[AI translation] In this parable, Jesus Christ is talking about the fruitful Christian life. The often overlooked practical fact that everything in our Christian faith is for the fruit. The kingdom of God, of which Jesus spoke so much, can be defined in many ways. A whole dogmatic study could be written about what it is, but in practical terms it can be simplified to the point of saying that the kingdom of God is essentially nothing more than a fruitful life.Jesus was born into this world, died and rose again so that our wretched, powerless lives might bear fruit that we could not bear ourselves. Fruit that is not produced by human strength, but only by the power of God's Spirit. Fruits of love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, temperance! Jesus was thinking of such fruits when he spoke of the good seed that falls into the ground and bears fruit, thirty, sixty, even a hundred. God's word is that all that Jesus did by his life and death as a seed should come into the life of man, sprout there and bear such fruit.
This fruit is closely related to the word, to the word of God. It comes from the Word, it produces. So the fruit will not come by getting up, getting pissed off, pulling myself together and deciding that I want to do good, or that I will love, or that I will be kind, good, gentle. No! The fruit will grow! It springs up of itself, so that the word of God, the word of God, like a heavenly seed, is put into my ear, through it or through my eyes into my heart, like a seed into the ground. There, an uncontrollable process begins, invisible, and suddenly the seed, the word, becomes visible again, but now in a different form: in a gesture, in a caressing, comforting word, or in joy, gentleness, faithfulness. In the fruit, then.
Jesus promised this fruit in the strongest terms. He said that those who bear fruit, some thirty or sixty or a hundred, are sown in the good soil. So he promised an abundant harvest. He promised that from the seeds of the word that was preached or read, there would be a very rich harvest of fruit. Let us never give up this hope! If Jesus promises something, it will be done. And He promised that those who keep the word they hear with a pure and good heart will bear fruit. And much fruit. Plenty.
Do such fruits really come from the preaching of the word? Because the word is preached! In the whole world! Every day, and especially on Sundays, the seeds of God's Word, the holy seeds from which the kingdom of God should spring forth, fall into hundreds of thousands of souls. This great sowing has been going on for two thousand years, so how is it that there is so little fruit, so little love, joy, peace, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, temperance in the lives of men? Let us put it this way: in our lives? How can it be that there is such a shocking lack of results from Bible study, from attending preaching sessions, from sowing seeds in general?
This question is only really valid if I personally ask it to myself, and you ask it to yourself: how often have I listened to or read the Word, and with what results? Where in my life are the fruits that Jesus promised? Is there not yet such great fruitfulness in the word that has so often fallen into my heart?
Well, brothers and sisters, this tantalizing question was asked and answered by Jesus before it was even formulated. This is what the parable of the sower is all about. We understand from it that even from the word of God we cannot expect some unnatural miracle, that it does not work in the heart like a winding mechanism or a machine that has been started, but, as Jesus says, like a grain of wheat sown in the ground.
For the fertility of the seed also depends on the quality of the soil! When the tombs of the pharaohs in Egypt were excavated thousands of years ago, they found in the huge stone tombs grains of wheat that had lain there dead, barren and fruitless for thousands of years. There could have been sacks of wheat there for all the good it would have done. But when these grains of wheat were brought up from the dark stone walls and sown in fertile, good soil, the millennia-old seeds were stirred to life, germination began and the ears of wheat ripened.
The human soul can also be like a stone tomb encased in a pyramid, in which the seeds of the Word have been piling up for years: there are golden words from the Bible, well-known passages from the Holy Scriptures, but no fruit. And maybe the same verb in another soul will bring wonderful results to the glory of God.
The overall great lesson of the parable of the sower is that fruit depends not only on the seed, but also on the soil. If the word you hear or read is ineffective in your life, it is not the word! That word is still, after two thousand years, as much a living seed as a grain of wheat found in a rock grave. Even more alive! Jesus tells us very clearly and plainly what is the real reason for a fruitless life. He illustrates this with three different examples, as we heard in the parable:
1) First, he says that the seed sometimes falls by the wayside where it is trampled underfoot or picked up by birds. He explains it this way: these are those who hear the word, but the devil comes and plucks it out of their hearts. Imagine, while sowing a seed, a seed, or even many seeds, falling on the hard-trodden little path that separates one field from another. What happens to it? It simply doesn't have time to do its work. That seed needs time to come to life. But there is no time! No time!
This is one of the greatest miseries of man today. So much horse-running that he cannot be a real plough-land for a quarter of an hour a day, and wait in silence to see what God wants to pour into the open furrows of his soul. There is no time for a man to ponder in a little silence a word he has read or heard. To turn a little in his heart, to listen a little to what it means for him on this particular day. To digest it a little, to soak it in his thoughts.
Do you want to expect results from watching that day's Lozung in between washing up and breakfast, or reading a quick passage from the Bible in your sleep before you go to bed at night? Because by the time it's time to put it into practice, you don't even know what you've read! That passage is nowhere to be found. You often have no idea what God said to you that day! How can it take root and bear fruit? The birds got it!
