference. We saw that the difference between loving Jesus and being cold to him, the difference between that woman who washed his feet with her tears and anointed his feet with oil, And Simon's coldness to him really comes down to whether you know you've been forgiven.

3:50 Simon had, in his own mind, nothing to be forgiven of. The woman had everything, and so she loved and he didn't. Well, today, Jesus tells another story, another parable. And it's a story about hearing. It's about the difference between hearing the Word of God merely and actually receiving it. because those two things are very much not the same thing to hear the word of God as it's preached as you read it in the Bible as someone explains it to you over coffee to hear the gospel to hear the word of God and for it to bounce off your eardrums and for you to forget it is not the same thing as receiving it not even close that's what we're going to talk about today look with me at Luke chapter 8 that's where we're going to be looking at the first half or so first third actually, of Luke chapter 8. If you're using one of these pew Bibles like this one, I've got these red ones. You can find them in the pew racks. You can find them under your seats if you're in the balcony or on the sides. You can find Luke 8 on page 864. So let me read. Luke chapter 8, verse 1.

5:00 Soon afterward, he went on through cities and villages, proclaiming and bringing the good news of the kingdom of God. And the twelve were with him, and also some women who had been healed of evil spirits and infirmities. Mary, called Magdalene, from whom seven demons had gone out, and Joanna, the wife of Chusa, Herod's household manager, and Susanna, and many others who provided for them out of their means. 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. Some fell on the rock and as it grew up, it withered away because it had no moisture. Some fell among thorns, and the thorns grew up with it and choked it.

5:45 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. When his 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, but then the devil comes and takes away the word from their hearts so that they may not believe and be saved.

6:21 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. As for what fell among the thorns, they are those who hear, but as they go on their way, they are choked out by the cares and riches and pleasures of life, and their fruit does not mature. As for that in the good soil, there are those who, hearing the word, hold it fast in an honest and good heart and bear fruit with patience. No one, after lighting a lamp, covers it with a jar or puts it under a bed, but puts it on a stand so that those who enter may see the light.

6:56 For nothing that's hidden, there's nothing hidden that will not be made manifest, nor is anything secret that will not be made known and come to light. Take care, then, how you hear. For to the one who has, more will be given. And from the one who has not, even what he thinks that he has will be taken away. Then his mother and his brothers came to him. But they couldn't reach him because of the crowd. And he was told, your mother and your brothers are standing outside desiring to see you. But he answered them, my mother and my brothers are those who hear the word of God and do it.

7:31 All right. Now, before we dive into the details of this parable and the things that kind of surround it, I want you to see the shape of the passage. I want you to see the structure of how the whole thing moves, because this portion of Jesus' teaching, this portion of Luke's book, is doing something very deliberate. So look down at it. It opens with this kind of brief snapshot of Jesus traveling around and preaching. He's kind of on a preaching tour among villages and cities and all the rest, and he's got his 12 disciples with him, and he's also got some women who are with him. That's verses 1 to 3, and the text just kind of barely says that.

8:04 And if you look at it, there are just a couple of little descriptive phrases that become really important. We're going to look at those later. That's verses 1 to 3. Then in verses 4 to 15, you have this parable of the sower and Jesus' explanation of it. That's the heart of the passage. That's what we're going to give most of our attention to this morning. Then in 16 to 21, you get these two short little sections. We get this proverb about the lamp, that's in verses 16 to 18. And then in 19 to 21, this really striking moment between Jesus and his mother and his brothers.

8:40 Now, even though it might not seem like it at first, those two little sections, the lamp and the mother and the brothers, are both building on the parable. They're not independent. They're not just a new topic that Jesus has decided to start talking about now. they affect our understanding of that parable. They press its logic further. So the question, and there's just one question that runs through this whole section is this. What happens when the word of God hits your ears?

9:13 What happens when the word of God hits your ears? Because something does happen every time. When you hear the word of God, whether it's a sermon from the Bible or whether it's reading the Bible or just somebody sharing it with you over a coffee table, you are never neutral when the word of the gospel, when the word of God comes into your ears. You are either receiving that word or you're not receiving it. And Jesus wants to press into your consciousness the difference between those two.

9:46 Well, then there's even another question that's brought up by the lamp and Jesus' mother and brothers. Not just what happens in the moment when the word of God hits your ears, but what happens from then on in your life when the word takes root in your heart? Like truly, really, savingly, what happens in your life? Because the word of God, when it lands, it definitely does not just sit there and do nothing. It moves. It works. It begins to produce a crop. So here's the main idea. It's kind of two parts to it. It's going to be the two parts of the sermon, two points of the sermon. You can, in fact, hear the word of God and not receive it. You can hear the word of God and not receive it.

