Clear Communication – Matthew 13:1-17

When I was growing up my parents took us to Presbyterian church every Sunday and in our church service, every Sunday, we said the Lord’s Prayer and the Apostles’ Creed. I was not a believer. When, at age 16, I was saved in a Cumberland Presbyterian church, where we also said the Lord’s Prayer and the Apostles’ Creed, it was like a whole new thing. Yes, the words were familiar and gave me a sense of comfort, but, with a new interpretive key in my spirit, they were suddenly so much more meaningful and powerful in their effect.

When God wants to speak to us he does so plainly. When He is judging our rebellion, He does not. Jesus begins speaking in parables to the crowds.  They hear the words but without the interpretive key, they don’t get the powerful effect.

That same day Jesus went out of the house and sat beside the sea. And great crowds gathered about him, so that he got into a boat and sat down. And the whole crowd stood on the beach. And he told them many things in parables, saying: “A sower went out to sow. And as he sowed, some seeds fell along the path, and the birds came and devoured them. Other seeds fell on rocky ground, where they did not have much soil, and immediately they sprang up, since they had no depth of soil, but when the sun rose they were scorched. And since they had no root, they withered away. Other seeds fell among thorns, and the thorns grew up and choked them. Other seeds fell on good soil and produced grain, some a hundredfold, some sixty, some thirty. He who has ears, let him hear.”

Then the disciples came and said to him, “Why do you speak to them in parables?” And he answered them, “To you it has been given to know the secrets of the kingdom of heaven, but to them it has not been given. For to the one who has, more will be given, and he will have an abundance, but from the one who has not, even what he has will be taken away. This is why I speak to them in parables, because seeing they do not see, and hearing they do not hear, nor do they understand. Indeed, in their case the prophecy of Isaiah is fulfilled that says:

“You will indeed hear but never understand, and you will indeed see but never perceive.” For this people’s heart has grown dull, and with their ears they can barely hear, and their eyes they have closed, lest they should see with their eyes and hear with their ears and understand with their heart and turn, and I would heal them.“

But blessed are your eyes, for they see, and your ears, for they hear. For truly, I say to you, many prophets and righteous people longed to see what you see, and did not see it, and to hear what you hear, and did not hear it. (Matthew 13:1-17 ESV)

This is the same day of opposition and Jesus marks it by teaching in parables.  You cannot understand a parable unless you are given the interpretive key.  In the case of this parable about the sower, who or what does the sower represent? Without knowing that the story has no meaning for you.  The disciples realize this shift in teaching and question it and Jesus explains that it is a judgment on Israel.  Isaiah predicted the time when God would send a message that the nation could not hear because God did not want them to hear it.  He had reached an end of His unbelievably long-enduring patience and He no longer was giving Israel a place for repentance.  They had become hardened just as these Pharisees had.

But the disciples are not hardened.  They are receptive, and should any in the crowd want to know the meaning, Jesus will tell them, also.  The the secrets of the kingdom belong to those whose hearts are open to God.  They are only secrets, of course, because human hearts are so covered over with scar tissue from sin.  But the disciples have had their eyes opened to see what many prophets and righteous people had been longing for, the coming of Messiah and the kingdom.  

Our responsibility when we have truth is to act upon it and when we do God gives us more in abundance.  If we stop acting on it we become hardened and unperceiving.