00:00
00:00
00:01
Transcript
1/0
This message was given at Grace
Community Church in Minden, Nevada. At the end, we will give information
about how to contact us to receive a copy of this or other messages. If you have your Bibles, let's
open up to the Gospel of Luke. Gospel of Luke chapter 8. Luke chapter 8, we'll be picking
up in verse 4. This is the reading of God's
word. And when a great crowd was gathering
and people from town after town came to him, he said in a parable,
A sower went out to sow his seed, and as he sowed, some fell along
the path and was trampled underfoot, and the birds of the air devoured
it. And some fell on the rock, and
as it grew up, it withered away because it had no moisture. And
some fell among thorns, and the thorns grew up with it and choked
it. And some fell into good soil
and grew and yielded a hundredfold. As he said these things, he called
out, he who has ears to hear, let him hear. And when his disciples
asked him what this parable meant, he said, To you, it has been
given to know the secrets or the mysteries of the kingdom
of God. But for others, they are in parables,
so that seeing they may not see, and hearing they may not understand. This is the reading of God's
word. You know, sometimes people are
simply surprising. Have you ever had an experience
where you are talking with someone, you're spending time with someone,
you may have known them for years and for years, and then suddenly
they do something, or suddenly they share something with you,
they say something, and it is a total surprise coming from
them. They do this, they say this, whatever it is, some way
they grew up, some perspective they have on this or on that,
and you find you are looking at them in a light that you have
never seen them before. Can you relate to the experience?
What's interesting about it is on the one hand, it can be totally
surprising. You would never have thought
of it. But then on the other, once you have a minute to process,
you think, well, that actually makes a lot of sense. you can
see them more clearly because of the light that has now been
shown upon them. I suspect that this passage in
Luke's gospel will show Jesus to many of you in a new light. And I expect that on the one
hand, you may find that unsettling. But on the other, if you will
hear what the word of God has to say, I think you're going
to find that Jesus's ministry makes just a little bit more
sense after you've seen him from that new perspective. See, where
we start is we start with a parable unexplained. That's verses four
through eight. In verse four, I'll read this
for you just a bit at a time so I make sure not to lose you
on any of the details. Verse four says this, and when
a great crowd was gathering and people from town after town came
to him, he said in a parable. So this crowd is gathering and
what you're finding about Jesus's ministry is that it's beginning
to sort of gain recognition. Day by day, more and more people
have heard of him. Day by day, people want to hear
from him. They seek him out to hear what
he will teach them, what he will show them. And he takes this
crowd and he teaches them in a parable. Now, what is a parable? Sometimes we assume that we know
what we're talking about when really we're quite fuzzy about
the specifics. And a parable is basically illustrating
a principle about God using something understood in everyday life.
is generally longer than a metaphor or a simile. And it ends up being
much more like a story. There's often characters involved
in it. And a parable, teaching using
parables, this was a popular teaching method. And so Jesus
has employed a popular teaching method for when he is teaching
these large crowds. And scene by scene, illustration
by illustration, he's using things that would have been familiar
to people in that society, but we find that the time and the
distance, we don't necessarily always understand each picture
that he's giving, so we might need a little more explaining.
So, verse 5. A sower went out to sow his seed,
and as he sowed, some fell along the path and was trampled underfoot,
and the birds of the air devoured it. Jesus starts with seed that
falls on a path. The picture here, it's a simple
picture. Picture a field where agriculture
might be going on, but there's a path cutting through that field. And so, as someone's out there
sowing their seed, some inevitably ends up landing, not on the cultivated
land, but on that well-worn and packed down path. And there,
the seed can't go anywhere, and the seed is exposed. It's exposed
to travelers on the path who trample that seed underfoot.
It's exposed to the birds of the air who swoop down and eat
it. The seed in this case is prevented
from being fruitful. And instead of being fruitful,
it is destroyed. It is eaten. Verse six, Jesus
next describes seed that falls on the rock. And some fell on
the rock and as it grew up, it withered away because it had
no moisture. Now here, what's pictured again,
not that complicated. You have a field, and we hear
rocky soil, and you picture big rocks scattered all across the
top, and that's probably not what we're talking about. More
likely is you have a field with a thin layer of dirt in certain
spots, and underneath those patches of dirt might have been a base
of limestone underneath. So from the surface without doing
any work, it would be hard to recognize that that area has
the rocky soil underneath it. From the surface, it would look
like the rest of the field. The result then, you sow a seed
there and the seed grows up, but its growth is always going
to be inhibited. Its growth is always going to
be limited by that rocky soil that lies underneath. Luke points
out that the big deficiency here is going to be a lack of moisture
in the soil. Matthew and Mark, when they tell
this same parable, they focus on the lack of depth of the soil. But in the end, the plant withers
away. The seed got further on this
type of soil than the seed that was sown on the path, but ultimately,
neither was fruitful. Verse seven, the third example.
seed sown among thorns. And some fell among thorns and
the thorns grew up with it and choked it. Apparently, I haven't
been there, I haven't seen these, but apparently there are these
Palestinian weeds that grow up like six feet tall. And that
might be what we're talking about here. And even if you've never
seen a Palestinian weed, we all know what these weeds are like.
