For the first parable (Matt. 13:3-23) we see the seed – it represents the word, the field represents the heart of the individual hearer. So there was a message being proclaimed, and it was being heard. The responses varied:
• Some seed showed no signs of life at all (seeds sown along the path)
• Some seed quickly germinated and sent up shoots (that sown on rocky places)
• Some seed gave promise of bearing fruit but was eventually fruitless (that sown among thorns)
• Some seed produced a crop yielding 100, 60 or 30 times what was sown (verse 23)
In each case the seed was exactly the same, the sower was the same, and the place where the seed was planted was the same. So what was different? The soil.
Here the differences Christ revealed to us (and His hearers) shows the responses to His ministry - He shows the responses by the hearts that hear the word. This reveals the response the disciples and followers of Christ would face in the coming age. Basically, this is the same response He received with the word He spoke to Israel.
In a nutshell, there will be a sowing of the word. With this sowing come varying responses. The Life Application Commentary speaks to this as no formulas.
As we studied earlier, Jesus stays in this same place (the same house) and three important things take place. These were:
1. The healing of the demon-possessed man (where the Pharisees accuse Jesus of being demon possessed)
2. The Pharisees requesting a miraculous sign to authenticate Jesus’ claims
3. The rejection of the nation of Israel by Jesus
Now He withdraws and goes to the seaside. Now this could have been due to the events of the day, and a break was needed. Or maybe the push of the crowds had become a bit too stifling, and to make it easier to address the mass of people going outside became prudent.
Matthew records that the crowd was so large Jesus got into a boat so He could teach from that platform. And His teaching began in parables. This method of teaching was not used frequently to this point by Christ. It caught the disciples a bit off guard, so that they ask in verse 10 why He chose to do this at this opportune time. So it’s probably a good time to look at what a parable is.
A Bit About Parables
In a parable, you teach by transference. What I mean is this – if you don’t know the truth in some area, the teacher uses something familiar to convey that unknown truth. A figure of speech in the form of a metaphor may be used, such as John 10:9 I am the gate. The idea comes across, or you could use a simile like Matthew 10:16 be as shrewd as snakes and as innocent as doves. Usually, a parable is a bit more complex than the examples given, and uses similar methods to reach the conclusion. At times there are allegories, along with teachings that convey one principle truth with other incidental parallelisms enveloped in them. Jesus used parables frequently, and parables He used were always true to life.
Using the John 10:9 example as a launching point, before you can learn any truth about Christ from the words He spoke, you must understand the mature, function, and purpose of the gate. What a gate provides in our knowledge must be learned before it can be transferred to the unknown realm.
Enough on that, back to what Jesus is teaching in the passages we are looking at. Jesus responded to the question of the disciples in a curious way. In verses 11 – 15, He says he used this teaching method to reveal truth to some while hiding it from others. That’s curious to say the least. Here, don’t forget to recall this historical situation – Jesus offered Himself to the nation as Savior and Sovereign, but some had rejected Him. So He faces a mixed crowd.
If Jesus were a politician on the political stump trail, it would be good to face friendly crowds alone. And we see many of these staged events today, it’s where we get the majority of our sound bites! But notice that Christ did not attempt to separate the unbelievers from the believers and then only instruct those that believed. Instead, He constructed His teaching in such a way that those that were believers would understand, and those that had rejected Him – while hearing the exact same set of words – would not understand. You see, believers have the key to unlock the understanding from the Lord, and unbelievers can’t decipher the teaching.
Another aspect of interpretation is historical context in which the parable was spoken. This was for those listening to the teaching! That’s not to say there is not any insight for us or others that come after – but don’t forget to look at the question Jesus is answering or the truth He is addressing. That will help us as we examine the parables since it gives an objective view to what you are studying. It also helps us determine at how many point in a parable an analogy is to be drawn. If these areas contribute to the answer of the question or problem being discussed, it is a good bet that you can include that portion in the interpretation.
Here, in Pentecost’s book we see a discourse on Jesus’ words concerning the announcement of the arrival of Jesus as Savior and King, ultimately ending with the rejection of this by Israel. (in class, we read pages 213-214 in the book with all the scripture references) From this point on Christ no longer publicly announced that the kingdom was at hand; rather, He indicated that the kingdom had been postponed. Jesus was not looking at a throne, instead the anticipation of a cross was in the near future. While the book goes on to ask and answer pertinent questions in this area (which covenant is involved, how will this come to pass, etc.), we’ll move on and get closer to looking at these parables!
