Matthew 13:1-23
Notes
Transcript
Matthew 13:1-32
Matthew 13:1-32
Happy Lord’s Day church! This morning we are continuing on in our study of the Gospel of Matthew. As we get into chapter 13, we come to one of the larger teaching portions of Jesus in this book. The chapter is 58 verses long, so we won’t try to tackle it all in one bite this morning, but that is the way that I think it was delivered.
One of the things that we definitely discover, or at least have reinforced, is that Jesus is a teacher. I think he is referred to as such, or found to be doing so, close to 100 times in the the New Testament. In fact, near the end of John chapter 11, we find that the chief priests, the Pharisees and the Sanhedrin gathered together and found that they finally found something to agree upon, Jesus had to go. In fact the Bible actually says that from that day on they planned together to kill Him.
But they didn’t know where He was because Jesus no longer walked openly among the Jews, so they went to the temple courts, because they assumed that Jesus would be there teaching, as that was just who He was an what He did. Now we have teachers in the room with us this morning. We have teachers of Creation, we have teachers of apologetics, a former professor of engineering, Kevin, isn’t here now, but he was a professor of economics, but Jesus was a teacher concerning the Kingdom of God, His Kingdom.
One of the things that we see Him doing consistently is inviting and welcoming whosoever will into the Kingdom. He who has ears to hear...on several occasions the invitation to Follow ME. At the end of chapter 11, "28 "Come to Me, all who are weary and heavy-laden, and I will give you rest." - Matthew 11:28 LSB
If anyone is thirsty, let him come to Me and drink. He who believes in Me, as the Scripture said, ‘From his innermost being will flow rivers of living water.’”
Later in this book, in the 25th chapter of Matthew, He says...."34 "Then the King will say to those on His right, 'Come, you who are blessed of My Father, inherit the kingdom, which has been prepared for you from the foundation of the world." - Matthew 25:34 LSB
He gives invitation, but then we also see and hear Him teaching about the Kingdom, what it is like, and what is expected of those that would become citizens of that Kingdom...which makes complete sense. If we are of a different kingdom, the Kingdom of the earth, and we are leaving that Kingdom to become part of a different Kingdom, a different Kingdom will be different.
Some of you have done this before. You lived in one nation and decided to move to another. I know that before doing that, you did some homework. If you didn’t there are agents outside, no there’s not. Not even a permanent change, but a visit, or a short term missions trip, you study to learn are there things that you are expected to do, are there things that you can do here that might be perceived as offensive there?
Dr. Stewart Webber wrote in his commentary on Matthew, The Old Testament has revealed the earthly reign of Christ on the throne of David. But Matthew 13 introduces a different form of the kingdom—the spiritual reign of the king over his own servants while he is physically absent before his second coming. That is the secret—how his kingdom program will unfold in the period between his two advents. That is the subject of Matthew 13.
This message that Jesus gives is all about the Kingdom of God. We are also going to see a change in His method of teaching, we know it was a change because His disciples ask Him about it, but on this day, at this time, Jesus teaches by telling stories. One story after another. And as we will see, some were getting it, and others weren’t.
It’s a pretty common method of teaching. Sometimes here, if I’m teaching through a passage and it is covering pretty heavy stuff, or maybe I dive a little too deep into theology, and I look out and I see the glaze starting to come over you...as soon as I see the first drop of drool go from somebodies lip to their lap, you might hear me say, let me tell you a story. And you’ll see people revive. We like stories. The word that the Bible uses here to describe these stories is parable (parabole) comes from the combination of the verb ballo (“to throw, cast”) and the prefix para- (“alongside”). The idea is that of placing two things side by side for comparison. A parable uses something with which the learner is familiar from everyday life (farming, the market-place, fishing) and compares it with something that is unfamiliar with...so you will here over and over again as we go through this message of Jesus, the Kingdom of Heaven is like...and there will be a story.
Parables are often described as an earthly story thrown alongside a Heavenly truth. My favorite description of why Jesus taught with parables, and I have no idea who first said it, but it is that parables turn our ears into eyes. They help us to see it. To get the point.