10:33 But when you do receive it, it will be seen in your life. You can manage to hear the word and not receive it at all. But when you do, it will be seen in your life. Two points to the sermon. we're going to be looking first at the first 15 verses and then verses 16 to 21. Number one, not all hearing is real. Not all hearing is real. But number two, when it is real, it will be revealed. When it is real, it will be revealed. All right, let's start looking at it.

11:06 So looking first at verses 1 to 15, mostly this parable that Jesus talks about, the sower scattering his seed. Number one, not all hearing is real. So chapter eight opens with this little snapshot that's, that's, I think, easy to blow right past. You can sort of just look at it and you can say, oh, interesting, there were some women with Jesus along with the 12 disciples, and then you can kind of, kind of move on without really getting what Luke is doing with it. But here's what he says. Soon afterward, he went on through the cities and villages, proclaiming and bringing the good news of the kingdom of God. So he's on a, he's on a preaching tour, right? The word has started to get out about who Jesus is, and the crowds are coming in, and people are wanting to hear him and so he moves around the cities mostly of Galilee at this point in his ministry. And the twelve were with him. Those are the twelve apostles he's just called. And also some women who had been healed of evil spirits and infirmities. Mary called Magdalene. She's called Magdalene because she's from the city of Magdala. It's a small village in the area. She's from Magdala. There were a bunch of Marys around and so they sort of identified her as being the one from Magdala. That's why she's known as Magdalene. Doesn't mean anything more than that. From whom seven demons had gone

12:11 out. That's interesting. Joanna, the wife of Chusa, Herod's household manager. So the word of Jesus has started to get up into the higher echelons of society, right? So this guy is pretty high up in the hierarchy of the king's household. He's the manager of the building, of the house. And then you've got Susanna, who nothing else is said of, and a lot of others who provided for them, that's Jesus and the disciples, out of their means. Now, I'm not going to say much about those three verses right now, but I do want you to just kind of keep it in mind, and especially I want you to keep in mind and look down at the little phrases that are used to describe especially these women, certain ones of them, right? Don't try to figure it out just yet.

12:52 Don't try to do a whole lot of work on what exactly it's doing. Just look at it and notice it for now. You've got these women, at least one of which had been broken and healed, but all of whom have heard the word of God, and now they're traveling with Jesus and even supporting his ministry out of their own pockets. What does that mean? Why does Luke put that in his book? Well, we're going to come back to it, because by the end of this passage, I think you're going to see that Luke did that not just as historical detail, not just as a kind of aside to make you realize that there were women along also. That's not the point. He's doing something with that passage. We'll talk about it later. All right. Anyway, the scene set, Jesus, with the crowds coming around him now, tells this parable. And you can look at it in verses four to eight. It's a really simple story, but it's one of the most famous parables that Jesus tells. So this farmer goes out to sow his seed. And when he's sowing the seed, he's not really paying attention to where it's going he's just kind of reaching in his in his pack and he's just he's just throwing the seed

13:53 everywhere right that's that's that's how you do it you walk down the path and you just throw seed everywhere and Jesus says okay the seed when it comes out of the satchel falls on different kinds of soil as it falls and then he specifies four different sorts of of soil so some of it he says falls on the path that the farmer is walking on you know he's just he's just doing that and some of it falls down on the path, but it doesn't do anything because the path has been walked on so much that it's hard packed. There's nothing for the seed to grab onto. And so the birds come and they eat the seed and it grows no crop. Some of it, he says, falls on rocky soil, which is probably right on the edges of the path. So some of it falls on the rocky soil. And what's interesting is he says those seeds spring up really fast, right? Because they don't spend a whole lot of time digging their roots down into the ground they hit bedrock really quickly and then and then very fast the little sprout comes up and it looks like oh my gosh those must be the best seeds and the best soil because they've grown so fast but the sun scorches them and the winds

14:58 blow and the storms come and all of a sudden the the little sapling because it doesn't have any roots, withers up and dies. Some more of the seed, he says, falls among thorns and the thorns grow up and the little sapling gets wrapped up by the thorns and choked out and it too dies. But some of it, he says, falls on good soil and that produces a crop. Luke puts it at a hundredfold. Sometimes Jesus seems to have said different things.

15:29 Sometimes thirtyfold, sometimes sixtyfold. Here Luke has it as a hundredfold. And then look what Jesus says there at the end of verse 8. He who has ears to hear, let him hear. Now why does he say that? He says that to flag you that this is not just a story about agriculture. He says it to flag you to the fact that this is a story about you. It's about you receiving the word of God. That's what it's about.

