What do you make of this?

Mark 4:1-9

¹ Again Jesus began to teach by the lake. The crowd that gathered around him was so large that he got into a boat and sat in it out on the lake, while all the people were along the shore at the water’s edge. ² He taught them many things by parables, and in his teaching said: ³ “Listen! A farmer went out to sow his seed. ⁴ As he was scattering the seed, some fell along the path, and the birds came and ate it up. ⁵ Some fell on rocky places, where it did not have much soil. It sprang up quickly, because the soil was shallow. ⁶ But when the sun came up, the plants were scorched, and they withered because they had no root. ⁷ Other seed fell among thorns, which grew up and choked the plants, so that they did not bear grain. ⁸ Still other seed fell on good soil. It came up, grew and produced a crop, some multiplying thirty, some sixty, some a hundred times.”

⁹ Then Jesus said, “Whoever has ears to hear, let them hear.”

The Message translation writes that Jesus asked the crowd, what do you make of this?

And Jesus tells a story about a farmer who scattered seed on four types of ground. Hard, Rocky, shallow and fertile.

What do I make of this?

What kind of a farmer scatters seed on hard, rocky and shallow ground?

That seems to me like a waste. This farmer is careless. The farmer should have been more careful so that the seed had a better chance of producing a crop. But the seed being scattered by this farmer is not a grain of wheat that is in limited supply. The seed being sown here is the gospel which never runs out. 

It doesn’t matter that it lands on rocky soil, or hard soil, the farmer scatters the seed anyway.

What do I make of this? Don’t worry about the condition of the heart, scatter the seed, scatter the Word anyway. We don’t make the seed grow anyway, it is God who makes it grow.

Father, thank you that you make the seed grow. You can also change the condition of the heart, so I pray that those who appear to have a hard heart towards your word, will have a soft heart, ready to receive your word.

Written by Andrew Martin