So lets begin, but by way of context as I think it is important here… notice verse one begins...
1 On that day Jesus went out of the house and was sitting by the sea.
On that day...what day? The same day that we left off on.
The same day that Jesus healed the man with the withered hand on the Sabbath, on the same day that Jesus delivered a demon-possessed man that was also blind and mute. The day that the religious leaders after witnessing those things, said, Hey Jesus, how about giving us a sign that You are who You say you are! Jesus responds...an evil and adulterous generation eagerly seeks for a sign...The chapter ends with Jesus describing that when a man is clean, delivered from demonic possession, if that now tidy house is not filled with the Holy Spirit, seven other spirits will return and that man will be in worse shape than he was before...and He says this...that is the way it will also be with this evil generation.
Then we read that scene where Jesus is inside, probably the house of Peter in Capernaum, His mother and brothers show up and can’t get to him because of the crowds, so the send message to Jesus that they are there and He responds with this...
50 “For whoever does the will of My Father who is in heaven, he is My brother and sister and mother.”
So it is on that day...
1 On that day Jesus went out of the house and was sitting by the sea.
and Jesus tells a story, and this first story is about how the Kingdom of God spreads. How it grows. How it goes from one person to another person, to another person, and how it goes from a little fishing village near the Sea of Galilee and spreads to Jerusalem, to Judea, and to Marsh Island and Old Town, Maine.
2 And large crowds gathered to Him, so He got into a boat and sat down, and the whole crowd was standing on the beach.
Can you see that picture in your mind? The Town of Capernaum only had a few thousand people in it in normal times, but these weren’t normal times.
3 And He spoke many things to them in parables, saying, “Behold, the sower went out to sow;
So, just so we understand, from our text who is Jesus talking to? The large crowds, the multitudes that had gathered to see the show. A Sower… A farmer. Now if you picture that scene in your head as they are gathered on the shore...he may have looked up on the hillside....
4 and as he sowed, some seeds fell beside the road, and the birds came and ate them up.
5 “And others fell on the rocky places, where they did not have much soil; and immediately they sprang up, because they had no depth of soil.
6 “But when the sun had risen, they were scorched; and because they had no root, they withered away.
7 “And others fell among the thorns, and the thorns came up and choked them out.
8 “And others fell on the good soil and were yielding a crop, some a hundredfold, some sixty, and some thirty.
9 “He who has ears, let him hear.”
Now Mark gives us a little more, I’ll save the details for when we get there, but it tells us that the disciples didn’t just ask Him why He was teaching that way, teaching in parables, but Jesus what does it mean? I mean they were fishermen. Jesus told them He was going to make them fishers of men? What are you saying, now we’re going to be farmers? SO Jesus gives them the Key to the whole thing...
13 And He said to them, “Do you not understand this parable? How will you understand all the parables?
14 “The sower sows the word.
See parables are not allegories...they are not filled with all kinds of hidden meaning for every element in the parable, in fact that is how you get into trouble with parables. IF I say , well I think the clouds represent this and the wind means that, and the rain is a type of....and you do the same, only with all of your own interpretations, then the Bible doesn’t mean what it says it means. If we are students of the Word then we know the Bible says what it means and means what it says. So when it comes to parables, we want to focus on the main point of the story and not every single element or potential meaning.
Fortunately, in this case we have Jesus to tell us what this one means… so lets jump ahead to that...look down at verse 18 with me...
18 “Hear then the parable of the sower.
19 “When anyone hears the word of the kingdom and does not understand it, the evil one comes and snatches away what has been sown in his heart. This is the one on whom seed was sown beside the road.
20 “And the one on whom seed was sown on the rocky places, this is the man who hears the word and immediately receives it with joy;
21 yet he has no root in himself, but is only temporary, and when affliction or persecution arises because of the word, immediately he falls away.
22 “And the one on whom seed was sown among the thorns, this is the one who hears the word, and the worry of the world and the deceitfulness of wealth choke the word, and it becomes unfruitful.
23 “And the one on whom seed was sown on the good soil, this is the man who hears the word and understands it; who indeed bears fruit and brings forth, some a hundredfold, some sixty, and some thirty.”