16:00 Well, in the next few verses, the disciples come to him and they're just flummoxed, right? They want to know what is this parable? What is this story about the farmer and his seed that you're telling us? What does it mean? And Jesus explains it over the next few verses. But before he does, he says this thing in verses 9 to 10 that's just kind of stunning. It's unexpected. Look at 9 and 10. When his disciples asked him what the parable meant, he said, To you, it has been given to know the secrets of the kingdom of God.

16:32 But for others, they are in parables, so that seeing they may not see, and hearing they may not understand. Okay, now what does Jesus mean by that? I mean, in terms of just the words, if you look down at verse 10, to you it has been given to know the secrets of the kingdom of God. That's the word mystery, mysterion in Greek. And Paul's going to use it later on. And it kind of fills out in content. We start to realize what it means. And it just means those things which have been hidden up until the arrival of Jesus, which are now revealed.

17:06 That's what it means. Things that have been hidden throughout the entire Old Testament, which have now been revealed. And what Jesus says to his disciples is all of those mysteries that have been hidden up until now have been revealed to you. The Father is working in you so that your heart will receive them and you'll be able to hold on to them. That's what he says. But it's a pretty hard thing to say, right? To you, it's been given to know the secrets of the kingdom of heaven. But for others, they're in parables. They're in stories.

17:38 They're veiled. So that even though they see them, even though they hear the words, they don't really receive the words. They don't understand. Even though seeing what I'm saying, they don't see it, right? And that can sound, can't it, like Jesus might be deliberately hiding the truth from people. But that's not what's going on, is it? I mean, it's not like Jesus goes over here and whispers the secrets of the kingdom to this group over here, right?

18:08 Hey, let me tell you about the secrets of the kingdom. I'll tell you about the gospel. And then he goes over here and he just goes blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, you know, and hides it from them. That's not what's happening. No, he says the same words, the same story, with the same meaning to all the people. The seed just scatters everywhere. That's what the farmer does. I mean, think about what that farmer does. He doesn't go along and look for, looks like good soil right there. You know, he doesn't do that. He doesn't do that at all.

18:41 He's just throwing the seed everywhere. Good soil, bad soil, it's the same seed. the difference is the soil that it lands on it's not a difference in the message that's the same thing Jesus isn't hiding anything he's being wide open it's just that when some people receive the words of that parable they go oh I get it like at the end of verse 8 I have ears to hear what you're saying to me I don't think that this is just about agriculture I realize it's about me while other people walk away and they're just like whatever whatever I don't get it doesn't make any sense to me. And one ancient theologian put this truth like this. It's the same sun that strikes everything. It's the same sun that strikes everything, but it melts the wax and hardens the clay. Do you see the point there? It's not about a difference in the message. It's not about a difference in the seed or the sun. It's about the material that the word is falling on.

19:44 See, the parables Jesus is teaching, the gospel, comes to everybody in exactly the same way. Same story, same words, same seed, everything. But it strikes different hearts in utterly different ways. So for some people, the gospel opens up truth, and they get it, and they see themselves as what they really are. I'm a sinner, and I need a Savior, and Jesus is the only one who can do that. They learn, and they believe. But for other people whose hearts are hard, the word of the gospel just bounces off like a seed hitting asphalt.

20:17 Or it gets choked out by the cares of the world. It's not that Jesus is withholding anything from people who want to understand it. There's nobody that's sitting there going, I really want to get it, I want to get it, but I can't. No, it's that his teaching just exposes what's already there. It's either a heart that's soft and ready to receive the word or it's a heart that's already hard, already not listening. See, the seed exposes what kind of soil is there, not what kind of seed is there.

20:52 So Jesus explains it. And this is where I want you to lean in. Because when Jesus lays out these four different kinds of soil, the fact is one of those soils is you. Now hear me on that again. As Jesus explains these four soils, you need to understand that one of those soils is you. Like right now, in this room, as you're listening to the words that I'm saying. Not theoretically, not someday, not in general even, but right now as you are hearing this word preached.

21:26 One of them is you. And Jesus explains it in verses 11 to 15. So you can see what he says there in verse 11. He's just straight up about it with his disciples. Let me explain it to you. The seed is the word of God. It's the word of the kingdom. It's the word of the gospel. It's who you are and what you need as a sinner. It's who I am, Jesus says, as the Savior, who's going to lay down my life for you. It's all of that truth. That's the seed that's falling on the soil. And it's constant in every scenario.

