The Gospel of Mark - Part 13
The Gospel of Mark • Sermon • Submitted • Presented
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Now we come into a very familiar passage of Mark…one that has been preached on and discussed over and over again - one that is most often recognized as the Parable of the Sower, but it’s really more about the soils and the seed.
Each type of soil represents a type of HEART…so as we begin, we must ask ourselves,
“What kind of heart (or mind) do I have?”… “How do I respond to the seed?”
I. The Setting
I. The Setting
1 And again He began to teach by the sea. And a great multitude was gathered to Him, so that He got into a boat and sat in it on the sea; and the whole multitude was on the land facing the sea.
By now, the seaside was a common teaching venue for Jesus.
The boat He requested the last time was now utilized as a floating pulpit and as a way for more people to hear Him.
The Gospel according to Mark The Parable of the Sower and the Mystery of the Kingdom (4:1–20)
Exactly where Jesus taught cannot be said for sure, but a possible location is a natural amphitheater situated halfway between Capernaum and Tabgha to the south where the land slopes gently down to a lovely bay. Israeli scientists have verified that the “Bay of Parables” can transmit a human voice effortlessly to several thousand people on shore
2 Then He taught them many things by parables, and said to them in His teaching:
Now Mark begins one of only two teaching discourses by Jesus. Remember that Mark is mainly focused on what Jesus DID, rather than emphasizing what Jesus DID.
Yet he does include some of Jesus’ teaching, as shown here.
Jesus taught almost everything by way of parables, which are:
The Lexham Bible Dictionary Parable
PARABLE (מָשָׁ֑ל, mashal; παραβολή, parabolē). A story or saying that illustrates a truth using comparison, hyperbole, or simile. Can be a model, analogy, or example.
παραβολή parabolē 50× a placing one thing by the side of another
Parables were Jesus’ only form of teaching the crowds:
Mark 4:34 (NKJV)
34 But without a parable He did not speak to them. And when they were alone, He explained all things to His disciples.
The question then comes to our minds: “Why?”…why would Jesus use parables with the crowds instead of teaching them plainly?
Parables are designed to both REVEAL and to CONCEAL truth.
Jesus was very judicious and wise about how much information He shared and with whom He shared it - many were not ready or willing to receive the plain truth of His teachings.
He reserved the explanations for those that WANTED to know truth.
6 “Do not give what is holy to the dogs; nor cast your pearls before swine, lest they trample them under their feet, and turn and tear you in pieces.
This is Jesus’ instruction to us to use DISCERNMENT in how we share the truth of God’s Word with people.
This is exactly what Jesus did with the parables:
Think about the SEED - When we see a seed on the ground or even hold one in our hand, we don’t see the plant that it will become - it is hidden in the seed.
All the information for a sunflower plant is hidden in a sunflower seed - this is a picture of a parable - the truth of the parable (the heavenly/spiritual meaning) is hidden inside the seed of the parable (the earthly/physical story).
When Jesus is teaching with parables, He is sowing with SEEDS - small, capsule-like packages that contain large, amazing truths!
The sower doesn’t sow the plant…he sows the seed!
This is why Jesus asks them the rhetorical question in verse 13:
13 And He said to them, “Do you not understand this parable? How then will you understand all the parables?
“all the parables” are like seeds! - spiritual truth encapsulated in a physical story.
If one is to understand the parables, they must understand this fact - always look for the deeper, spiritual meaning.
You are reading a seed, not a plant!
Another aspect of Jesus’ statement here is that since the seed is the word of God, one must have an understanding of the word of God in order to understand the parables. This is where BIBLICAL LITERACY comes into play. When we have a true understanding - a literacy - of Scripture, the spiritual truth hidden in the parables will become clear.
So, we need to keep that in mind as we study this section of Mark where there are several parables in a row.
Notice how Jesus begins and ends this parable:
3 “Listen! Behold, a sower went out to sow.
Notice the commands: “LISTEN!” and “HEAR!”...in other words, listen up - what I am about to say is important!
This passage - Mark 4:1-20 - is another “Markan Sandwich”.
Another Markan Sandwich:
Mark 4:3-9 The Parable Given (bread)
Mark 4:10-13 The Purpose of Parables (cheese)
Mark 4:14-20 The Parable Explained (bread)
We will be studying the “bread slices” together, and then moving to the cheese in the middle…think oreo cookie - we’ll eat the wafers first and save the filling for last.