Weeds, they grow fast. They're so often hard to kill.
And every day that they grow, they are competing for water. They're competing for nutrients
in the soil. And you have the more delicate
stuff, you know, the stuff that you actually want to grow up. And what happens when the weeds
are there? The delicate stuff ends up dying off if you leave
it alone with the weeds. And so it is here. The desirable
plant, it can't compete. and it ends up being killed off
by the weed. Once again, the seed is prevented
from being fruitful. You get to verse eight and finally,
Finally, the seed falls on good soil. I read the first half of
verse 8 for you. And here you have it, when the
conditions are right, the seed is fruitful, like it's meant
to be. It prospers. It grows so it can
bear even more seed, a hundredfold. A hundredfold would have been
a very good result for a single seed. But then in the second
half of verse eight, Jesus concludes his message to the crowds. I
want you to hear this. As he said these things, he called
out, he who has ears to hear, let him hear. Jesus will talk like this, if
you have ears to hear. And the point, it is a challenge. It is a challenge to everyone
who has heard Jesus speak to respond correctly. Jesus is saying,
think seriously about what I just said. Leon Morris, he says this
in this way. He says, it's like, if you have
ears, use them. How often do we not do justice
to what we are told, to what we are taught? We hear sermons
friends and brothers and sisters, they give us good counsel from
the word. We spend time in the word ourselves,
and when we do so, we're receiving these truths, and not just like
little bitty truths, but the most important kinds of truths
out there. When we are in the word, we're
receiving the truth from God, and he tells us what reality
is really like. We hear these truths from God
and we receive the truth of the gospel and we're shown how it
is we're supposed to live in light of the most glorious good
news in all of creation. And often we hear these words,
we read these words, and they are compelling us to change. They're saying, you're not living
right. You are not living in light of
what you have just been told, of the truth that you say you
believe in. And then, We'll take those words,
you almost imagine we're looking them over, we're thinking about
them, we're mulling them, and we'll feel them. We'll feel how
sharp they are, what a deep cut they could deliver. We'll look
them over for just a little bit, and then we'll put them down
and walk away. We'll be able to sense how important that truth
is, how much we need that truth in our life, whether it's conviction
or encouragement. We look it over and we say, I'll
think about that later. Have you ever heard a sermon?
Thought that was a good sermon. That was a faithful sermon. I
really appreciate the words of truth that I just heard. And
then gone and promptly forgotten it. Not the only one. Have you ever told someone, hey,
would you pray for me? Man, I'm really struggling with
this. I'm really working on this. And then that person has the
nerve the next week, ask you how it's been going. That thing
that you said was so important and it turns out you haven't
thought about it all week. Wow, that's so important. I just
can't remember to think about it over the week. Have you ever
found conviction just slipping away like sand through your fingers? Jesus would say to you, do justice
to what you have heard. Take the words of life and consider
them. Reflect on them. Be blessed by
them. Live them out. Let no one be
able to say of you that you ever wasted a word of God. Let no
one be able to say of you that you did not embrace every single
gift that the Lord had for you. The Lord would rain down blessing
upon you if you would just have it. Hear. Believe. Receive the blessings
of the Lord. You come back to this original
crowd, and I'm going to ask you to do something that's near impossible,
but I want you to try and put yourself in their shoes. This
is a famous parable. I remember learning as a little
kid. I had a song taught to me. I remember parts of the song
still. It's a famous parable that we
have a hard time getting distance from because to us it's always
been familiar. But I want you to imagine that
you have never had this explained to you. No one has ever used
this picture to teach you. You never had a Sunday school
class where they explained it to you. Picture you're in that
original crowd and you hear this rabbi painting a picture that's
really rather ordinary. If all it is is seeds on soils,
every single part of it is like, well, okay. Yeah, that makes
sense. But then the rabbi concludes
his parable by saying, and you better act accordingly. Remember,
there is no command. He gave no command in that parable. There's no point where he explains
that parable to everyone. There's no point where he applied
that parable to everyone. All there is, is illustration.