Jesus says: the devil will get the word out of their hearts. The devil! Don't think here of some special, scary-looking devilish phenomenon. That devil can be as tiny as your shoelaces that you tied too tight in the morning and your feet hurt so much that it takes your mind off the Word. Or an annoying thought, why does this priest speak so loudly or so softly? Or a bug crawling on the wall while the sermon is being preached. Or the topic of conversation that someone will start with you half an hour later on the way out of church. Yes, the birds love to lurk at the church door and haunt those returning home from worship. The conversation is going on between the people who were just listening to the Word. You start a bit of gossip to stumble over. A good joke is told that can be laughed at, or someone's complaint is poured out that can be commiserated, and if we were asked an hour later what the sermon was about, we might not be able to tell it. But how could we, for on the way home the birds had picked up all the seeds that had fallen on the roadside.
And so the sowing is wasted and fruitless. This is the seed that fell on the roadside! It will not bear fruit.
2) Secondly, Jesus says: the same result if the seed falls on the stony place. In the thin layer of humus on the top of the stone slab, it will sprout quickly, but it will not be able to get its roots deep, and the first hot sun will dry it out. These, Jesus explains, are the ones who welcome the word, but have no root. They believe for a while, but when it comes to taking a stand for the word, they break off.
This is the kind of emotional Christianity that can be very enthusiastic about a preaching of the Word. He tells all around how great it was, how blessed it was. How heartfelt it was, as if the pastor was speaking directly to him. In his touched devotion, great enthusiasms, resolutions, vows, beautiful plans and promising thoughts are born in him. The seed of the Word germinates beautifully. Only then come the temptations of daily life. When you really have to love that vile person who has hurt you so rudely and unjustly, or when you really have to bear with patience the impossible family situation you have found yourself in, or when you have to reach into your pockets and make not a charitable donation but a serious sacrifice for God's cause or for others, and when, in a given situation, you really have to take seriously the need to "deny yourself", to deny the anger that you feel is justified, that someone's brutality would provoke - that is, when it comes to the fruit - that is when it comes out: your whole Christianity is superficial. It's just an emotional rollercoaster. No deep roots in that seed at all. Nor can it bear the heat of such small temptations, such burdens. And what has begun to germinate withers, sprouts like a salamander. The word is good for him only so long as it caresses him, comforts him, gives him truth, or delights him. As soon as it cuts into his soul, so that it hurts, then it is no longer needed! Do not penetrate to the very depths of the soul!
Such a hearer of the word, with all his ardent listening, remains the same man he was. Nothing changes in him. The seed does not become fruit!
3) Jesus points to the trouble when the seed falls among thorns and they choke it before it can bear fruit. Thorns, according to Jesus, are the troubles of life, the deceitfulness of riches or the delights offered. It is when one's heart is divided. He seeks salvation, but he doesn't want to let go of worldly pleasures either. He loves Jesus in his own way, but he also plays with Satan. He confesses Jesus as Lord, but he does not want to put everything at His service. He acknowledges God's sovereignty over all things, but he cannot and will not sacrifice everything for Him. He is bound up in himself, unable to get rid of certain things that God has judged to be a waste and sin in his life. He has never made a sharp decision on the question of either/or. He tries to stay in the middle between the kingdom of Jesus and the cares, riches and pleasures of life.
The thorns grow in him along with the seeds of the Word, and because of them the corn cannot grow and ripen. No wonder, then, that it remains unfruitful.
Let us not be surprised, then, if so many preaching and Bible-reading efforts remain fruitless. Indeed, it is a wonder if there is any soil at all in which the seeds do not fall in vain. But indeed, is there such soil? Is there such a thing as keeping the word you have heard with a pure and good heart and bearing fruit - as Jesus says here? There is! There must be, Jesus says.
Now, let no one think that we are talking about different types of people. So that one person has this kind of spiritual disposition or gift and another has that kind of disposition or gift: it is not his fault, he was born that way! That's not the point! Our Lord is not talking here about different types of people, but rather about the fact that each one of us, individually, carries within himself these four types of field. There are times in our lives, occasions, situations, when we are like one or the other. But it also means that your heart can also be turned from a trodden, stony or weedy soil into a good soil! You can fend off the flitting birds yourself, if you are alert and watchful!
How good it would be to revive the old Reformed custom of revisiting and discussing the word they heard in church at noon on Sundays in the family circle at home. But it is not just a rapturous or disparaging critique of the sermon, but the humility of the believer's soul seeking God as people tell each other what God has said to them through that word. How they want to change as a result, and how they would help each other to do so. Then, with the humus of their prayer, they would cover the seeds of the word that had fallen there.
Let us humbly accept that God will sometimes plow up our petrified souls and soften them with the ether of some suffering. Or bathe us with some trial. He does this not by accident, but out of love. For in the freshly ploughed ground, the seed grows better. And then Jesus can root out the root of all kinds of thorns, if one allows the cleansing influence of His blood to reach down to them.
In a word, you too can obey the Word you have heard or read, for nothing else but obedience: immediate, unconditional obedience is the only secret of fruitfulness. And this is what Jesus is pointing to here. He promised that those who keep the word they hear with a pure and good heart will bear fruit! So every soul can become good soil: yours and mine, which will then bear the great fruits of love, joy, peace, temperance, and witnessing to Him.
He sows the word. He also gives it to us abundantly, daily. And that is all he expects from you. Get started, today!
Amen.
Date: 26 November 1967.