Let’s move into this parable:
II. The Sower
II. The Sower
3 “Listen! Behold, a sower went out to sow.
The sower is never named, but based on the nature of the seed (PARABLES) and the nature of Jesus’ ministry activity - (TEACHING WITH PARABLES) - that the sower is Jesus Himself and by extension anyone who spreads His teachings.
III. The Seed
III. The Seed
3 “Listen! Behold, a sower went out to sow.
Sowing was the 1st century method of planting seeds in the ground.
Sowing was literally casting the seeds by hand onto a field.
14 The sower sows the word.
So the seed is the word. Matthew calls it “the word of the kingdom”, and Luke calls it:
11 “Now the parable is this: The seed is the word of God.
In Jesus’ immediate context, the seeds are His parables.
Today, we might use a parable, but we often don’t…yet we are still sowing the seed of God’s Word whenever we share the gospel or other truth from Scripture.
Wherever the word of God is being broadcasted, whether in an ABF class, a pulpit, a coffeeshop, a backyard, or a front porch, that is what God calls “Sowing the Seed”.
While seed can have other meanings in other parables, (like the kingdom of God, people, money, lifestyle, or service)...it is here clearly representing the word of God.
Now let’s dive into the soils themselves…there are four types of soil, each representing four types of hearts…so as we read this we need to remember to ask ourselves, “What kind of heart do I have?”
IV. The Soils
IV. The Soils
IV. The Soils
A. The Wayside Soil
4 And it happened, as he sowed, that some seed fell by the wayside; and the birds of the air came and devoured it.
The wayside is the path that went around the fields.
The soil on the path was constantly walked on…it was packed and trodden down, beaten flat, and hard!
The wayside was never cultivated or plowed up. It was for foot traffic, not for planting.
And it made a great “bird feeder”…the seeds were not able to penetrate the hardened soil, so they lay on top, easy pickings for the hungry birds.
Let’s look at Jesus’ explanation of the Wayside Soil:
Mark 4:15 (NKJV)
15 And these are the ones by the wayside where the word is sown. When they hear, Satan comes immediately and takes away the word that was sown in their hearts.
This is exactly what happened when Jesus taught His parables - most of the people thought it sounded nice, but it made no difference to their lives. And the scribes refused to even listen - Satan was able to remove the truth before it had time to sink in because the Pharisees’ hearts were so hard.
This is also often what happens today when someone is sharing the gospel and the other person just shrugs it off.
Because the heart is so hard, the Word of God is not embedded in the heart, and is easy for Satan to explain it away and whisper his lies to undermine and discredit Scripture.
What is interesting is when we zoom out to include more context of this teaching, we find the previous passage fits right in with this one:
We just covered the last portion of Mark 3 - where we discussed the “Unforgivable Sin”, which we learned was a matter of the HEART!
The scribes blasphemed the Holy Spirit by claiming that His working through Jesus to cast out demons was actually the power of Satan.
This was an extreme condition of hard-heartedness…actually an apostate heart that refused to acknowledge God’s power and presence right in front of them.
The seed, in their case, was the words and the deeds of Christ Himself.
This hardheartedness is a reminder of the ancient account of Moses and Pharoah:
15 But when Pharaoh saw that there was relief, he hardened his heart and did not heed them, as the Lord had said.
Two other, separate times the Bible specifically states that Pharaoh hardened his own heart.
Now God also hardened Pharaoh’s heart, but not until he had hardened his own heart
But this hard-heartedness is a spiritually blind condition. When one’s heart is hardened, they cannot see the truth standing right in front of them. This was true of Pharoah and it was true of the scribes of Jesus’ day.
Exodus—Saved for God's Glory The Hardest of Hearts
If Pharaoh had realized how hard his heart was, he would have been terrified. The Egyptians believed that the heart was the essence of the person and thus the key to eternal life. Many of their temples and tombs depict a heart being weighed on the scales of justice. The meaning of this image is explained in “The Book of the Dead” found at the Palace of Anubis, in which a man named Ani enters the throne room of the gods for judgment. At the front stands the balance of truth on which the death-god Anubis will weigh the dead man’s heart. Anubis is joined by Thoth, who will record the verdict, and by the goddess Amemit, who waits to devour the hearts of the damned.