All there is is illustration. And have you ever been in a conversation
where someone's explaining something, you're like, uh-huh, uh-huh,
uh-huh. And then they pause and they say something like, you
see what I mean? And the problem is you have no idea what they
mean. Have you ever been there? Are you feeling that right now? You see what I mean? And you
don't know what they're talking about. They're sitting there
with this look like, it's obvious, right? The conclusion's obvious.
Do you see what I mean? And you're just not following.
It can be an uncomfortable moment because sometimes it just means
you were spacing out while they were talking and that's uncomfortable
to have to admit. But here, Jesus concludes a rather
normal illustration. about what happens when you sow
seed on different kinds of soils. And then he gives this exhortation
to do justice to what they've heard. Do you feel the disconnect
there? What do you mean do justice to
this? I bet they were confused. I bet those crowds were confused
and actually I am positive they were confused because his disciples
come to him later and they say, we don't know what that meant.
Will you tell us what that meant? The speakers are going to attack
me if you could do something about that. So this leads us to an important
question. Why did Jesus use parables? See, there's a common answer
and that turns out to be just far too simple. The common answer
says Jesus used parables because he was trying to be clear and
memorable. Well, that's not quite right.
There's the common answer and then there's the true answer.
And the true answer to why he used parables depends on who
the listener was. in relation to Jesus. Were they
believing in Jesus or were they rejecting Jesus? I want you to
see what Jesus says in verses nine and 10. And when his disciples
asked him what this parable meant, he said, to you it has been given
to know the mysteries of the kingdom of God. But for others,
they are in parables, so that seeing they may not see, and
hearing they may not understand. That is a weird statement to
make if Jesus is simply trying to be clear and memorable. See, there's parables, for disciples
of Jesus, and there are parables for those who have rejected Jesus. We start with parables for disciples,
parables for those who have accepted Jesus, who are following Jesus.
You know, before we get too far into that point, I just want
to point out, I just want you to notice that the disciples
were confused. And so what did they do? They
went to ask God. That right there, great model
for life. And let's never underestimate
the need and the privilege of being able to take our confusion
to God and seek his wisdom. Part of them having ears to hear
is that they didn't wallow in their uncertainty. They went
to Jesus. The disciples sought Jesus and
Jesus helped them. And Jesus taught them. The disciples enjoyed a special
privilege from Jesus. And this privilege is what Jesus
is talking about. Jesus says to disciples, it has
been given to know the mysteries of the kingdom of God. Let's
break that down just a bit at a time. You start with the reminder
that we actually need, in the full sense of that word, we need
God to reveal things to us. When it comes to the nature of
God, when it comes to the nature of the gospel, we cannot just
figure these things out. God must show us. This is why
Christians over time have so zealously prized and guarded
the Bible like we do. It is God's revelation to us. It is how we know him. It is
how we know salvation. And this is the same situation
here with the parables and with these disciples. The disciples
are not simply going to figure things out. Jesus must help them
or they will be just as confused as the crowds. The disciples
have been given the privilege to know mysteries. These mysteries,
it's a word we talk about in Paul's writings as well. It's
generally describing something that's been hidden that God must
reveal for us to understand it. The disciples, by grace and by
revelation, they get to know the mysteries of the kingdom
of God. They get clarity where the rest of the world only has
confusion. We should never get over that.
We should never get over the wonder of all that has been given
to us. You see, not only is there the
wonder that any given passage contains, I just pulled one from
random. There's so many good ones. Psalm
103, 11 and 12. For as high as the heavens are
above the earth, so great is his steadfast love toward those
who fear him. As far as the east is from the
west, so far does he remove our transgression from us. You see,
you read that and it's beautiful and it's wonderful all on its
own. But then, but then there is the wonder of realizing that
we would never have known it otherwise. We would never have
known it if God had not shown it to us. How could we know of
the boundless love of God, the boundless forgiveness of our
God, if it weren't revealed to us? You don't figure that out
by going up to Lake Tahoe and sitting on the beach. We would
not know these things if God had not shown us. So thank God
for a Bible that contains a million truths that you would never have
known about otherwise. Thank God for the conviction.