The time period covered by the parables in Matthew 13 go from the time of Israel’s rejection until Israel’s future reception of the Messiah. So, the program began while Christ was still on earth, and it will extend until His return to earth. Basically, this is the period from Pentecost (in Acts 2) to the Rapture or the age of grace – which includes the age of the gift of Holy Spirit; the age of the church). In all, the parables don’t deal primarily with the nature, function and influence of the church; instead they show the unrevealed form of God’s theocratic rule that would be extended in an age that had not been shown to them. What hadn’t been shown was really unthinkable to them, for no one anticipated Israel to reject the Messiah, so Jesus let’s everyone in on how this was going to go down.
There are nine parables, each one giving us an essential characteristic of the kingdom in this present age. The first feature of this age is characterized by a sowing of the seed by sowers. While there are various responses to the sowing, the scene was so familiar to the hearers that Jesus didn’t find it necessary to explain the action (it was well known by all of the audience). What is cool is that Jesus guides those listening (and us reading) in interpreting two of parables, then we can use those lessons learned in interpreting the rest!
While Jesus was addressing the multitude that had come to hear His words (and perhaps catch a glimpse of His works), a portion of His family comes to speak to Him. The problem is the crowds were so great that they could not get close enough to actually meet Him. Word was passed through the crowd that His mother and brothers were on the fringes of the crowd and would like to speak to Him. The reply Christ gave may seem a bit odd or even rude, but it is very important. He asked the question ‘Who is my mother, and who are my brothers’. Now, the obvious response would be… your family, you know, the one that gave birth to you and raised you, along with those other folks that had been given life and were growing up with you… in the same house… every day… those people. The blood relationship thing.
But rather than recognizing blood ties as constituting a true relationship, Jesus pointed to His disciples – the people that had accepted His person by faith. This was a relationship that was not instituted by natural birth but was instead brought about by a supernatural birth. The relationship was wrought by faith in a person – the person of Jesus Christ.
So what does this mean? Is it that the only persons that Jesus would accept as being spiritually related to Him were those who had this faith relationship? Absolutely! Keep in mind that the nation of Israel put huge amounts of effort in showing that they were blood-related to Abraham. This common relationship allowed them to claim a relationship with the Messiah when the time was right for His appearance. But here, Jesus rejects this basis (blood ties) as constituting a spiritual relationship.
If someone wants to enter into the kingdom of the Messiah, the criteria was the blood tie to Abraham. The crowd probably had quite a few persons that would say ‘Amen’ to this and make the claim. Christ rejected this at this time – in other words, the relationship with Abraham was not the determining factor, it was not because of the act of that physical birth.
It was no mistake that this comes after the conclusion of the Pharisee’s (see verse 24) that Jesus was demon possessed. The nation that rejected the Messiah was now rejected by the Messiah. This passage of scripture anticipates God’s setting aside of the nation of Israel and prepares the way for the revealing of a new form of God’s program for the kingdom.
What practical things come out of this? Well, it would be convenient if I was allowed into God’s kingdom and heaven based on my birth – my blood ties. With Dad being a long time servant of the Lord, chairman of deacons, and coming from a family of believers himself (not to mention my mom, her faith and service, and the believing family she came from), this should be a slam dunk for me! But it doesn’t depend on that.
It doesn’t depend on the church I attend / am a member of either. It is independent of the denomination I am affiliated with. It does not hinge on the street I live on, my neighborhood, the city, state or even the country I claim. It’s separate from my socio-economic standing, me level of education, my shade of melanin, or my gender. It’s about my relationship with Jesus Christ. Have you accepted His offer of salvation? He extends it to you today!
This is a follow up to my posting on Communications. I’ve been intrigued at the concept of church marketing. And - I’ve been thinking about how we do it (or the lack thereof). I guess first things first - I’m part of the problem and part of the solution. Our mindset in many church environments is one of letting the paid staff do the work of ministry. That work, while including spreading the gospel (’isn’t that what we pay the pastor for?’), ministering to those in need, etc. seems to always be something staff should do. It is why they make the big bucks!
I’m thinking….NOT! I don’t want our staff to be the creative or end product of our efforts to market! It would be like asking them to be graphics artists - and the last experience they had with art was either doodling on a church bulletin (or in a hymnal if you’re old enough to remember them…) during a boring service or creating their paint-by-numbers masterpiece as a youth. What madness!
But God has given us diversity and talent, and I have no doubt that many in our body can be very creative in marketing. Please keep in mind I am talking marketing as in branding - putting what we, as the Body of Christ, are about in our fellowship. I’m not trying to ’sell’ anything - but what is our identity? And how do we portray it to others?
In that spirit, I ask for 5 minutes. You may laugh really hard at this. You may not…hard to tell on the web. I see this is a great portrayal of church marketing, in something most of us can relate to.