So Jesus says what this story tells us is how the Word of God spreads from one person to the next, or from one place to another place, or from one generation to another generation....The sower sows the Word and when the Word lands on good soil, it produces good fruit and inside of good fruit is what?
Now, I’ll use this watermelon for my example, because it is almost summer in Maine, and I plan on eating a lot of watermelon. What is interesting about fruit and it’s seed is you could never really predict what you are going to get, just by looking at the seed. If we zoom in a little closer...
Now if we take just one of those seeds. And in just one of those seeds everything is there that is necessary, it is encoded in Heaven to produce what it is supposed to produce and there are all kinds of stages from seed to fruit, but if we put it in good soil, there is a transformation that occurs. At first you might not think it’s a big deal. I do, I love to see sprouting seedlings anxious to grow....it might look something like this...
and if everything goes right...this grows and ultimately produces fruit....
Some 30, some 60, and some a hundred fold, because there is good reproduceable seed inside of the good fruit. Does that make sense?
Ok, I’ll come back to this, because there is application here for us. But when we put this chapter all together, in a way like Matthew did so it makes sense, we can make another observation about why Jesus is teaching in parables and we notice something further, that one audience heard the parable, but only part of that original audience got the explanation, lets look. Verse...10
10 And the disciples came and said to Him, “Why do You speak to them in parables?”
11 And Jesus answered and said to them, “To you it has been given to know the mysteries of the kingdom of heaven, but to them it has not been given.
Let’s pause there for just a minute....I just want to explain the word mysteries here, because it is a bit different than what it has evolved into in our own culture today.
according to Oxford online dictionary we define it today as....
Oxford Languages : mysteries
Something that is difficult or impossible to understand or explain.
But Mysteries or secrets in the Bible refers to something that was hidden in the Old Testament and now made known in the New Testament. It was no secret in the Old Testament that God was going to send a Messiah, but what was unknown was what kind of Messiah He would be. How He would conquer and establish His Kingdom, that it wouldn’t be with sword or spear, not by brute force, but by sacrificial love and being a servant King.
The bible speaks of this in the book of Colossians....
26 that is, the mystery which has been hidden from the past ages and generations, but has now been manifested to His saints,
but Jesus explains to them that just as the Father is revealed to those He choses out of His mercy, Jesus now speaking, not to the masses, but only to His disciples he says to you it has been given to know, but to them it has not been given to know. Paul talks about this in detail in the book of Corinthians.
I tried to limit the cross references in this passage, but I think these are important. IN THE First chapter Paul writes.
18 For the word of the cross is foolishness to those who are perishing, but to us who are being saved, it is the power of God.
How can it be foolishness to some and life to others? Read 1 Corinthians 2 for a full explanation, but in that chapter he says....
14 But a natural man does not accept the depths of the Spirit of God, for they are foolishness to him, and he cannot understand them, because they are spiritually examined.
So Jesus tells them to them it has been given know, but not to all that were there...lets keep going and fill in the middle, verse 12...
12 “For whoever has, to him more shall be given, and he will have an abundance; but whoever does not have, even what he has shall be taken away from him.
13 “Therefore I speak to them in parables; because while seeing they do not see, and while hearing they do not hear, nor do they understand.
14 “And in them the prophecy of Isaiah is being fulfilled, which says, ‘You will keep on hearing, but will not understand; You will keep on seeing, but will not perceive;
15 For the heart of this people has become dull, And with their ears they scarcely hear, And they have closed their eyes, Lest they would see with their eyes, Hear with their ears, And understand with their heart and return, And I would heal them.’
Who has closed their eyes? Jesus is quoting Isaiah 6 here.
16 “But blessed are your eyes, because they see; and your ears, because they hear.
17 “For truly I say to you that many prophets and righteous men desired to see what you see, and did not see it, and to hear what you hear, and did not hear it.