21:57 It doesn't change. What changes is the soil, the heart that receives it. And Jesus gives us four kinds. So let's look at them. So first he says some of the seed falls on the path. Some of your hearts are like the path, hard-packed earth. And what happens is that the seed of the world lands on top and it just kind of sits there. It never penetrates, it never takes root, never creates a crop, never drives root down into the soil, nothing. It just sits there and so the devil comes and snatches it away so that you never believe and you are never therefore saved.

22:29 Now who is that? Now what kind of person is it that has that sort of hard-packed soil in their heart? Well, this is the person who comes to church over and over and over and over and hears sermons and does Bible studies and maybe even reads the Bible with a friend sometimes. But basically, it just bounces off. It doesn't register. You've got other things to think about. So you come in here, and you sit, and you listen. You hear the gospel, and by the time you're in the car, the whole thing's gone. You're thinking about other things.

23:00 There's a football game this afternoon, or there's things I've got to do tomorrow. I have a thousand other things in my mind, It's just gone. And it's not necessarily because it was a bad sermon. I mean, maybe it is. I preach some bad sermons sometimes. But it's not because the sermon is bad. You can listen to the best preachers in the world. It's just the ground is hard. And no matter how good the seed is, it's not going to penetrate your heart. It just never gets below the surface. It's interesting to me that sometimes people will almost brag about that.

23:33 You literally run into people who almost brag about that. Ah, that Christianity stuff. This has never made sense to me. This has never made sense. I've been to church a thousand times, and it all just sounds like a bunch of gibberish to me. I think it's all just a crutch that they lean on. None of it makes sense. I mean, friend, look, that's really nothing to brag about. And if you don't understand the Word of God, if it bounces off of your heart and never takes any root at all, All you're doing, according to Jesus, is just bragging about your hard heart.

24:12 And here's what's really frightening, I think, about this. If your heart is that kind of soil, then you probably don't even know it. You probably don't even realize it. Because that's the thing about hard ground. Nothing gets through. Not even a warning that it is hard ground. In fact, not understanding the word just feels normal to you.

24:44 Not caring about the word. Not letting the word register in your heart. It just feels normal. You come, you hear, you leave. And you never once think about the fact that nothing is happening inside of you. And you even brag about it. I wonder if that scares you. I wonder if it just bothers you even just a little bit that you've heard a thousand Christian sermons and it's never once moved you. Do you really think that's a problem with the word of God?

25:20 Or is that a problem with your heart? Second, the rocky soil. So this is the person who receives the word with joy. You can see that he says that in verse 13. The ones on the rock, the seeds on the rock, are those who, when they hear the word, receive it with joy. But they have no root. So they believe for a while, but in the time of testing, they fall away.

25:54 So there's this immediate enthusiastic response to the gospel. Yes, I'm a Christian now. But there's no root, there's no depth. And so when times of testing come, when times of hardship come, when it turns out that it actually costs something to follow Jesus, those are the kinds of people that fall away. They just disappear, right? I've met dozens of people like that over the years here at 3rd Avenue. Somebody will come in for one service and they'll hear one sermon and all of a sudden it's like, yes, I'm a Christian now.

26:30 And it all looks so good. But then time goes on, and things happen, and they just disappear. See, I think this is one of the most important soils for the church, you and I, to understand and be aware of. Because weirdly, weirdly, we Christians are so prone, aren't we, to celebrating the rocky soil. we love it we love the rocky soil because we're impatient and the rocky soil allows us to see results immediately we love it when somebody gives a big emotional response to the gospel we love the dramatic conversion story we love the tears at the altar we love the person who says i'm all in the first minute they hear the gospel we absolutely love that celebrity that finds jesus And look, sometimes that's real.

27:30 I mean, sometimes it's real. Sometimes there's an explosion of emotion and gratitude to Jesus and it is real and it lasts. But be careful with that. Be careful with it because sometimes that's just the seed bouncing off the rock. You get this spectacular growth or spectacular response, but you get no staying power. be careful with the rocky soul i mean i mean just by the way this is this this is why we here at third avenue don't baptize children when they're very young our elders adopted many many years ago a policy that that will start having that conversation with your child if they've grown up in the church when they're about 13 years old and what we're trying to do there is is just make sure that because your child prayed with you at one point whether at a dining room table like i did when I was young or at the edge of the bed or asked you something at lunch after church, we want to make sure that that little thing