So…marketing…what do we do in this area? What can we do better? When can we get started? I’m excited about the potential marketing has for us - and some of these concepts, coupled with what is going on with the Church Health team and other areas, perhaps the time is right to review a vision statement, a mission statement (for those more traditional ‘things’ we do), and then look at placing that in an identity (meaning something that reflects it in a minimalistic way, logos, slogans, etc. - like Nike’s swoosh or Intel’s trademark sound). Why not leave your comments here - I’m interested in hearing what you think (I’m positive not everyone agrees we should even mention marketing and the church in the same breath!).
Related to yesterday’s post on our growing need for unity, please see this from World Magazine on the same topic. Be prepared for strong expressions of anger, with threats of violence. This is probably the mildest of the statements quoted there:
“While financially I supported the Vote No [on Proposition 8, the amendment to ban gay marriage in California], and was vocal to everyone and anyone who would listen, I have never considered being a violent radical extremist for our equal rights. But now I think maybe I should consider becoming one. Perhaps that is the only thing that will affect the change we so desperately need and deserve.”
This is on the increase. It’s no surprise to God; it’s just something we’re not used to here. We ought to be prepared for it, by growing in our knowledge of God through the Scriptures, by increasing our united support for one another in the body of Christ, and practicing love toward our neighbors and even those who may decide to be enemies.
We’ve all thought a lot about our church’s unity over the past several months. We all know it’s crucial to our church’s health. We know it’s a central theme of Scripture, to be found all through the book of Phillipians, in Jesus’ John 17 prayer, and in many other places.
We can easily imagine how important unity must be in persecuted places like India, Sudan, Belarus, and China. It’s not actually more important there, but it most be more obviously important, as Christians must stand together in the face of severe opposition.
Does that have anything to do with us here, though? Yes, it does. Did you know that a pastor in Canada was put on trial for teaching from the Bible? Did you know a major American newspaper could publish an editorial that speaks of “the angry evangelicals, the quivering clan of militant Christoholics,” “led by the most virulent, spittle-flecked gaggle of mental throwbacks to ever stain the American newswires”?
I recently was made aware of a web forum, an online discussion site, that further illustrates how this touches us. You may be aware of Proposition 8, an initiative in California to amend to state constitution such that only marriage between a man and a woman would be legally recognized. A writer on this forum tells of his hatred, his anger, his urge to kill proponents of the measure.
I’ll link to a very sanitized set of quotes from that page in a moment. Before I go there, though, I must answer the question, “Why even bring this up? Why give attention to something as shocking as this?” Because it shows how us something about our world. It shows us that it’s changing, and the church’s situation is no longer what it was 25 years ago, or even 5 years ago. Jesus said in John 15:18-25 (ESV),
“If the world hates you, know that it has hated me before it hated you. If you were of the world, the world would love you as its own; but because you are not of the world, but I chose you out of the world, therefore the world hates you. Remember the word that I said to you: ‘A servant is not greater than his master.’ If they persecuted me, they will also persecute you. If they kept my word, they will also keep yours. But all these things they will do to you on account of my name, because they do not know him who sent me. If I had not come and spoken to them, they would not have been guilty of sin, but now they have no excuse for their sin. Whoever hates me hates my Father also. If I had not done among them the works that no one else did, they would not be guilty of sin, but now they have seen and hated both me and my Father. But the word that is written in their Law must be fulfilled: ‘They hated me without a cause.’
I also bring this up because of the way I was made aware of this web page. You see, another commenter on this forum linked to something I had written on my own blog. I take some of this anger very personally because, from a distance, it was directed toward me.
The page I’m referring to is not appropriate for quoting here. If you want to see some excerpts I lifted out and sanitized–heavily–for language, you may do so here. The part that refers to my blog, though, is something I can quote here, since it was somewhat less violent than other portions of the page. It said,
Why [express ourselves calmly]? We are talking about people who want to deny other rights because they feel like it. Why should we calmly deal with people like this? Should we have dealt “calmly” with slavery?
Now if I had actually insulted someone I would have deserved this. I am far from perfect, but I do aim to be as gentle as I can be while standing for what’s true; and with some success, as others have attested.
These kinds of incidents are on the increase. It’s time to wake up. This is not about a blog. It’s about us, the church. It’s about needing each other. I need you; which is a statement we all can make to each other.
It’s not about being fearful or defensive, though. It’s about God’s people showing God’s love to the world, which we do first by loving one another (John 13:34-35). The world sees that, and by it they know we are his disciples. Nothing draws people more powerfully into God’s kingdom than seeing and experiencing God’s love, expressed through God’s people.