SO back to the parable...to those who haven’t closed their eyes, Jesus tells a story, that if they want to know, will turn their ears into eyes and they can look for the truth in it and be healed. But to those that are just there out of curiosity and are a part of this wicked generation that has had all kinds of evidence won’t have further condemnation heaped upon them from having indisputable evidence presented to them by the Son of God and willfully reject the testimony the Holy Spirit gives that Jesus is the Messiah and they are sinners in need of salvation.
But to us that have ears to hear. To us that it has been given to understand there is some application. The sower sows the Word. I won’t go back to my picture, actually, I think I can...
My big beautiful watermelon The harvested fruit. The parable that Jesus gives is about not about watermelon. So instead of picturing a nice, red, juicy watermelon, picture in your mind a strong, health, spiritually mature Christian. You might want to jot down any characteristics that come into mind.
I would guess that in their private life there isn’t continuous failure, continuous turning back to secrete sins. I imagine a life of victory. Not flawlessness, but doing the right thing in their family. Serving their spouse. Being quick to forgive, slow to anger. Not exasperating their children, and not ignoring rebellion or defiance either. But in love, redirecting their children back to the the standards of their home, and the foundation that it is built upon, being the Word of God.
I think probably most of us in this room would meet that perfect description right? I mean if there was a police line up with the perfect, mature Christian, some average old sinners, and we were thrown in there, they would think, us and the mature, Christian, walking the walk and us, were identical twins. Maybe, but probably not. How do we get there? What can we learn from this parable?
Jesus says the Word is the seed. This book, the Word of God has the ability to produce that in us. Everything that we need is encoded in this book, and listen, there is no other way for us to get there.
Let me give you three simple ways to invest His word in you life that will result
Take it in.
Purpose to do it and do it. Read it, listen to it. Read it with someone else. Also, doing what we are doing here this morning, listening to teaching. Going to Growth Group to really unpack it and look at personal application.
Meditate upon it.
So what, how does it apply, why does it matter. How should it effect my life, my work, my relationships.
Put it into action!
Jeremiah 23:29 “29 “Is not My word like fire?” declares Yahweh, “and like a hammer which shatters a rock?”
It can change our hearts...fire is a purifier. When someone is super excited about what Jesus is doing, we have an expression where we say they are on fire for the Lord.
29 “Is not My word like fire?” declares Yahweh, “and like a hammer which shatters a rock?
When our hearts are like a rock, not only can God’s Word shatter our hardened bitter hearts, but His Word tells us He will give us a new heart not a repaired heart.
26 “Moreover, I will give you a new heart and put a new spirit within you; and I will remove the heart of stone from your flesh and give you a heart of flesh.
Lets come back to a verse in our parable
3 And He spoke many things to them in parables, saying, “Behold, the sower went out to sow;
Paul said Romans 1:16 “16 For I am not ashamed of the gospel, for it is the power of God for salvation to everyone who believes, to the Jew first and also to the Greek.”
Our sower was fully equipped with the seed. And what did he do with it? He cast it, right? He sowed it.
Consider again where he sowed it. I mean the goal is to have it land in a spot that it is going to produce good fruit. I mean if he put it all in the center of the field, it seems like maybe more would have grown to maturity, but He didn’t. It is His farm He knows where the wayside it, but I want you to notice that He cast seed everywhere.
Some might say He was careless. I think a better word would be generous. See, we don’t know, who is which soil. Who is shallow or rocky ground, who is the wayside, or the thorns and where is the good soil? The point is we don’t know, we can’t know. I read it already, to one it is foolishness and to the one being saved it is the power of God! Our job, our practical application is to sow the seed.
Jesus used the example of Jonah, last week, I will too. Jonah did everything wrong, except He spoke forth the Word of God and it had the power to save, all by it’s self.
There is something else we can do. We can prepare the soil to receive the seed. We can pray. We can serve others with humility. We can let the message of our life soften the hardend ground. We can help the pick out the rocks or the thorns. Preparing the soil for when it is ready to receive the Seed. The Seed is the Word.
Listen church as you exit the building this morning. I hope you notice this every time you leave, but we have a tendency to be like the masses and grow dull and not see things. There is a reminder as you leave here and go out into the world that you are now entering the mission field. SO go out and cast some seed.
Grace and Peace