28:30 you're seeing that looks like it's spiritual life in your child, we want to make sure that it's real before we baptize them. Before we tell that child through baptism that yes, we think you're a Christian. Because the very worst thing that can happen to somebody who's rocky soil is that the little thing pops up, right, it sprouts and everybody goes awesome, you're a Christian. And then it dies. And then that soil looks at itself and says, everything's dead. I see that. But those people back there told me I was a Christian. And so they remain dead. They never see any reason to repent. We don't want that to happen to your children. And so we wait. We let the roots go a little deeper. We want to see the child face the world and the flesh and the devil. We want to see them feel some pressure from all of those things and stand against that pressure for the sake of jesus we want to see that we don't just want to take it on your word i mean we know you love your

29:35 kids i love my kids but we don't want to take it on on the word of loving parents that i am sure my kid is a christian we want to see him face up to the world the flesh and the devil and choose jesus and friends don't don't wait you may be asking the question i mean i did years ago and i came to this you know blindingly obvious answer right don't worry that you're not going to be able to see that you will be able to see it and the lord will actually orchestrate things in your life to show you that give it time let the roots go deep look look being a christian is ultimately a matter of playing the long game. It's not a sprint. It's not an emotional explosion. It's a marathon. It's a long, hot, burning fire. What Christianity wants from you, what Christ wants from you, is not 60 days

30:35 of burning yourself out for Jesus. It's 60 years of faithfulness to him. One step in front of the other all the ups and downs all the setbacks all the heartbreaks all the disappointments and yet you stay faithful to Jesus that's what Christianity requires I imagine some of you if you're honest with yourself you you had a really good moment at one point right the seed sprouted up really fast and really hard and it felt great and people told you it was great and maybe that was in high school Maybe it was at a summer camp when you were a youth at church.

31:16 Maybe it was a conference more recently. It seemed real. It really did. But since then, what's happened? Well, life. Life has happened. That's what's happened. You feel the pressures. You feel the boredom. You feel the heartbreaks, the disappointments. You feel other things in your life that just seem like higher priorities. And you look at your spiritual life, and there's just not much left of it now. friend that's the definition of rocky soil the question is not did you once have a moment the question is not can you remember a time at some point in your childhood when you prayed the sinner's prayer it's not can you remember a time when you gave your heart to jesus no no the question that jesus pushes on you is is anything still growing now and what if you decide it's not what if what if you look at it you look at your spiritual life

32:20 and you decide no no there's nothing growing and i can see that what do you do when you do what anybody does you repent of your sins you look at that and you even repent of the rocky soil and you turn to christ and say lord this is just another reason that i can't save myself please save me stand in my place, make my heart new, save me. That's what you do. There's nothing magical about it. There's no incantation. There's no ritual. You just take that rocky junk to Jesus and you say, would you turn this into flesh, please? You repent and believe.

32:57 Third kind of soil that Jesus talks about is thorny soil. Verse 14 is, as for what fell among the thorns they are those who hear but as they go on their way they're choked by the cares and riches and pleasures of life and their fruit does not mature. I think you know in all honesty I think this is probably the most dangerous soil to think about for people in this particular room for this church because thorny soil looks like real faith for a pretty long time. It doesn't sprout up and die quickly in a day like the stuff on the rocks it takes root there's some genuine growth it actually sprouts up and maybe even starts to produce a little bit of fruit but what happens is that the thorns grow up alongside it and wrap around us and Jesus tells us exactly what those things are cares and riches and pleasures of life I mean and that's that's wild isn't it that Jesus says that's what will choke out your spiritual life because none of those things look at them

33:57 cares, riches, pleasures, none of them are evil in themselves. In fact, they're just the things that happen in life. It's just the stuff of life. A full calendar, career ambitions, financial worries and anxiety, kids' activities and sports. None of that stuff, none of that stuff is sinful in itself. But they can fill up the field of your life so completely that the Word of God gets crowded out, choked. I know, I know that you've seen this when people fall away from the faith. It's not usually a kind of dramatic deconstruction, right? I know that happens.

34:41 I know some people fall away from the faith in this, you know, dramatic deconstruction, and they post it on their Twitter account or whatever. I am leaving the faith because of this, this, and this, but it's not usually that. When people fall away from the faith, it's not usually dramatic. It's usually a slow drift because you're just being carried along by currents and pressures that are sometimes not even obvious at first glance. The job makes demands. Relationships build pressure.

35:15 A child decides to live as a homosexual and slowly but surely the word just gets choked out. So how do you know if that's you? Well, let me tell you a way to kind of diagnose it. You can diagnose it by looking at yourself honestly and checking out whether you are just too busy to do the things that would make the Word grow.

35:48 Are you just too busy to do the things that would make the Word grow? Are you too busy to read your Bible with any consistency? Are you too busy to pray during the day? Are you too busy to be in a home group or even to attend it regularly? Are you too busy to have a real conversation with somebody about what God is doing in your life? No, none of those things mean you're hostile to the Word of God. To be choked out by the thorns is not to be hostile. It's just that you're busy. Your garden's full.

