Chapter 3—“First the Blade, Then the Ear”
This chapter is based on
Mark 4:26-29
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The parable of the sower excited much questioning. Some of the
hearers gathered from it that Christ was not to establish an earthly
kingdom, and many were curious and perplexed. Seeing their perplex-
ity, Christ used other illustrations, still seeking to turn their thoughts
from the hope of a worldly kingdom to the work of God’s grace in the
soul.
“And He said, So is the kingdom of God, as if a man should cast
seed into the ground; and should sleep, and rise night and day, and the
seed should spring and grow up, he knoweth not how. For the earth
bringeth forth fruit of herself; first the blade, then the ear, after that the
full corn in the ear. But when the fruit is brought forth, immediately
he putteth in the sickle, because the harvest is come.”
The husbandman who “putteth in the sickle, because the harvest is
come,” can be no other than Christ. It is He who at the last great day
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will reap the harvest of the earth. But the sower of the seed represents
those who labor in Christ’s stead. The seed is said to “spring and grow
up, he knoweth not how,” and this is not true of the Son of God. Christ
does not sleep over His charge, but watches it day and night. He is not
ignorant of how the seed grows.
The parable of the seed reveals that God is at work in nature. The
seed has in itself a germinating principle, a principle that God Himself
has implanted; yet if left to itself the seed would have no power to
spring up. Man has his part to act in promoting the growth of the grain.
He must prepare and enrich the soil and cast in the seed. He must
till the fields. But there is a point beyond which he can accomplish
nothing. No strength or wisdom of man can bring forth from the seed
the living plant. Let man put forth his efforts to the utmost limit, he
must still depend upon One who has connected the sowing and the
reaping by wonderful links of His own omnipotent power.
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