Hear God’s Word and hear it well!

Sermon for Sexagesima

2 Corinthians 11:19-12:9  +  Luke 8:4-15

I’m very glad you are all here in church this morning (or tuning in online). You took a very important step, coming to church or listening online, a step toward growing in faith and growing in love, because this is where God’s Word preached, where God the Holy Spirit comes to awaken faith and strengthen faith and empower you to live as Christians in an antichristian world. But you know, I think, that just being here in the place where the Word of God is preached is entirely useless if you’re not actually listening. And if you listen with joy and believe what you hear, but then let pressure from the world keep you from living according to your faith, then listening won’t have helped you, in the end. And if you listen now, but let yourself get distracted by all the things there are to do in the world, so that you don’t put the Word into practice, then being in church and hearing the Word will, likewise, have all been for nothing.

But, if you hear, and listen, and take to heart what you hear, if you hear God’s Word and hear it well, if you dig into God’s Word with roots that run deep, so that you can bear up under the world’s persecutions with patience, if you’re watching out for the distractions and praying for God’s help to keep from being strangled by them, then God’s Word will be fruitful in you and in your life, both for this life and for eternal life. That’s the message in a nutshell of today’s parable of the sower and the seed. Let’s take a closer look at it.

Jesus addresses the parable to the multitudes who had gathered around Him. Some had come, no doubt, out of curiosity. Some had come with malicious intentions. Some had come for healing. Some had come to hear this “good news of the kingdom” that Jesus had been preaching all over Israel. Regardless, Jesus preached the same Word of God to them all. And He has a warning for all of them, too, because simply hearing His words that day would benefit them nothing if they didn’t take this warning to heart.

So He tells them the parable of the sower who went out to sow his seed, and it fell on four different kinds of ground: Along the hardened path, where it doesn’t sprout at all, because it’s trampled or snatched away by birds. On the rocky soil, where it sprouts quickly, but is quickly scorched by the heat and withers, because it has only shallow roots. Among the thorns, where the seed takes root, but is choked by the surrounding weeds. And on the good ground, where it sprouts, grows, and flourishes.

He who has ears to hear, let him hear!

And yet, not even Jesus’ own disciples understood what the parable meant. That was intentional on Jesus’ part. As He says, To you it has been given to know the mysteries of the kingdom of God, but to others in parables, that seeing they may not see, and hearing they may not understand. The truth was laid out for the crowds, but they couldn’t see it. Why? Because only the Holy Spirit can truly open a person’s eyes to see and ears to hear the truth of God’s Word. This truth of the sower and the seed was hidden from the multitudes for the time being, although anyone who cared to know could have asked Jesus about it, as His disciples did. And later, anyone who was willing to listen could listen to the apostles explain the parable, as Jesus explained it to them, even as we’re doing here today.

The seed is the Word of God as it’s preached. So we’re not talking about all those people out there, who never even hear the Word of God. We’re talking about people who have heard the Word of God, the Law and the Gospel. We’re talking about people in here, people who sit in pews and chairs in church or who listen to the Word at home, if they can’t make it to church.

Sometimes the Word falls on hard ground. The ground may be hard because people aren’t really listening. Or, just as commonly, it may be hard because people often come with their own preconceived notions about God, about the truth. They may have hardened their hearts with their own sin, so that the Word of God doesn’t penetrate at all through their own stubbornness and willfulness. They come with their own agenda, to defend themselves or to puff themselves up rather than to allow the word of God to expose their sin. They come with confidence in their own works, so that the word of God about the far superior works of Christ is snatched away by the devil.

Sometimes the Word falls on rocky ground, with enough good soil on top for the seed to take root, but not enough to for it to send down roots to capture the much-needed moisture. Some people do receive the Gospel of Christ gladly. They worship Jesus as their Lord with excitement. But for them, it remains superficial. They don’t dig into God’s Word. These are the people who don’t think that “doctrine” matters or that creeds are important. Just some sort of “relationship with Jesus.” But as the Lord Jesus warns, the only way for faith to survive all the hardships and persecutions that go along with being a Christian is for that initial faith to grow. Christians have to become firmly grounded in God’s Word, hear it often, ponder it, study it, and pray for the Holy Spirit’s enlightenment. Otherwise, when they’re attacked for their beliefs, when they’re attacked for being Christians, they’ll shrivel up like a plant without roots in the desert heat.

Sometimes the Word falls among thorns, among weeds. It sprouts. People believe the Word. But, you know, there’s stuff on TV or stuff on the screen, there are jobs and chores that require our attention. There are books to read, and tests to study for. There’s money to make and to invest and to save and to spend. There are friends to hang out with and families to spend time with. And the Word of God and the Christian faith and Christ Himself become just one small part of person’s life. But the Christian faith doesn’t work that way, doesn’t survive that way. If Christ and His Word become just one small part of your life, capturing just one small part of your heart, faith won’t thrive. It won’t even survive.

But then, sometimes, the Word when it’s preached falls on good ground, good soil. People hear it and listen. They listen as the Law of God convicts them of sin, without allowing any of their excuses to stand. They listen as the Gospel is preached, that Christ suffered and died for their sins and now calls them to repent and believe in Him for the forgiveness of sins. Then they ponder what they’ve heard. They go back again and again and listen. They don’t always understand everything they hear (just as Jesus’ disciples didn’t), but they keep listening anyway, trusting that their God will reveal everything in due time. They seek to put God’s Word into practice in their lives. They live in daily contrition and repentance. They pray that their hearts may not become hardened by sin or unbelief. They pray for God’s help to overcome the hardships that go alone with being a faithful Christian, the false accusations, the ridicule, the mockery, even the torture. They’re careful not to let distractions crowd out the word of God from their lives, but to order their lives around hearing God’s Word and putting it into practice, to live in faith and in love. In short, they remain planted in Christ Himself, and so they bear much fruit, with which God the Father is truly pleased.

God has already granted you ears to hear. May His Holy Spirit now work mightily through what you have heard, to preserve you in the faith and to cultivate both faith and love in your heart, that the Father may be glorified, and that you may be true disciples of Christ. Amen.