Parable of the Sower
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These persons could cultivate and enrich the soil of their hearts, if
they would, so that the truth would take deeper hold; but this involves
too much patience and self-denial. It costs them too much effort to
make a radical change in their lives. They are easily offended by
reproof, and ready to say with the disciples who left Jesus, “This is
a hard saying; who can hear it?” “And these are they likewise which
are sown on stony ground; who, when they have heard the word,
immediately receive it with gladness; and have no root in themselves,
and so endure but for a time; afterward, when affliction or persecution
ariseth for the word’s sake, immediately they are offended.”
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Jesus represents the seed as falling into neglected borders and
patches covered with rank weeds which choke the precious plants that
spring up among them; they grow sickly and perish. Many hearts
respond to the voice of truth, but they do not properly receive and
cherish it. They give it a place in the soil of the natural heart, without
preparing the ground and rooting out the poisonous weeds that flourish
there, and watching every hour in order to destroy them should they
again appear. The cares of life, the fascination of riches, the longing
for forbidden things, crowd out the love of righteousness before the
good seed can bear fruit. Pride, passion, self-love, and love of the
world, with envy and malice, are no companions for the truth of God.
As it is necessary thoroughly to cultivate the soil that has once been
overgrown with weeds, so it is necessary for the Christian to be diligent
in exterminating the faults that threaten his eternal ruin. Patient, earnest
effort in the name and strength of Jesus, can alone remove the evil
tendencies of the natural heart. But those who have allowed their faith
to be overcome by the growth of Satan’s influences, fall into a worse
state than that which they occupied before they heard the words of life.
“And these are they which are sown among thorns; such as hear the
word, and the cares of this world, and the deceitfulness of riches, and
the lusts of other things entering in, choke the word, and it becometh
unfruitful.”
Few hearts are like the good soil, well-cultivated, and receive the
seeds of truth and bring forth abundant fruit to the glory of God. But
Jesus finds some earnest Christians, rich in good works and sincere
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in their endeavors. “And these are they which are sown on good
ground; such as hear the word, and receive it, and bring forth fruit,
some thirty-fold, some sixty, and some an hundred.”