36:21 And the thorns are winning. Look, nobody, nobody decides to have a choked out spiritual life. Nobody wakes up one morning and says, you know what? I think I will let the cares of the world strangle me out today. Nobody says that. It just happens before you even recognize that it's happening. It happens because you never made room. You never protected the seed. You never pulled the weeds out. And one day you look up and realize that the faith that you thought you had has just been quietly suffocated by a life that was just too full of everything else.

37:02 Well, then, of course, there's the good soil, 15. 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. There are three things that Jesus says are true of the good soil. Look down at 15, see if you can see them. Three things that are true of the good soil. First thing is they hear the word. They really hear it, not just with their ears, off their eardrums, but deep down in their hearts. They hear the word. Number two, they hold it fast.

37:33 In other words, they don't let it go when life gets hard or when life crowds in. They hold the word. And then finally, the third thing is that they bear fruit with patience. It's not overnight. It's not in a blaze of excitement, but steadily, over time. Over decades, with endurance, they bear fruit. That's real hearing. But here's the question, isn't it? How do you know? How do you know if you're good soil?

38:06 And not just rocky or thorny or hard-packed soil. Well, that's where we're going next in point two. When it's real, it will be revealed. When it's real, it will be revealed. That's looking at verses 16 through 21. So right after this parable, Jesus says something in this next paragraph that I think can seem just almost like three random proverbs if you're not paying attention. It's almost like Jesus glitches, right? Because he's talking about the word and it's a very kind of pointed message.

38:37 And then, oh, now I need to say something about the lamp and evangelism, right? That's how most people think about that. He's talking about evangelism. And then, oh, no, over here I'm going to talk about hidden sins a little bit. And then I'm going to give this really cryptic thing about, you know, this last thing in verse 18. It just sounds a bit out of nowhere, like Jesus is turning to talk about a whole different topic. But it's not random at all. Look at it. Verse 16. No one, after lighting a lamp, covers it with a jar, puts it under a bed, but puts it on a stand, so that those who enter may see the light.

39:08 For nothing is hidden that will not be made manifest, nor is anything secret that will not be known and come to light. Okay, so is that just a kind of grab bag of topics? Like one verse about evangelism, another verse about hidden sins. Is that what he's talking about there? I mean, that'd preach, right? I could preach a whole sermon to you about hidden sins, and they're all going to be revealed, and then I could turn it around with evangelism, right? It'll preach, but that's not the point.

39:40 It's not what he's talking about at all. So think about it. What's the context that verses 16 through 18 fall in? What has Jesus been talking about up to this point? And what does he keep talking about after this point? He's talking about the word of God and how we receive it. The seed from the parable, right? And then in the next paragraph, the mother and brother's things, he's going to go on talking about hearing and obeying the word of God. So the whole thing is about the word of God.

40:11 And it's just not likely that he now drops a couple of fortune cookie sayings into this about other topics. He doesn't do that. No, it's all talking about the word and what it does when it lands. It becomes visible. It can't help but become visible is his point. So think about his image of the lamp. What does a lamp do? It's lit in order that it might be seen, right? you you light a lamp so that it shines you don't you don't light it and then shove it under a bed so jesus is saying that's what happens when the word of god really gets into a person it shows in fact it has to show that's what the point of verse 17 is verse 17 is not about hidden sins it's about the absurd idea that the word of god can be hidden it will shine if you try to hide it. It will shine anyway because that's what it does. In other words, you can't truly receive

41:18 the gospel and have nothing change. If the lamp is lit, people are going to see the light. It is really that simple. And then you got verse 18. And I want you to hear this carefully because this is really the point of the whole thing. I mean, Jesus just, Jesus just puts it straight. look at 18 do you see his point after all this take care therefore how you hear there's your point take care how you hear the word of god and then he says for the one who has more will be given and from the one who has not even this is interesting what he thinks he has not what he has what he thinks he has will be taken away it's frightening isn't it that's a person who believes that they've received the world the word who would tell you they're a Christian who would

42:18 point to a prayer they prayed or a baptism or a moment at camp but who only thinks they have it but they don't actually and Jesus just says it straight that illusion will not last. It will be stripped away. Everything will be made plain. But the flip side of that verse is just as important, right? To the one who has, more will be given. You see, if you've truly received the word in your heart, it grows, it deepens, it produces a crop, it shines, it can't help but do that. Even if it's slow, Even if the growth is slow and you can barely see it, it's happening.