Thank God for the encouragement. Thank God for the hope. Thank
God for the joy. Jesus is reminding the disciples
of the precious privileges that they enjoy. They come to him
with questions and he actually gives them answers. They come
with confusion and he gives them understanding. But that is not
the way it was for everyone. See, parables, that was how they
were used for disciples. Parables had a different use
for non-disciples, for those who had rejected Jesus. The second
half of verse 10 says this, but for others, they are in parables,
so that seeing they may not see, and hearing they may not understand. Jesus says, get your minds around
this, Jesus says that he uses parables so that some people
won't understand him. Do you see that in the text?
He uses parables so that some people won't understand him. And this is the point where I
expect that this is unexpected for some of us. we usually assume
that Jesus used parables to help people understand him. And that's
only partly true, because for disciples who had the meaning
explained to them, well then the parable does become a helpful
illustration. I'm sure that you are a lot like
me, that those descriptions of all the soil, the path, the rocky
soil, the thorns, the good soil, I bet you that helps you to remember
God's teachings. It helps me. The parables are
a blessing to the disciples of Jesus because he explains them,
but they are not a blessing to those who are not his disciples,
to those who have rejected him. They're not a blessing when they're
not explained. So the question is, what are they? What are parables
to those who have rejected Jesus? The answer is judgment. Parables
are a form of judgment with non-disciples. That sounds really disruptive.
Please hear me out. We often have an overly simplified
understanding of God and Jesus's ministry is no exception because
we can draw on truths of scripture to say Jesus brought grace and
truth. And so we go on to say that Jesus
only brought grace and truth. But the Bible has more to say
than that. The gospels are clear. Jesus brought more than blessing. I remind you of what we've already
covered in the gospel thus far. The very beginning of the gospel,
Simeon prophesied of Jesus. And he said that Jesus was appointed
for the fall and rising of many in Israel. If you read that text,
like I'm tempted to read that text, we're tempted to skip right
over the word fall and get right to the idea of rising. We like
to get right to the blessing, right to the hope. But Jesus's ministry was also
intended to bring about the fall of many. In other words, the
judgment of many, the condemnation of many. We don't see this in
just one spot. We saw this theme of judgment
in John the Baptist as well. We talked about this in Luke
chapter seven. John's ministry and Jesus's ministry, they brought
judgment. They were fulfilling Malachi's
prophecy when God promised to answer his people's unbelief
with a messenger of judgment. Malachi foretold a refining fire
that would be brought by the true judge before whom no one
could stand. John the Baptist was the introduction
to judgment, and Jesus was and will be the fulfillment to judgment. So you might ask, how does Jesus
bring grace and truth on the one hand and judgment on the
other? I'll let the gospel of John explain
that one. John 3, 16. which turns out to
be followed by several other verses. For God so loved the
world that he gave his only son, that whoever believes in him
should not perish, but have eternal life. For God did not send his
son into the world to condemn the world, but in order that
the world might be saved through him. Whoever believes in him
is not condemned. And we want to say dot, dot,
dot, dot, dot. As if there's nothing else after you say, Jason,
seek no condemnation, but you keep going. But whoever does
not believe is condemned already because he has not believed in
the name of the only son of God. And this is the judgment. The
light has come into the world and people loved the darkness
rather than the light because their works were evil. Yes, Jesus brought grace and
truth. He brought the grace and truth
of salvation into a world that desperately needed it. But it
turned out he brought grace and truth and people rejected it. People rejected the grace and
truth of the son of God. So for those who have rejected
salvation, they will have judgment. So Jesus' primary mission, it
was not condemnation, but for those who rejected salvation,
they will indeed be condemned. Rejecting the grace of God is
not without consequences. When people reject God's grace,
they are choosing God's judgment instead. So when you accept that Jesus's
ministry also included judgment, then you can now understand how
he was using parables. For many of you, I'll bet you
can now better understand Jesus because you have seen him in
a new light. For those who trusted him and
followed him, he gave insight and blessing using parables.