Jesus himself made it clear that (unthinkable as it seems to us in America) some people would hate us for this, which brings us back around to where we started here. In a world where feelings against Christianity are increasing, we must stand together, support one another, and press forward in our mission together, to bring Christ to the world as a unified body of brothers and sisters who love one another.
We enter this lesson knowing that Jesus has had the ‘rock star’ status for some time. He had done things that this generation had never seen. He was amazing, and crowds followed Him. I suspect, as perhaps you do, that the Pharisees knew full well that Jesus was claiming to be the heaven-sent Messiah. They knew full well the miracles that He had done and that these multitudes of miracles authenticated His person. But now they came to challenge Him and request a sign that would prove to them He was what He claimed to be.
And Jesus responded by explaining to them the reason for their request. It was not a request from faith, instead it was a request from unbelief and their unwillingness to believe His words and signs. And to do that indicated that they were evil and their intentions were less than stellar. In fact, He gave them a sign – the sign of Jonah. What was that all about?
Well, where would you find the story of Jonah? Look in the Old Testament book of Jonah. Here I will pause and say that Jesus is alluding to types. He is showing how Jonah had aspects of types of things that would be made clearer by experiences and things that Jesus Himself would show. This type, of course, points to the 3 days and nights that Christ would spend after His death and before His resurrection. The things that were not fully clear (or were not fully revealed) through this prophet would now be brought to light.
Let me try to be clearer for those reading this on the blog.
What is a type? Literally speaking, the word type comes from the Greek word tuptein, to strike. In Webster’s dictionary, type is defined as “to figure, to represent by a model or symbol beforehand. In the context of our study of the Bible we consider both the type and antitype. In our study of the Bible a type is a person, place, thing, or event that is a foreshadowing of a future person or event. The antitype or thing the type foreshadows is greater and clearer to understand. For example, a rubber stamp is a type. It is not clear and simple to understand. However, its antitype, that print that appears when the rubber stamp is pressed on paper, is much clearer than the type. The type was a shadow, or promise of the revealed antitype to come. There are dozens of types of Christ in the Old Testament. information Copyright 1999 by Grady Scott, taken from http://www.christianlibrary.org/authors/Grady_Scott/types.htm - on this page are some introductions to a few types that may be of interest.
I have no problem admitting that I had 2 favorite classes out of my studies in seminary, and the study of types was one of them. The text we used was ‘Study of the Types’ by Ada R. Habershon – I highly recommend it if you are interested in learning more.
Christ through an illustration revealed the condition of the nation Israel at that time as a result of its rejection of Him and His offer. Christ said that when an evil spirit leaves a man, it seeks rest and is unable to find it. Remembering the body in which it formerly dwelt, it determines to return. On its return it finds the main freed from evil spirits and determines to reenter but rather than to occupy that body alone it seeks seven other spirits more wicked than itself. Together these spirits move in and occupy that body as their dwelling place. Thus the man’s condition after his initial deliverance is worse than before. This illustration clearly revealed Christ’s reflection upon the recent history of Israel. John the Baptist had come to find the house of Israel occupied by evil spirits; the nation was full of unrighteousness and sin. As a result of John’s preaching, which brought about repentance and confession, the nation of Israel had been purged from its evil. Multitudes were awaiting the coming of the kingdom. But before the kingdom was established, the nation of Israel had returned to the sin that had been removed by John’s preaching, and now the nation was further from God. It was more wicked – and consequently under more severe judgment – than it had been before John began his ministry. Because the nation that professed to receive John’s witness had turned in unbelief from the One whom John introduced, it was now in a worse state than before John’s ministry began.
I ask you – have you found yourself in this condition? Have you lost that flame and are asking ‘Lord, where are you? Show me a sign.’ If so, would God answer you like He did with these Pharisees? What condition is your house? Perhaps you are overwhelmed with other things…concerned with the things of this world and not really focused on Jesus and how He is at work right now – in a very tangible and undeniably real way – in your life and in mine.
November 30, 2008 - Sermon Title: Celebration, from the series Eating the Elephant: A study of the book of Nehemiah - TJ Woodfin November 23, 2008 - Sermon Title: Restoration, from the series Eating the Elephant: A study of the book of Nehemiah - Jack Duffer November 19, 2008 - Wednesday Sermon: Disciplines - Aaron West November 16, 2008 - Sermon Title: Getting Out of a Rut, from the series Eating the Elephant: A study of the book of Nehemiah - Jack Duffer November 9, 2008 - Sermon Title: Facing Opposition, from the series Eating the Elephant: A study of the book of Nehemiah - Aaron West November 2, 2008 - Sermon Title: Overcoming Inertia, from the series Eating the Elephant: A study of the book of Nehemiah - Gene Cornett