43:04 You see the point of 18? False faith gets exposed. The fruit or lack of it tells you everything. And if it's really there, it'll grow. So, you see what he's saying in 18? Be careful how you hear. Be careful that you don't just let the word of God bounce off your eardrums. Be careful that it gets down into your heart. Now, what's the diagnostic? What's the kind of self-test here?

43:37 Is it to look down into your heart and sort of examine, you know, the soil, right? And say, well, I don't know. Like, what's the makeup of this soil? You know, which to take the metaphor away would be for you to spend a whole lot of time staring at your faith. Is it big enough? Is it of the right nature? Am I joyful enough? Is that what Jesus is saying to do? No. What does he say is the difference between good soil and bad soil? Is it to do a chemical analysis on the soil and find out what it's made of? No, it's just to look at it and see if it's producing fruit. Is it growing? Is it doing stuff?

44:08 Is your life different than it was? Are you more aware of your sin than you used to be? Do you love the people of God and his word more than you used to? Are there things in your life that you've given up or given over to the Lord because all of a sudden you now just have higher priorities in life? See, all of that stuff and a hundred other things, that's fruit. It doesn't have to be dramatic, but it does have to be real. Friend, listen to me. If you've been driving yourself nuts trying to figure out the nature or size or weight or character of your faith and whether it's good enough, stop.

44:46 Stop it. You're never going to get anywhere with that. That's Jesus' whole point with the mustard seed thing. Parabolically, that's the smallest little seed imaginable. He's not trying to be scientific. It's tiny. And yet he says, that's enough to move mountains. So stop worrying about it. Have somebody help you look at your fruit. That's what you do. Now, here's another thing that I find interesting here. If you're sitting here and you're a believer, you're a follower of Christ, you've got the word in your heart, and you struggle with assurance, then I want you to look carefully at the promise part of verse 18.

45:27 If you struggle with assurance, you're going to tend to focus on the scary part. I know that. Even what he thinks he has will be taken away. How do I know if I have? Maybe I'm only thinking. You're going to tend to focus, if you struggle with assurance, on the scary part. Look at the promise part too. To the one who has, more will be given. You hear that? Friend, if you're a Christian, even if you're a weak one, even if you're the mustard seed type Christian, that's you. You've got something. And Jesus is promising you that over time that thing's going to grow, more will be given.

46:03 Friend, you may feel like you've barely got a sprout sowing above the dirt. You may be staring at me. I think there's a little green there. That may be you in your spiritual life. But if it's real, God's going to grow it. Did you notice up in 15 how Jesus says the good soil will bear fruit? Look at it. Very last word. With patience. You bear fruit with patience.

46:37 Friend, you don't have to have a hundredfold by Tuesday. You're not expected to have a hundredfold by Tuesday. You just got to be growing. And you know what else? The very fact that you're sitting there worried about it probably says that your heart is soft. Hard soil doesn't worry about anything. It doesn't know that it's hard, and it doesn't care that it's hard. Now, your worry, your worry is a sign that your faith really is something.

47:10 And God will give the growth. Look at what happens next, 19 to 21. His mother and brothers come to him. They can't get to him because of the crowds. And he's told, hey, your mother and your brothers are standing outside desiring to see you. But he answered them, my mother and my brothers are those who hear the word of God and do it. Now, that sounds harsh when you first read it, right? It sounds like he's saying, those are not my mother and my brothers. I've got these over here now, and they are not the ones who believe the word of God. Well, that's probably not true. We know Mary's character, and she seems very much to have been a believer in Jesus, and his brothers got there eventually, right, even if they weren't there now.

47:46 So he's not rejecting his family. That's not the point of this. He's defining his family. He's defining who his people are. And his definition is, in one sense, it's exactly what you might expect, but it's also staggering. His true family isn't determined by blood. It's not determined by proximity. It's not determined by religious heritage, none of that stuff. To be a member of Jesus' family, his people, his kingdom, is by hearing the word of God and doing it. Not just hearing it, but doing it.

48:20 But did you hear that one part? It's not by proximity to a Christian or a church or a Christian family. You don't get into the kingdom of heaven through being close to another Christian. Being close to Jesus, being near the word, having the word kind of wash over you like water every Sunday is not the same thing as receiving it. It is not the same thing as receiving Jesus.

48:52 I mean, think about it. Jesus' own mother was standing there. It wasn't her relationship to him that made her a member of the kingdom. It's whether she hears the word and obeys it. Think about Simon the Pharisee last time. I mean, Simon had Jesus right there at his dinner table and felt nothing because it was hard. Look, you can sit in this building every Sunday for 30 years and never be good soil. You can be married to a Christian and never be good soil.