Those who came in faith, they found blessing. But for those
who did not come in faith, for those who rejected him, for those
who were not disciples, as we're all called to be, parables brought
judgment. When Jesus says this part about
seeing they may not see, hearing they may not understand, he's
actually quoting a text from the Old Testament. He's quoting
from Isaiah chapter six, verses nine and 10. This is what it
says in Isaiah. And he said, go and say to this
people, keep on hearing, but do not understand. Keep on seeing,
but do not perceive. make the heart of this people
dull, and their ears heavy, and blind their eyes, lest they see
with their eyes, and hear with their ears, and understand with
their hearts, and turn and be healed. This is what we talked
about at Bible study. And I'll give you the summary
in case you weren't there. God is long-suffering, and he is
patient with his people. He gives them chance after chance
after chance. And that's all in his mercy. But at some point, he stops showing
mercy and he gives justice instead. At some point in judgment, he
lets his people go their hell bound way. He lets them go and then he even
hardens their heart so that they can't hear or receive the truth
that would heal them. It's terrifying. Daryl Bach said
it like this, God in judgment removes the benefit of revelation. This is how Jesus is using parables. parables were making clear that
there were already two kinds of people, disciples and non-disciples. Those who accepted Jesus and
those who rejected Jesus. For a rejecting non-disciple,
a parable heaped condemnation upon their heads for their unbelief. There they were so close to Jesus,
so close to his blessing, and yet they didn't have the hearts
that wanted that blessing. They saw the light of Jesus and
they chose darkness instead. They chose the darkness of their
evil over the goodness of Christ. Their hearts were far from God. And so they were far from blessing
and near to condemnation. When Jesus spoke a parable to
someone who rejected him, he was purposefully bringing condemnation
upon them. He gave them spiritual truth
that because of their hard-hearted rejection, they could not see,
hear, or understand. And so their condemnation grew. To summarize, why did Jesus use
parables? Well, parables were both blessing
and judgment. at the same time. And it all
depended upon whether you had accepted or rejected Jesus. Parables were insight and they
were blessing for disciples and they were judgment for everyone
else. The judgment of Jesus' ministry,
it brings a sobering urgency to all of us. If you have a heart
to believe in Jesus, rejoice in that. If you have a heart
to follow him and to obey him, rejoice in that, but also do
justice to that. When he says, he who has ears
to hear, let him hear. He is not saying do justice to
my teaching when you feel like it. There is nothing casual about
this command. Jesus' command demands a sort
of trembling urgency. Because if you keep casually
ignoring the Lord's will for you, at some point, your lack
of acceptance, your lack of faith, your lack of submission, they
might put you in the camp of those who saw the light and yet
chose darkness. It might be you who could be
described as one of those who perpetually rejected Christ. It might be you who loses the
ability to seek the Lord and actually find him. It might be
you who one day can no longer be healed. Now, don't take this fatalistically. Do not take this fatalistically
because some of you, some of you hear about this kind of judgment
and I know you, you fear that perhaps God has already pronounced
you eternally judged. And so you will be tempted to
fear that there's just no hope for you. I'm not God, I'm not
a prophet, I can't see your heart, but I want to encourage you here.
For the one who actually fears the condemnation of God, for
the one who actually longs to be right with God, I actually
have every hope that you are nearer to God than you think.
In your case, the sobering threat of God's judgment is doing exactly
what it is supposed to do. It is spurring you along to repentance,
to faith, and to salvation. Be encouraged. You still have
the promise before you. Draw near to God and he will
draw near to you. For all of you who can hear and
believe that promise, the gospel is still being held out to you.
So don't mess around. Don't delay. Embrace the God
who will still save you, who will still heal you. Now you may have noticed that
we just spent all our time And we never got to the meaning of
the parable. Well, the original disciples,
they actually heard the parable unexplained at first too. And
what did they do? Did they go away, resigned to
be confused? No, they sought the Lord and
they found his blessing. So in our own parallel, If you
want to hear the parable explained, if you want to receive its blessings,
if you want to hear Jesus explain the mysteries of the kingdom
of God, you're going to have to come
back after lunch. Let's pray. Our father, sober us. with the severity of judgment
that exists. Father, forgive us that we have
dealt lightly with you. Forgive us that we have dealt
casually with you. Forgive us that we have been
so easily turned away from seeking out your truth and your blessing.
We get inconvenienced and we think it's too big an obstacle
to seeking out your truth. Father, forgive us. And we pray
that you would spur us on. Lord, I beg, let not a single
hard heart exist in this room. Let not a single one of us be
those who saw the light and chose the darkness. Father, save. Save us from our sin. Save us
from an evil world. Save us from ourselves. Lord,
we need you. We thank you for the word of
God. We thank you that we have the privilege of hearing what
these parables meant. May we rejoice in that always.
We pray this in Jesus's name. Amen. We hope you've enjoyed
this message from Grace Community Church in Minden, Nevada. To
receive a copy of this or other messages, call us at area code
775-782-6516 or visit our website gracenevada.com.
When Jesus Doesn't Explain Himself
Series An Exposition of Luke
| Sermon ID | 41716173578 |
| Duration | 40:30 |
| Date | |
| Category | Sunday - AM |
| Bible Text | Luke 8:4-11 |
| Language | English |
Documents
Add a Comment
Comments
No Comments
© Copyright
2026 SermonAudio.