Exodus—Saved for God's Glory The Hardest of Hearts
Like every false form of worship, ancient Egyptian religion was based on the principle of works-righteousness, but it also contained echoes of Biblical truth. There will indeed be a final judgment, in which every human heart will be weighed against the righteousness of God. If that is true, then what will become of a hard-hearted man like Pharaoh? According to the Egyptians, such a man could never be saved. A man with a hard, heavy heart would be weighed in the balance and found wanting. The weight of his sins would drag him down to destruction.
This is what Jesus said about the scribes…their state of rebellion against God that gave Satan credit for the work of the Holy Spirit was their undoing.
Sometimes our hearts can become hardened to the seed of God’s Word, and when we hear it, we ignore it or turn away from it, and it never penetrates our hearts. We also have an enemy that seeks to remove the seed of the word before it has a chance to be imbedded in our hearts…the lies we believe…the pride we nurse…the anger we conceal…and the word is rejected.
We must allow God’s word to penetrate our hearts, to allow its razor-sharp blade to plunge into our very souls and expose the pockets of hard resistance lurking there.
IV. The Soils
A. The Wayside Soil
B. The Stony Soil
5 Some fell on stony ground, where it did not have much earth; and immediately it sprang up because it had no depth of earth. 6 But when the sun was up it was scorched, and because it had no root it withered away.
This soil was soft enough for seed to penetrate and even begin to grow, but it was SHALLOW.
When seed is planted in shallow soil, it can take root and it can grow a plant, but the root is not able to go very deep and therefore the plant’s growth is stunted and is not anchored well.
Also, the roots are unable to reach down to the deeper areas of earth were the moisture is…so when the hot sun starts beating down, the plant is scorched and withers up - unable to produce fruit.
16 These likewise are the ones sown on stony ground who, when they hear the word, immediately receive it with gladness;
So, shallow soil = shallow hearts
But notice that the Word is able to penetrate the shallow hearts - it is received “with gladness”.
There were some people that listened to Jesus and recieved what He said with gladness. Here is an example:
John 2:23–25 (NKJV)
23 Now when He was in Jerusalem at the Passover, during the feast, many believed in His name when they saw the signs which He did. 24 But Jesus did not commit Himself to them, because He knew all men, 25 and had no need that anyone should testify of man, for He knew what was in man.
Here we have some believers - they recieved the word with gladness - they saw the signs that Jesus performed and believed in Him…but Jesus knew that they weren’t ready for the next step…they were not ready for more of His kingdom message yet.
In the very next chapter we have a man named Nicodemus coming to Jesus at night to
Sometimes, just below the surface of our hearts, there are some hidden stones.
The soil itself is fertile, but it is shallow.
Jesus said this heart has “no depth of earth”.
Notice what else He says:
17 and they have no root in themselves, and so endure only for a time. Afterward, when tribulation or persecution arises for the word’s sake, immediately they stumble.
These are believers that have been saved and are living out their Christian lives which is why they are experiencing persecution.
Often we choose to obey God we will draw criticism from the world.
The Shallow Soil Hearts represent believers that have forgotten this promise from Jesus:
10 Blessed are those who are persecuted for righteousness’ sake, For theirs is the kingdom of heaven. 11 “Blessed are you when they revile and persecute you, and say all kinds of evil against you falsely for My sake. 12 Rejoice and be exceedingly glad, for great is your reward in heaven, for so they persecuted the prophets who were before you.
Sometimes Jesus rescues us from persecution, but other times He just gives us the strength to endure.
20 Remember the word that I said to you, ‘A servant is not greater than his master.’ If they persecuted Me, they will also persecute you. If they kept My word, they will keep yours also.
Notice what Paul prayed for the Ephesian believers:
Turn to Ephesians 3:16-19
Remember that Paul is praying this prayer on behalf of believers, not unbelievers.
Christians can be immature in their faith, not “rooted and grounded in love.”…but withering from the heat of trials or tribulations or persecution.
Let us strive for spiritual maturity as individuals, families, and as a church to be rooted in Christ!
A church that is soundly rooted cannot be destroyed, but nothing can save a church whose root is dried up. No stimulation, no advertising campaigns, no gifts of money and no beautiful edifice can bring back life to the rootless tree.