49:31 You can be the child of a pastor or an elder and not be good soil. You can grow up in VBS, you can go to the youth camps, you can go to summer camp, none of that, none of it makes you a Christian. Only hearing the word, hearing the gospel, and doing it, believing it, trusting in it, can do that. Okay, now, now go back to verses 1 through 3.

50:06 Because I think now, with all of that in your backpack, you can see what Luke is doing when And he puts that little snapshot right at the beginning of the passage of these women. So these ladies, Mary Magdalene, Joanna, Susanna, all the others. Do you see what they're doing now, even before all the teaching is done? What they're doing is that they are providing a living illustration of everything Jesus is about to teach. They're doing what he says they ought to do. They're good soil. I mean, think about it. Mary Magdalene, from whom seven demons had gone out. And seven may even be symbolic for like a whole lot more, right?

50:39 Seven is a symbolic number that means fullness. Seven demons, that's just about as bad a soil as it gets, right? You would think, actively inhabited by the enemy. It's like soil that's been salted. And yet the word reached her. And it didn't just take root. It transformed Mary Magdalene completely. She heard the word, received it, and it started to grow. And what are they doing? Do you see what they're doing? Three things. They've heard the word, so they've been healed. they've been forgiven. They're with Jesus, right? So they haven't just had a moment of emotional explosion and then gone on about their lives. They've reorganized everything in order to follow him. And not only that, but they're providing for him out of their means. They're giving money so that he and his disciples can eat and can have a place to live. That's visible, costly, practical fruit. It's not just feelings. It's not just attendance. It's resources. It's time. It's money.

51:37 energy, their actual lives, completely rearranged for Jesus. See, that's what good soil looks like. That's what it looks like. It's not perfection. That's not the point. It's not perfection. It's not a dramatic conversion story either. It's just a life, a whole life that's been genuinely seized by the goodness of the gospel and is now bearing fruit and being transformed in a way that other people can see the lamp is lit it's on the stand you can tell because it's shining and you see you see the beautiful thing in that whole seven demons thing these women didn't start that way mary magdalene started as the worst soil imaginable but the word of the king reached her anyway and she realized she was a sinner and she believed in Jesus as the only one who could save her. And she repented of her sins, whatever they were.

52:34 Friend, if you're here this morning and you're not a Christian, I want you to hear this. This word that Jesus is talking about, the word of the kingdom, the word of the gospel, that's what's happening right now. As you sit and listen, the seed of the word is landing on your heart and Jesus says the way you respond to this word right here is the most important thing about you as a human being it's not just the most important decision you're going to make today or this week or this month or this year it's the most important thing about you period so yeah you can you can let it bounce off or you can get excited for a week and then forget about it when life gets hard. You can let all the other stuff that's going to come up tomorrow morning crowd it out until there's nothing left, or you can receive it really and truly and savingly. And it'll take root and it'll change everything. But here's the thing about

53:39 it you can't make yourself good soil you just can't I mean that's that's verse 9 and 10 right to you it has been given to know the secrets of the kingdom you can't will your heart to be soft but you know what you can do you know what you can do you can cry out to the one who does take rocky soil and make it good you can pray to him you can say God give me ears to hear and I promise you God is not in the business of turning people away who ask him for that in fact you know you know what the irony is and the funny thing is if right now you feel your heart maybe for the first time in your life even wanting to pray that prayer, God, give me ears to hear.

54:34 I want to hear. Friend, that may be the very first good sign that God is already doing that work. Trust him. See, Jefferson, Texas, heard that offer from Jay Gould. They thought they understood it, but they didn't. They were wrong. They walked away, the offer bounced off, and it cost them everything.

55:06 And Jesus says that that same kind of moment is happening every single time the Word of God comes to you, every time you hear it. You respond to it, some way, somehow, and it's never neutral. So friends, like Jesus said, take care how you hear, because one day how you heard the word of God will become unmistakably clear on the day of judgment it will become unmistakably clear whether that seed took root in your heart and grew and produced a crop or whether it never really got in at all so don't assume it don't look back to a moment and call that you know that's enough ask the Lord now Lord give me ears to hear and if it's real it'll make itself known let's pray our Lord we thank you that your word is living and powerful and that when the gospel

56:08 hits hearts it causes a response although we thank you that for those of us who have put our faith in Christ we can know beyond a shadow of a doubt that it was your spirit that brought our dead hearts to life made us good soil so that when the word fell we heard it and responded oh our God we pray that there would not be a single person in this room today who would walk away as hard or thorny or rocky soil but make us good soil that hears your word and receives it deeply and produces a crop we pray all of this in Jesus name amen